Although the dot was used at first in India, as noted above, the small circle later replaced it and continues in use to this day. The Arabs, however, did not adopt the
circle, since it bore some resemblance to the letter which expressed the number five in the alphabet system.[[207]] The earliest Arabic zero known is the dot, used in a manuscript of 873 A.D.[[208]] Sometimes both the dot and the circle are used in the same work, having the same meaning, which is the case in an Arabic MS., an abridged arithmetic of Jamshid,[[209]] 982 A.H. (1575 A.D.). As given in this work the numerals are
