Who came up with the first numbers and when? Previous When 0 appeared.
It may seem that zero is an essential part of any number system, and without it mathematics is impossible, but it is a relatively recent invention. In fact, this ubiquitous symbol of “absence” appeared in Europe only during the Proto-Renaissance period, more precisely in the 12th century.
The first zero in history: Sumerians and Mayans
According to most historical opinions, the zero first appeared in the fertile valley of Mesopotamia, in ancient Mesopotamia. The Sumerians noted the absence of a digital digit in their number columns as early as the second millennium BC. BC, but the null character first appeared in written records of the third century BC. e. in ancient Babylon. The Babylonians used a sexagesimal number system in which zero served to distinguish numerical values in the same way that today we use it to distinguish tens from hundreds, thousands, and so on. This was the meaning of zero in Babylon.
The same symbol, used for the same purpose, appeared among the Mayans around 350. None of these ancient civilizations assigned zero its modern mathematical meaning.
Mathematical value: India and Middle East
Early civilizations used zero only to indicate increasing digit digits, and not as an independent number with its own mathematical properties and characteristics. The mathematical value of zero was first realized in India in the 7th century. The mathematician and astronomer Brahmagupta recognized the “zero” value of zero and called it sunya, which translated means “empty.” Brahmagupta was the first to perform mathematical operations on zero.
From India, zero migrated to the Middle East and the territory of former Babylon. The Persian mathematician Abu Ablullah, or Muhammad ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi, used zero in algebraic equations in 773. In the 9th century, the Arabic numeral "0" appeared, with almost the same oval shape that we use today. Interestingly, the Indian “sunya”, translated into Arabic, became the word “sifr”, from which the word “digit” was subsequently derived.
Modern application: Europe
It took several centuries for zero to reach Europe. The first mentions of it date back to the very beginning of the 12th century. The works of Leonardo of Pisa, better known as Fibonacci, helped popularize the zero and bring it into widespread use. The concept of "absence" played an important role in the theories of many scientists such as Descartes, Newton and Leibniz. Since then, no number system has existed without zero.
Zero ( zero) (from lat. Nullus- none) - the name of the first (in order) digit in standard number systems, as well as a mathematical sign expressing the absence of the value of a given digit in the number record in the positional number system. The digit zero placed to the right of another digit increases the numerical value of all digits to the left by one digit (accordingly, in the decimal number system, it multiplies by ten.).
The main advantage of the Indians' introduction of number writing methods was that they greatly reduced the number of digits, applied the positional system to decimal counting, and introduced the zero sign. The introduction of zero, numbers and the principle of their place value facilitated computational operations on numbers, and therefore arithmetic calculations received significant development in India.
The Indians called a sign denoting the absence of any digit in a number the word " sunya", What means empty(rank, place). The Arabs translated this word according to its meaning and received the word " syfr", The word “digit” comes from it. For the first time, Kharyazmi used the number zero in his stories. The first reliable information about the recording of zero dates back to 876; in a wall inscription from Gwalior (India) there is the number 270. Some researchers suggest that zero was borrowed from the Greeks, who introduced the letter “o” as zero into the sexagesimal number system they used in astronomy. Others, on the contrary, believe that zero came to India from the east; it was invented on the border of Indian and Chinese cultures. Earlier inscriptions from 683 and 686 were discovered. in what is now Cambodia in Indonesia, where zero is depicted as a dot and a small circle. The Indians initially depicted zero as a dot. When the Indians in the 5th century A.D. introduced the zero sign, they were able to leave the place-based number system and develop the absolute positional decimal number system, the superiority of which in counting, if not realized, is used daily by hundreds of millions of people.
In Europe.
Leonardo of Pisa (1228) used the Arabic term " sifr" word zephirum ( Latin word zephyrus- zephyr meant the west wind), at the same time another main advocate of Indian numbering in Europe, Jordan Nemorarius (1237), uses the Arabic form cifra. In Vienna, handwritten arithmetic of the 15th century, acquired in Constantinople (Istanbul), is kept, in which Greek numeric signs are used along with the designation of zero by a dot. In Latin translations of Arabic treatises of the 12th century, the zero sign - 0 is called a circle - circulus.
The term "no sign" appears in handwritten Latin translations and adaptations of 12th-century Arabic works. The term "nulla" appears in the Shuke manuscript of 1484. and in the first printed Trevisan (according to the place of publication) arithmetic (1478). Depman I.Ya. History of Arithmetic. - ed. "Enlightenment", Moscow, 1965, - p. 89.
Since the beginning of the 16th century, in German manuals, the word “number” takes on a modern meaning, the word “zero” comes into widespread use in Germany and other countries, first as a foreign word and in the Latin grammatical form, gradually taking on the form characteristic of a given national language.
In Russia.
L. Magnitsky in his “Arithmetic” calls the sign 0 “a number or nothing” (first page of text); on the second page of the table in which each number is given a name, 0 is called " never". At the end of the 18th century, in the second Russian edition of H. Wolf's "Abridged First Foundations of Mathematics" (1791), zero is also called number. In 17th century mathematical manuscripts using Indian numerals, 0 is called " onom" due to its resemblance to the letter O. Depman I.Ya. History of Arithmetic. - ed. "Enlightenment", Moscow, 1965, - p. 90.
Zero in other cultures
Mayan. The Mayans used zero in their base-20 number system almost a millennium before the Indians. The first surviving Mayan calendar date stela dates back to December 10, 36 BC. It is curious that Mayan mathematicians used the same sign to designate infinity, since this sign did not mean zero in the European understanding of the word, but “beginning”, “cause”. The counting of days in the Mayan calendar began with day zero, which was called Ahau.
The Incas. The Inca Empire of Tahuantinsuyu used the knotted quipu system, based on a positional decimal number system, to record numerical information. The numbers from 1 to 9 were indicated by knots of a certain type, zero - by skipping a knot in the desired position. However, what word the Incas used to denote zero when reading the quipu is unclear (in the modern Quechua language, zero means the word " missing", "empty".
That's right, about mathematics, or more precisely, about the most unusual number - zero (0). We are so used to it, we constantly use this symbol for mathematical calculations, and calculators even have several zeros! But once upon a time it did not exist, and people managed in mathematical operations without this sign. When and by whom was this symbol found?
Imagine Ancient Rome. A rich city dweller wants to pay for the construction of a house. At the same time, he folds the money into 14 columns of 44 piles of 12 sextertia (Roman coin). Now try to calculate how much money this is? Multiply XVIII by XLIV by XII in your head. It’s not easy, right? Such a calculation took up to an hour using an ancient calculator - an abacus (a specially graphed board). A modern schoolchild will do this in a couple of minutes by multiplying the numbers into a column. The problem of the Romans, as we see, was ignorance of the number 0.
Zero means nothing, a symbol of emptiness. But in combination with other numbers, zero leads to unexpected results. By adding one zero to a number, it increases by 10 times. Two zeros are a factor of a hundred, three are a factor of a thousand... The invention of the zero revolutionized the methods of mathematical calculations. Numbers began to be defined not only by their digits, but also by their positions relative to each other and to zero. From right to left, numbers began to mean units, tens, hundreds, thousands, and so on. Compare the numbers CDLXXXVIII and 488. It can be seen that in the first case the meaning and representation of the number were more primitive - its components were simply added, in contrast to the second, modern method, where combined addition and multiplication takes place.
The second way of representing numbers - with zero - allows you to do mental calculations in a simpler way. I have no idea how to learn the multiplication table expressed in old numbers
In Babylon (modern Iraq), scientists invented the number zero in the 4th century BC. But their invention was not widely used because their mathematical apparatus was based not on the decimal, but on the 60-digit number system. In other words, their mathematics had not 10, but 60 digits. But from their mathematics we took the principles of time tracking - 60 minutes of 60 seconds equals 1 hour.
In pre-Columbian America, the Mayan Indians also came to the concept of the number zero, this happened around the 5th century AD. But since their civilization was closed to outsiders and territorially isolated, and subsequently simply disappeared, this invention was lost again.
It was only in the 6th century AD that the number zero was also invented in India, after which they developed a positional number system. This system was adopted by the Arabs, who called the numbers "Indian signs." In the period before the 10th century, their display changed slightly, arriving at the familiar numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9. Europe received these numbers from the Arabs, and we use our number system thanks to them, calling the numbers Arabic.
Here is such an interesting story of the origin of a seemingly insignificant sign - the number 0. And it’s wonderful that it exists
Municipal budgetary educational institution
Secondary school No. 8 in the village of Spasskoye, Spassky district, Primorsky Krai
Project: “The amazing number – zero”
I've done the work:
Antokhin Ilya
5 "B" class
supervisor: M.P. Laktionova.
teacher, MBOU secondary school No. 8
S.Spasskoye
2016
Table of contents
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………….…..3
2. History of the emergence of the number 0………………………………………………….….4
3.Specific properties of the number 0…………………………………………………………….....5
4. Application of the number 0 in other areas of knowledge except mathematics………………6
5. The meaning of the number 0 in the practical life of people………………………………….…8
6. The place of zero in literary and folk art………………………………..9.
7. Conclusion………………………………………………………………………………………......10
8. References………………………………………………………………...10
Introduction
My project work is called“The amazing number is zero.” This is a short-term project that combines such areas of knowledge as mathematics, physics, and literature.
Objective of the project : tell the story of the appearance of zero to classmates, show the significance of the discovery of this number.
Tasks:
Study the history of the number 0:
Study the specific properties of the number 0;
Find out the use of the number 0 in other areas of knowledge except mathematics;
Find out what significance the number 0 has in the practical life of people;
Find out the place of zero in literary and folk art.
Relevance:
people always use numbers and numbers everywhere: at work, at home, on vacation. And counting is an important and necessary thing. And many people do not know anything about the origin of the account.
Research methods: searching and collecting information from various sources (popular science literature, Internet sites), a walk around your hometown; generalization and analysis of the obtained data.
Object of study: amazing number - ZERO
Project product became a presentation containing:specific properties of the number 0,the meaning of the number 0 in the practical life of people, the place of zero in literary and folk art.
Practical significance: the ability to use the information received in lessons and outside of class time in mathematics, application in everyday life.
The history of the number 0.
The number zero, which we now use, came to us together with Arabic numerals, which came to Arab mathematicians from India. That is, it was in India that the decimal positional system was invented. But how could they count without zero before? And they could and couldn’t at the same time. Something similar to zero is found on clay cuneiform tablets of ancient Babylon.
In ancient Greece and Egypt, pebbles were used for counting. When a pebble is lifted from the place where it was lying when counting, a hole remains from it. Isn't it zero? No, not zero yet. Everything that came before the Indians was only of an applied nature and cannot in any way be accepted as the real history of the invention of zero. This is just a designation for empty space.
The decimal place system also existed in China. To write down the number 934, 4 sticks were placed in the units column, 3 tens sticks, and 9 hundreds sticks. Instead of zero, an empty space was left. But when writing numbers, the Chinese did not use digits and there was no symbol for zero.
-The Indians called zero “sunya”, empty. The Arabs translated this as "syfr", from which the word "numbers" comes.
Indian ancestors:
What is zero?
Zero is an integer, one of the digits in the decimal number system. The name "null" comes from the Latin word nullus, which means "no". Zero is denoted by the sign 0.
As a digit in a multi-digit number or decimal fraction, zero is used to indicate the absence of units of a certain digit. The main property that characterizes zero as a number is that any number does not change when added to zero.
Specific properties of the number 0.
The number 0 behaves completely uniquely in ordinary arithmetic operations: 
The number 0 is the only number that cannot be divided by. 
The number 0 behaves very peculiarly when raised to a power:
The number 0 is the only real number that is neither positive nor negative. 
In set theory, Georg Cantor denoted the minimum cardinality of infinite sets (that is, the cardinality of countable sets) as follows:
Application of the number 0 in other areas of knowledge besides mathematics
Until the end of the 19th century, various countries used their own national ZERO meridians to measure geographic longitudes:
Of all the vectors, only the ZERO vector cannot be depicted as a directed segment: 
The first digit of a natural number can be anything except 0: 
ZEROS of a function are numbers from the domain of the function at which it takes on a ZERO value: 
The closed orbit of any cosmic body is an ELLIPSE, which in shape completely coincides with the shape of the number 0. 
In 1849, the Chain Bridge was built in Budapest, where the zero kilometer was established - the starting point for distances in Hungary
Zero kilometer of roads in Ivanovo
Absolute ZERO temperature is the minimum temperature limit that a physical body can have in the Universe.Absolute zero serves as the origin of the absolute temperature scale. On the Celsius scale, absolute zero corresponds to a temperature of −273.15° C.
The meaning of number 0 in the practical life of people
On any calculator, after turning it on, a SINGLE number immediately appears - the number 0. 
At midnight, four ZEROS appear on the digital clock. A new day begins! 
On a computer keyboard, numbers are depicted in this order: 
Zero without this stick was either a number or a letter. That’s why they sometimes began to say “ZERO WITHOUT A STICK”:
TIC-TIC-TOE is a logical game in which one of the players plays with “crosses” and the other with “toes”. 
A hand gesture representing the number 0 in English-speaking countries means “EVERYTHING IS OKAY,” “EVERYTHING IS NORMAL,” “EVERYTHING IS EXCELLENT.” 
The number 0 has two names: ZERO and ZERO.
The word "zero" is used in the following expressions:
And only the word “zero” in such expressions:
In 1964, the wonderful book “THE ADVENTURES OF NULIK” was first published.
And then a musical performance was created based on this book, and even a record was released. 
The place of zero in literary and folk art
S.Ya. wrote about the properties of zero. Marshak:
Children's poems about the number zero:
K. Green
Zero looks like a bun
He is pot-bellied and round.
The cat looks like him
If it folds into a ball.
T. Shatskikh
The king sits on the pot,
Looks everywhere for the number zero.
We can suggest the answer:
Zero – when something is missing!
A. Sosina
Zero is a thoughtful sage.
Where is the beginning, where is the end
He can't make it out himself.
How can we not recognize him!
A. Smetanin
You won't see a lamprey
So that she swims in formation out of step.
Why? Yes, just legs
Exactly ZERO in lamprey fish
M. Pridvorov
But in the ranks they have freedom...
Oh, I completely forgot about zero!
So he’s not there, it seems,
Even though it occurs in nature.
T. Lavrova
Zero doesn't mean anything.
I feel very sorry for him.
It's good: round, smooth,
Everything is fine with the calculations.
Zero is very friendly with everyone,
He is needed everywhere and everywhere.
Zero requires no rewards,
Completes the series of numbers.
Conclusion
It was interesting for me to work on this topic. In the process of work, I learned a lot of interesting things. I now know the history of the origin of the number zero, some properties of zero, where the number 0 can be applied in other fields of knowledge besides mathematics, what significance the number 0 has in the practical life of people, the place of zero in literary and folk art.
Now I can tell the story of the appearance of zero to my classmates and show the significance of the discovery of this number.
1. Depman I.N. From the history of mathematics. Detgiz. Moscow 1950.
2. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia.
3 Mathematics at school. No. 4 Pedagogy, 1989.
4. Panisheva O.V. Mathematics in verse. Teacher. Volgograd. 2008.
5. https://luktore.to
6. otvet mail.ru
Who invented zero? For those who want a quick answer, I’ll tell you that zero was invented by Indian mathematicians. This is what the official history of mathematics says. But for those who are more curious and ready to read this article to the end, I will say that zero was invented not only by Indian mathematicians. It was just a slightly different zero.
By the way, how to speak correctly "zero" or "zero" is not of fundamental importance. But in mathematical works the number zero is usually written as “zero” (“equal to zero”, “below zero”), and in free use “zero” is more common.
But let's return to the history of the number zero and the number zero. The number zero, which we now use, came to us together with Arabic numerals, which came to Arab mathematicians from India. That is, it was in India that the decimal positional system was invented. But how could they have done it before? count without zero? And they could and couldn’t at the same time. Something similar to zero is found on clay cuneiform tablets of ancient Babylon.
For example, the Babylonians, not knowing about zero, completely distinguished the numbers 202 from 22. Although they had a sexagesimal number system, and not a decimal number system like ours, they intuitively understood what zero meant. In an empty cell, either three “hooks” or two wedges were written, indicating emptiness. This was done around 300 BC.
The ancient Greeks had no concept of zero. The fact is that the Greeks operated with numbers mainly for applied geometry purposes. And the length of a segment equal to zero has no practical value. In astronomical notations the letter "omicron" (όμικρον) was used. This is the first letter in the word "ouden" meaning nothing and written as O (circle) and meaning.... No, not zero, but 70! The Greeks used an alphabetical system for writing numbers.
The Romans did not know about zero. If you write the number 388 in Roman numerals, you get CCCLXXXVIII. No concept of ranks.
In both ancient Greece and Egypt, pebbles were used for counting. When a pebble is lifted from the place where it was lying when counting, a hole remains from it. Isn't it zero? No, not zero yet. Everything that came before the Indians was only of an applied nature and cannot in any way be accepted as the real history of the invention of zero. This is just a designation for empty space.
The decimal place system also existed in China. To write the number 934, 4 sticks were placed in the column of units, 3 in tens, and 9 in hundreds. Instead of zero, an empty space was left. But when writing numbers, the Chinese did not use digits and there was no symbol for zero.
The Maya Indians, so popular now, also had their own zero in their base-20 number system, a thousand years earlier than the Indians. But among the Mayans, zero did not mean zero in our understanding of the word, but “beginning.” The counting of days in the Mayan calendar began with day zero and was called Ahau.
The Inca's neighbors used knot writing, where the numbers 1 to 9 were represented by different knots, and zero by an empty space.
What property did Indian mathematicians invent? They wrote zero at the beginning of the exact number, indicating the missing number, then with a circle. But the main thing is that they defined zero not as the concept of the absence of a number, but as a number.
Around 500 AD, a positional system for writing numbers was developed, and a record concerning the use of zero dates back to 876.
Indian mathematicians Brahmagupta, Mahavira and Bhaskara wrote that if you subtract the same number from one number, you get zero. This is the familiar definition of the number zero. Now zero is a number. Zero is used in calculations and is even written as a small circle. With just 10 digits you can write down any number, even the largest one. It was a revolution in mathematics.
The Indians called zero "sunya", empty. The Arabs translated it as "syfr" from which the word comes "numbers". By the way, Indian mathematicians
