A Dot, a Line and a Shell: Maya Numbers — Epoche A2
Dear Camila, Greetings from Antigua, in Guatemala! It is 24 degrees and there is a volcano behind the church every time I look up. Last night my host brother Diego, who is nine, did his mathematics homework at the kitchen table, and I could not read it. No 1, 2, 3 anywhere — only dots and thick lines. His school teaches the Maya numbers, and Diego explained them, very patient with me: a dot is one, a line is five. Two lines and three dots — thirteen. Then came the shell. A small drawing of a shell means zero. And for big numbers you build floors: a mark on the second floor counts twenty times more. Diego wrote my age — one dot on the top floor, three dots on the bottom floor: twenty and three. His teacher told the class that the Maya were writing with zero centuries before the idea reached Europe. Diego finds zero boring. He is nine. I could not stop looking at it. Wish you were here! Elena