Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 6 (1897).djvu/25

 OF THE EOMAN EMPIRE 5 empire was again united by the arms and policy of Abdalnialek, he disclaimed a badge of servitude not less injurious to his^M^ai-^^ conscience than to his pride ; he discontinued the payment of esovcs] the tribute ; and the resentment of the Greeks was disabled from action by the mad tyranny of the second Justinian, the just rebellion of his subjects, and the frequent change of his antagonists and successors. Till the reign of Abdalraalek, the Saracens had been content with the free possession of the Per- sian and Roman treasures, in the coin of Chosroes and Caesar. By the command of that caliph, a national mint was established, both of silver and gold, and the inscription of the Dinar, though it might be censured by some timorous casuists, proclaimed the unity of the God of Mahomet.^ Under the reign of the caliph Waled, the Greek language and characters were excluded from ^^"t^J..^] the accounts of the public revenue. ^'^ If this change Mas pro- ductive of the invention or familiar use of our present numerals, the Arabic or Indian cijphers, as they are commonly styled, a regulation of office has promoted the most important discoveries of arithmetic, algebra, and the mathematical sciences. ^^ Whilst the caliph Waled sat idle on the throne of Damascus, while his lieutenants achieved the conquest of Transoxiana 'ind secjn^siege^ Spain, a third army of Saracens overspread the provinces of Asia nopie^ a.d. Minor, and approached the borders of the Byzantine capital. But the attempt and disgrace of the second siege was reserved for his brother Soliman, whose ambition appears to have been [s^a^^^j- sElmacin, who dates the first coinage A.H. 76, A.D. 695, five or six years later than the Greek historians, has compared the weight of the best or common gold dinar, to the drachm or dirhem of Egypt (p. 77), which may be equal to two pennies (48 grains) of our Troy weight (Hooper's Enquiry into Ancient Measures, p. 24-36) and equivalent to eight shillings of our sterling money. From the same Elmacin and the Arabian physicians, some dinars as high as two dirhems, as low as half a dirhem, may be deduced. The piece of silver was the dirhem, both in value and weight ; but an old though fair coin, struck at Waset, A.H. 88, and pre- served in the Bodleian library, wants four grains of the Cairo standard (see the Modern Universal History, torn i. p. 548 of the French translation). [But see Appendix 2.] fiovd&a^ ri &va&a^ 7j rpiaSa, q oi-:tu) riinav tj rftim. ypi.i^tfr9in. Tbeophan. Chronograph, p. 314 [A.M. 6199]. This defect, if it really existed, must have stimulated the ingenuity of the Arabs to invent or borrow. ^' According to a new though probable notion, maintained by M. de Villoison (Anecdota Graeca, tom. ii. p. 152-157), our cyphers are not of Indian or Arabic invention. They were used by the Greek and Latin arithmeticians long before the age of Boethius. After the extinction of science in the West, they were adopted by the Arabic versions from the original Mss. and restored to the Latins about the eleventh century. [There is no doubt that our numerals are of Indian origin (5th or 6th cent. ?) ; adopted by the Arabians about 9th cent. The circumstances of their first introduction to the West are uncertain, but we find them used in Italy in 13th cent.]