What was the importance of stone, stick, and shell symbols in the Maya Empire? Write your answer in English. Use some of this information in the lesson: The Mayan Number System: Long before the Spanish arrived on American shores, a Native American people known as Maya had set up a very advanced civilization in parts of what is now México and Central America. Their empire, made up of city-states, had an economy based on agriculture and trade. It makes sense then, that they would have to develop some type of number system to keep track of their commercial transactions. And that's just what they did. The Maya people had a number system with three symbols for numbers, which roughly resemble a stone, a stick, and a shell. In addition, there was a symbol for 0, which served as a placeholder, just as 0 does in our system. The Maya is the first world civilization known to have a 0 and the system of placeholders Unlike our system, though, the Maya system was based on 20, instead of 10. The symbols could be combined in different ways to form numbers from 0 to 19. (This is also different from our decimal system, which has numbers from 0 to 9.) With these combinations, they were able to make any positive integer and do arithmetical operations, such as addition, well into the millions. Mayan Math: I said that the Maya people could do math operations into the millions. Let's see if we can do some, too. The Maya number system is a base 20 system. Here's how it works. A pebble is worth one, and a stick is worth five. So, five pebbles make up one stick. Pebbles and sticks are put together in different combinations to make any number through 19. A shell is the symbol for 0 and serves as the placeholder. Look at the following examples: Maya number Decimal number o 1 ooo 3 (1+1+1) \ 5 ooo \ 8 (1+1+1+5) \ 10 (5 + 5) oooo\ 19 (1+1+1+1 + 5+5+5)

Question

What was the importance of stone, stick, and shell symbols in the Maya Empire? Write your answer in English. Use some of this information in the lesson: The Mayan Number System: Long before the Spanish arrived on American shores, a Native American people known as Maya had set up a very advanced civilization in parts of what is now México and Central America. Their empire, made up of city-states, had an economy based on agriculture and trade. It makes sense then, that they would have to develop some type of number system to keep track of their commercial transactions. And that's just what they did. The Maya people had a number system with three symbols for numbers, which roughly resemble a stone, a stick, and a shell. In addition, there was a symbol for 0, which served as a placeholder, just as 0 does in our system. The Maya is the first world civilization known to have a 0 and the system of placeholders Unlike our system, though, the Maya system was based on 20, instead of 10. The symbols could be combined in different ways to form numbers from 0 to 19. (This is also different from our decimal system, which has numbers from 0 to 9.) With these combinations, they were able to make any positive integer and do arithmetical operations, such as addition, well into the millions. Mayan Math: I said that the Maya people could do math operations into the millions. Let's see if we can do some, too. The Maya number system is a base 20 system. Here's how it works.  A pebble is worth one, and a stick is worth five. So, five pebbles make up one stick. Pebbles and sticks are put together in different combinations to make any number through 19. A shell is the symbol for 0 and serves as the placeholder. Look at the following examples: Maya number    Decimal number o    1 ooo    3 (1+1+1) \    5 ooo \    8 (1+1+1+5) \    10 (5 + 5) oooo\    19 (1+1+1+1 + 5+5+5)

Bot · Answer

In the Mayan Empire, stone, stick, and shell symbols had great importance in their number system. Their economy was based on agriculture and trade, so it was necessary for them to keep track of their commercial transactions. The Mayans had a number system with three symbols for numbers which were stone, stick, and shell. They also used a symbol for 0 as a placeholder. This number system was different from ours as it was based on 20 rather than 10. The symbols could be combined in different ways to form numbers from 0 to 19. Using these combinations, they were able to make any positive integer and do arithmetic operations such as addition, well into the millions. So, the Mayans were the first world civilization to have a 0 and a system of placeholders, which was an important invention in their time.