on 2003-10-09 03.15, Han Maenen at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: <snip> > Many financial calculations were made in Roman numerals and the money was > not decimal as well. Present day archivists and researchers get in trouble > with this stuff and have to master Roman numerals and non-decimal > calculations.
Dear Han, It makes you realise the genius of Simon Stevin, when you consider his physical and intellectual surroundings. I can remember one of his papers bemoaning the severity of calculating something like, 'What is the result of investing 324 pounds, 12 shillings, and 4 pence ha'penny for 17 years 8 months and a week at 3 7/8 per cent?', when all calculations were done in Roman numerals. As I remember it the answer had a whole number with a 13 numeral numerator above a 17 numeral denominator. I didn't check his calculations for accuracy � I took Simon's word for it! However, I did think at the time that many hundreds of intellectually gifted people must have been employed on these terribly pointless tasks. It's no wonder that Simon Stevin was so delighted when he developed decimal numbers and decimal calculations in 1585. Cheers, Pat Naughtin LCAMS Geelong, Australia Pat Naughtin is the editor of the free online newsletter, 'Metrication matters'. You can subscribe by sending an email containing the words subscribe Metrication matters to [EMAIL PROTECTED] --
