Conversation

@euhmeuh @clacke @neauoire so for e.g. on a babylonian table you’d have black and white stones, labeled I, V, X, etc, and black stones could be used for subtraction. you’d gather the amount you want to subtract, pair the black stones up with white stones to “cancel” them out. if you had black stones left over, the result was a negative value (a debt).

conceptually the prefix notation is like sticking black stones in