Originally Posted by TakemetotheBurrow

Okay. Southern Babylonia...which was now Iran and Iraq. Ella scribbled down these additions to her notes, wanting to keep them up to date. As for Professor Hadley's next question, Ella knew this one. She remembered from their previous lesson. "Professor Hadley, wasn't the number nine left out because it was considered to be like a...holy number?" YUP. Number nine was like the swiss cheese of numbers to the Chaldeans. Tee-hee.

Originally Posted by nups21

Again, Ira raised her hand up and answered, "9 was considered as a sacred and holy number." Though Ira didn't see why it could not been used. A sacred number was even more special right? So it should have been used with even more emphasis on it as a lucky number.

She continued, "I think it is because of the fact that any number multiplied by 9 always reduces back to 9... so it was considered different..maybe"

Originally Posted by hpluvr037

Now this was something he couldn't know from basic geography and knowledge of ancient civilizations. But he could hazard a guess, no?

Two hands shot up into the air, well before fellow student leader, Sierra Greingoth, could manage a response.

"Honestly, I have no idea. But ancient people tended to be rather superstitious and violent. So my guess is that it had something to do with their religion, perhaps it was the number of love, war, fertility, something along those lines?" Or he was way off.

"But what confuses me there is that I thought the Babylonians had a base-60 numbering system, so it seems far less likely that this specific number would garner any significance. Like for our base-10 system, 9 is the last digit before you have to add another place value and power of 10. But nothing like that holds with theirs." AND he was rambling now.

Back on topic."Er.. I guess what I'm saying is... perhaps it has some superstitious quality? I know the Jews had a word they wouldn't use because it was holy, and other religions have numbers that are sacred. Maybe this is just another example of that."

That's right, Greingoth. The Puffs can beat you in class, why not on the Pitch?

And most importantly, WHAT had he eaten for breakfast this morning? It seemed to be stimulating his brain in an unusual way.

Originally Posted by sweetpinkpixie

With the next question Kurumi again decided to simple repeat the information silently in her head for review, although she did omit the southern bit from her thoughts having forgotten about that minor detail. Babylonia was still on par with everything else, so she hadn't forgotten all that much during the gap between her OWLs, the previous lesson, and now.

Hearing the next question, the sixth year again decided to remain silent in her seat and instead answered inside her head as her own personal review. Because because the Chaldeans felt the 9 was holy, sacred, and thus to be held apart from the rest, she repeated inside her head word for word from the textbook - just as she had memorized it. She could still remember the flashcard she had made about the Chaldean System for her OWLs. Those were not tucked away somewhere inside her sock drawer. She should probably offer those to Selina for her own studying benefits now that she thought about it.

After class she would be sure to find her in the common room...or in the Great Hall. Chances were she would find her in the Great Hall devouring nibbling on some friend chicken or something.

Originally Posted by Steelsheen

He sifted through his notes from last class and raised his hand "Professor the Chaldeans regarded the number 9 as sacred and wanted to keep it separate from the rest of their usual numerological chart." There was something he was wondering about though, since last class. Up goes the hand again "Professor, the Chaldeans still allow a person with 9 as a sum of their number to keep that number, but what meaning would they be using then, given how each number all the way to 52 as a specific meaning? "

Originally Posted by Vanillasweetheart

Oopsie. Chelle didn't know that part about Babylonia, so she took her quill and some parchment and began to scribble it down. She would have to do a little more research from now on before coming for Arithmancy. Yup.

Why was 9 left out?

This was one question she was confident about. A few days ago, she had been wondering the same thing, and she had gone looking for the answer by herself. This was an easy one. "Professor, the number 9 was left out of the Chaldean Number System because the Chaldeans felt that the number 9 was holy, sacred and thus to be held apart from the rest," she replied.

Originally Posted by FireboltAvis88

Alyssa was upset that she had missed answering the last question regarding where the Chaldean System was first used which everyone knew was the Southern most part of Babylon and even though she was slow in answering the next question, she was still determined to give her answer.

So she raised her hand, and answered.

"Professor the Number 9 was left out of the Chaldean Number System because the Chaldeans believed that the number 9 was considered holy and sacred and therefore was considered to be better than the other numbers."

"However, the Chaldeans did still consider the number 9 if it was the number that one's calculation ended up with."

"I guess one of the reasons why it's special and different is because unlike the other numbers, no matter how one multiplies the number 9, it's core number will always reduce back to the number 9."

Originally Posted by FearlessLeader19

"Why is the number 9 omitted from Chaldean Numerology System?"

Jory raised his hand. "It was left out because it was considered to be sacred,'' he said after some thought. If his memory served him right, that indeed was the answer.

Originally Posted by nogoodforyou

"Because it was their sacred number," Nora said as she quickly raised her hand, glad that she finally knew the answer to a question. Well, she probably knew them all, but she just wasn't as quick as others were. Besides, she didn't want to look in her notes before answering. That would be called cheating, eh?

Originally Posted by Princesspower

"The Chaldean culture supposed that, in addition to being highly mystical, the number always vanished. To them, connecting a letter with this number would be bland to the beholder." Said Sarah upon raising her hand.

Originally Posted by ortalismusicoh

This was cool! They were doing like a quiz session. Ness liked this and once again she was greatful to have Hadley her teacher. The red head listened careful giving up a little with answering. She knew only some of those answers anyway and she didn't feel like embarrasing herself by saying the wrong things.

As for this answer, she remembered more or less what it was about, but just to make sure she looked in her book again. "Professor wasnt it because the number 9 was considered to have more importance?" That seemed right..well to Ness it did.

Originally Posted by Leeness

Elijah had spotted the look the Professor had given him when he had been pretending to use his abacus. Perhaps this was not the time to be using his abacus. He'd wait till actual maths started and not this alphabet mumbo jumbo.

He was determined to get back in her good books so waited for the next question to be answered. Now, no matter what question was likely to come out of Professor Hadley's mouth, there was NO chance Elijah was going to know the real answer, so he devised a plan...

The first person to put up their hand was a Huffie girl. Ella, he thought her name was - they met briefly in Care of Magical Creatures, maybe? Or maybe she was one of his admirers that kept coming up to him to tell him how gorgeous he was... ANYWAY.

As Ella raised her hand, Elijah raised his hand in unison. Part one: complete. As the girl began to speak, Elijah's jaw began to move, copying everything she was saying, just a millisecond later than her perhaps, but LOUDER to ensure his answer was the one that was heard. "Left out... because... considered.... HOLY number!"

He gave his biggest smile, smug at how he KNEW this one. Sorta. He turned round to his good friend Vickers, "Look Vickers! I knew one!" So what if everyone in the class was giving a variety of different answers, he was FIRST... kinda.

Originally Posted by naomibabe

Originally Posted by Meizzner

Nigel was now wondering where these questions were going and what they were going to do in this class today. But Nigel did not really care if it wasted time, he just wanted to answer the question.

"Professor, is it because the number 9 was a holy number?"

Originally Posted by Anna Banana

Oh, for the love of Merlin! Did the poor boy have some crush on Hadley, or something? Surely the question didn't need that detailed of answer. Nevertheless, he'd answered just before Sierra, which gave her the upper hand. Why spend valuable time thinking when you can wait for the Puffers to give you all the answers?

Puffers = hard workers

Slytherins = those who benefit from the hard workers

Sierra happened to know this answer, though, and it wasn't what the Puffer had said. "...because the Chaldeans thought the number was holy and should be set apart," Sierra said, raising her hand. "However, ...if a name happens to total nine then the nine remains."

Originally Posted by HOPEendures

Jezzabelle just sat there and made tiny star in her notes next to the answer this time around. The answer had already been thoroughly given by the other students and she also knew the answer herself without having to refer to her notes. So she waited patiently for the next question.

Originally Posted by DancingwithRainbows

Originally Posted by Bazinga

Minerva was confused by the questions. She listened and wrote in her notes what others said, but she hated not knowing the answers. When the next question came she looked into her book and put her hand up, "UMMM.. Professor Hadley could it be they thought the 9 was evil or that it did not add well so they avoided it?" Minerva wasn't really sure, but figured guessing couldn't hurt.