Arabic Numbers and Numerals

Arabic Numbers and Numerals,

Arabic Numbers and Numerals, 0-10
So I’m being somewhat misleading with that post title, since what we’re really going to be learning are the Eastern Arabic numerals; presumably anybody reading this already knows the Western Arabic numerals, since they’re the ones we use in English. Arabs took the Indian numeric system, made some alterations, and then passed a variant of that system on to Europeans, which is why we call them “Arabic numerals” instead of “Indian numerals,” despite the fact that they ultimately come from India. In the Arab countries of the Maghrib (basically all of North Africa west of Egypt), these are the numerals that are used. In Egypt and points east, however, different (but related, you can see the similarities) numerals are used, which in Arabic are called أرقام هِندية (arqām hindīyah), or “Indian numerals” (“numeral” is رُقْم ruqm, plural أرقام arqām). The table below shows names and numerals for the numbers from 0-10 (teens will have to wait for another time).

In addition to رُقْم, “number” can also be translated as عَدَد (ʿadad), plural أعداد (aʿdād).
English name

Western Arabic numeral

Eastern Arabic numeral

Arabic name

Arabic name transliterated
zero

0

۰

صِفْر

ṣifr
one

1

۱

واحِد

wāḥid
two

2

۲

إثْنان

ithnān
three

3

۳

ثَلاثة

thalāthah
four

4

٤ (variant: ۴)

أربَعة

arbaʿah
five

5

۵

خَمْسة

khamsah
six

6

٦ (variant: ۶)

سِتّة

sittah
seven

7

۷

سَبعة

sabʿah
eight

8

۸

ثَمانية

thamāniyah
nine

9

۹

تِسعة

tisʿah
ten

10

۱۰

عَشْرة

ʿashrah
Note that 4 and 6 have alternate forms; these are more commonly encountered in Persian but may be found in Arabic as well.