Hindu–Arabic numeral system system is based upon ten (originally nine) different glyphs. The symbols (glyphs) used to represent the system are in principle independent of the system itself. The glyphs in actual use are descended from Brahmi numerals and have split into various typographical variants since the Middle Ages. These symbol sets can be divided into three main families: Western Arabic numerals used in the Greater Maghreb and in Europe, Eastern Arabic numerals (also called "Indic numerals") used in the Middle East, and the Indian numerals used in South Asia. The Hindu-Arabic numerals were invented by mathematicians in India. Perso-Arabic mathematicians called them
Arabic numerals include fractions, as recorded in a treatise by Syrian mathematician Abu'l-Hasan al-Uqlidisi in 952–953. The decimal point notation was introduced by Sind ibn Ali, who also wrote the earliest treatise on Arabic numerals. A distinctive West Arabic variant of the symbols begins to emerge around the 10th century in the Maghreb and Al-Andalus (sometimes called "ghubar" numerals, though the term is not always accepted), which are the direct ancestor of the modern "Arabic numerals" used throughout the world. Woepecke has proposed that the Western Arabic numerals were already in use in Spain before the arrival of the Moors, purportedly received