180 
Proceedings of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. [Sess. 
the early form of the Latin letter, and would thereafter share its 
evolution to the form D, and the current D. A survival of the old 
form, viz. D, was, however, used on the title-pages of printed books 
until comparatively recent times. 
YI. (500-1000). Proceeding again by successive additions of the 
earlier series of gestures until the natural limit is reached, we get 
ID, DC, DCC, DCCC, DCCCC, DCCCCC. The only possible method of 
signifying the completion of this series is to bring both arms simul- 
taneously to rest in the “ teapot-handle ” position, as CD. Thus the 
gesture and sign CD acquired the value of 1000 and superseded the 
gestures and signs DCCCCC, 
It may be asked: “If CD represents both arms in the ‘teapot- 
handle ’ position, how can the several forms DC, DCC, etc., be also held 
as representing both arms in that position ? ” The explanation is that 
CD represents a simultaneous gesture or position, while, like all the 
earlier series, the forms DC, DCC, etc., represent successive gestures 
in a progressive order. 
It will doubtless be urged that the form CO or CXD is, in all 
probability, much older than CO and could not be derived therefrom. 
But, while we have employed the form CD for convenience’ sake, we 
have not stated that it was the original sign. According to our 
present hypothesis, indeed, the probability is entirely the other way ; 
and the answer to the above objection presents a striking corroboration 
of the pictographic hypothesis. For, if palaeography shows that CO 
or CX3 must be regarded as the earlier form, that is entirely what the 
pictographic method would lead us to infer. No elaborate pictograph 
for the gesture-sign of 1000 has been adduced, and, indeed, it is quite 
possible that no such pictograph ever existed; for, as the earlier 
gesture-signs reached the conventional and symbolic stage of re- 
presentation, no detailed picture would need to be employed to denote 
the larger and late-acquired gesture-sign for 1000. The representation 
of the gesture corresponding to that number would, in short, be a 
conventional symbol, formed on the lines of the pictograph for “ man,” 
with omission of the details that were unessential in the representation 
of this gesture, and with emphasis or exaggerated representation of 
those details that were essential. Now, whether we look at the 
pictographs of Crete, or at the rude drawings of the North American 
Indians, we find that the symbol for “ man ” represents the body in 
the form of a cross : 
