[MarkSimpson]

> They were never designed for quick little sums, they were designed for engraving on massive long lasting objects like buildings and copyright notices on feature films, and they look pretty darned good there. Stop complaining that Roman numerals are not Arabic numerals.

Actually, Roman numerals were designed for counting the men in your army, whereas Arabic numerals were designed for mathematics. Comparing the two isn't a good argument against redthrowaway's point at all, because both are better at the task they were designed for.

[paradoja]

?!?!?!?!?!

Are you saying that Roman numerals are better for counting than Arabic numerals? I suppose you don't mean count (I, II, III, IIII, V...), but show the number of men in the army. I don't see any advantage in using Roman numerals.

Lets say we divide infantry in XXX maniples of CXX men each, supposing they are complete and you haven't lost people yet in battle. How is that better than 30 maniples of 120 men?

[ent]

Actually, roman numerals are easier to sum than arabics. To sum two roman numerals you just write all the digits together and collapse them as much as possible. There is no carrying over of digits and such.

Otoh, arabic numerals are a lot easier to multiply/divide. Before the wide adoption of arabic numerals all but the most educated couldn't perform simple multiplication/division.

[paradoja]

You may have a point, but I still find easier to do

         111
 948      948
 289  =>  289
 ---      ---
         1237

than

CMXLVIII plus CCLXXXIX => CMCCXLLXXXIXVIII => MCLLXXIXVIII => MCCXXXVII

but it may be that it's because what I'm used to.