Talk:Chiliarch

Chiliarch: Commandor of 1 000 or 1 200?

Numbers and names makes a peculiar relativity. I don't know of the history of the Greek quanta, but I know that the there has been semiological drift regarding the relationship between the signified number and the signifying names, hundred and thousand. In Norwegian 'a hundred' signified not 100, but 120. The same was for 'a thousand', signifying 1 200. This issue itself seems to have had quite a tremendous symbolic signifiance in the transition into the so-called modernity, related to, and contested between the jewish-christian gematria on one side, and the Roman mercantile practice, and effectiveness of military organisation, on the other side. Therefore I must say, I'm not sure of the accuracy of this article, taking for granted that a thousand is 1000 in the time of Seleucid Nicator and Ptolemy the first. My guess is that the Hellenic was at the time of Alexander the great, perceiving itself a twelve-tribes confederacy, not merely a 10-tribes confederacy, as the Greek, and Roman. But it is not much more than a guess. --Xact (talk) 15:58, 17 August 2011 (UTC)

You're talking about the difference between the short thousand and long thousand. This is a Greek term and the base-12 stuff is mostly restricted to the Germanic language. In any case, the page now more directly addresses the exact numbers involved, which seems to have been approximate and binary (1024 instead of 1000 or 1200). — LlywelynII 10:28, 4 December 2022 (UTC)