Dozenal Character Sets: New numbers for a duodecimal counting system
First Draft: February 8, 2005
Revised: January 13, 2010
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Any time we start talking about adopting a new number base for our counting, we have to come to terms with the fact that, if the new base is greater than ten, we are going to need new characters to represent the single digit numbers between nine and whatever the base is. The hexadecimalists have been very unimaginative, preferring to assign the letters A-F to the numbers ten through fifteen. Not only does this show a lack of imagination, it is extremely inefficient as you suddenly have numbers that might be mistaken for words. Proponents of duodecimal (dozenal) counting have been significantly more creative in this regard over the years. The best characters can be made with no more than two pen strokes, but, for the sake of efficiency, one is preferred (just like one syllable is preferred for number names).
Isaac Pitman proposed the first well-known dozenal characters in the nineteenth century. Pitman had the idea that if nine is just a six turned upside down, why can't we do that with other numbers? And thus, he rotated the two and the three 180 degrees and used these new characters to represent ten and eleven respectively. The trouble is (though not for Pitman) that in digital format, the ten resembles a two.
The second major proposal came from F. Emerson Andrews of the Dozenal Society of America. He suggested using a stylized 'X' and 'E' for ten and eleven respectively. I find this one extremely useful for practical typing since they are readily found on my keyboard. Another positive point of Andrew's characters is that it is possible to render them in digital format.
The third major proposal comes from Don Hammond of the Dozenal Society of Great Britain. Hammond was very innovative in tweaking the Pitman characters to make them different enough to work in a digital format. With the Hammond characters, it is possible to easily make a dozenal calculator with a digital display.
In my first draft of characters for a dozenal ten and eleven, I decided to further tweak Hammond's characters to make them even more like their digital counterparts. Ultimately unsatisfied with the aesthetic, I used a different basis for my second version. Noticing that Hammond's digital ten resembled a truncated, backwards digital five, I decided to base my new numeral ten on the numeral five and am quite pleased with what I came up with. For eleven, I experimented with a rotated and crossed seven that might resemble a truncated italic E.
Though the new eleven worked well with a digital display, I was ultimately unhappy with the aesthetic. Now, I have introduced my latest version of a dozenal character set. Instead of basing my eleven off of the letter E, I decided to adopt the look of the double-one seen in the decimal number 11. Consequently, my new eleven looks like a U with an inverted curve on the bottom. Like the other characters I've worked on, this one is also efficiently rendered in digital format.
Another feature I am suggesting is the replacement of the 0 character for zero with a D. Many have made the argument that a different-looking zero would more effectively put the reader on notice that he was dealing with a dozenal, and not a decimal number. And, indeed, it is easier to realize that 1D is one dozen and 1DD is one gross than 10 and 100 respectively. Ideally, I would prefer a formal Ð to easily put the reader on notice that what they are seeing is a number and not a letter. It would be no different than the crossed seven or crossed zero that are common today. However, for the sake of efficnecy in jotting numbers, a one-stroke D should be considered as acceptable as an one-stroke 0 is in our current decimal notation. In digital format, D makes a good alternative to 0 as they look the same on a calculator display.
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