Shooter's Hill, April 8.
[Our correspondent will find some curious notices of early dates
of Arabic numerals, from the Rev. Edmund Venables, Rev. W.
Gunner, and Mr. Ouvry, in the March number of the _Archæological
Journal_, p. 75-76.; and the same number also contains, at p.
85., some very interesting remarks by the Rev. Joseph Hunter,
illustrative of the subject, and instancing a warrant from Hugh
le Despenseer to Bonefez de Peruche and his partners, merchants
of a company, to pay forty pounds, dated Feb. 4, 19 Edward II.,
i.e. 1325, in which the date of the year is expressed in Roman
numerals; and on the dorso, written by one of the Italian
merchants to whom the warrant was addressed, the date of the
payment, Feb. 1325. in Arabic numerals, of which Mr. Hunter
exhibited a fac-simile at a meeting of the Institute.]
* * * * *
_Arabic Numerals._--In the lists of works which treat of Arabic
Numerals, the following have not been noticed, although they contain a
review of what has been written on their introduction into this part of
Europe:--_Archæologia_, vols. x. xiii.; _Bibliotheca Literaria_, Nos. 8.
and 10., including Huetiana on this subject; and Morant's _Colchester_,
b. iii. p. 28.