P. HISTORY OF ' AATHEMATICAL - School of Mathematics

OLD NUMERAL SYMBOLS 35
56. In certain sixteenth-century Portuguese manuscripts on navigation
one finds the small letter b used for 5, and the capital letter R
for 40. Thus, zbiij stands for 18, Riij for 43.'
(0) it>
FIG. 15.-Degenerate forms of Roman numerals in English archives (Common
Pleas, Plea Rolls, 637, 701, and 817; also Recovery Roll 1). (Reduced.)
A curious development found in the archives of one or two English
courts of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries2 was a special Roman
J. I. de Brito Rebello, Limo de Marinharia (Lisboa, 1903), p. 37,85-91,193,
194.
Anliquuries Jouml (London, 1926), Vol. VI, p. 273, 274.