Chinese numeral

This article contains Chinese text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Chinese characters.

Chinese numerals are characters for writing numbers in Chinese. Today, speakers of Chinese use three numeral systems: the ubiquitous system of Arabic numerals, along with two ancient Chinese numeral systems.

One such system is the Suzhou numerals or huama system. It has gradually been supplanted by the Arabic system in writing numbers. It is the only surviving variation of the rod numeral system, was once popular in use only in Chinese markets, such as those in Hong Kong before the 1990s.

The other Chinese numeral system is the written numbers system. It is still in use when writing numbers in long form, such as on cheques to hinder forgery. This character system is roughly analogous to spelling out a number in English text. The Chinese character system can be classified as part of the language, but it still counts as a number system. Most people in China now use the Arabic system for convenience.

Individual Chinese characters in this article link to their dictionary entries.

[edit] Written numbers

The Chinese character numeral system consists of the Chinese characters used by the Chinese written language to write spoken numerals. Similarly to spelled-out numbers in English (e.g., "one thousand nine hundred forty-five"), it is not an independent system per se. And since it reflects spoken language, it does not use the positional system as is done in Arabic numerals, in the same way that spelling out numbers in English does not.

[edit] Characters used to represent numbers

[edit] Standard numbers

There are characters representing the numbers zero through nine, and other characters representing larger numbers such as tens, hundreds, thousands and so on. There are two sets of characters for Chinese numerals: one for everyday writing and one for use in commercial or financial contexts known as dàxiě (大寫 in traditional Chinese, 大写 in simplified Chinese). The latter arose because the characters used for writing numerals are geometrically simple, so simply using those numerals cannot prevent forgeries in the same way spelling numbers out in English would. A forger could easily change everyday characters 三十 (30) to 五千 (5000) by adding just a few strokes. That would not be possible when writing using the financial characters 叁拾 (30) and 伍仟 (5000).

S denotes Simplified, T denotes Traditional

[edit] Characters with regional usage

[edit] Large numbers

Similar to the long and short scales in the west, for numeral characters greater than 万 (wàn), there have been four systems in ancient and modern usage:

In modern Chinese, only the second system is used in expressing numbers^{[citation needed]}. Although there is some dispute on the value of 兆 zhào, the usage (representing 10¹²) is still consistent through Chinese communities, as well as Japan, Korea^{[citation needed]}. However, most people do not recognize numerals beyond 亿 yì (10⁸) and dictionary definitions on the words of larger number may not be consistent (except Korea where 兆zhào and 京jīng are frequently used)

[edit] Numbers from Buddhism

The numerals beyond 载 zài come from Buddhist texts in Sanskrit, but these "Buddhist numerals" have become "ancient usage".

[edit] Small numbers

The following are characters used to denote small order of magnitude in Chinese historically. With the introduction of SI units, some of them have been incorporated as SI prefixes, while the rest has fallen into disuse.

[edit] SI prefixes

The translations for the SI prefixes in earlier days were different from those used today. The larger (兆, 京, 垓, 秭, 穰), and smaller Chinese numerals (微, 纤, 沙, 尘, 渺) were defined as translations for the SI prefixes. For instance, 京 jīng was defined as giga, and 纤 xiān was defined as nano. This resulted in the creation of more values for each numeral.

By the time of "early translation", a dispute had arisen over the value of 兆 . The government of the PRC used a part of this translation, and defined 兆 zhào as the translation for the SI prefix mega (10⁶). (Perhaps the government was not aware of the common usage of 兆, and thus did not consider an alternative single Chinese character, such as 巨, to represent mega.) Because of this, the translation has caused much confusion.

In addition, Taiwanese defined 百万 as the translation for mega. This translation is widely used in official documents, academic communities, informational industries, etc. However, the civil broadcasting industries sometimes use 兆赫 to represent "megahertz".

Today, both the governments of the People's Republic of China (Mainland China, Hong Kong and Macau) and Republic of China (Taiwan) use phonetic transliterations for the SI prefixes. However, the governments have each chosen different Chinese characters for certain prefixes. The following table lists the two different standards together with the early translation.

[edit] Reading and transcribing numbers

[edit] Whole numbers

Multiple-digit numbers are constructed using a multiplicative principle; first the digit itself (from 1 to 9), then the place (such as 10 or 100); then the next digit.

In Mandarin, the multiplier 两 (liǎng) is used rather than 二 (èr) for all numbers greater than 200 with the "2" numeral. Use of both 两 (liǎng) or 二 (èr) are acceptable for the number 200. When writing in the Cantonese dialect, 二 (yi⁶) is used to represent the "2" numeral for all numbers. In the southern Min dialect of Chaozhou (Teochew), 两 (no⁶) is used to represent the "2" numeral in all numbers from 200 onwards. Thus:

For the numbers 11 through 19, the leading "one" (一) is usually omitted. In some dialects, like Shanghainese, when there are only two significant digits in the number, the leading "one" and the trailing zeroes are omitted. Sometimes, the one before "ten" in the middle of a number, such as 213, is omitted. Thus:

Notes:

1. Nothing is ever omitted in large and more complicated numbers such as this.

In certain older texts like the Protestant Bible or in poetic usage, numbers such as 114 may be written as [100] [10] [4] (百十四).

For numbers larger than a myriad, the same grouping system used in English applies, except in groups of four places (myriads) rather than in groups of three (thousands). Hence it is more convenient to think of numbers here as in groups of four, thus 1,234,567,890 is regrouped here as 12,3456,7890. Larger than a myriad, each number is therefore four zeroes longer than the one before it, thus 10000 × wàn (万) = yì (亿). If one of the numbers is between 10 and 19, the leading "one" is omitted as per the above point. Hence (numbers in parentheses indicate that the number has been written as one number rather than expanded):

Interior zeroes before the unit position (as in 1002) must be spelt explicitly. The reason for this is that trailing zeroes (as in 1200) are often omitted as shorthand, so ambiguity occurs. One zero is sufficient to resolve the ambiguity. Where the zero is before a digit other than the units digit, the explicit zero is not ambiguous and is therefore optional, but preferred. Thus:

[edit] Fractional values

To construct a fraction, the denominator is written first, followed by 分之 ("parts of") and then the numerator. This is the opposite of how fractions are read in English, which is numerator first. Each half of the fraction is written the same as a whole number. Mixed numbers are written with the whole-number part first, followed by 又 ("again"), then the fractional part.

Percentages are constructed similarly, using 百 (100) as the denominator. The 一 (one) before 百 is omitted.

Decimal numbers are constructed by first writing the whole number part, then inserting 點 (traditional) or 点 (simplified) ("point"), and finally the decimal expression. The decimal expression is written using only the digits for 0 to 9, without multiplicative words.

[edit] Ordinal numbers

Ordinal numbers are formed by adding 第 ("sequence") before the number.

[edit] Negative numbers

Negative numbers are formed by adding 負 (traditional) 负 (simplified) ("negative") before the number.

[edit] Suzhou numerals

Main article: Suzhou numerals

In the same way that Roman numerals were standard in ancient and medieval Europe for mathematics and commerce, the Chinese formerly used the rod numerals, which is a positional system. The Suzhou (苏州) or huāmǎ (花码) system is a variation of the Southern Song rod numerals. Nowadays, the huāmǎ system is only used for displaying prices in Chinese markets or on traditional handwritten invoices.

[edit] Hand gestures

Main article: Chinese number gestures

There is a common method of using of one hand to signify the numbers one to ten. While the five digits on one hand can express the numbers one to five, six to ten have special signs that can be used in commerce or day-to-day communication.

[edit] Cultural influences

During Ming and Qing dynasties (when Arabic numerals were first introduced into China), some Chinese mathematicians used Chinese numeral characters as positional system digits. After Qing dynasty, both the Chinese numeral characters and the Suzhou numerals were replaced by Arabic numerals in mathematical writings.

Traditional Chinese numeric characters are also used in Japan and Korea. In vertical text (that is, read top to bottom), using characters for numbers is the norm, while in horizontal text, Arabic numerals are most common. Chinese numeric characters are also used in much the same formal or decorative fashion that Roman numerals are in Western cultures. Chinese numerals may appear together with Arabic numbers on the same sign or document.

[edit] See also

• Chinese number gestures
• Japanese numerals
• Numbers in Chinese culture
• Chinese units of measurement

[edit] References

[edit] External links

• Chinese/English Number Converter
• Learn how to write Chinese numbers