Finger-counting

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Finger-counting, or dactylonomy, is the act of counting along one's fingers. Though

marginalized in modern societies by Arabic numerals, formerly different systems
flourished in many cultures,[Note 1][Note 2] including educated methods far more sophisticated
than the one-by-one finger count taught today in preschool education.
Finger-counting can also serve as a form of manual communication, particularly
in marketplace trading includinghand signaling during open outcry in floor trading and
also in games such as morra.
Finger-counting varies between cultures and over time, and is studied
by ethnomathematics. Cultural differences in counting are sometimes used as
a shibboleth, particularly to distinguish nationalities in war time. These form a plot point in
the film Inglourious Basterds, by Quentin Tarantino, and in the novel Pi in the
Sky, by John D. Barrow.[1][2]
A person indicating a numeral to another will hold up their fingers to signal the specific
number. For example, a North American will raise their index, middle, and ring fingers
vertically to signal the number 3.[3]
For Continental Europeans, the thumb represents the first digit to be counted (number 1),
as opposed to the index finger in North America. The index finger is number 2 through to
the little finger as number 5. Fingers are generally extended while counting, beginning at
the thumb and finishing at the little finger. For example, Europeans would use their
thumb, and index, middle and ring fingers to express the number 4, [3] whereas in North
America they would use their index, middle, ring, and little finger.
Finger-counting systems in use in many regions of Asia allow the counting to 12 by using
a single hand. The thumb acts as a pointer touching the three finger bones of each finger
in turn, starting with the outermost bone of the little finger. One hand is used to count
numbers up to 12. The other hand is used to display the number of completed base-12s.
This continues until twelve dozen is reached, therefore 144 is counted. [4][Note 3][5][6]
Chinese number gestures count up to 10 but can exhibit some regional differences.
In Japan counting for oneself begins with the palm of one hand open. Like in East Slavic
countries, the thumb represents number 1; the little finger is number 5. Digits are folded
inwards while counting, starting with the thumb. A closed palm indicates number 5. By
reversing the action, number 6 is indicated by an extended little finger. A return to an
open palm signals the number 10. However to indicate numerals to others, the hand is
used in the same manner as an English speaker. The index finger becomes number 1;
the thumb now represents number 5. For numbers above five, the appropriate number of
fingers from the other hand are placed against the palm. For example, number 7 is
represented by the index and middle finger pressed against the palm of the open hand.
[7]
Number 10 is displayed by presenting both hands open with outward palms.
[hide]

Contents

1Historical counting

2See also

3Notes

4References

5Further reading

6External links

Historical countingEdit
Complex systems of dactylonomy were used in the ancient world. [8] The Greco-Roman
author Plutarch, in his Lives, mentions finger counting as being used in Persia in the first
centuries AD, so the source of the system may lie in Iran. The practice was later used
widely in medieval Islamic lands. The earliest reference to this method of using the hands
to refer to the natural numbers may have been in some Prophetic traditions going back to
the early days of Islam, more than fourteen centuries ago. In one tradition as reported by
Yusayra the Prophet Muhammad enjoined upon his female companions to express
praise to God and to count using their fingers (=) () . In Arabic,
dactylonomy is known as "Number reckoning by finger folding" (=) . The
practice was well known in the Arabic-speaking world and was quite commonly used as
evidenced by the numerous references to it in Classical Arabic literature. Poets could
allude to a miser by saying that his hand made "ninety-three", i.e. a closed fist, the sign of
avarice. When an old man was asked how old he was he could answer by showing a
closed fist, meaning 93.The gesture for 50 was used by some poets (for example Ibn AlMoutaz) to describe the beak of the goshawk.
Some of the gestures used to refer to numbers were even known in Arabic by special
technical terms such as Kas' (= ) for the gesture signifying 29, Dabth (=
) for
63 and Daff (=
) for 99 () . The polymath Al-Jahiz advised schoolmasters in his
book Al-Bayan ( ) to teach finger counting which he placed among the five
methods of human expression. Similarly, Al-Suli, in his Handbook for Secretaries, wrote
that scribes preferred dactylonomy to any other system because it required neither
materials nor an instrument, apart from a limb. Furthermore, it ensured secrecy and was
thus in keeping with the dignity of the scribe's profession. Books dealing with
dactylonomy, such as a treatise by the mathematician Abu'l-Wafa al-Buzajani, gave rules
for performing complex operations, including the approximate determination of square
roots. Several pedagogical poems dealt exclusively with finger counting, some of which
were translated into European languages, including a short poem by Shamsuddeen AlMawsili (translated into French by Aristide Marre) and one by Abul-Hasan Al-Maghribi
(translated into German by Julius Ruska.[9]
A very similar form is presented by the English monk and historian Bede in the first
chapter of his De temporum ratione, (725), entitled "Tractatus de computo, vel loquela
per gestum digitorum",[2][8] which allowed counting up to 9,999 on two hands, though it
was apparently little-used for numbers of 100 or more. This system remained in use
through the European Middle Ages, being presented in slightly modified form by Luca
Pacioli in his seminal Summa de arithmetica (1494).

See alsoEdit
Wikimedia Commons has
media related to Counting
gestures.

Finger binary

Chisanbop

Tally marks

Prehistoric numerals

Chinese number gestures

NotesEdit
1.

Jump up^ Georges Ifrah notes that humans learned to

count on their hands. Ifrah shows, for example, a picture
of Boethius (who lived 480524 or 525) reckoning on his
fingers in Ifrah 2000, p. 48.

2.

Jump up^ Neugebauer 1952, p. 9 notes that as early as the

3rd millennium BCE, in Egypt's Old Kingdom, in the Pyramid
texts' "Spell for obtaining a ferry-boat", the ferryman might
object "Did you bring me a man who cannot number his
fingers?". This spell was needed to cross a canal of the
nether-world, as detailed in the Book of the Dead.

3.

Jump up^ Translated from the French by David Bellos, E.F.

Harding, Sophie Wood and Ian Monk. Ifrah supports his
thesis by quoting idiomatic phrases from languages across
the entire world.

1.

Jump up^ Barrow, John D. (1993). Pi in the Sky. Penguin.

p. 26. ISBN 978-0140231090.

2.

^ Jump up to:a b "Dactylonomy". Laputan Logic. 16

November 2006. Retrieved May 12, 2012.

3.

^ Jump up to:a b Pika,Simone; Nicoladis, Elena; and

Marentette, Paula (January 2009). "How to Order a Beer:
Cultural Differences in the Use of Conventional Gestures for
Numbers". Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 40 (1): 70
80.doi:10.1177/0022022108326197.

4.

Jump up^ Ifrah, Georges (2000), The Universal History of

Numbers: From prehistory to the invention of the
computer., John Wiley and Sons, p. 48, ISBN 0-471-39340-1

5.

Jump up^ Macey, Samuel L. (1989). The Dynamics of

Progress: Time, Method, and Measure. Atlanta, Georgia:
University of Georgia Press. p. 92. ISBN 978-0-8203-37968.

6.

Jump up^ This is actual count numbers to 156 - first hand is

used for 144 + 12 with second hand

7.

Jump up^ Namiko Abe. "Counting on one's fingers" (in

Japanese
url=http://japanese.about.com/library/weekly/aa112198.htm).
About.com.

ReferencesEdit

8.

^ Jump up to:a b Bloom, Jonathan M. (2001). "Hand sums:

The ancient art of counting with your fingers". Yale University
Press. Retrieved May 12, 2012.

9.

Jump up^ Julius Ruska, Arabische Texte ber das

Fingerrechnen, available at Digilibrary.de.

Neugebauer, Otto E. (1952), The Exact Sciences in

Antiquity, Princeton University Press, ISBN 1-56619-269-2;
2nd edition, Brown University Press, 1957; reprint, New
York: Dover publications, 1969; reprint, New York: Barnes
and Noble Books, 1993.

Wedell, Moritz (2012). Was zhlt. Kln, Weimar, Wien:

Bhlau. pp. 1563. ISBN 978-3-412-20789-2.

Further readingEdit

The Universal History of Numbers, Georges Ifrah

External linksEdit

Counting in American Sign Language

Counting with your fingers in France

Finger Counting Questionnaire

Yutaka Nishiyama, Counting With The Fingers.

Categories:

Finger-counting

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