|
A myriad (from Ancient Greek , ''myrias'') is technically the number ten thousand; in that sense, the term is used almost exclusively in translations from Greek, Latin, or Chinese, or when talking about ancient Greek numbers. More generally, a myriad may be an indefinitely large number of things.〔''Oxford English Dictionary'', Third Edition, June 2003, ''s.v.'' '(myriad )'〕 ==History== (詳細はAegean numerals of the Minoan and Mycenaean civilizations included a single unit to denote tens of thousands. It was written with a symbol composed of a circle with four dashes 𐄢. In Classical Greek numerals, a myriad was written as a capital mu: Μ, as lower case letters did not exist in Ancient Greece. To distinguish this numeral from letters, it was sometimes given an overbar: . Multiples were written above this sign, so that for example would equal 4,582×10,000 or 45,820,000. The etymology of the word ''myriad'' itself is uncertain: it has been variously connected to PIE '' *meu-'' ("damp") in reference to the waves of the sea and to Greek ''myrmex'' (, "ant") in reference to their swarms.〔Schwartzman, Steven. ''The Words of Mathematics: An Etymological Dictionary of Mathematical Terms Used in English'', (p. 142 ). The Mathematical Assoc. of America, 1994.〕 The largest number named in Ancient Greek was the myriad myriad (written ) or hundred million. In his ''Sand Reckoner'', Archimedes of Syracuse used this quantity as the basis for a numeration system of large powers of ten, which he used to count grains of sand. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア(Wikipedia)』 ■ウィキペディアで「Myriad」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|