NUMERATION.
D. W. Eakins, in Schoolcraft I, p. 273, describes the mnemonic
numeration marks of the Muskoki thus:
Each perpendicular stroke stood for one, and each additional
stroke marked an additional number. The ages of deceased persons
or number of scalps taken by them, or war-parties which they have
headed, are recorded on their grave-posts by this system of strokes.
The sign of the cross represents ten. The dot and comma never
stood as a sign for a day, or a moon, or a month, or a year. The
chronological marks that were and are in present use are a small
number of sticks made generally of cane. Another plan sometimes in
use was to make small holes in a board, in which a peg was inserted
to keep the days of the week.
Capt. Bourke (_b_) gives the following account of an attempt at
compromise between the aboriginal method of numbering days, weeks, and
months, and that of the civilized intruders to whose system the Indians
found it necessary to conform.
The Apache scouts kept records of the time of their absence on
campaign. There were several methods in vogue, the best being that
of colored beads which were strung on a string, six white ones to
represent the days of the week, and one black, or other color, to
stand for Sundays. This method gave rise to some confusion, because
the Indians had been told that there were four weeks, or Sundays
(“Domingos”), in each “Luna,” or moon, and yet they soon found
that their own method of determining time by the appearance of the
crescent moon was much the more satisfactory. Among the Zuñi I have
seen little tally sticks with the marks for the days and months
incised on the narrow edges, and among the Apache another method of
indicating the flight of time by marking on a piece of paper along a
horizontal line a number of circles or of straight lines across the
horizontal datum line to represent the full days which had passed,
a heavy straight line for each Sunday, and a small crescent for the
beginning of each month.
It is not necessary to discuss the obvious method of repeating strokes,
dots, knots, human heads or forms, weapons, and totemic designs,
to designate the number of persons or articles referred to in the
pictographs where they appear.