The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Number Concept, by Levi Leonard Conant

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Title: The Number Concept
Its Origin and Development

Author: Levi Leonard Conant

Release Date: August 5, 2005 [EBook #16449]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE NUMBER CONCEPT ***

Produced by Jonathan Ingram, Hagen von Eitzen and the
Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net

[*Transcriber's Note:
The following errors found in the original have been left as is.
Chapter I, 14th paragraph:
drop double quote before 'It is said';
Chapter IV, 1st paragraph:
'so similar than' read 'so similar that';
Chapter IV, table of Hebrew numerals (near footnote 144):
insert comma after 'shemoneh';
Chapter V, table of Tahuatan numerals (near footnote 201):
'tahi,' read 'tahi.';
Same table:
' 20,000. tufa' read '200,000. tufa';
Chapter VI, table of Bagrimma numerals (near footnote 259):
'marta = 5 + 2' read 'marta = 5 + 3';
Same table:
'do-so = [5] + 3' read 'do-so = [5] + 4';
Chapter VII, table of Nahuatl numerals (near footnote 365):
'90-10' read '80-10';
In paragraph following that table:
'+ (15 + 4) x 400 x 800' read
'(15 + 4) x 20 x 400 x 8000 + (15 + 4) x 400 x 8000';
In text of footnote 297:
'II. I. p. 179' read 'II. i. p. 179';
*]

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK . BOSTON . CHICAGO . DALLAS
ATLANTA . SAN FRANCISCO

MACMILLAN & CO., LIMITED
LONDON . BOMBAY . CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
OF CANADA, LIMITED
TORONTO

THE NUMBER CONCEPT

ITS ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT

BY
LEVI LEONARD CONANT, PH.D.
ASSOCIATE PROFESSOR OF MATHEMATICS IN THE WORCESTER
POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTE

New York
MACMILLAN AND CO.
AND LONDON
1931

COPYRIGHT, 1896,
BY THE MACMILLAN COMPANY.

COPYRIGHT, 1924,
BY EMMA B. CONANT.

All rights reserved--no part of this book may be reproduced in any form
without permission in writing from the publisher.

Set up and electrotyped. Published July, 1896.

Norwood Press
J.S. Cushing Co.--Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.

PREFACE.

In t