In Japan, "clarke" is translated as . The word  is always added, which happens to make the term appear similar in form with scientific constants such as . The term may have a narrower sense than Fersman's. Several of the following constraints may apply:
* Only of Earth's crust
* Lithosphere approximated as a 10 mile-deep layer from sea level
* Must include all of three layers: lithosphere (93.06%), hydrosphere (0.91%) and atmosphere (0.03%)
* Only mass ratio)
* Denote in percents) (not in ppm or ppb)
* (What the quoter believes to be) data from Clarke and Washington(1924)
Another peculiarity in Japan is the existence of a popular version of data, which was tabulated in reference books such as the annual "Chronological Scientific Tables" (RCST1939(1938)), the "Dictionary of Physics and Chemistry" (IDPC(1939)) and other prominent books on geochemistry and chemistry. This version Kimura(1938) was devised by chemist . It was often quoted as The "Clarke numbers" (unsourced examples:,). The numbers differed from any versions by Clarke / Clarke&Washington (1889–1924), or anything listed in foreign (non-Japanese) articles such as the USGS compilation , thus unknown outside of Japan. Yet the numbers were sometimes quoted in English articles without citation (example:).
As geological definition of "Earths crust" evolved, the "10 mile-deep" approximation were deemed out-of-date, and some people considered the term "clarke number" obsolete too. Yet other people may have meant broader senses, not limiting to Earths crust, leading to confusion. RCST1961(1961) switched their "clarke number" table from Kimura(1938) to Mason(1958) based, and the label "clarke number" on table was removed in RCST1963(1962). IDPC(1971) removed the "clarke number" table which was a Kimura(1938)s variant. IDPC(1981) said the term is mostly abandoned, and the dictionary entry for "clarke number" itself was removed from IDPC(1998). So "clarke numbers" became associated almost solely with Kimura(1938)s data, but Kimuras name forgotten. Incidentally, in major reference books, there was no data table titled "clarke numbers" which showed Clarkes original tables.
Despite being removed from major reference books, data from Kimura(1938) and phrases such as "the Clarke number of iron is 4.70", unsourced, continue to circulate, even in the 2010s (example:).