Editing Digamma (section)

===Episemon===
The name ''episēmon'' was used for the numeral symbol during the Byzantine era and is still sometimes used today, either as a name specifically for digamma/stigma, or as a generic term for the whole group of extra-alphabetic numeral signs (digamma, [[koppa (letter)|koppa]] and [[sampi]]). The Greek word "{{lang|grc|ἐπίσημον}}", from {{lang|grc|ἐπί-}} (''epi-'', "on") and {{lang|grc|σήμα}} (''sēma'', "sign"), literally means "a distinguishing mark", "a badge", but is also the neuter form of the related adjective "{{lang|grc|ἐπίσημος}}" ("distinguished", "remarkable"). This word was connected to the number "six" through early Christian mystical [[numerology]]. According to an account of the teachings of the heretic [[Marcus (Marcosian)|Marcus]] given by the church father [[Irenaeus]], the number six was regarded as a symbol of Christ, and was hence called "{{lang|grc|ὁ ἐπίσημος ἀριθμός}}" ("the outstanding number"); likewise, the name {{lang|grc|Ἰησοῦς}} (''Jesus''), having six letters, was "{{lang|grc|τὸ ἐπίσημον ὄνομα}}" ("the outstanding name"), and so on. The sixth-century treatise ''[[About the Mystery of the Letters]]'', which also links the six to Christ, calls the number sign ''to Episēmon'' throughout.<ref>{{cite book|last=Bandt|first=Cordula|title=Der Traktat "Vom Mysterium der Buchstaben." Kritischer Text mit Einführung, Übersetzung und Kommentar|place=Berlin|publisher=de Gruyter|year=2007}}</ref> The same name is still found in a fifteenth-century arithmetical manual by the Greek mathematician [[Nikolaos Rabdas]].<ref name="einarson">{{cite journal|last=Einarson|first=Benedict|title=Notes on the development of the Greek alphabet|journal=Classical Philology|volume=62|year=1967|pages=1–24; especially p.13 and 22|doi=10.1086/365183|s2cid=161310875}}</ref> It is also found in a number of western European accounts of the Greek alphabet written in Latin during the early Middle Ages. One of them is the work ''De loquela per gestum digitorum'', a didactic text about arithmetics attributed to the [[Venerable Bede]], where the three Greek numerals for 6, 90 and 900 are called "episimon", "cophe" and "enneacosis" respectively.<ref name="bede">{{cite book|last=Beda [Venerabilis]|title=Opera omnia, vol. 1|editor-last=Migne|editor-first=J.P.|place=Paris|chapter=De loquela per gestum digitorum|page=697}}</ref> From Beda, the term was adopted by the seventeenth century [[Renaissance humanism|humanist]] [[Joseph Justus Scaliger]].<ref>Scaliger, Joseph Justus. ''Animadversiones in Chronologicis Eusebii'' pp. 110–116.</ref> However, misinterpreting Beda's reference, Scaliger applied the term ''episēmon'' not as a name proper for digamma/6 alone, but as a cover term for all three numeral letters. From Scaliger, the term found its way into modern academic usage in this new meaning, of referring to complementary numeral symbols standing outside the alphabetic sequence proper, in Greek and other similar scripts.<ref name="wace">{{cite encyclopedia|encyclopedia=Dictionary of Christian Biography and Literature to the End of the Sixth Century|last=Wace|first=Henry|year=1880|title=Marcosians}}</ref>