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Devanagari numerals

The Devanagari numerals are the symbols used to write numbers in the Devanagari script, predominantly used for northern Indian languages. They are used to write decimal numbers, instead of the Western Arabic numerals.

Table

In modern-era, languages like Hindi, Marathi and Nepali have adopted Devanagari as the standard script, before which they were respectively written using Kaithi, Modi and Newari scripts.

The word for zero was calqued into Arabic as , meaning 'nothing', which became the term "zero" in many European languages via Medieval Latin . In Hindustani language, it was borrowed from Arabic (via Persian) as ().

Variants

Devanagari digits shapes may vary depending on geographical area or epoch. Some of the variants are also seen in older Sanskrit literature.

In Nepali language ५, ८, ९ (5, 8, 9) - these numbers are slightly different from modern Devanagari numbers. The Nepali language uses the old Devanagari system for writing these numbers, like , ,

See also

References

Notes
Sources