This is important! What are the Roman numerals for 1990? Possible solutions: (1) MXM, (2) MCMXC, or the cumbersome (3) MDCCCCLXXXX. Help! –Anonymous, Chicago
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In school, for instance, you may have learned that the Romans used M for 1,000 because it stood for the Latin mille, thousand. Wrong on two counts: many authorities think it’s only coincidence that the number M happened to look like the letter M (ditto for C = 100–it’s unlikely C stood for centum, hundred). In any case, as often as not, the Romans indicated 1,000 not with M but either the lazy-8 infinity symbol or else something along the lines of (I)–that is, a vertical stroke framed by exaggerated parentheses.
So where does this leave us? Well, if we are truly desperate for moral guidance, we may turn to the world of computers. Cecil happens to have a desktop publishing program known as Xerox Ventura Publisher, an amazing bit of software thought to have been used originally to torture heretics during the Inquisition. Among other things it will convert numbers up to 9,999 into Roman numerals for use as page numbers. Punching in 1990, we come up with MCMXC, an unsurprising and somehow comforting result. But if we then try 1999, we get MIM. Why MIM for 1999 and not MXM for 1990? Lord knows. Worse, if we enter 9,999 we get what appears to be IZ. I have scoured my reference books in vain for any indication that Z was ever used for 10,000, which moves me to write the whole thing off as the product of malicious computer geekery, an impression that actually trying to use Ventura will certainly confirm.
You’ve misread Shirer’s book. The proclamation you refer to wasn’t read September 4, 1932, it was September 5, 1934. See Shirer, page 1145, note 9.
