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Science 31 October 1980:
Vol. 210. no. 4469, pp. 499 - 505
DOI: 10.1126/science.210.4469.499
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Articles

Aztec Arithmetic: Positional Notation and Area Calculation

H. R. Harvey 1 and B. J. Williams 2

1 Professor of anthropology at the University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison 53706
2 Associate professor of geography at the University of Wisconsin Center—Janesville, Janesville 53545

Texcocan-Aztec peoples in the Valley of Mexico used both picture symbols and lines and dots for numerical notation. Decipherment and analysis of mid-16th-century native pictorial land documents from the Texcocan region indicate that the line-and-dot system incorporated a symbol for zero and used position to ascribe values. Positional line-and-dot notation was used to record areas of agricultural fields, and analysis of the documentary data suggests that areas were calculated arithmetically. These findings demonstrate that neither positional notation nor the zero were unique to the Maya area, and they imply an equally sophisticated mathematical development among the Aztecs.


THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
Aztec Arithmetic Revisited: Land-Area Algorithms and Acolhua Congruence Arithmetic.
B. J. Williams and M. d. C. Jorge y Jorge (2008)
Science 320, 72-77
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Science. ISSN 0036-8075 (print), 1095-9203 (online)