From One to Zero: A Universal History of Numbers. A fascinating exploration of the worldwide origins and evolution of numerals and numerical systems.

New York: Viking Penguin Inc., 1986. Octavo, tan cloth & brown boards (hardcover), blue lettering, xvi, 503 pp. Fine in a Very Good dust jacket with light edgewear. From dust jacket: This uniquely wide-ranging and original book is described by its author as “an archaeology of numbers.” Numerals, or numbers in their written form, are so familiar a part of our cultural heritage that we tend to think of them as innate, timeless, outside history. But sparked by a student’s simple question -- where did numbers come from? -- Georges Ifrah embarked on six years of multidisciplinary research into the origins, evolution, and uses of numerals in different cultures, both primitive and advanced and as widely separated as the Maya, the Babylonians, and the Chinese. The story he tells, made vivid and tangible by hundreds of illustrations, all drawn by the author, is fascinating and fully human and stands as remarkable testimony to the ingenuity, the diversity, and the underlying unity of human culture...