Sigma\Code

-" foe Prestel

 Cecil Balmond Number 9
An enigmatic riddle leads
to an astonishing truth
Number 9 is an enthralling mystery and
a study of the intriguing world of numbers
at the same time. In solving the riddle,
Enjil, a boy mathematician, leads us deeper
and deeper into an inner world. Diagrams
and picture maps which illustrate the
book show how the number nine holds the
fate of other numbers, how, like a phantom,
it can change and vanish, or like a virus,
~~ attack and conquer the character of other
numbers.
This enigmatic book reflects a parallel
___ between this hidden world and ours, how
amidst the havoc of our lives we crave
an inner order, its secret code, its quiet
stillness. It comments on patterns dis-
covered, on symmetry, classical ideas and
modern impulses. Ultimately nine is seen
not just as a number but as a beginning
and end, a metaphor for the closed and
secretive or the open and inquisitive. Enjil
is not just another person, but an animation
of our restless spirit, looking for a meaning.
Cecil Balmond
Number 9
 Cecil Balmond

Number 9
wpe
The Search
for the Sigma Code

Nine Fixed Points

in the Wind

Ss.
F rrestel
Munich -New York
To Ruth and Hugh

© Prestel Munich - New York, 1998

All intellectual and pictorial material
is the copyright of the author.
All rights reserved.
No part of this publication may be repro-
duced, stored in a retrieval system or
transmitted in any form or by any means,
electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording or otherwise without the prior
written permission of the author.

Prestel-Verlag
Mandlstrasse 26, D-80802 Munich, Germany
Tel. (89) 38 17 09-0, Fax (89) 38 17 09-35
16 West 22 Street, New York, NY 10010
Tel. (212) 627-8199, Fax (212) 627-98 66

Library of Congress
Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Balmond, Cecil, 1943 -
Number 9. The search for the
sigma code / Cecil Balmond.
ISBN 3-7913-1933-7 (alk. paper)
1. Number theory. |. Title.
QA241.B255 1998
512'.7--de21

All graphics and illustrations

are by the author.
Edited by Christopher Wynne.
Cover-design by Angela Dobrick, Hamburg.
Book-design by Stefan Engelhardt, Muhldorf,
in corporation with Cecil Balmond.
Printed and bound by Spiegel, Ulm.
Printed in Germany on acid-free paper.
ISBN 3-7913-1933-7
To begin the search...
It is like a detective story, gradually unfolding, because
that is how it happened; not just for me but for Enjil,
the boy mathematician who discovered the secret
behind the mysterious world of numbers. In his
case though he would have come to it quickly — but I
laboured long many a night to find the answer. The
thing to do is to follow the path until all the clues are in
place and let your mind run free. It is only then that
you find what the young master saw: the fixed points
in the wind.
I had little to go on, just the stories without any
detail, more legend than fact about how the numbers
worked in secret and, in particular, the magic of one
number.
My grandfather first told me about those stories
and the special drawings and number shapes. Only the
remotest people of the mountain village knew about
these, he said, but it was all too distant and far away for
me to give it any further thought. I was at university
and more interested in working out how to put a
rocket on the moon; playing with arithmetic was not
for me — my mind was occupied with higher things.
Then one day I came across a children’s book on
numbers. One...two...three.... My eye went over
the figures. Suddenly I saw something. There were
hidden patterns; the old man’s story about secret num-
bers came back to me and I became curious. I started to
look into these simple ideas and the more I searched
the more fascinated I became. Something was indeed
going on underneath the surface of arithmetic and
what appeared as a unique calculation to the outside
6 To begin the search...

world was something quite different when viewed

from below. Looked at another way, six and six was
not necessarily twelve but something much more
exciting — the number 3, of a secret code.
I was won over. I began to look at numbers differ-
ently.
I used the special code I had stumbled on to find out
more and track what Enjil had done; I spoke to people
and read books; I looked for the answer to the riddle
that made the Elders blanch and stir uncomfortably on
that fateful day of the Examination. And I finally visi-
ted the mountain villages where the pupils in the
schools stared at the pictures before they did any cal-
culations, in order that they may inspire themselves
for the rigours of the task ahead. The pictures of course
had been added to and decorated heavily but at their
centre stood the original spirit of Enjil’s drawings,
powerful and beautiful.
Through Enjil’s investigation and my own research
I have learnt many things I was never taught at school.
When I think of the effort and the monotony I went
through learning by rote, suffering numbers as
necessary evils, I shudder. No teacher talked of the
spirit of numbers, no teacher showed me the shape of a
number. No one introduced me to a secret code that
made lightning work of numbers and opened up
worlds of wonderful possibilities hidden from the
day-to-day grind; I found that other peoples too, in
ancient times and in other lands, understood numbers
as secret and special and alive, and not as mere
counters, not just fodder for tiring calculations.
 To begin the search... 7

So Iset out on the path Enjil took.

My own labours overlap his and our two stories
have now become one. But that is how a personal
search should be —-with the spirit of that first discovery
reaching out and embracing one until no difference
can be found between one’s own research and the
inspiration that was first taken in. What was the
author’s becomes yours — which must be the meaning
of original, something that embraces and absorbs
all those inquisitive enough to enquire of others’
inventions.
And it is in this spirit I dedicate the journey to you.
Follow the clues, build up the jigsaw piece by piece
and make your own investigations; become part of
the search.
Go back in time and let the free spirit in you enter.
Talk to it, play, ask the strangest questions.
Start to count again in the simplest of ways,

one, two, three, four... up to nine.

You need to do this, but you will also need nine

clues.
And to begin with there is the story of Enjil himself,
the talisman I conjure up whenever I think of numbers
and of the fixed patterns that turn in the wind.
 Nine Fixed Points
in the Wind
Part One
- Talisman... 2

- The Four Corners rf

ofthe Harth........00.. 25
rz
- Archetypes..a... 37

- Reversals... )_

- Secret Numbers
and the Sigma Code......... 61

. Four Precious Mirrors... //

~wWandala ex 99

- Nine Fixed Points

itive Windies2 26

POWErS® . 141
 Movements
of Nine
Part Two ;
. The Search... 158

. Cycles and Pattemms .. 3... 160

. The Golden Section... 1 rot.

. Triangles... 188

5 YRS Ca nioea6 l 9§

. Equations... 206

. Proverbs and Charms... 2 ] a

o INGUIN oie = ierener 2 14

° symbol... 216
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 Nine Fixed Points
in the Wind
Part One
Talisman
Enjil slept uncomfortably, his mind full of torment
in fear of the Examination to come. He was standing
in front of the Elders, those of the supreme rank, and
he had nothing to say! He had not found a proof
or a clever hypothesis to place before them on this
auspicious day. And the day could not be put back —
it marched right up to him, dragging him out
brutally into the open, while the Elders, in their
crimson robes, sat at the high table waiting for him.
They motioned him to come up. He climbed up the
steps and went to the blackboard and picked up the
dry chalk in his wet, nervous hands.
Villagers crammed the square to see him perform.
Word had gone out that the boy with the limp had
magic powers; for when he lay dying from smallpox
a strange bird had suddenly flown in and settled on
his fevered brow, pecking at it. Superstition said
it was the devil who seized a person's brain at such
times, to give out great powers only to suck it back
again at the moment of death, to prevent that tender
soul from being re-born. And amazingly, as the bird
flew away Enjil recovered and began talking in
strange languages and writing down sheets of
numbers, confusing everyone with ideas that they
had never heard of.
 Talisman 13
i = 1 1 —-- — —

Stories travelled through the mountain commun-

ities about the boy with the pockmarked face. How
could the child be so precocious if not for some super-
natural power? (No-one mentioned the devil’s name
for that would bring bad luck down on all of them!)
Enjil’s beleaguered parents took him to the
temple and gave him away to the priests, who in turn
gave him away to the Academy and the Elders, these
same Elders who now were laughing in his face —
“Where is the cleverness that brought you here?”,
they mocked. “You insult us with your silence.
We know who you are; The Devil’s Child, a horrible
trick; a wretch we now must throw out from this
place of learning — Go! Only scholars are admitted
here, true scholars like Vivek , who can work out
the symmetry of magic squares better than you.”
The insults came thick and fast like poisoned darts
thrown at him, tipped with venom.
But the boy had nothing to say, his hand stuck
fixed in the air with the chalk wet in his fingers.
And the villagers became angry at being deceived.
Provoked by Vivek, Enjil’s older rival for the title of
Master, the villagers aroused themselves into a riot.
As the mob hurtled towards him Enjil woke up with
a scream, his heart racing. The sweat poured off him;
he felt he was dying. But framed in his window the
night moon shone brightly, the wind rustling the
leaves like waves washing the shore. There was no
mob, there were no accusing Elders. Everything was
quiet and peaceful. There was really nothing wrong
with the world, or him. The Examination was still
days away; and he was well prepared!
14 Talisman
ee SS ees,

His thesis was done — he had a proof written out

in the higher algebra which his mentor had said
would easily give him the title of Master; it was the
sort of thing the Elders would like, for it was similar
to the studies each of them had done. “It is not about
being original, Enjil”, his mentor said, “for you
must not sit uncomfortably in your superiors’ minds.
Ifyou present something they do not understand,
or agree with as high learning, they will fail you.
Conform, and then privately get on with your real
discoveries. That is what we all do.” His teacher
shrugged at the way life was at the Academy and
worry grew on the old man’s face at the thought of
what his stubborn student mightdo. But Enjil had
listened, he had conformed — his thesis was as fine
a piece of complicated mathematics as one could wish
for, deliberately put together in an obscure way
so that difficulties abounded in every line of the
argument. In truth, Enjil had a much simpler proof;
but it would appear too easy. So he had put it to one
side and applied himself to obscurities in the
demonstration of his thesis, knowing this approach
would be more favoured by the Elders. And the
peace of the night said he had nothing to worry
about but go back to sleep and wait happily for that
day of the Examination.
As he lay there looking up at the moon, his mind
began to wander over the ideas he really loved to
think about, like the expansion of x. Was there
a pattern to it? Or how many unlike squares could
fit into a rectangle or another square? This was a
problem no one at the Academy could solve, though
 Talisman 15
LS
i. | = SS Oe T T aaa |

Enjil had come near. Was every even integer the sum
of two prime numbers as ten was the sum of three
plus seven?
And there was more — the multiplication patterns
along diagonals used by the Chinese or the elegant
ratios used by the ancient geometers that gave beauty
and shape to the spiral and to the growth of the leaves
around a stalk or the petals in a flower.
As he roamed through the numbers in his mind
a strange thing then happened. A moon beam
suddenly reached out to him and dropped to Earth
and turned into a shining woman. “So here you
are!”, she said smiling. “I have kept looking out
for you. I find you here of all places, in a musty old
Academy or is it a temple?” She wrinkled up her
nose at the small room he slept in. The woman
stroked his leg — “Does your leg hurt? Isaw you as
a child, limping, dragging your leg through the
sand, making patterns that were wonderful — my
friends still talk about you. Iam Soma: Do you still
play such games? You gave me and my companions
a lot to think about that day, about the possible
patterns in a matrix, instead ofjust the straight
across and up and down. And now here you are,
almost fully grown, yet still only a boy and sitting
for the Examination of Master! Hah, that will sound
fine — Master Enjil, Master Mathematician! How'd
you like that?”
She patted him on the head and stroked his hair.
Enjil could see the beautiful colours in her eyes. Her
energy flowed into him. She took his thoughts away
and she spoke to him:
16 Talisman
T .agian | er oe gf
i” ees ae

“There are the cumbersome proofs you follow

that only the few will ever understand. Your proofs
are carrion for those vultures, the Elders. So why
don't you do something else, something amazingly
different for your Examination? You are capable
of it! Why give the elders what they want, such a
narrow outcome from your learning; why not
something that everyone can enjoy?
Imagine even the villagers following your every
sign on the blackboard, understanding it and seeing
a simple but great truth unravelling right before
their eyes. Something that lies under their noses,
wouldn't that be fun?
How about drawing the manty different shapes of
squares it takes to fit in just one square. Ah—I know
you were thinking of this already. You see Iknow
your thoughts — so I count them out. And I'll spoil it
for you anyway, I'm going to give you the answer;
twenty-four! Yes, don’t look so amazed, it takes that
many different squares to fit into one square. You
want to know the size of the square that allows this
to happen? Ah, that is harder. That you must work
out for yourself.” She smiled teasingly and added,
“Do you know the answer to the simpler problem;
how many different squares does it take to fit in
one rectangle? I'll tell you. It’s nine! Nine unequal
squares go to make up a rectangle.”
“But why bother about geometry; why not
something simpler than that? What is it that
everyone knows and feels expert about? I'll tell you.
It’s numbers of course! Imagine the village folk
clapping hands and cheering as they see you, their
 Talisman 17
a T T T 1
°

new master, working with the humble materials of

numbers, the tools they use every day of their lives
to count coins and goats and sacks ofgrain from the
harvest. Let your mind dwell on this: numbers!
Take the most simple ones. Think of their make up.
Don't be afraid of the Elders; they are not bad men,
but men with too much oldness stuffed into their
brains. Take them back to their childhood, let them
smile again and hop, skip and jump through your
constructions; what do you think of that? You smile?
Do I take that as yes? Good! Then here is the riddle
you must solve. And remember I will be watching,
now that I have found you; but I won't help. I will
only give you a signal when you succeed. Remember
the only thing that will slow you down or stop you is
the amount your mind has grown up to be like the
Elders, the brain of an expert. The problem I set is
for a child, with a mind that in innocence questions
everything and finds new beginnings. I too, believe it
or not, am like that. I live in the moon and each night
I set a new day. The turning of a fresh beginning
uplifts me. It keeps me from falling into endings and
dull repeat reasonings. Think about that. In your
dreams I will speak to you, I will help. My spirit will
be with you. But now I must go for I have to set
another day. And this is the question I leave you
with:

What is the fixed point in the wind?”

The woman withdrew along the moonbeam and

vanished as ifshe had never been.
18 Talisman
| ha a. . 3 ey eo. oe
f age) nd a
e

Enjil sat up. He looked hard at the moon, staring

into the white disc of cold light —- and the moment of
magic vanished. Was it a trick? Was Vivek his arch
rival for the title of Master trying to hypnotise him
from a distance? If he listened to the woman it would
be like suicide. Standing in that great open courtyard
and speaking about simple things that did not need
proofs would have the Elders laughing at him,
baying like jackals at his feeble efforts. Certainly he
would be thrown out. This must indeed be a hex put
on him by his enemies! -
But what was the fixed point in the wind?
The question intrigued and teased him. How can
something be unmoving in the swirling wind; what
was its fix, ifindeed there was such a point? For
hours he lay awake struggling with these thoughts
until his tired brain came to a stop and wanted rest.
Finally Enjil fell asleep. The woman in the moon
entered his dreams.
And he woke up with a new conviction — the
doubts and torments of the night well behind him.
He whistled and even smiled at Vivek, winking at his
arch rival as ifto say he had prepared a brilliant
proof. Enjil laughed to himself when he thought of
the title he would introduce to his Elders on the day of
the Examination. He would wear the yellow robe of
scholarship, go up to the blackboard and announce
in his most stern voice the customary words, “My
respectful Elders and Seniors. I submit for your
Examination and proper adjudication this thesis I
have now prepared for the award of the Most Expert
Master of Mathematics, the honour I now seek,
 Talisman 19
ie ee eee T —T —— ae 1

and pronounce as the title of my learned subject:

‘The Fixed Points in the Wind’.” He could see them
writhing in agony, splitting their sides with laughter
and thirsting for his blood. The images made him
break out in a cold sweat. But a small voice spoke
inside saying, “Don't be afraid — of course you can do
it— after all it is an easy question — so solve it like a
child, think like one, just like I said.”
To solve the riddle Enjil went to a secluded spot
and sat in the shade of a banyon tree and blanked
everything he knew out of his mind. The great
blackness descended. Nothing moved. Shadows went
into deeper shadows, layer into layer. A black disc
grew. First as a dot, then a circle, then a rushing
blind movement. Then the numbers came out,
tumbling one over the other, rolling the patterns over
in his head. There were the star patterns, zigzags,
squares, cubes, seesaws and the weaving patterns
going in and out, all twisting over each other.
Mindful of the woman spirit, he looked at the
simplest numbers; he followed their trails, the white
and black patterns, some, dotted with colour, moving
like the wind, changing shape and turning all the
time. And there in the simplest patterns were points
that did not move or change, no matter what the
numbers were. And they were fixed points. When the
woman in the moon had talked of the wind Enjil
knew she must have spoken of numbers, jumping
over each other in gusts of multiplications or
blowing steadily in ordered breezes of additions and
subtractions. But within these patterns, there was
one number and point through which all the others
20 Talisman
eS a ee ee ee
ba

seemed to gather — it indeed must be the fixed point.

Could that be the answer to the riddle?
Then Enjil opened his eyes and composed his
thesis. It was so simple that he laughed out loud.
Never mind the Elders — they would have to love it,
for he would draw the movements of all numbers
in one simple diagram. What was clever about it was
the method he had in his mind. He would take the
secret code the Elders knew about but had never
thought of using to look beyond their rituals of
prophecy, for they would take the letters of someone's
name and use such secret numbers to divine the
character of that person. But Enjil vowed to go
beyond this. ‘
That night he wrote out his thesis. When hé had
finished he went out into the deserted courtyard and
held up each page to the moon. “Look”, he said to the
woman in the moon, “I have finished — the task is
done. I pray these are the answers.”
A shape seemed to move across the face of the
yellow disc though he could not be sure. But the
woman did not appear. The wind picked up, the
night chill made him shiver. Tomorrow was the day,
and Vivek would be hoping for his downfall; and his
teacher would fret to the last moment as the Elders
assembled, sharpening their wits in readiness to
humble the nervous candidate. The crowd would
gather and settle. Everyone would be waiting,
watching.
Still, Enjil was at peace. His ideas were simple,
innocent; he believed they would shine through
no matter what. While Vivek performed great feats
 Talisman 21
ae T a| — 1

of algebra Enjil would offer to the Elders and

the gathered crowd the four precious mirrors of
arithmetic. They could all laugh or puzzle at the
reflections he would show them, but in time their
doubts would vanish or be blown away, just as the
gusting wind cleans out the dirt lying on the ground.
Suddenly a bright light flared, lighting up the
compound for an instant, and then faded. Had the
woman come to him and acknowledged his answer?
Enjil rolled up the pages of his thesis and held up
his hand, just in case, to the night sky in salute and
farewell and then went to bed. He slept the peace of
the innocent, a fixed point himself in that night of
swirling anxieties and jealousies. Tomorrow would
be anew beginning.

I wear Enjil’s Talisman now, whenever I calculate and

look into numbers, and remember the mathematician
who was a boy. He inspires me to look afresh at things.
Enjil went on to be famous. He surprised the Elders
with his arguments of the fixed point in numbers; he
astonished the crowd. And if not for them cheering as
they did at what was being drawn on the board, the
Elders would surely have failed him — the old men
being insulted that there was no high algebra or long-
winded, obscure complications to be resolved. Enjil’s
workings were just basic arithmetic, they grumbled,
which even a nine year old could follow, they whis-
pered to each other. It was laughable; it was ridiculous
and all too simple. But the crowd cheered and cried
out, “Master, Master,” so many times, that the Elders
22 Talisman
= — | ae T ar a er | 1

gave in. On the boy’s shoulders they placed the purple

sash of Master embroidered with winding circular
motifs in gold thread, and then they held up Enjil’s
hand to the crowd who in turn roared, “Mas-Ter, Mas-
Ter”. The four syllable chant rocked the compound.
When the dust cleared and the noise subsided and the
courtyard was empty, the temple still hummed long
into the night with stories of the new Master’s cheek
and sheer luck.
So Enjil went on to be the real Master of the Acad-
emy, outshining everyone and everything. He proved
many things, much of it beyond the best minds in that
Academy of high learning. But he kept faithful, from
what we know of his teachings, to the simple and
straightfoward, and always the beautiful arid in-
triguing. The Master saw patterns where others only
saw calculations.
Then disaster struck. In the wars that ravaged the
country the Academy was set on fire and the intellec-
tuals speared to death. Enjil and his papers and all the
great library of learning in the Academy were lost for-
ever. No one found the young mathematician’s body.
Soon the story went out confirming Enjil as a spirit
child, one that visited Earth now and then to remind
us of the greater glories that hid elsewhere. Others said
it was the work of the devil, who flew in to collect the
soul that he had claimed for himself long ago, when
the little boy had lain dying from a fierce attack of
smallpox.
Whatever the truth of it the crooked smile and
limping walk of the Master was no more, severely
missed by those who loved him. Those who were there
 Talisman 23
ae
.
i a a aa | 1

on that day of the Examination told others. And the

words and diagrams spread. The ideas travelled from
community to community; changes and additions
were made along the way. But the basic structure Enjil
proposed is still there in the teaching.
Modern ways have swept across the culture of this
great land and hand calculators and computers have
taken away the simple romance of numbers, but in
remote parts of the highlands, in locked away villages,
young mathematicians still look at Enjil’s patterns and
meditate for half an hour before doing any serious
mental computation.
What follows is a trace of the young Master’s
working, gleaned from private study and old village
stories. With Enjil we move towards finding the magic
of numbers and that special point, which though full
of movement itself, remains unmoving and stationary;
just as a fixed point does in the wind.
The Four Corners
of the Earth
26 The Four Corners of the Earth
ke ee ee SP es
ae oe

Clue 1: Corners of the Earth

The first clue is in the wind itself; where does it come

from; where does it go? During the summer the land
mass heats up and the cool sea wind is dragged in from
the South-West and with it the monsoon rain. In the
winter, the cold ice of the mountains chills the land but
the Northern seas are warmer; the wind blows out in
that direction, towards the North-East.
In other countries similar changes take place be-
tween the seasons. There is no fixed pattern. The wind
moves in all directions, coming or going, its movement
held by the swing of summer or winter. The season’s
alternation gives the dynamic. Local features inter-
vene affecting fast or slow, gust or breeze, and in small
pockets different directions take hold. But we can give
a sense of order to this swirling change by mapping
eight directions.

First we mark the cardinal points North-South and

East-West.
 The Four Corners of the Earth 27
T Ss ae T | a tee T ——=)

Then the directions of North-East, North-West and

South-East, South-West, are marked as four more
corners.

NW NE

SW SE

If the points of the arrows are plotted on the ground

there are now eight points that corner the wind.

But these points only have meaning if there is a centre,

that is, the origin of the framework. We need a ninth
point, the centre of a star that radiates in eight ways.
28 The Four Corners of the Earth
ee le a % 1
ir i T
.

Whilst eight points give outer meaning, the ninth

point in the centre of organisation makes a strategy
possible for mapping direction.

A long time ago the cube was

the symbol for the world.
Square in elevation and plan,
of even character, the cube was
the essence of the solid body
of the earth and stood as
a symbol for its substance.

Eight corners of the cube gives sufficient outward

consolidation and mapping to shape, but hidden in the
construction and implicit is a ninth point, the fixed
point through which all else happens. In this defining
point of the cube, where all its mass is supposed to act,
a centre of balance and symmetry occurs at the secret
heart of volume.
 The Four Corners of the Earth 29
’ i = T ir T ee 1

Is nine special?
At first I did not think so; it was not obviously a num-
ber I thought of as auspicious. But then I found that
Buddhist relics in stupas are buried at a central ninth
point, around which eight small buddhas sit marking
the directions of the world.
I found that the number nine seems to be a point of
initiation and departure, a beginning and an end.
In human life it is nine months from the moment
of conception to the birth of a baby. And at a practical
level there are nine passageways in and out of the
body.
There are nine parts to heaven and nine planets!
I found stories and myths full of the number nine.
Yes, there are other numbers that are used in old
legends; numbers like 7 are part of the Bible stories
and its lucky mark holds in many myths of good omen.
And looking through the reference books on myths,
number 3 comes over as a very powerful number
because the first organisation of ‘things’ seem to be in
threes: the Three Bears, the Three Blind Mice, the
Three Kings, and the Holy Trinity. But 3 of course is the
prime mover of 9. It is the thrice magnification of three
that makes up the power of nine!
So the references grow as one probes; number nine
seems to have an uncommon hold in the early stories
we first made to describe the world. But before we
enter this frame of archetype, we must first look briefly
at the characters of the numbers themselves, their
symbols and their qualities and witness their hold over
our imagination.
30 The Four Corners of the Earth
r a rie ea SS Ee
.

Numbers
In the world of arithmetic numbers are just counters,
they are markers in calculations, having no other
property but to represent their own value. But if I look
for relationships between the numbers then some-
thing else happens, the numbers come alive.
The great discovery of Pythagoras that 3, 4 and 5
were not just plain numbers in a sequence but that

72g= 5
defined right angledness, is an exciting idea to contem-
plate. But when I find that

Peg eo é
a whole new layer of intrigue and speculation grows
over the previous answer. The question is asked: are
there other such patterns in the hypotenuse of right-
angled triangles? When the answer is yes, we are led
into a world of open-eyed wonder that such relation-
ships even exist. We enter a world of number theory
and find strange families and fascinating behaviour
patterns. The search is a pure reward because we find
out patterns for their own sake; the numbers seem to
grow in character and develop their own sense of
mystery.
And if we contemplate what a number means to
us, in our imagination, a further layer grows as to what
its colour or shape is. Is it awkward or comfortable,
powerful and royal or cadaveric and evil? If we just
close our eyes and think of numbers, we open all
of our senses to them. I can touch them and ‘feel’
their texture or inward force. Are they magical?
 The Four Corners of the Earth 31
eS ae aa T Sree T tr = 1

Uniquely, they touch us in different ways, exactly

according to our own make-up. Some are steady and
robust, some vibrant and exciting, others dynamic and
lucky.
What is intriguing is that the smaller a number
is the more potential it seems to have. Large numbers
do not seem to be as interesting as small numbers.
Smallness seems to focus a number better in our
mind’s eye. And the smallest we can make them
are the single digits, one to nine.

LitA seta Leas Oapde p09

These numbers have fantastic potential, for from
here, in their purest form, they go on to structure the
gigantic surfaces of all the combinations of numbers,
and Enjil’s discoveries lead us to find surprising shared
characteristics even between these numbers.
But I am now getting ahead of myself; that story
has still to unfold. The clues must be played out and
chased, and puzzled over.

First, let me introduce the characters themselves.

 32 The Four Corners of the Earth
ee a ee ee =.
——- >
.

Odd and Prime

THREE is special — we are ‘three times lucky’. Most
important categories come in threes, like Mother,
Father and Child, or the Trinity of the Christians:
Father, Son and Holy Ghost. The atom is classified in
three main parts as Proton, Neutron and Electron, and
__ all matter is either solid, liquid or gas. Three is also the
mark of the eternal triangle, the first definition of a
two dimensional area according to books on geometry.

To Sorcerers and Magicians number FIVE is the most

powerful — five is the mark of the pentacle, a five
pointed star drawn by extending the sides of a
Pentagon. Five surely is in the possession of the occult.
And the Pentagon is the geometric figure in which the
golden ratio of classical art and architecture is found
most.

To others SEVEN is the lucky number, associated with

mystery and mysticism. In the world of the Buddhists
and the Taoists seven spirits put the world in order, the
seventh putting the pillars of the Heavens in place to
complete the act of creation sublime.

3, 5 and 7 are all odd numbers — they are also the first
prime numbers. And luck and power are associated
with these numbers.
 The Four Corners of the Earth 33
a Sas | ————— = ‘an es 1

Number ONE is the beginning of all numbers. Every

number is an accumulation of units of ones. Since one
is the source, it is the binding principle of all numbers
and in a sense is beyond counting. One stands for iden-
tity. We stand upright in the individual figure of one,
and we stand together as one.

Even Numbers
Like one, the number TWO is also important as a basic
principle; it provides all doubling and evenness. It
smoothes out all angularities and oddness, for twice an
odd number gives an even number. If one is unity,
then two is duality and provides a balance between
opposing halves. Two is also unique amongst prime
numbers — it is the only even one.

To the ancient Greeks FOUR was the symbol of the

Earth. Standing ‘four square’ was also the measure of
Pythagorean justice. Christians mark a figure of four
points on their person in the sign of the Cross. A
curious property of 4 is that any odd number squared,
when divided by four, leaves a remainder of one.
34 The Four Corners of the Earth
f , a cos See ae ee 2a = z
°

For centuries mathematicians praised the number SIX

as perfect — that is a number whose divisors sum up to
the number itself. (Six can be divided by one, two, and
three and these numbers when added come to six.)
Perfect numbers are rare and very hard to find. Six is
the number of days it took God to make the world. Six
is the number of sides of a hexagon, also the first shape
of geometry found in nature, as in the honeycomb.

To the early Greeks a person was a full chord of eight

notes. And number EIGHT to numerologists is an aus-
picious number having affinities with twos and fours.
There is also a curious relationship to number four in
the division of numbers; all prinfe numbers when
squared and divided by eight leave a remainder of one!

So we skip through the basic digits very quickly and

have a thumbnail sketch for

dead DatborndeOs
ifod

But where is
number NINE ?
 The Four Corners of the Earth 35
Ss er = 7 ie T 1

Seen as last in the line, before zero slips in and we

start counting again, is nine a last stop charlie?
Yet its stepping stones()and()seem to have a
special power.
Three and six blaze with luck and perfection. And
nine is also three times three, magnifying the power of
three. Perhaps after all nine may come to hold a special
promise.

26s 9 luck + perfect ?

Jo =e9 luck x luck ?

Nine is also twice four plus one. But four is equal to

two plus two so

Peete
2s) I- =. 2

Nine seems to be a number in qualitative terms full of

inner fortifications: luck, perfection and doublings.
Perhaps we glimpse some of this in the arrow tips of
the wind and in the binding symmetry of a cube, both
built on the organisation of an unseen but vital ninth
point, the central point. Maybe nine is the core be-
tween all the corners of the world? And what takes us
to the corners of the world is the stories. Once upon a
time we gave shape to these stories with numbers; in
the traditions that grew, the numbers became arche-
types, with a symbolic power all of their own.
36
Archetypes
38 Archetypes
f — oe a Te ie — 1

Clue 2: Archetypes

First there is the archetype of symbol.

A thousand years ago the number nine was fixed
by Arab mathematicians in the notation we now use,
the curling in of a line that turns continuously.

But Arabic mathematicians inherited a Hindu script

in AD 876 and an inscription from Gwalior which
showed the number 9 like this: ‘

Gn
The Gwalior inscription in turn came from a develop-
ment of the earlier Brahmin numeral for nine, from
the second century AD. And before that came the
older histories and markings of the Romans, Hebrews,
Greeks, Chinese, Babylonians and Egyptians.
 Archetypes a?

Figures of Nine

: 648
Egyptian $8
64 8

vvyv
Babylonian VVvY¥
vvy

Chinese Tt

Greek eG

Hebrew (5

Roman 1p.

Indian G\.

Arabic 93
40 Archetypes
+. Shae ee ee ee eS
.

Then there are the tales of great spirits and strange

forms that govern the beginning and endings of things.
They are the stories across cultures which invoke nine
as a magic ingredient in rites of passage.

The Seeds of Nine

Yang formed the Heavens and Yin formed the Earth. And
Pan Ku, who was in the middle, changed his form nine times
a day, sometimes into a God in heaven or into a saint here on
earth.

A dead person must cross the Chinvat or ‘grading’ bridge,

which is as wide as nine spears laid end to end for the just,
and as narrow as the finest edged razor blade for the wicked.
(From Persia)

The dwelling place of the dead is not easy to get to; there are
steep mountains to climb, terrible deserts to cross and poison-
ous snakes to confront. The wind pierces the body and the
weary soul looks for a final resting place but first must cross
Hell's frightening rivers, all nine of them.
(From Mesoamerica)
 Archetypes 41
=. T im i 1

Homer wrote in the Odyssey:

At the age of nine, they were nine orbits wide and nine
fathoms tall and they threatened the Immortals by bringing
the tumult of war to Olympus. They wanted to pile Mount
Ossa onto Olympus and Mount Pelion with the restless leaves
onto Mount Ossa in order to mount their assault on Heaven.

Haephaestus was a magician, unique in the world of the

Gods, but he was lame and his mother thought him ugly and
dropped him from Olympus. He was brought up for nine
years in an underwater cave by Tethys and Eurynome and he
there learned handicrafts and the art of jewellery and the
making of necklaces.
(Iliad XVII)

It took Vulcan nine days to reach the island of Lemnos when

he was banished from Olympus.
The voyages of Odysseus lasted for nine years before he
arrived home.
The duration of the siege of the City of Troy was nine
years.
The Ark of Delucion was tossed about for nine days when
it became stranded on top of Mount Parnassus.

When the fallen angels were cast out of heaven for “nine days
they fell.” (Milton, Paradise Lost)
42 Archetypes
| eae Fs T a T SS aS ae
.

Niobe, the wife of Amphion, King of Thebes, boasted of the

number of children she had. Latona raging with mad
jealousy called her own two children to seek a terrible revenge
and Niobe’s loved ones were destroyed. For nine long days
Niobe lay beside her children, weeping for them, before their
bodies were buried into the darkness and she was turned into
stone.

In the old ways of the Norse, Odin was a great traveller, and
he wanted to understand everything. But wisdom could not
be bought by gold or silver, so he gave his eye to the woman
who guarded the fountain of Mimir, so that he could truly see.
And Odin discovered the runes, the sacred writing which
allowed thought itself to be set down and passed on. To do this
he hung from the tree which was battered by the winds for
nine long terrible nights, pierced by a spear. Without having
eaten or drunk he picked up the runes shouting out he knew
how to increase and prosper. He engraved the runes into wood
carvings.

Heimdallr, the God of the Norse people, could see everything

and never closed his eyes. He could hear everything, the grass
climbing out of the earth and the wool growing on the back of
sheep. He guarded the foot of the rainbow which led to the
Gods. Heimdallr, the special one, was born of nine mothers.
 Archetypes 43
r ry ai ma (he 1

There were nine Muses; they were the children of Zeus and
Mnemosyne. They were not only divine singers but they were
patrons of all intellectual activities of the times, including the
highest, which was everything that freed man and gave access
to the eternal truths. These included Eloquence, Persuasion,
Wisdom, Knowledge, Mathematics, Astronomy as well as
Poetry, Music and Dancing.

There were also nine virgin priestesses of the ancient oracle.

Dryden wrote in The Flower and The Leaf:

Nine worthies were they called, of different rites,
Three Jews, three pagans, and three Christian Knights.

The Jews were Joshua, David, and Judas Maccabaeus;

The Gentiles were Hector, Alexander,
and Julius Caesar;
The Christians were Arthur, Charlemagne,
and Godfrey of Bouillon.

Sometimes the nine worthies were referred to as being

three from the Bible, three from the Classics and three
from romance.
44 Archetypes
oe
ey

But nine covers Hell and the dark side in thrice three-
fold ways as well.

At last appear
Hell-bounds, high reaching to the horrid roof,
And thrice threefold the gates; three folds were brass,
Three iron, three of adamantine rock,
Impenetrable, impaled with circling fire
Yet unconsumed.
(Milton, Paradise Lost)

To make a charm the witches chant:

Thrice to thine,
and thrice to mine, .
and thrice again to make up nine.
(Shakespeare, Macbeth 1 [iii])
 Archetypes 45
|semen a T =e T ii T 1

Buddha was the ninth incarnation of Vishnu.

Vishnu created the world in three strides. He pushed apart the

universe and placed the sky, the heavens and the earth in
their rightful place.

Three times three, the trinity of trinities, gains select

status then as the doubling and resourcing of special
power.

SPOS
a eK,
From ancient times number nine was seen as a full
complement; it was the cup of a special promise that
brimmed over.

The organisation of heaven:

Seraphims Cherubims Thrones

Dominions Powers Virtues
Principalities Archangels Angels

To the Greeks a person was a full chord of eight notes; the

ninth was the all embracing sound of the deity.
46 Archetypes

So nine enters religion.

Allah is blessed with 99 names and the Feast of Rama-

dan is on the 9th month of the lunar year.

For the Cabbalists there were ten emanations of God; from

Malkuth, the Kingdom Earth, a soul has to leave its earthly
body and move upwards towards the nine spheres above to
reach Kether, the creative Godhead itself. It is easy to see how
early numerology assigned nine as the Royal Number, the
mark given to high creativity.

In the Catholic Church there are nine First Fridays. In a

vision from God St Marguerite Marie ‘Alacoque, a French
nun, was given the message that special devotion should be
made to the Sacred Heart. On the first Friday of every month
for nine consecutive months, those who attend Mass and
receive the Sacrament of the Eucharist, pray that special grace
is granted.

Novenas, which are said for special intentions, are for a

period of nine consecutive days.
 Archetypes 47
T T T en

On the Sermon on the Mount there are nine categories

called Blessed:
Blessed are the poor in spirit; the patient;
and those who mourn;

Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for holiness;

Blessed are the merciful;
Blessed are the clean of heart;

Blessed are the peace-makers; those who suffer persecution

in the cause of right; and those who are reviled and have all
manner of evil spoken against them in His name.
(Matthew 5, 3:12)

Jesus was crucified at the Third hour.

At the Sixth hour the world was plunged into darkness.
At the Ninth hour Jesus yielded up his spirit and died.
(Mark 15, 25:39)
48 Archetypes
rc 2 ee | gta ‘= 3 a

Beyond the stories there are the numbers themselves:

the Great Year of Babylon;

the verses in the Rg- Veda;
the choirs of angels in the Book of Revelation;
the years in Hell for a Buddhist;
the gates to Valhalla;
and all the names of Allah.

The Babylonian Great Year is 432 000 years long.

Written thousands of years ago, that most sacred

Hymn and first recorded poem ‘of existence, the
Rg-Veda of the first Hindus, has stanzas 10800 in
number.

In the Book of Revelation a choir of 144000 angels

redeemed the Earth.

For the devout Buddhist, Hell can last 576 million

years!

Valhalla is said to have up to 5 400 gates to Hell.

Allah has 99 names.

 Archetypes 49
; : t ’ v T iat i 1

When I look at these great and awesome numbers

there is one surprise, they all have a secret; in each
case the sum of their digits adds up to nine!

432 000 > 44+3424+0+0+0 =o

10800 > 14+04+8+0+0 = 9
144000 = 1+4+4+0+0+0 —_o
576 ee ee Ee0 A eee le eas ea)
5 400 > 54+44+0+0 = 9
99 DEOe NS eS = 9

Deep down in the fabric of the numbers that describe

and classify these great events is number nine, planted
like a hidden seed. Throughout sacred literature this
number keeps cropping up as the mark of auspicious
events, acting as a trigger point of initiation or
departure.
Even in the archetypes of our hands, nine is a
catalyst to counting. Each finger can be divided
vertically into 9 points, a series of 3 on each side and
one up the middle. The points on one finger can then
be allocated numbers 1-9. The next finger can be
marked from 10-90 another 100-900 and so on,
until with one hand, as the early Chinese did, one can
count up to ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and
ninety-nine.

ee
SR DD
50 Archetypes
ea T See

COUNTING FROM | - SSSSF.

loo Gee too

ste 6000 Fooe

6p \t
e ooh re 4800 a

Bdeph Bh
50 \e@° _ 28 * € Scene

r
ty
e

s 8 300 4p0 Soo 4c00

. 5
30) 40e
\s° 3o, ° 39000
4, ah
3 2oonf es

Soees F000

J000° rs 80 006

4ooco
 Archetypes 51
7 T 1
aa :
arg eet

Ce) hey th
ie.
9x2=|8
Sx3224

9x =45 Sx6=S4
9xA=36

Sx¥5=8\
9xe=42
5x7=-63

Muctr@eving. BY NINE
52 Archetypes
aun anSS Seen eeimetii san aca: ainda: iat

The First Magic Square

The Emperor Fuh-hi was sailing down the Yellow River and
saw a large turtle in the water, on its back were strange mark-
ings. The marks made up the sign of the lo-shu, or first magic
square, each dot standing for a number.

Today we arrange the lo-shu into the nine parts of a

square and instead of dots use numbers to mark down
the magic. The square is supposed to bring luck.

Whatever the direction of

addition, vertical, horizontal
or diagonal, the numbers in
the square add up to 15.
The square is 3 x 3 = 9 parts.

And the magic number 15 adds up to 1 + 5 =6

If you multiply the numbers across each line 4 x 9 x 2;

3 x 5 x 7; and 8 x 1 x 6 and add them up, the total
Ih WAP
AS
Similarly if you multiply the vertical lines
4% 3X 649 x5 Svand 2 x 7 x 6 and add them up
the total is also 225. And2+2+5=9.
 Archetypes 53
a ea =a Pe 1

We have the stepping stones of nine@G)-(6)-(Q)

emerging in an intriguing way.
By travelling through the archetypes of ancient
times we see the number nine as a mark of passage, of
initiation and departure, and a number full of mystery.
But these stories are all qualitative, and intriguing as
they are, a much greater curiosity lies in finding out
just what nine does in the world of numbers.
To find the real character of nine we have to enter
a special world and peer into the four precious mirrors
of arithmetic. There we must catch reflections and
pursue the elusive nature of what turns out to be a
chameleon amongst numbers, now you see it, now
you don’t.
But first, we have to play a trick with reversals.
Reversals

9
56 Reversals
r Xo T — me ai CC Utee
.

Clue 3: Reversal of Nine

A trick with numbers that the conjurers played went like this:

Take any three digit number, say 781.

Reverse it and subtract it from the original number:

781
— 187
594

Now reverse this answer 594 to 495

and add it back to the last sum:

594
+ 495
1089

Whatever three figure number is used the number

1089 always comes up. The only rules to follow are
that the first digit of the chosen number must be
greater than the last digit, so that subtraction can take
place, and that the 0 is not omitted if it arises after the
first subtraction.
 Reversals 57
Te a ale |cei matte 7 — er fi

Examples

652 562 221

— 256 — 265 = leg
396 297 099

396 297 099

+ 693 +. 192 + 290
1089 1089 1089

The answer is always 1089. Try it!

If the same idea is now repeated with any two figure

number, always keeping the first digit higher than the
last one we get:

Original number 8&1 4]

Reverse and
subtract - I18 14
63 rwe

Reverse answer
and add + 36 + te
99 99

Nine is somehow at the heart of the matter.

58 Reversals
Fr eo iat a: ei Ca mai ae

Where does 1089 come from?

Adding up the digits of 1089 gives:

1+0+8+9 18
and 1+8 9

Two 99s go up to make 1089 as follows:

99
+ 99
1089

When 1089 is divided by 9 the answer is

12]

a symmetrical number. Reading from left to right it is

the same, as if a mirror runs through number two.
There are further symmetries within this number
because it is also the self replication or square of yet
another symmetrical number.

12] = 11x11
 Reversals 59
ret ee T T aT

Number 9 is connected somehow with reversal but, at

the same time, there is a hint of symmetry in the way
1089 is structured.

Task for the reader:

Try reversing four or five or six figure numbers in the

same manner — see what happens with 4 321 or 79 685
or 528 613? Try decimals. Add the digits in the answers
you get. Are they a multiple of nine?

ee
60
Secret Numbers
and the Sigma Code
62 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code
.

Clue 4: Secret Numbers

In an idle moment one day, as the sun shot its ninety

nine thousand rays over my desk, I wrote down the
integer values 1 to 99 in serial fashion, in rows of nine:

oe ee
Jt} bi -Id 13 1413 16-47 I8
IS 2Z0" 21 22 23 24) 25> 26 as
26 29 SU Je ee
37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45
46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53, 54
22 36°97 268? 60 GIG2) 62
64 65 66 67 68 69 70 71 72
72 74 f5e i6. 77 7S 72 GO si
82 83 84 85 86 87 88 89 90
91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99

As I scanned the numbers I realised suddenly that the

entire table was but a repeating pattern.
 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code 63
a eR ee Ee eo | eb il

For example, the third and fourth rows in the table

PO Al hha telie adh teh isch O prek dy

AGw2D) BO 23d 324.33 0349330 36,

reduced to the same nine values as the first row in the

table when the digits in each number were added up.
(If on addition the answer was greater than ten, then I
added up the numbers again to get a single value. For
example. -19..=. 1-4+-9-=-10<and 4 + 90 = 1;
20=2+0=2,andsoon).

The table I had written out from 1 to 99, then reduced

to nine rows of numbers, each one identical to the first
comprising just the values one to nine.

Ps: Gg" 7 eo 9
This was intriguing. Nine digits running through
everything. My moment of idleness vanished and I
became excited, asking the question: how had the
number 9 jumped out at me so easily, from out of these
figures? The answers seemed to lie not in the numbers
themselves but under the surface - where undercur-
rents left a different trace, revealing hidden patterns to
a secret eye.
64 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code
f aes! ei a ee ee Oe ee |?oe

So with the number nine as inspiration, believing in its

royal and creative values, I decided to use this short-
hand to get me into the heart of the riddle: What were
the fixed points in the wind? And what did number
nine have to do with this; was nine the end of the line
or something else, at the fixed centre of things?
 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code 65
a ee a ULE ee

The Sigma Code

Each and every number has a secret number. Buried
beneath the surface, hidden within the construction is
another mark, a secret code that defines the original
number. Like the elements in chemistry, like the
alphabet in language, it is a primary classification from
which all else flows. It is an imprint.

It is a digital code with only nine values.

hind 3: Amd 6--<f-899

Each number reduces to just one such value when its
integers are summed up.

32 has the hidden number 5 for 3%2 = 5

81 has the hidden number 9 for 8+l1
100 has the hidden number 1 for1+0+0 =| \O
m

Because secret numbers are derived by an additive

process I call them sigma numbers, using the Greek
letter = (sigma) which in time-honoured tradition in
mathematics stands for adding things up.
66 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code
Po <= oe — oer >
eee

B32 =5
r8l =9
2100= 1 (1+0+0=1)
L148 =4 (14+44+8=13; 1+3=4)

What happens with a big number?

If the digits of 1035 721 are added up

we get 21035721 =1

[40434 8204202 ae
and 1+9= 10
and I+0= J .

The sigma value of a number

is the ultimate essence of a number.
It is the hidden mark which lurks
within the greater construction;
in this sense it is a primary code,
a blueprint.
 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code 67
a a. a ae : aa e ei | st

Mental additions can be done rapidly due to a strange

property of the sigma code. If there is a 9 in the num-
ber it can be left out. Moreover, as one adds up the
digits, every time the sum comes to nine or a multiple
of nine these accumulations or partial sums can be left
out and the addition continued.

Examples:

2392 = 5

I get the same answer if I add three and two, dropping

the nine, as when I add up all the numbers three, nine
and two, and get fourteen, for 1 +4=5.

Suppose I want to add the digits of the number:

495342619

If I start from the left, I leave out the first 9 and add;
4 +5. But this sums to 9 so I leave it and carry on;
3 +4+2 which also sums to 9, so I drop this as well and
carry on; 6 + 1 = 7; and I leave out the last 9. The
sequence of short cut additions give a final answer of 7.

Bev IZ42619 = 7

When adding up the digits, one can start anywhere.

Seize on the pattern that gives the simplest, quickest
addition, looking out for the dropping of nines. Very
quickly the reader will become adept at really fast
addition, anticipating which numbers add to nine and
can be left out without affecting the final answer.
68 Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code
Es :jas “=< T ea a eee ee

Number Trace
If we want to know what the sigma value of 16 x 253 is
we only need to multiply their individual sigma code
values to get the number we want.

216 = 7 2253 = 210 = 1

The answer is one times seven which is seven and this

checks out with the longer calculation.

X(16
x 253) = 24048 = 216 = 7
You see how powerful the method is to check calcula-
tions. If there are any errors in the calculations the
code will reveal it, because numbers cannot shake off
their blueprint. .

The sigma code leaves a permanent trace.

Secret Numbers and the Sigma Code 69
 Four Precious Mirrors

Addition: Clue 5
Subtraction: Clue 6
Multiplication: Clue 7
Division: Clue 8
72 Four Precious Mirrors
tS
ee Se oe oe

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jonr Tran
uf | & $
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+

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& in
> FE

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IXIFEX
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H+tK—
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Et
ED
KKH
 Four Precious Mirrors 73
i atta a -( 7 a Be) ele ay T ‘ieee 1

Four Precious Mirrors

O)
Armed with the code we go on to look into the
precious mirrors of arithmetic, the four infinite planes
of adding, subtracting, dividing and multiplying, that
manipulate all numbers.
The sigma code lays down a trace of how numbers
work in secret, we can peer into their basic patterns.
But it is only when these patterns are seen as a whole
that the beauty of the code is revealed and the
astonishing truth of number nine at the heart of our
number system.
(And here we must thank zero for even allowing
the sigma code to exist. For without zero the process of
reduction would not work. Adding digits to pare down
to a single digit is dependent on our unique placement
value system of units, tens, hundreds, etc. Zero allows
the code to be bound within the range 1-9).
74 Four Precious Mirrors
r a is ee ee ee a ot es ee

Clue 5: Addition

When 9 or a multiple of 9 is added to a number, the answer

has the same sigma value as the original number.

33+9 = 42

Written down more formally according to the sigma

code:

DHSS: 242
(3 + 3) (4+ 2)

The addition of 9 leaves no trace! But try this with

another number and it does not nas Add, say, seven
to thirty-three:

33+7 = 40

As before the digits 33 add up to six, (3 + 3); but the

corresponding answer of forty adds up to (4 + 0) giving
four. And six does not equal four.
 Four Precious Mirrors 75
rr ail epee = “aa a ia |ei T 1

Other examples:

132 + 9 = fal
44+ 18 = 62
If + 36 = 47

In each of the above examples the number on the

left of the addition has the same sum of digits as the
corresponding answer on the right hand side. Nine
seems to change nothing under the sigma code.

That is:

Sole
6. = S14)
Dad = 5 = >.62
DH 2 = a7 (4+7=11; 14+1=2)

This indeed is a strange situation. In the world of arith-

metic, addition makes things grow and the outcome is
expected to be bigger than any one of the starting
numbers. But when the hidden trace of numbers is
investigated something else happens. There is no
change at all when nine or one of its multiples is added
to a number. In secret, as it were, the original number
is allowed to pass unchanged. If any number other
than nine is used in the addition the hidden trace is
altered.
76 Four Precious Mirrors
ee NRE ee eee

Consider one more example, of say six being added to

forty-four. The answer, fifty, has digits that do not sum
up to the digits of the number forty four.

For example:

44 +6= 50
4+4 = 5+0

But if 9 had been added then

44 +9 = 53
4+4 = 5+3

Again number nine leaves no trace. In the first

precious mirror of addition, 9 has nbd reflection; it is a
ghost!

What happens when nine is added to itself?

9+9 Sew be
94949 = 27
94+94+949 = 36
94+94+9494+9 = 45
etc.

This, of course, is also the multiplication table for nine.

 Four Precious Mirrors 77
i = aoa vot a

In each case the digits add up to 9. However many 9s

are added, the outcome is the same; the answer always
sums up to nine. Nothing changes. Nothing alters.
Only the fixed mark of 9 remains.

9+(12x9) = 117. and (1+1+7= 9)

This is quite amazing. It is as ifnine is stationary and does not

move at all!

The multiplication table of number nine also gives

curious reflections.

9xIi09 1 90= 10x9

9x2=18 1 81= 9x9
Oxi=27 °, 72= So
9x4=36 | 63 = 7x9
pees Sa = OXY

The first five products are reflected in the next five

products as if a mirror runs between them.
78 Four Precious Mirrors
ee ee ee ee a a es ee

Clue 6: Subtracting Numbers

Subtracting 9 or a multiple of 9 from a number does not alter

the sigma value of that number — its secret value does not
change.

44-18 26
132- 9 123
1089-27 = 1062

The reader may verify that the sum of the digits of the
original number on the left hand side prior to subtrac-
tion is the same as the sum of the digits in the answer.
The reduction and shrinking has not been affected by
nine. E

But if numbers whose digits do not add up to nine

are subtracted from these numbers, say by even the
difference of one in the value of the number being
subtracted, then the secret value of the answer is quite
different to that of the original number.

44-17 = 27 244 # X27

132-10 = 122 2134 @ Bilge
1089-26 = 1063 21089 #« 21063
 Four Precious Mirrors 79
ee CCC Uhr
e

Summary:

Upon addition and subtraction number 9 leaves no trace. On

the surface of appearances in arithmetic, everything changes,
every addition or subtraction has a unique value. But under
the surface, when tracked by the sigma code, it is as if arith-
metic freezes in time when the character of nine enters the
scene. Nothing is changed by plus or minus. In the mirrors of
addition and subtraction nine is an unseen ray.

How different then the

behaviour of nine on multipli-
cation. From being an unseen
ghost it turns now into an
attacking force, eating up the
characters of other numbers,
pushing itself into a position
of permanent domination.
Upon multiplication, as
revealed by the sigma code,
number 9 is like a virus, an
invincible marauder.
80 Four Precious Mirrors
rc ae ee ne eee oe ee ne a

Clue 7: Multiplication

When a number is multiplied by 9 or a multiple of 9 then the

digits of the product always add up to 9.

eT 263 = J
4 x 45 = 180 2180 = 9
IFex 72 = 792 2792 = 18(1+8=9)

Once a multiplier has the secret value 9, it seems to

stamp its authority onto any multiplication and takes
over the identity of the numbers it multiplies.

Again, as with addition and subtraction, it is nine that

has the unique character, not any other number. With
other multipliers, for example, the product of multi-
plication does not have the same sigma value as the
multiplier.

7x 8= 56 256 #8
4 x 43 = 172 2172 # 243 (=7)
Il x 74 = 814 2814 # 274 (=2)
 Four Precious Mirrors 81
ok a ee es ora. 5! aro T =

If a number is multiplied by a series of numbers and 9 is one

of them, then the sum of the final product again is 9.

7X (4%, 3.%4
¥9 X.6) = 9072

29072 adds up to 18, and1+8=9.

On multiplication, nine emerges as a mighty force —

quite different to its unseen behaviour in addition and
subtraction. There is no change to the sigma code
value of a number when 9 is added or subtracted but
upon multiplication number nine gains control. Why?

To summarise then what arithmetic has shown us so

far, if all numbers are reduced to a secret value held by
the sigma code:

Znumber + X29 = LZnumber

“number - X19 = Znumber

Xnumber x XI = ZI
82 Four Precious Mirrors
SSE

Nine behaves identically in two precious mirrors — for

it gives no sign of its existence in either addition or
subtraction. In the third mirror, multiplication, it
thrusts itself forward in a dominant mode. One would
expect then in the reflection of multiplication, viz
division, that in this fourth mirror, number nine
would feature strongly. And it does.

ety
ety
gu
 Four Precious Mirrors 83
LoS ha | aa daa a peg, sm | aac 1

Clue 8: Division — the last of four mirrors

Ifa number is divided by 9, the remainder has the same value

as the sum of the digits of the original number.

62
= 9

When 62 is divided by 9 the remainder is 8, identical to

the sum of the digits of the original number 6 + 2 = 8

Example:
When 439 is divided by 9 the remainder is 7

2439 =4+3+9 = 16; OS Mrs

If a number is exactly divisible by 9 giving a remainder of

zero, then the sum of its digits is 9 or a multiple of 9.

Example:
432 sums up as 4+ 3+2=49; it is therefore exactly
divisible by nine.

432 = 9 x 48

Similarly 288, 126, 8919, 112 923 are numbers exactly

divisible by 9. In each case the sigma value of the
number is nine. Zero seems to be related in some way
to2z9.
84 Four Precious Mirrors
iF; asians Salim =a T ae Se a a ee

Question?
Is nine something static, another number in line after
seven and eight, or do we think by now that it is some-
thing more wilful and dynamic, vanishing and being
seen as it pleases?
If we had followed additions and multiplications up
on the surface of arithmetic we would have noticed
nothing, just numbers. Patterns would have been hard
to find. But when marked by the special code, num-
bers do not escape their blueprint. They leave a trail
and it is here, in the hidden world of numbers, where
the full richness of the patterns of number nine are
revealed.

Nine and Zero

Under the sigma code, in addition and subtraction nine
has no effect, just as if zero is added or subtracted to a
number. In multiplication nine takes over the identity
of a number, just as zero does. And in normal arith-
metic, exact division by a number gives the remainder
zero — according to the sigma code if a number can be
divided by 9 exactly its digits add up to nine.
There seems to be a strange affinity between zero
and 29.
 Four Precious Mirrors 85
T T 1! 1
e

Clue 9: Multiplication Tables

Most of the clues are now with us. But something is

still missing, one more clue is needed to unravel the
mystery. For the ninth clue it is best to take a closer
look at multiplication, where nine revealed itself in the
most direct and forced manner so far. A search into
these products should be fertile ground for more
revelation.
But can we find something more interesting in
these products than just their jumping and ever
increasing size?
Would it not be nice to find a hidden pattern at
work that would make learning the times table more
fun, and not the labour so many have to learn
the tables by rote, in a dull and uncomprehending
manner?

ogo
86 Four Precious Mirrors
eS ee ee ee eee

The 2x table

Let’s keep it simple and start with the easiest multipli-

cation, that of the 2x table which gives jumps in twos:

2-4-6-8-10-12-14-16-18-—20-—22-24-26...

By adding up the digits this series of numbers can be

transformed into the sigma code as follows:

Sa ET a a ES ae Se RE, PO eet. PPS

Here is a surprise! Instead of something that grows

forever in jumps of two the sigma code shows a repeat-
ing pattern of nine values:

ge Sah ny Sd RA he ee Ae: Be
However far the multiplication goes the hidden pat-
tern repeats itself. Written below, as a further example,
are the products from 266 (2 x 133) to 300 (2 x 150).
The corresponding code values are in brackets.

(Remember 266 has the sigma value 5; for2 +6+6=

14;and1+4=5).
 Four Precious Mirrors 87
“S22 oh 7ST Tn. lee i eae Aili eens eae: | enemas
e

266 (5)
268 (7)
270 (9)
272 (2)
274 (4)
276 (6)
278 (8)
a a) The repeating
sequence
282 (3)
284 (5)
286 (7)
288 (9)
290 (2)
292 (4)
294 (6)
296 (8)
298 (1)
300 (3)
88 Four Precious Mirrors
r ——— T — a aaa

Like some kind of inner mantra the pattern is repeated

over and over again; a self stabiliser in the jumping
growths of multiplications. The 2x table has only one
composition when seen through the x-ray of the code.
Its blueprint is:

2A Mahe
d SD Lae

Multiplication by 3x table

The products of the first nine values are:

2 6 9 | ae” = TOSS. S eee’ — ’ ¥f

The corresponding secret values or sigma code values

are:

3 a SE 6 a 6 9

However far the multiplications go the hidden

pattern is indelible, marking the products in steps of
G)- (6)- (9) , the stepping stones of nine.
From these results it looks like only the first nine
values of a multiplication table need to be studied
to find a hidden pattern. (The character of nine
dominates again).
 Four Precious Mirrors 89

It is time now to look at the entire table of multiplica-

tions along with the corresponding code values of their
products to see what else we can find. It is here that we
first come across the astonishing secret of the numbers
1-9 in the sigma code. They are twinned!
90 Four Precious Mirrors
ee aT:CCC

Figure 1:
Multiplication Table

a eS Ba ee? SS
1 I A in dim Se ee ee. Sea
2 iy 4 6G 8 JON IZA VIG. 18
3 3 63902. 38 Jé Val 24 27
4 4 8 ]2 16-30 Vib 28. 32, 36
5 5 10 DD 2a Ww 35 BM 45
6 6 12° 18 parse 36, 42 48 44
z 7 4, (21 Bes) 95a? £9 36 63
8 8 16, 24\"a2) @0eeds 356 /644 2
9 9 CI& (27 \ Siew (9463/2772. fs!

Figure 2:
Sigma code values of the multiplication table

x1. -*2...xXd, X4 XS x6 XY XS xX
1 I RES SGT Salta t 6 r ies.De Me
2 hee rT le I 3 5 Pit ae
3 3 i agp: Pe Bae ne,
4 ee area PM,” 6 1 ee
5 5 I ee \ ie FA ER Re
6 ey a Se er ee 4
7 TF Oe pele, hee hee. ee
8 8 Fi Bo) pee 5 ae 1 Ss
9 Boge SR a Oe OO oe Bee
 Four Precious Mirrors 91
eee ie a [te cali a x segs nes se ae | 1

Figure 1 contains the multiplication tables up to x9 for

the numbers 1-9. Figure 2 tables the corresponding
sigma values of these products. We need not go
beyond 9 x 9, for x10 or x14 say, are the same
as multiplying respectively by 1 (210 = 1+0=1) or
5 (214=1+4=5).
Unlike the multiplication tables which go on and
on, all multiplications are condensed in the sigma code
sequences shown in figure 2. Within that table is the
blueprint for all doubling, tripling, quadrupling, etc.
Every possible multiplication is reduced to the
matrix of nine by nine, just eighty one values. And yes,
‘81’ as 8 + 1 adds back to 9! Nine permeates every-
thing.
But the startling discovery is that there are inter-
relationships between the values of the sigma code
itself. The code is not a set of independent values as
we might have first thought. I had been interested
in tracking just the number nine, but now a more
intricate and surprising world of interconnection is
revealed.
The blueprint for each ‘times’ table has a matching
reverse! Multiplication under the sigma code shows
that except for 9, the basic numbers 1-8 are twinned
with each other. Each sequence is the opposite of the
other, except for 9, which seemingly acts as an end
stop.
92 Four Precious Mirrors
I T SSeS ee

Nine refuses to act as the other numbers do, having

no opposite. Instead the number stands aloof and acts
as a border to each array, stopping any flowing out-
wards and inwards of a sequence. Number nine is the
end of the line watchdog — keeping a strict limit to
multiplications under a secret code. Here are the
‘twins’ from the table in figure 2:

oh ad oles Sil Rian 6 — Ww \o

5x Fed ale BS eae eS

aX 2) Ge DS $95. i ee et Oa
6X 6 2 Oe a oe oe \o
aw

20m. Dre 26: — Ww Ww N \‘o

Tix wes ee Died wee ley Cnty ed atta 0

1x ~ bo 1vS) cs WY fon N Co \‘o

x 745 @8 ¢ 3) 2 4 @

If the numbers vertically above each other are added,

they sum up to 9!
Number 9 ‘locks’ in the sequences. Nine refuses to
act as the other numbers do, having no opposite.
 Four Precious Mirrors 93
Tt ee as at. qT T a 1

It is interesting to map the values of 9 in the sigma

multiplication table.

oOo
NYO
YO
ODO
DO
0
o
©

Number 9 features as a limiting value, as a border;

but there is also the symmetry of 9, marking out the
corners of a square in the middle of the table.
Is number nine the end of the line, a border, or
a centre? Here it shows a dual personality, both as
centre and border.
94 Four Precious Mirrors

What pattern is buried within the code?

 Four Precious Mirrors 95

Summary of the nine clues:

Clue 1:
The ninth point in the directions of the wind is at the
centre. It is the point from which all else flows.

Clue 2:
In myths and legends nine has the quality of initiation
and beginning. So nine is not the end of the line, but
more a jumping-off point, a beginning, a point of
origin.

Clue 3:
Nine is closely allied to reversals as in the trick with
three figure numbers. Nine is some kind of mirror.

Clue 4:
The sigma code, the hidden blueprint of all numbers,
has nine values. The nature of nine is the code itself. (It
exists, in other words, to serve nine.) Like a selfish
gene in the chain the character of nine dominates the
basic digital code of all numbers.

Clue 5:
In addition number nine leaves no trace.

Clue 6:
In subtraction number nine leaves no trace.
96 Four Precious Mirrors
ee ee ee i ee ee

Clue 7:
Multiplication by nine always ends in nine. In this case
imagine a causeway of stones; if we skip in twos or
threes or fours or whatever, but repeating it nine times
(the equivalent of multiplying by nine), then we
always land on a stone marked by nine.

Clue 8:
A number upon division by nine leaves a remainder
equal to the sum of its digits. If the digits of the original
number add up to nine, then the number is exactly
divisible by nine. 2 9 has an echo of zero to it.

Clue 9: ‘
The multiplication tables, as revealed by the’sigma
code, have in-built symmetries between numbers 1/8,
2/7, 3/6, 4/5. Number nine acts as both border
and centre in the secret map we make of all our multi-
plications.
 99

Mandala
100 Mandala

Enjil’s strategy and first solution

All these facts and questions passed through the
young master’s mind. He had done the work and
contemplated all the clues. The search had been
exciting, it revealed a world of hidden negotiations
that he had not dreamt of. The strategy of using secret
numbers was powerful — it gave ready access to larger
calculations and the noting of hidden rhythms.
But how nine appeared or disappeared in arith-
metic when tracked by the sigma code was a puzzle.
Something very special was going on and Enjil knew
it needed a unique solution, something that would
have great beauty but also something the children
of the village could play with. Why not? Why should
the solutions be open to only the few, the so-called
experts?
He climbed up the mountain behind the
Academy and bathed in cold water to refresh his
mind. He put on clean clothes next to his skin.
 Mandala 101
+ —— ——- ly ——— ———

He meditated hard upon the clues, all nine of them

and thought afresh again. But there was still no
answer. There were intuitions; but the facts kept con-
fusing him, they pulled in different directions. The
pattern he sought was hard to catch. It seemed to
move and reflect and have motion, and yet it had the
habit of not moving, being fixed like a totem pole in
the centre of a village.
Enjil became more agitated, afraid he had
abandoned more high-minded algebra in favour of
child-like curiosities, a wilfulness that would now
cost him dearly and leave him empty-handed before
the critical and cutting eye of the Elders. And the
Examination would not wait; there were only two
days left. He knew he had it in him to solve the riddle
but ifonly he could see the direct path to it.

What or where was this fixed point

in the wind?

When his mind became tangled into a knot as it

was now he had learnt to cut out the reasoning parts
and let emptiness flow in; and as the sun went down
Enjil entered this phase of being an empty vessel.
Night fell.
The moon came up and somehow the surround-
ing blackness helped his mind grow vacant of all facts
and numbers, and he listened to the rustling leaves
as the moving air silently put the first patterns into
his head. He saw numbers coming from several parts
and going to many parts, just like the wind.
Any number, like seventy-two say, stood for an.
infinity of things, from ants to seeds, to cows, plants
102 Mandala
Se ee —— _— Se

and constellations. But number seventy-two itself

could be made up in many ways by other numbers.
Even unity, the number one, could be composed
a million ways by the combination of different
fractions; so a number had motion passing through
it, like a river flowing. Each number was part of
other numbers — for one instant we catch the essence
as the pool eddies and forms a stillness, a stationary
point, before dissolving again. Perhaps numbers
are poles offrozen abstraction, quiet points in an
otherwise constant movement? But these thoughts
took him into the philosophy of numbers and that
was something else to debate with the Elders, on
another day. Now he needed to open his mind to find
the pattern he sought, for like with most things, he
knew it was Pattern and not Number that would be
the answer to his quest.
The moon came out in all its brightness. It was
full. He gazed at the disc wondering if there really
was a woman spirit who lived in the illuminating
light, cold and white when she was inspired,
and warm and yellow when her spirit moved tender
hearts to open like giant, magic mushrooms?
Enyil closed his eyes around the moon.
A shape came into them. He tested it against
the clues. The numbers rushed around and fitted.
It worked! As he extended the mental calculations
the shape grew and made an even better fit. Each
clue was tested. Several patterns overlaid his eyes in
a beautiful symmetry. Oh the joy of discovery! Then
there was more; in a sudden twist the pattern became
chaotic and surprisingly even more beautiful to his
 Mandala 103
— Ss— Le ee i| ee
2

eye. He knew he had it! It was what he had looked for

all along. The search was over.
And Enjil took the bright visions he saw into the
drawings he prepared for his thesis. Whether the
Elders passed or failed him he did not care; what
mattered was the joy he found at unlocking the secret
world of numbers, hidden way below the surface of
what was arithmetic. Moreover, he had also solved
the riddle the woman had given him. He had found
the fixed points in the wind, not just one as he had
thought, but all nine of them!
 Mandala 105
i T ae a T .
eee

The Pattern
Instead of imagining the sigma code as a straight line
of values, everything falls into place if the code is
arranged in a magic circle.

Number nine, the royal nine, takes pride of place at the

top; everything flows from there, clockwise, as the
circle divides into nine sections.

Each section of the circle subtends forty degrees at the

centre.
106 Mandala
a, :: _— se al
ES

The numbers across the circle sum up to nine:

L+ é, 2+, 3 +6, 4+5

Reading across the circle and pairing numbers first

right-left and then left-right we find the nine times
table:

$3 AY 3h. 85. SE 63 12 4 Si
 Mandala 107
eta Tae aie =a ii ciaoe
e 1

This is like imagining a vertical line going through nine

and acting as a mirror

1 in 8 and 8 in 1
2 1n 7 and yg ar4
3 in 6 and 6 in 3
4in5 and 5 inA

exactly reflecting the pairings revealed by the

sigma code in multiplication, where one sequence is
the exact reverse of the other except for 9. That is
because 9 is the mirror plane; it has no reflection. It is
quite beautiful that the strange patterns of the
multiplication table in code are so easily explained as a
natural consequence of the number 9 arranging its
component parts around a circle, making the twin
pairings inevitable.
108 Mandala
ee es 2 ee ee ee eee a ee ee

In a vertical direction, the numbers one above the

other on the left add up to 13 and on the right to 5. But
13 reduces to 1 + 3 = 4, so we have in the circle:

left-handedness as 4
right-handedness as 5; and4+5=9

Remember that each number represents a code value,

a summation of the digits of numbers on the surface
of arithmetic. Here in the circle of nine, we swim
through the undercurrents of numbers. Calculations
run through and around the circle.
The sigma circle also explains the puzzles we
encountered in the four mirrors of arithmetic. Without
recourse to the mathematics of algebraic proofs, the
circle simply draws a picture around each clue.
 Mandala 109

We move around the circle to find the answers.

And like a good detective story, after the puzzle is set
we must have an explanation. So let’s begin with
number tricks and reversals.
110 Mandala
To oe Rh ee ee ee
i

Reversals and Party Tricks: Clue 3

Take a two digit number, say number 31. Then after

reversal and subtraction we get the number 18.
9

31
-— 13
18

Now 31 has the sigma value 4 (3 + 1 = 4). So I travel

along the circle starting from 9, four stops, to arrive
at 4.

When 31 is reversed to the number 13, the new

number has the same sigma value, for 1 + 3 still
equals 4. Subtraction means going into reverse on the
sigma circle, so I go back four stops. I arrive back
at 9. This means that any number, once reversed and
subtracted, will always give an answer whose digits
will add up to 9.
Now, after reversal, the answer 18 has the sigma
value 9. If the answer is reversed yet again, say to 81,
it still has the sigma value 9, for 8 + 1 = 9. Nothing
changes.

We could go on reversing and adding, or reversing and

subtracting, it does not matter. We travel a full 9 stops
around the circle, backwards or forwards, always
arriving back at 9. What matters is that first reversal
 Mandala 111
f T Te =—=- T 1 a . —

which brings us back to point 9 on the sigma circle.

Thereafter, subsequent reversals keep us at the same
point.

Going on to three digit numbers,

Number 781 PPO hin ef

Reverse — 187 tt aie 3
594 Zed =O
Reverse 495 2495 = 9
Add 1089 BIOS? = 9

The original number of 781 adds up to 7. Go to point 7

on the circle. Reversing and subtracting moves us back
seven places (reversing does not change the sum of
digits) and we reach 9. This point corresponds in the
calculation to the number 594 — whose sigma value
must also be 9. And this indeed is the case.

Now if 594 is reversed to 495 the sigma value is un-

changed, as 2495 is the same as 2594=29.
We are back at 9, the point we had reached in the
first place. And so on .... We can extend this game
beyond anything the old number tricksters imagined.
We can use any numbers, small or big, (even negatives
or decimals if we are careful to follow the correct
rules). We can reverse and re-reverse any amount of
times; the final answer will always sum to nine.
The explanation of Clues 5 and 6 now become
obvious.
112 Mandala
SSee ee ae

Clues 5 and 6

No traces in the mirrors of addition and subtraction

Adding nine to a number leaves no trace, for adding 9
is to travel a full nine stops around the circle to come
back to where we were in the first place.

132 ht = 6
~ 9
14] 14, = 6

The number we add need not be 9. The digits of the

number need only add up to 9, like say 171. Then the
same result happens. ‘

132 21jzf = §
+ 171
303 2203 = 6

Adding 29 is to travel around the circle a full nine

stops.
 Mandala ats
T T T T T |
°

Similarly with subtraction:

132 2132 = 6
=, 2
123 2123 = 6

Subtraction acts just like addition. Taking away 9 from

a number is to go back round the circle, a full nine
stops, arriving at the same point. I have used small
numbers to keep the sums simple but the rule holds
good for any number, even large numbers.

83426813 = (8)
= 31253616 r(9)
52173197 (8)

The first large number has digits that add up to eight;

its sigma value is 8. The number to be subtracted has
the sigma value 9 and thus will not affect the outcome,
for we travel round the circle coming back to 8. The
answer therefore should have the sigma value 8,
which is the case.
114 Mandala
RE
SeeSS eee

Multiplication by Nine: Clue 7

2x9= 18 218
= 9

Remember the numbers move from the fixed point

of 9. To multiply nine times we must take 9 steps of 2.
The first step is obtained by moving 2 along from 9;
and we arrive at 2. Then eight other similar moves in
twos will finally reach 9 again. It is easy to see that
with any number this wi!l happen, because there are
nine divisions to the circle. Try it out.

Example:

3S = 27 227. =.9

Three times one takes us to point 3 on the sigma circle

because 3 moves out of 9 to take its place at position 3
on the sigma circle. Then eight other jumps of 3,
means we have taken 3 x (1 + 8) jumps or 3 x 9 jumps;
and we find ourselves at the top of the circle, at the
pole position again.

= 9 is the fixed point for all growth in nines.

 Mandala 115
lace aay | T T T sao op T =
e

Division: Clue 8

Number 481 resides at point 4 on the sigma circle, and

when divided by 9 its remainder is, surprisingly, also
four. Similarly, when say 53 is divided by nine, the
remainder is eight, and number 53 resides at point 8
on the sigma circle (£53 =5 +3 =8).

The sigma value of a number is its remainder when divided

by nine.

But if the sigma value of a number is 9, like say 261,

then under division by 9 there will be no remainder.

2 9 corresponds to remainder zero.

Numbers such as 621, 432, 411111, each add up to

nine as well. Such numbers whose sigma values are 9,
are privileged, they reside at the top of the circle, at the
pole position. They are on a mirror axis and do not
move, as if anchored to a zero point.
In the dynamics of the sigma circle 2 9 must be seen
as fixed. The other values move out from 29 to take
their place in the circle. We travel to the other num-
bers but we do not move when we are at the position
of the number nine. It is as if the other numbers turn
and spin away or towards nine; but at the top, at the
pole, the ninth spot does not move.
116
i
Mandala
a. |Sn ee er aes

Number Shapes from the Sigma Circle

a
|
But what are the shapes of the numbers themselves as
seen by the secret code in multiplication?

The products of multiplication according to the sigma

code are:

rC iat fe ee fe eee
a eh eee ee ae
ge ey soe ase tie wnt Bos: aor Kee
a a oe Ot fe ee a
CRS: See dk Te arse rer weg Pee wa
eo) A eo. ae ee
im 92I3sS 3 Byieee 4 2 te
Ore ae Ce ee Oe pas eee aw eke,
oo of 8 Ue Se ee ee

If each horizontal row is now plotted on the sigma

circle and the points joined together, we get the
shapes of the numbers 1-9 in multiplication as seen on
the diagram on the right. This diagram is repeated on
the following page to give clarity to the comments that
follow.
Mandala ay
118 Mandala

>—
 Mandala 119
ee, T as |a a Re 1
e

Numbers | and 8 rotate in a pure orbit.

Other numbers like 4 and 5 right in the middle of the

sequence of 1 —9 cut across space with high energy star
patterns.

And 3 and 6 take up the strong three-sided shape of

stability. Their outline, not surprisingly, is the robust
triangle.

Multiplication by 2 and 7 form polygons.

The pairings have identical shapes except

that the trace of one is the reverse of the other.

And 9 stays mysterious, unmoving.

It has no orbit except itself.

In all the unseen arithmetic of secret numbers, of

addition, subtraction, division and multiplication
which revolve around the circle, number nine remains
stationary, as if too full of movement to move.

But we are looking at only one, innermost, circle here.

There are others.
120 Mandala
i =a oe + eo ah ee ae lS he

Mandala

In a magic circle the sigma code first explains all that

happens in the secret mirrors of arithmetic. Number
nine is seen as a pivot, a point of beginning and ending;
it is the place from which all numbers move and circle.
But contemplation of all the multiplication tables
and the strange twin pairings of numbers in the sigma
circle leads to another and much grander picture.
A Mandala of several circles takes shape and
revolves. Like the Mandalas used in meditation, there
is an intricacy of pattern and a holding together of an
inner harmony between the numbers.
To understand this complete pieture we must turn
again to the sequences of the multiplication: table.
We must plot each sequence on radial arms reaching
out from the relevant value of the sigma circle, the 2x
table starting from point 2, the 3x from point 3, and
so on.
These sequences are shown on the opposite page.
If these arms are now placed on the sigma circle, in
their correct position, we then have a Mandala.
121
Mandala

AG ana non n7n nn an wa

 \
TOTOTORTORTOTOTOTOS
ay EREBe
 Mandala 123
r =e T

The Complete Revolution

Putting all the parts together reveals nine orbits. It is
the blueprint of secret arithmetic. Like the nine planets
whirling round the sun, nine orbits circle the centre.

Each ring adds up to nine, as do the numbers along

each radiating arm.

The figure is a crystallisation of the sequences of multi-

plication under the sigma code. The 2x table runs out-
wards along radiating arm|2|, the same sequence also
goes round the second circle starting at number 2; the
3x table similarly along arm| 3 |and around the third
circle beginning at number 3, and so on. There
is an inner harmony due to this completeness, the
straight lines overlaying and combining with the
circular motions to produce a strong sense of inter-
locking and vibration.

Down the mirror plane number 9 dominates, inter-

cepting each orbit; but not only that, the character of
nine controls everything. Each circle adds up to nine,
each radiating arm adds up to nine as well.

The pattern can be studied for calculations or just

looked at, travelling deeper into the mystery behind
the numbers. At the outermost orbit number 9
surrounds the figure like a sentinel, guarding and
containing everything else in turn.

The outermost layer of nine acts as a boundary and

also a mirror.
124 Mandala
i [atl ‘ i T eens rt —_ ="

For example, the radiating arm of| 2|has the values —

reading from the centre outwards —

Pome CEN Pome Gee ee Ses

Then it hits the outer boundary of nine and travels

along the circle coming back on its complement of
nine, number 7. The order is now reversed from the
inside to the outside along the radiating arm

P na aie feet i” Ae» ET Br a

And so on, the symmetries and the reflections grow.

I lose myself in wonder at the beauty and the intricacy

in which the numbers depend on eath other, in secret.
On the surface one would never imagine this closed
circuit of intrigue. In the Mandala of nine, the digits
have life-long partnerships, number ONE with
EIGHT, TWO with SEVEN, THREE with SIX, FOUR
with FIVE. Each pairing has an identical shape —
when its multiplication sequence is plotted on the
sigma circle, one is the reverse of the other.
Like partners in an eternal dance they turn, their
bond being the number nine which holds them
together and at the same time keeps them apart.
Behind the whole revolution is this special mark, the
character that keeps secrets and takes on several dis-
guises — now a boundary, now a mirror, now unseen,
and then taking complete hold of another's identity.
Whichever way we turn in the circles, we find that all
paths out of the labyrinth lead to 9. ,
 Mandala 125
i —— r T aia ia T => 1
.

t is one grand act of conservation. Each orbit adds up

to nine, as does each radiating arm. And in one magni-
ficent homage, all the values of all the circles add up to
nine. Everything in this hidden cosmos of numbers
comes to the same thing, the uniqueness of 9.
Its component parts, the digits one to eight, hold in
tight confidence
this secret
of the first revolution of the

MANDALA.

Hidden by all permutations of arithmetic the

numbers of the code spin quietly. In the music of the
spheres the sigma code comes together; layer upon
layer, orbiting in a secret universe. It is a revolution
of numbers beyond that which any of the Elders
could imagine. Like the planets in the sky, the code
revolves in full nine orbits.
Enjil said numbers are not fixed, but ultimately
rotations.
126

Nine Fixed Points

in the Wind
The Elders had never seen it coming.
The young Master was elated as the crowd
cheered, each one of them understanding how simple
it was. They saw for the first time the basic nature of
the numbers themselves, their shapes, the stars and
the triangles, the crossing polygons and the spinning
discs. Underneath the clutter of the arithmetic was
the simple nine number code, which seemed to rotate
all around their heads as the young master drew
fantastic circles on the blackboard with radiating
arms.
But when the boy master had worked out his
thesis and drafted those lovely circles of nine, he was
not content. He saw the completeness of it but
something was not quite right. There was too much
balance. It was not satisfying how the nines bordered
the figure yet the reflection and the reversals did not
catch the spirit of what was in his head.
Enjil wanted a deeper clarity — to match the
swirling movements he had first seen —so that the
diagram would show better what actually was going
on, if that was at all possible.
Like the Elders and wise Masters who had come
before him, everyone believed in the perfection of the
circle. The world was created round, the sun was
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 127
—— T = ipa ae | T 1

round, the stars wrapped around the vast bowl of

the sky in a great orbit. Mathematicians knew that
numbers had a perfection not corrupted by daily
affairs and that the concept of a number was
abstract, unchanging. What better shape then, than
the perfection of a set of circles?
But to Enjil nine was the number through which
everything else flowed. It was also the number that
must give reversal and the more he thought of the
pattern, of circle upon circle, the more dissatisfied he
became. It was too static, too stationary. It did not
move. Number nine was full of vigour, it did things to
other numbers — it was a catalyst. And yet it had to be
stationary to allow other things through it — this was
still the problem to solve. But how?
In the afternoon before the day of the examina-
tion he saw the breeze gust up and whip up trails of
dust in the compound. Minor sand storms that eddied
and whirled and zigzagged. He saw spirals and the
vortices, as the force in the wind moved his mind into
action.
He felt then that number nine was an even
greater concept than he had first imagined; it must
be like the secret, unseen force of the wind itself,
and this would be the force that moved the other
numbers. The pattern he sought then must have only
one point of reference —number nine itself! Not a
circle of numbers, but a condensation of the nature
of that first innermost circle. It summed to nine,
it had nine parts, it had three hundred and sixty
degrees which in turn compressed to nine as three’
plus six plus zero.
128 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind
So eee SS a ee ee —" - nC. ge ae) oe

And Enjil wanted the numbers to represent

themselves better. He desired that the orbit of eight
should be noticeably eight times as large as that of
number one, and so on.
He thought the answer must lie in the arrange-
ment of the multiplication tables. It was here that
the real secret would be revealed. How did the
numbers between one and eight really pair as twins?
In intense concentration he meditated on the blue-
print of these products, dwelling upon their patterns
of multiplications.
The eight times table gave

(8) (16) (24) (32) (40) (48) (56) (64) (72)

which in the sigma code was

& ar Te 3 2 1 9

a reverse of the one times table except for the last

figure of nine. Ifnine itself was a pivot and common
to both one and eight, he speculated, then both orbits
would connect somehow at nine, the orbit of one
number being eight times larger than the other.
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 129
if i ey

Since the sequence of number one is the reverse of

number eight, but both have nine in common, then
the number nine must be the point that makes the
reversal and reflection happen. And this is the case
only ifthe orbit of number one first passes through
nine and turns then into the eight times greater orbit
of number eight. Where nine occurs there has to be a
violent and sudden twist. Otherwise, there would be
no reversal.
One orbit has to go one way and then sweep into
the other orbit, but going the other way. The point of:
change has to be a point of reversal, a location of
twist.

And a strange picture took place in Enjil’s head

unlike anything he had seen before.
130 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind
°

The other pairings of

7-2

6 - 3

5-4

followed the same logic. One orbit went one way and
flowed through nine, in a clockwise sense, reversing
itself into its twin partner and then going round in
the opposite way, in an anticlockwise orbit.
Quite unlike the stationary circles, energy is
released into the numbers so that they spin, one out
of the other — a Mandala of a new sort arose before
his eyes — the bending and twistihg in and out of
separate energies, the big and the small, connected by
a continuous movement through the eye at the centre
of the storm of numbers.
Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 131
= T

e/\
132 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind
SS a ae ee

That eye, the cross-over point, is at nine, the focus of

the drawing. And to draw one trace, the focus has to
be crossed nine times.
Enjil now had the pattern he wanted, a swirling
form that rushed in and out, with vortices spinning.
In the paths of reversal, he counted nine crossings.
He was joyous; he must indeed have found the fixed
points in the wind. The riddle set by the golden
woman in the moon was answered.
That night Enjil looked up at the sky to pay
homage again to the moon. He laughed and
exclaimed to the warm light that bathed down on
him:
“You tricked me. There is nofixed point to the
wind, Oh Lady, not one;
and I looked in the wrong
place.

NNW
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 133
eo oo eae ss a "i 1

But in looking, I found nine circles and drew

them one around the other. Yet all the time there was
more. Like the wind I found those circles collapsing
and twisting and passing through each other in
different orbits, in different ways. Indeed, the wind
has not just one fixed point, Oh Soma, but nine. Did
you know that? I now laugh and play with numbers
and my debt is to you, Soma — the fair one who makes
light out of new beginnings.”
He unfurled the large drawing he had done in
different coloured inks and held it up to the moon.
He said, “Just for tonight my lady your secret is
mine. Tomorrow it will be with the Elders and the
keen eyes of the crowd. After that I pray the orbits

i
move into the worlds of people's minds and playfully
keep turning and twisting, bringing out the free
spirit which hides in each one of them.”

S
\

WS
|

fy

SS
sr

Gy
/

Enjil smiled then at his wonderful secret, at the

number of worlds of nine he had found and bid the
lady in the moon goodnight.
134 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind
ES
ee ae
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 135
fe — i. root eee pay T T 1

For want of a better name let us call this new Mandala,

the Strange One.

All the symmetries of the original Mandala are to be

found in the new drawing if one studies it.

The radial lines intersecting the orbits have values that

are reflected through the eye of number 9. On the left
hand side of the diagram, looking at it sideways, the
values on each radiating line add up, anticlockwise,
from 28-21. On the right hand side, we have the
opposite pattern from 21-28, clockwise. This is a
clearer picture on the nature of reversals inherent in
the sequences of the numbers than in the first circular
Mandala.

The ninth number in the sequence is the hub

of the diagram, number nine itself IS the
magic eye in the vortex of spinning numbers.

The Strange One catches this essence perfectly. In the

dynamic that swirls around, number nine is stationary,
serene and unmoving.
136 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind
Ce es ee ae er

The Vedic Drawing of the Elders held all multi-

plication in a square where nine was a border and
a centre to the diagram. In the first Mandala Enjil
discovered, nine became the outermost circle and
a mirror plane through which all the other orbits
are reflected. But in the Strange Mandala, nine is
at last given its true power, of centre and border, in
spectacular patterns of shifting and twisting orbits.
To Enjil it was like seeing great firewheels in the sky,
exploding and turning, first one way and then
burning in a flash to go the other way. And through
the curling eye of sparks that was number 9, all the
other trajectories of numbers moved.
Enjil knew that the Elders and the village folk
were used to seeing symmetry in their constructions.
Did not the heavens move in celestial orbits, in great
circles around the centre of the Earth, was not the
sun round and perfect? Were not the prayer wheels
and the Mandalas of meditation equal in part about
centre lines? But this is to see symmetry as the balance
of separate parts which means an assumption that
each part is distinct. What ifeverything connected, one
to the other? Then true symmetry would be the centre
that contains everything or through which everything
flows. In this sense the strange Mandala to Enjil
was perfect, the point 9 being the centre of symmetry.
Ifwe could really understand how the heavenly
bodies moved we would find that one orbit influenced
the other, and that the real point ofsymmetry would
not be the centre of the sun but some other place, deep
in the blackness, which would take into account the
stars and that burning point of our sun.
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 137
me, 7 ie T T i T
e

Somewhere in this great void would be the other

Strange Mandala, even greater than the one Enjil
had drawn and dreamt of, and even more marvel-
lous with its twistings and turnings, passing through
the shape of a special number, one that would hold
the character to all other movements. And Enjil knew
that this special number would be at the heart of a
great spiral, the beginning point of spin and the spur
of all movements.
 Nine Fixed Points in the Wind 139
T geass apeina ein|

When Enjil drew the first Mandala of perfect

circles he then followed it with the second Mandala,
the Strange One. He explained that this second set
of orbits was but the same as the first set of circles,
except that they were shown in a better way to express
the real character of nine in relation to the other
numbers, one to eight.
But though Enjil loved his Strange Mandala and
felt comfortable with the shifting orbits, he knew it
was an extraordinary jump for those who wanted
identical symmetry and patterns of equal parts. So
Enjil gave them one last demonstration to set them
talking. To end his thesis, copying from a parchment
pinned to the board, the young Master drew quickly
the third and last Mandala, the one of Powers and
gave the Elders and the gathered crowd their last
astonishment.
 141

Powers
The Elders could just about bring themselves to admit
that addition and subtraction fitted neatly within the
logic of a set of circles, derived from adding up the
integers of numbers by applying the sigma code.
But powers? Those exponentially jumping values
of doubling, tripling, quadrupling.... Could that
escalation of numbers have set patterns, even
though the numbers grew so rapidly beyond simple
calculation?
Enjil had gone too far, they whispered amongst
themselves as the boy gave them his crooked
smile and picked up the chalk again. To their mind
his voice was cheeky, arrogant, and insolent,
announcing that the power expansion of numbers
unfolded in set ways and was not open ended as
they may have thought. The sun, shining on the
young Master, threw sharp shadows into the holes
of his ravaged pockmarked face. The black spots
made him look sinister. Were they in the hands of
a demon, they asked, as some of them feared?
142 Powers
 Powers 143
a a —— 1

Then Enjil began his demonstration by writing

out the numbers, adding the digits to reduce the
powers to one number only, and revealing the
patterns to the astonished Elders. The adoring crowd
who by now had accepted him as the light of the
Academy settled down and went quiet, awaiting the
demonstration as when a new comet comes into a
black sky.
Though this time the concept of the powers of
numbers was beyond their daily arithmetic, the way
Enjil reduced the problem to simple numbers made
the crowd believe they had been shown a great
mystery, that unto now had been hidden; and even
though they may never use doubling and quad-
rupling in their everyday affairs, the fact that even
such big jumps were controlled in set ways, under-
neath the surface of numbers, was something they
found extraordinary.
The world and the huge jumps to the stars were
perhaps then not so great and unbelievable — perhaps
even invisible ways were all around, ifonly they
knew how to look. So they willed the young Master
success. They watched him limp from one end of the
blackboard to the other as he wrote out his belief in
the expansion of numbers in an elegant way. And
they began clapping when they saw the fun of it all.

Enjil wrote out his workings in a neat hand.

144 Powers
LOSSES
SSS ee

The workings

The sequence for N? where N = 1, 2, 3 ...is

ie RE cena le teaap aay ACI seid Oghta.
Pe
ia OR Anat Mall a Mew ott 2 ees ee
If the integers of the numbers in the second row are
added and reduced to one number, then we have

I + 9 7 re, - I hae

As the expansion continues from 107 to 18?

we have

oA iF 1? if is) (lee ee
100 121 144 169 196 225 256 289 324
The same rule is applied to reduce these numbers to
one value

I 4 9 z OR te; I 9

In fact, as the square powers are plotted further, the

code numbers keep repeating. Every third, sixth and
ninth value in the sequence is 9.
 Powers 145
T as ‘iz T =r T ——————

Similarly the expansion N° for N =1 to 9 gives

I Oo tf Of . la? 416, 323 312 129

which reduces, according to the sigma code as

1 & 2 I & 9 1 & 2

Here the rhythm is 1, 8, 9 with the third, sixth and

ninth values acting as anchor points, just as in the
sequence for N?’.

Similarly the expansion of N* is

1 16 81 256 625 1296 2401 4096 6561
1 ae: ~ 9 z M4 9

Again the pattern emerges here of every third value

being 9, and the sequence being nine numbers,
beginning with one and ending with nine.
146 Powers
ta ee 7, ae — ame ge,
rc

If the calculations are continued to higher values of

N and the code sequences are written out from N ' to
N’ we arrive at:
ee 2 3 df 5 6 ee -
wd 4 9 7 7, #8 \4 1 9
wd & 9 I & 9 1 & 4
ge aE RS See 9 7 1 9
Noe 7 9 a? : 9 4 8 9
ne 1 I 9 1 I 9 I 1 7
Nv 1 2 ee Ny 7 ¢ 9
Win i = 9 7 ee ay 1 9
Noa & 2 I & 9 I & PJ

These sequences can help find other relationships be-

tween the powers of numbers. Because the arithmetic
is reduced to single values, it is easy to test various
speculations about how numbers relate to each other.
I found interesting patterns very quickly using the
code values rather than carrying out the actual multi-
plication. All one has to do is obtain the sigma value,
the rest is easy.
The interesting feature is that each of the
sequences of nine values, when added up horizontally,
gives the rhythm 9-6-9-6-9.... That is the row for
N', in the above table adds up to 9, the row for N* adds
up to 6. The row for N’ adds up to 9 and so on.
 Powers 147
| ae in a | ail T ile T 1
e

If each sequence of the power expansions is written

out in a circle of nine values, we obtain a picture of
concentric orbits say for N? and N’, the following is
then true:

expansion of2
3 1

The inner circle is the sequence for N*. This means the
whole expansion of N?, sits along this inner circle with
values 1 -4-9-7-7-9-4-1-9
spinning round the circumference.
And the outer circle is the sequence for the expan-
sion of N’, with the values 1 — 8 — 9 repeating. Because
the sequences have only nine values they fit around
each other neatly, just as in the first Mandala. There is
also a flow outwards along radiating arms of the
- powers of a given number. The line for 2" is shown, i.e.
Que Ar? = §, etc.
 wa\ \ Ves
atotetetetot
alatejo)

= ee’ ‘hes
Raat
a
Le!
=
-
=
Le!
~™
 Powers 149
Ss oe a ra 1 1

Power Mandala
The innermost circle is the expansion of N', the sigma
code itself, the numbers 1 — 9.
The second circle relates to N*. The third circle
relates to N’ and so on, where N = 1, 2, 3, ....
But each radiating arm is the sigma sequence of a
fixed number being raised successively to higher
powers.
For example, the arm starting at number 2 in the
innermost circle shows the sequence

2 2 & ae I Zi ~ &

which is the sigma value of the power expansion of

eee De Fe?

Each radiating arm sums up to a multiple of nine and

successive orbits have the sigma pattern 9-6-—9-6-9
— 6... when the values of each orbit are added up,
starting from the innermost circle.

The strong radiating lines of 9 divide the Mandala into

three sections.

It can also be seen that along each radiating arm some

patterns are short, before they repeat, like that for
number 4. Numbers 2 and 5 have longer sequences
. before they are repeated. But the numbers 3, 6 and 9
raised to successive powers are held by the fixed value
of nine.
150 Powers
+ oe a Se ee ie a 5 Te
vi

The patterns that repeat are:

Spee inte
reds 4 Bf ed ot aaa

3N 9

4N — 7

Se Fa 2 MN ale

oN 9

7yN a 1a
a hd a

oe “See

The power circles show that though a number seem-

ingly jumps rapidly as it is raised to higher powers,
underneath the surface there is a set of repeating
cycles.
There is conservation at work, in secret.
 Powers 151
Co + ae a T
e

So we go back in time to that first circle of the

compound in the Academy, with the sun shining
down on the blackboard and on Enjil as he draws
his power circles. Not only have additions, sub-
tractions, multiplications and divisions been held in
the power ofjust nine orbits, now he demonstrates
how all the possibilities of expanding numbers in
squares, cubes, and quadrupling and so on are also
held around the circumference and radius ofjust
nine circles, one within the other.
As Enjil adds the numbers within each sector,
along each curve, and outwards along each radius,
he shows them how nine and its stepping stones of
three and six run through the whole construction of
this newest Mandala. The mathematics of the powers
of numbers are beyond the humble village folk who
keep arithmetic simple, to bartering for grain and
livestock, but they still smile and cheer for they
understand how complicated things can be broken
down and made simple. The Elders are different; they
are clever and know all about numbers — or so they
thought until this fateful day of the Examination,
which turns into an examination of themselves. Now
they have to look again at how they see the dust of
arithmetic after what Enjil has shown them, the
reflections that turn in the precious mirrors, visions,
covered with numbers in secret... .
152 Powers
\ ae = Ue —eSS Oe oe ee

... Enjil showed them that numbers were more

than just counters in calculations. They had a secret
life. Ifanything, these hidden reflections were more
exciting than the actual images of arithmetic. For on
the surface every calculation was a forced answer
with one outcome only; and the possible outcomes
were a million times a million and more in all the
calculations one could do. But it was not just the
outer event that mattered, that was nothing if an
inner life could not be guessed at.
In this way Enjil argued for the jewels he had
found, hidden in the dust of calculations. As he said,
ifcalculations and all the sums we do are just
patterns of an untamed wind, blowing any which
way it pleases, what cannot change is the character
that seeds the wind, the fixed points which structure
and raise shape and whose force always gives
direction.
The powers of numbers jumped like those ghosts
in a storm, growing larger and more frightening
every time. But in the leaps, a rhythm, a pulse that
no one could see turned, in repeating ways, never
changing no matter how big the jumps. No one need
be afraid, he said.
 Powers 153

Enjil’s proposal was that his Mandalas were

fixed orbits which gave the essence of all the
movements of numbers. In secret mirrors, they held
the inner reflections.
Like with people, numbers had a hidden nature.
And even though we may do so much in the out-
ward appearance of our lives, what mattered was
the inside shape of a person, he argued, that gave
character to everything else.
Even though people were all different in various
circles of power and influence, underneath it all
they shared a set of values, love offamily and fear of
God. People everywhere held to some sort of secret
code. Even if they did not talk about it their actions
were governed by an inner faith. In the same way
Enjil said numbers were blown this way and that
by the fate of calculation and worldly actions, all
appearing to be different; but underneath it alla
hidden mantra turned, holding sway in a myriad
world of change.
He said the Mandalas of nine were but the
fixed points in a set of beautiful meditations, on the
meaning of numbers.
 q
ra
TE, TE
-
ES
7 ,
ialliaenanae
. ’ 7 7 =

wa ibe falaran) regi a .

Pe ee
WS Go eye vinertirane sthgebiiat eaten ;
—- ba ng hs ; 2 erty ir | NEES Pare AL -
ws within tlre apr oe lk a=
es a hon cactus Rowe oe
. 1) ve Lagesttean and se:ate oh Tatebeanies tie som |
-
nt ae ata Panag tal oman inaepebe sort i
r ct hat reasiire
a,Ait
aps wget aa deaf
ROU nh AAPOR Yeeros Coystealhved
teW
atindlear reas SEIN te hesreget
Wes at erty ocThnasia theewide resteertghinn ota
~~ qs retee
Var ie setteeeases + meee , res
IBIAS RSNA tats Raa Yin iy seme
wig Lait eH, wit hespeer uf Boserrene ty

brat a 01) h rhe 8 prance rian. ;

temet Ae Sune a werty nested da sbeatihs viet :
oe rycen “ wea A of iteny a
g Prayers oe) avin yates ve seven fart '
(9 sare, ghewnlang Latavy and a 2° Captain YyRibttn
_ om Hi So wienlo wAbjebos sounhunaty |
m4 wi veecatyiaabrnan Asahiver ly
er A Hhoh
“rr? i ite tae fs Sarde mat

Lee dee ealtid, a a : ~<

» a be 7 7 ~ aa (Oe =<
: 7
aa Saat arg TT
tae
=
 155
1

Movements
of Nine
Part Two
157
 The Search...
The intrigue of nine does not stop with the Mandalas.
The movements of nine go on.
In a way, these movements are the heart of the
book. Enjil and the Mandalas of nine were but the
catalyst and inspiration; now comes the unfolding, the
discoveries of what lies buried in higher arithmetic and
mathematical topographies. :
I said at the outset that nothing original stops, it is
just taken over. As one story ends another begins. The
Mandalas are now mine and Enjil has become my
talisman; a charm that works its spell under the differ-
ent disguises of arithmetic and mathematics, for if I
look with the sigma code I find things. I see hidden
paths. Like ghosts, footprints emerge. What is compli-
cated or plain bewildering suddenly becomes simple.

By looking below the surface we find surprises.

 The Search... 159
rT T T —— T —=a TT T

For those who search out more from the numbers

the trail now goes on to follow the movements of nine,
into more intriguing and deeper constructions; we
enter a world where the hypnotic trace and secret
mantras continue in remarkable ways.
The reader is encouraged to journey through,
marking trails, so that in time his or her own journeys
may be made into the force of nine.
And somewhere inside me Enjil, with a great big
smile on his face, is urging us to look further. The
quest, as he puts it, is for the crucible of numbers, for
the fixed points in the wind that do not move, though
everything else around them is changing all the time.

What follows is an open invitation, to the reader, to

join the sigma circle.
160
ae ee ee ee
°

Cycles and Patterns

Circular Numbers
A number well known to number theorists that seems
to cycle itself upon multiplication is 142857. When
multiplied by 1, 2, 3, etc. up to 6, the answer is the
same number but moved along a few places.

I x 142857 = 142857 .
2 x 142857 = 285714
3 x 142857 = 428571
4 x 142857 = 571428
5 x 142857 = 714285
6 x 142857 = 857142

The number has a circular nature.

 Cycles and Patterns 161
oe ee ee ee eC Ole
e

But what I cannot find in the number theory books is

how this number relates to nine and our invention of
the sigma circle.

And here is a surprise!

2142857 = 9

We know then that every multiplication of this num-

ber, by one or two or whatever, will never change the
sigma value because as we have seen when 9 enters
multiplication, the product always adds up to nine.
When this number is plotted on the sigma circle it
shows a symmetry about the vertical axis, about the
lone and proud figure of 9.

5 4

Cyclic numbers are exceedingly rare and are hard to

find. Can the sigma circle help to find others?
162 Cycles and Patterns
——— reer tT ,—~C—Ots=<CSsé‘“C ‘SCO3SWN”*!W!W!UOC

The number 0 1 2 34567 9 has cyclic properties upon

multiplication as shown below:

012345679 x 19 = 234567901
x 28 = 345679012
x 37 = 456790123
x 46 = 567901234
x 55 = 679012345

x 64 = 790123456
x 73 = 901234567

Remember 1089?
As a fraction, the number that leads to tricks with
reversals has an inversion of the digits 1-9.

1/1089 = 0.000918273645546372819...

The pattern on page 169 gives a picture of this

sequence reading from right to left, starting at the
bottom,9-1 8-2 7-3 6-4
 Cycles and Patterns 163
ae
e

The number on the left comes from the fraction !/g,

which has the repeating cycle to its expansion of
.012345679. If we forget the decimal and just take the
numbers that repeat then we have this number. When
it is multiplied by the 9x table we get an interesting
sequence in a nine digit pattern:

pase
3 6°78 Kx OS 1 Te i es a asaa|

h2345 67-94 -x% 18 EOA ae OE,

12325079 SX 27 2a= 338, 33.33 3 2

12345679 x 36 = 444444444

MASS GEO LQOX SAS) SIF DDS S

ees 45.6. BOn x. 54). =. 6 66,66 6:6,6.6

PO eNOS PIAL
AA LA ST

12345679 “Ko72— S| SSSESEESS

ere679 xX Sy = 999999999
164 Cycles and Patterns
 Cycles and Patterns 165
T =a 7 se “ae all

Patterns
The essence of mathematics is to look for patterns.
Our minds seem to be organised to search for
relationships and sequences. We look for hidden
orders.
These intuitions seem to be more important than
the facts themselves, for there is always the thrill at
finding something, a pattern, it is a discovery — what
was unknown is now revealed. Imagine looking up at
the stars and finding the zodiac!

Searching out patterns

is a pure delight.

Suddenly the counters fall into place and a connection

is found, not necessarily a geometric one, but a
relationship between numbers, pictures of the
mind, that were not obvious before. There is that
excitement of finding order in something that was
otherwise hidden.
And there is the knowledge that a huge unseen
world lurks behind the facades we see of the numbers
themselves.
 KILLA
WSS g——
\/
SAYS:
S >.

2
we —s<

CARREY
AT
ey Ma HY
ieiatfs)
(

eomee
 Cycles and Patterns 167
eS
ee ae =e 7 T mi

Patterns with all nine digits

0 \o 1
I i} Il
12 Pit
123 Chee
1234 PLOY
12345 H} ‘ee ee:

123456 a id4 ye
1234567 BABII I
12345678 OK
ee
ee
5
Rees
OR
9 XO
‘©
‘oO
‘o
© mMN
WN
UA
©
A PEERED Pid

0 &
9 &8
98 888
987 8888
9876 8888
98765 888888
987654 8888888
9876543 I 88888888

98765432 OC
Ke
ee
XM
Maasai
‘Oo
‘o
SO
OO
tO
‘©
© +t
t+eetetttet
ttttt+
++WY
WAN
NWA
Ge 888888888

I 0
12 98
123 GST
1234 9876
12345 98765
123456 987654
1234567 9876543
12345678 98765432
123456789 i OO
OK
XK
KOK
KS
KK Co
& ++ttteteetrt+
DA
mMN
Oo
NH
WwW
UA 987654321
168 Cycles and Patterns
——————— See rT cL C:SOSa:~C<S7;7C;73C;3SPCtaettee

1/099 O1O1O1OIOLOIOIOIOIOIO...

1/198 .005050505050505050505...

1/297 .003367003367003367003...

1/396 VO2SZSIS252352
42 S2I2O 2%). .

1/495 .002020202020202020202...

1/594 .001683501683501683501...

1/693 .001443001443001443001...

1/792 .001262626262626262626...

1/891 .001122334455667789001...

1/990 OOLOLOIOIOIOIOIOIOIOL...

The above fractions have two features to their denom-

inators. Each is = 9 and to each side of the fixed middle
figure there is a rise and fall of the digits 1-9.

When these fractions are added up, the result has an

intriguing secret.

0.029585537918871252202

Correct to nine decimal places this is

0.029585538

Remarkably, this adds up to 9.

 Cycles and Patterns 169
T T = | _— ee | ; ees ma | ui]

19+28+37+46+55+4+
644 734+ 82+91=495=>9

oOo
NH
WY
KR
oO
BO
DN
= KR
Oo
WO
NN
D2
NH
©
W=

19 428 + 37 446 + 55° 4 6f + 73 4+ 827 9F = 32085

The individual numbers above raised to the same

power give a sequence whose sum equals 2 9:

= (19" + 28" + 37" + 46" + 55" + 64" + 73" + 82" +91")

=X9

Vere il = Oe) 23, ..4etc.

170 Cycles and Patterns
SSeS eer F:CO:—:—C=Cs—“‘“‘RNNNNCOOCOC;*™”™O;™C~;«S

The (3)-(6)-(Y) Triangle in the Sigma Circle

PRG a KS ae ee
 Cycles and Patterns 171
Sia ee TT a i > ae ae

Triangles and the sigma circle

Base 8-1

Smee OC. = EO
OX 6 bese 48
ox De 1 P=" 40
5 x 44x?1 = bE 32
8% 386 [2=al 24
Or es) =e 6
Sex ae Te
288

Base 7-2

Taxa xan = OF
Lx 2 =~ 70
WSC AE SEGA SI)
T See ee oe
Teel x2 = we
ie ie 2 = N76
7x 8x2 = 112
504

Base 5-4

ox 4 =e 60
DEeet = a)
Dex x= 0
5 xe9 x 4 =5 180
5x8 x4 = [60
5x 7x4 = 140
5x6x4 = 120
720

A horizontal base to the triangles produces answers that

add up to 9. Inclined bases give different answers. Try it!
172 Cycles and Patterns
- «= —T TT “TT 7
i _

Patterns across the sigma circle

9
8 1
28+ 71 =-99
37+62 = 99
“d 46 +53 = 99
554% 440=\ 99
6 3 64+ 35 = 99
73 +26 ='99
5 4 S2rahy = 99

9
8 1

2
This is the same calculation
as multiplying out the
6 3 numbers on the keys of a
: 4 calculator pad, vertically.

IX AX Bee P21 Se SOS O™ S70)

 Cycles and Patterns 173
ee ww Li TT a Te T i)

Across the sigma circle

or 98
say 77
wo 26
64 35
55 44
46 53
3h be
28) 7)
19 39
495 +495 = 990

Id 88
gorTay
335 561
A] B52
56 643
65 34
if See=
Ss ONG
92 EOF
495 +495 = 990
174 Cycles and Patterns
Sy Seer cL ”S””:CS—"—C—‘“#E$PDUCSEEN”CSC“CO‘CCCSYSNS§RV
.

The Magic Sigma Square

Ee Each row or column

fa [6 |4) or diagonal adds up to2 9.

eos |

The square also reveals patterns that ‘magically’

add up to either, 23, 26, 29. (Add the numbers
represented by dots in the figures siown on the facing
page).

But where does this square come from?

If we take the First Magic Square shown on page 52,

add 1 to each number, and make 10 = 1 (for 1 + 0=1)
and re-arrange, then we get the magic sigma square.

See what happens when the numbers in the square

are raised to the second, third, fourth powers and
so on and reduced to their sigma values. Compare the
answers you get with the values running round the
circumferences of the Power Mandala!
 Cycles and Patterns 175
Ss lh CO Uc CCC mC SCO:CS
°

a
as)
ea HE
Se
176 Cycles and Patterns
.. — oe ee ee
°

Calculator pad keys

ll 24

l| 15

06
45

7 ay +2
+ +5 +6
$0] oth Dotyd
12 15 18 —~12+15+18
=[45] 44+5 = 9

Relationship of the sigma circle to calculator pad keys

(1x2x3) + (4x5x6) + (7x8x9) 630 (29)

(1x4x7) + (2x5x8) + (3x6x9) 270 (9)
Adding up both rows 900 (9)
 Cycles and Patterns UES
T . TT ——— ae T T 1 uf

Multiplying corners

Vy
poe
7

256
| iS
Mm
Bb
bo KEKbo
OK
SK lo
mw
Nw ON
tae
sy &A
N NN=
PCa&
Kae 576

Add the centre + 005

1359

1+34+5+9 EDO:
178 Cycles and Patterns
oT, eae see pee —SSeee. CCU”tC—ee

ose — £087 = E] — B4 :
S72 in FRR be SH ey ZF 8 1
16, =<—876- = ZT4 = AY
S56? \i—< S63 le Lh oreo B4 :
5650) =~ 5G a LY im KEP 2 3
434 | '=5 3434 = 24 .~5 31 7
32771 =. 2349 El =” £4
212? = BY / = 427 /— ZZ
1917? - 917% = 34 = XI
a 2, £9

The above pattern is in the form of‘a continuous loop

of the numbers 1 —9 as repeated below.
Each leg is a rotation around the sigma circle, first
anticlockwise, then clockwise and so on.
The net effect on the arithmetic is zero!
 Cycles and Patterns 179
an — ae el eee ane i:|va « 2) =

| | | | | | | } S Nh

ies ~— | | | | | __120
RYN
RK li vo | PND ~ |
| tile.
| | | 2720
PE
NAM
RRS AE es eT
| eee Ee 8S AS se te re
| | rat eas adD> allel Bidtaae
752
alfy apse, 40 320
ot a 5040
; ae | . 720

He 120
| 24
DY)
RYAN
ANY
SNwe
RL
RM
ARNE
RMON
/ 06
02
mH
fo
&
®
YM
NWR |
| 01

12 02
144
2880
86
400
3628
800
203
800
212
14631321600

The numbers in the array above are multiplied out

with each other in the horizontal direction, then
separately both in the vertical direction and along
the diagonal. When the products of multiplication
are all added up, their sum equals diagonally
23 (40107), vertically 26 (14838 252 639) and hori-
zontally 29 (455 346) — the stepping stones of 9!
180 Cycles and Patterns

The Complements of Nine

717

SAS SA ASA SANE REARS NEEEMNEEEANAARARAARREASARASESAREE

NA AAA AARSRANSAS SAE SSS EEEAARARR RARER AREER SSEAREAREREE DY
EE

9.428? #7? +6454 +4 + 3° + 27 +18

1+ 8+ 49 +216 + 625+ 1024+ 729 +128 +1

The total of this sum is 2781 which is 59.

 Cycles and Patterns 181
|| > ae ee

Geometry and Symbol

The Star of David is made up of 6 triangles of 3 sides

each, giving an 18-sided figure, i.e. 29 straight line
segments.

Nine regions make up the power of the Celtic Cross,

that most ancient of Christian marks.
 183

The Golden Section

The Golden Section is special in classical art and archi-
tecture. It is the particular ratio given by subdividing a
line so that the greater part is to the lesser part as the
whole is to the greater part.

A B ‘G

AB _ AC
BC AB

A B

The ratio 7
works out to 1+V5

(approximately 1.618)

This was said to be the proportion found most pleasing

in the rectangle and was used in the planning of the
Parthenon and numerous other architectural works.
184 The Golden Section
Ce ae eT SS = ee ee
Pr .

The golden ratio is also found in a triangle when it

is isosceles (in which the two opposite sides are equal),
but with a particular base angle.

72° ee

The ratio of the long side of the triangle to the shorter

base is in the golden ratio when the base angle is 72°.
This means the angle at the top vertex is 36°. Each
angle of the Golden Triangle sums to nine!
The Greeks believed that at the heart of perfect pro-
portion was the golden ratio and is it not pleasing to
find number nine buried in the works, to those of us
who chase its tail?
The unique property of the golden rectangle is that
if a square is taken away from it, the remaining part is
a rectangle, which has the same proportions to the
original rectangle. That means it is golden as well. The
process continues, with each removal of a square,
leaving another golden rectangle. Smaller and smaller
we go and if the points of the construction are joined
together in a smooth curve, we enter a spiral, winding
down into its vanishing point, the hidden eye.
The eye of the spiral is of course the shape of a
vanishing 9. ,
 The Golden Section 185
T ea ee oe Um

Geometry is cornered around 9.

The triangle is a line that bends twice to close on itself,
enclosing en route a total of 180° in its internal angles.
A square is a line that is more formal in its bending
around corners, enclosing each time a right angle so
that the sum of the internal angles is 4 x 90° = 360°.
A circle is a line that bends round continuously,
about a centre point, enclosing the angle of 360°.

In general, any regular polygon encloses

a total internal angle of (2n-4) right angles
where n is the number of sides of the
polygon.

Forapentagonn= 5 Sumofinternalangles = 540°

Forahexagonn = 6 Sumofinternalangles = 720°
For anoctagonn = 8 Sumof internal angles = 1080°
Foradecagonn =10 Sumof internal angles = 1440°
etc.

In all cases the digits in the sum of internal angles add

up to nine or multiples of nine. In other words for
regular polygons

_ 2 (sum of internal angles) = x9

186 The Golden Section
1 T T ‘a T
.

The Spiral in the Golden Section

 The Golden Section 187
ee oe ee 7 T T T T <A

Pentagon and the Golden Section

Any diagonal of a regular pentagon in ratio to its side is
golden:

A
wating Golden Ratio
AB

Extending any side of a pentagon gives the golden

ratio:

AD _ Golden Ratio
AB

No wonder the pentacle is deemed to be magic!

 188

Triangles
Pascal’s Triangle is a famous mathematical contrivance
that is fascinating and surprising. It is an array of
numbers, built up by adding two adjacent values to get
the next number below. For.example 3 + 3 gives 6, or 6
+ 15 gives 21. The array starts at the top with 1 and is
bordered on each side by ones.
A pyramid is built up of numbers with very special
properties. ;

1 9 26 “S49 °126" 126 84° 36 oe.

1 10. 45 9120 210.952 210 120 45° “%6
 Triangles 189
| (| i ote 1Nii T 1 1

Amongst many other things Pascal’s Triangle is a

probability chart.
If two coins are tossed there is only one chance of
getting both heads or tails but there are two ways of
getting one head and one tail. The coefficients 1, 2, 1
are exactly the values of row 2 in Pascal's Triangle, if at
the apex of the triangle, we take the single value 1 as
row 0.

sie eth xd load |

aera

6660e@
Heads Heads Heads Tails
606 Cece
Tails Heads Tails Tails

Row 3 of Pascal’s Triangle gives the probabilities when

tossing three coins, and so on. But getting back to
row 2 of the Triangle, the values 1, 2, 1 are also the
coefficients of the expansion of the algebraic series.

(lex = I +*2x Pi
The expansion (1 + x)’ will have coefficients from row
3 of the triangle, which are 1, 3, 3, 1.

Ges) e= 1+ 3x + 3x tlk
There are many other interesting properties to this
fantastic piece of organisation in numbers — and the
keen reader must look to more mathematical texts on
Pascal's Triangle for further elaborations.
190 Triangles
Tr ~ TT gemtae ate ae eS
a Lee oe

When the sigma code is applied to Pascal’s Triangle a

curious thing happen. Unlike the numbers in the
triangle which keep growing exponentially, I find that
beneath this pattern of growth there is a hidden con-
sistency.
Each row, when added up horizontally, reduces to
a single value as part of a set sequence of six values:

P—- 2-4-8
= /-—5
 Triangles 191
Co ee T or Cs a 7 1 —ai

This is a real surprise; a hidden conspiracy going on in

the hugely versatile and inventive triangle under the
surface. What is rather special is that the values of the
sequence 1 —-2-4-—8-7-—5 add up to 27 which gives
DTS Oe
I looked into sixty rows of the triangle, where the
numbers become really gigantic, but each row still
reduced to the same sigma sequence above, repeating
after every six rows. Is this a coincidence or just extra-
ordinary?
But this sequence is also found in radiating arm
of the power circles in Part I of this book. In other
words, the sequence 1 2 487 5 is the expansion of the
power of 2.

Pees oe ge

The sigma code shows something in this triangle that

is not obvious at first glance.
I found further resonance in the triangle with the
stepping stones of 9, viz those of 3 and 6.
Each band of six rows of the triangle contains a
number of entries (here we are not considering the
actual values, just their location) that sum up to three
when reduced to the sigma code. For example the first
six rows have 21 entries (221 = 3) and the next six
rows have 57 entries (257 = 3), and so on.
192 Triangles
ee
ee a ee

But the loveliest touch of all is that the repeating

sequence of 1 - 2 -4-— 8-7-5 when plotted on the
sigma circle yields a symmetric plot about the vertical
axis.
This sequence that repeats as the triangle grows,
shows that under the surface something is conserved;
a secret energy under the obvious multiplicity and
growth of the actual values of the triangle. And con-
servation has its reward — on the sigma circle the
sequence has symmetry.
The intrigue is that the sequence 1 2 4875 has the
same numbers as the cyclic number 1 4 2 8 5 7, just the
order is different. See “Cycles”.
 Triangles 193
ee ae ae OL CLS T =i 7
e

The listings of the sums of the first 36 rows

of Pascal's Triangle with the relevant sigma values.
Rows 1-18 = Values Rows 19-36 = Values

1 1 262144 1
2 2 524288 2
4 4 1048576 4
8 & 2097152 8
16 7 4194304 ry
32 5 8388608 g

64 1 16777216 1
128 2 33554432 2
256 4 67108864 4
512 & 134217728 &
1024 7 268435456 7
2048 5 536870912 5

4096 1 1073741824 1
CL92 2 2147483648 Z
16384 4 4294967296 4
32768 8 8589934592 &
65536 7 17179869184 7
131072 5 34359738368 5

The sequence 1 - 2- 4-8-7 -5 which sums to 29

repeats throughout the triangle.
194 Triangles
ae T “TT T WT a |
ts ee

Older Version of Pascal's Triangle

The Chinese used such a triangle hundreds of years
before the French mathematician - though they
organised the triangle differently — as a right angled
triangle.

ia ~—

vo
an<—

LP endl} 5 1

~ btAe 20 15 6 1

ve © Ee See | 7 I

2G~ P2356 70 —>56 28 & 43

.&
Oo
Ay.
bO
elu
Jn
0 36 §=84 126 Pe Bt 6 Sad

i ~S 43 420° "290% 232 210 F220 4ielon!

Each number is the result of a ‘dog leg’ addition:

34+3=6 or 70+56 = 126 etc.

 Triangles 195
<i as " ecm Ata wma. ra
The Diamonds in Pascal’s Triangle
Beneath the rapid growth of numbers in Pascal’s
Triangle we tracked a secret code at work — each six
rows giving a repeating sequence of numbers whose
sigma values added up to nine.
But what happens if we write out Pascal’s Triangle
in sigma values (so that 6 + 4 = 10 is written as 1, and
20 + 15 = 35 is written as 8 and so on)?
In fact we do not need to do even these conver-
sions, the triangle can be constructed from the outset
by just using the logic of reducing any new entry to the
relevant sigma value.

Now if a pattern of diamonds is set up in the

triangle, their sigma values add up to 9 when going
across the triangle, except for the first entry.
See the triangles overleaf.
196 Triangles
a a a ee mee Cea meeoeee oes

Pascal's Triangle with Sigma Values

 Triangles 197
—
aeSS

Adding any row of diamonds

across gives 2 9 except for the first one.

oO
SECOOCR© Ws 4
xe a
5 6286 128 =8g 6 2671

DP 3//\1/7\1 PN 2ff 1/1

198

Primes
In the world of numbers some numbers have very
special properties. They are the prime numbers. They
are unique in that they cannot be factored. Numbers
like seven, eleven, seventy-nine, one hundred and
one, are such numbers. All other numbers are called
composite and can be factored down into primes. For
example 276 and 390 have the following factors,
which are prime:

276 2+ 2 ets
390 ll 2S SRI OCTS

Ultimately, primes are the ‘atoms’ of numbers.

What is much celebrated about the primes is their

distribution. It appears to be random, starting with 1
and continuing:

P4290 U1 1S TF IO 22S aia ea

 Primes 199
T 7 T 7 T = 7 1

Mathematicians have tried over the centuries to

predict this unfolding sequence with a formula, but
have failed. The only successful solution to date has
been a default method, invented by Eratosthenes, of
writing out all the integers in sequence and crossing
off successively the multiples of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, etc.
The numbers left after this ‘sieving’ process are,
miraculously, the primes! A sample of the method
from numbers 2 to 52 is shown below.

DOLOKO# ¥ HOLE
Ke 6 OM OW 1 AB UB 2B
of6 B 36GD36BH 6 B 6 78
WO 6 OMS 6 @ 6 9 363 6
The study of primes is a fascinating subject because
one is always trying to find if there is a hidden pattern
or some trace of conformity.
As the sigma code looks under the surface of arith-
metic I thought it would be an ideal tool for finding
such traces, if they existed. And what I found under
the x-ray eye of the code is a special relationship that
the primes seem to have to the numbers 3 — 6 - 9.
200 Primes
{po ee ee ee

Beyond number 3, all primes add up to one of the

following sigma code values

| ma ees’ ma gam aa FS

but their digits never seem to add up to 3, 6 or 9.

It would appear that the character of 9 is avoided.
Further analysis however shows that this is not the
case and that actually number nine is buried deep in
the works, a secret, behind a secret.
To find out more, I raised the prime numbers to
successive powers and tabulated their sigma code
values. And the answers still avoided being 3, 6 or 9;
but when I went further and added up these products,
mysteriously the character of nine began to appear: as
9 itself or in the guise of one of its stepping stones — 6.
 Primes 201
ee ee T 1

For example the prime number 13 raised from the Ist

power to the 6th power gives successive sigma values
as:

Prime Power (13)' (13)’ (13)? (13)* (13)? —_(13)°

Value 13. 169 2197 28561 371293 4826809
Sigma Value 4 7 I 4 7 1

There is no 3, 6 or 9 here. But if these values are added

up horizontally, 4+ 7+1+4+7+ 1 they add up to 24
and2+4=6.

Let us carry the investigation further; prime numbers

17, 19, 23, give the following sigma power sequences:

ey OE TPES
4
RS:
17 8 1 8 ii 8 I —- 9
19 1 if 1 i 1
23 5 if 8 4 2 1 an ©

Adding the results horizontally leads to the values

shown in the extreme right hand column, an un-
folding sequence of 6 and 9.
202 Primes
T T — ae meas a ome stetiie! teens ee eat «|

As this working continues, the columns of numbers in

the sixth column show a remarkable consistency.
All primes to the sixth power, except for number 3,
have digits that sum up to unity! This is a shock to the
system. How do these random numbers suddenly
show such conformity? And it does not stop there;
this fact holds for the 12th power, the 18th power and
so on.
Another way of saying this is that at every sixth
self-multiplication prime numbers come home as it
were, in a great levelling off, with their digits adding
up to unity.
On the following page is a listing of the prime
numbers from 1-109 giving the sigma values of the
primes themselves and their successive powers.
The far right-hand column, which is the sum of the
first six powers, shows the hidden organisers 6 and 9 at
work.

Primes have many secrets

but what the sigma code reveals must rank
as one of the strangest.

x (N prime)? =
 Primes 203
rr aii TT T Ss ica a 1 ee

Chart of Sigma Values of Primes

Prime numbers raised to successive powers, with their
associated sigma value, tabulated up to the sixth power.
Adding
Prime columns
NumberN —(ZN)' (2N)* (ZN)? (ZN)* (2N)° (2N)° one to six
+ ] Se ie Se ae ee ae >
4
9
7
MO
=
WN
N 4
4
13 7,
17 1
19 1
23 7.
29 4
31 7
37 1
41 7
43 4
47 4
53 1
61 4
67 7
71 1
73 1
79, 4
83 4
91 1
97. 4
101 4
103 7
109 UH 1
@® 10
OO
HK
Op
mem
OD
KH
NMNRENNKF
BPR
DMNHNUPEPAN
WN
DANNY
AN HH EP
&OOH
HHO
HHH BORNINSE
RNR
ENYA
NNR
ANE
ON
EE
EF
NN DWN
URKH®WNYA
“OO
UAHND AHOARDAO
WUANHKENYQUN
UDR
~N ee
Oe)
ee
ee
ee
ee
204 Primes
TT —— a —" ae a aT >.

The Hidden Organisers

Throughout the Movements of Nine the investigation
has shown that despite its organising power, number
nine seems to act as an innermost secret, not revealing
itself at first.
Upon first analysis the sigma code values we come
across are:

Toe od Ss Olas

In Pascal’s Triangle every six rows has the sequence

1-2-4-8-7-5. And in Cycles, the number that
rotates itself under multiplication is 142857, a slight
alteration to that of the Pascal’s Triangle sequence. Yet
again in looking at prime numbers, their sigma code
value is either 1, 2, 4, 5, 7 or 8 (the number 3 is the one
exception to this).
What is missing from these numbers in general are
the values 3, 6 or 9. Yet as we have seen in the text, the
character of nine ultimately does appear. It is as if the
numbers three, six and nine remain hidden to serve as
some kind of conduit or template through which the
other numbers pass.
If the numbers 1, 2, 4, 5, 7 or 8 carry the motion of
the sigma code and first announce a secret, then the
stepping stones GB) - 6)- (9) must remain the inner-
most secret, to allow this to happen.
We can gain an insight into this behaviour when
we look at the magic sigma square or the sigma circle.
 Primes 205
T “ Les T TT a

In the magic sigma square the numbers three, six

and nine are on the diagonal like an organising
principle, pushing the other numbers to each side of
them. Similarly, in the sigma circle the numbers three,
six and nine form a robust triangle with the other
numbers to each side of this central anchor.
The numbers G) —(6)-(9) seem to be both conduit
and control in a secret world of numbers.
It is the principle of the active and the passive, the
Yang and Yin, the active core that illuminates buried
secrets.
206

Equations
As revealed by the sigma code, the way number nine
affects arithmetic can be written out in a set of strange
equations, where N is the sum of the digits of any
number:

IN Sy
IN -=29==N :
aN xX Lo = 2Y
XIN + 29 = XN (remainder)

In the case of prime numbers there is a very curious

equation I found that results if a prime number is
raised to the sixth power and its digits added up.

Then:

X(N prime)’ = =1
For details of how this happens see “Primes”.
 Equations 207
“it T = T 1 $a on
T
e

The above equations, strange as they seem, can be

explained mathematically by using the following facts:
— number nine is equal to ten minus one

9= 10-1

—and any number can be expressed as an algebraic

equation of the form

Ge + x + +(x + OX
where a, b, etc. are integers 1, 2, 3, etc. and x is the
relevant base of numbers.

Now in our decimal system x = 10, any two digit num-

ber, say, can be expressed as:

ax! + bx’
or more simply as ax + b because x' =x andx° = 1
The sigma value of this number is the same as its
coefficients so that:

x number = (a + b)

Now if 9 (which is 10-1 or in algebraic notation

x — 1) is added to the original number, the new
number is:

(ax + b) + (x-1)
208 Equations
a. . © = ~ os = ee a ui]

Adding like coefficients the new number is:

(a+ 1)x+(b-1)
The sigma value of this number is the sum of its
coefficients.

= New Number=a+1+b-—l=a+b

That is the same sum as the original number before the

addition of nine. In other words adding nine makes no
difference to the sum of the digits. This proof for addi-
tion is the simplest. For subtraction, the logic is similar
but you need to watch carry-overs. Multiplication is
also similar, and again watch the carry-overs. But for
division, the reader needs to know about congruences.

A number like 10 divided by 9 is said to be congruent

to 1 and written:

1021

and is stated as “10 is congruent to 1 modulo 9”. This is

a more advanced branch of number theory and the
reader who wants to understand these proofs in detail
should consult one of the books listed in the biblio-
graphy.
 Equations 209
ee a 1 vr —T
e

No doubt for the pure mathematician the algebraic

explanations are succinct, simple and elegant; but
what is fun is to find a graphical way of explaining
these abstractions.
To most people mathematics is a taboo area, an area
they do not feel comfortable with. That is a pity,
because mathematics is beautiful; the delight being in
chasing purely mental constructs.
The strange power of number nine may be written
out in only a few lines of algebra yet there is something
more, something much more interesting when a
picture emerges from out of the abstraction.
210 Equations
| = CO a a re

The sigma circle is such an invention. In one orbit it

explains the unique property of nine. And in some
ways it is more powerful than the mathematics,
because the picture penetrates deeper into the area
behind our rational mind. The saying goes that a pic-
ture says much more than words; in that sense the
sigma circle and the greater inspiration of its Mandalas
speaks volumes, sharpening our intuition beyond a
number itself into patterns and characters. Whereas
mathematics describes, a picture inspires. Equations
demand our intellect, but the Mandalas demand
curiosity and our poetry.
From pure mathematics we can see that nine owes
its character to the unique position it has in our
decimal system. But number nine has also travelled far
beyond these computational confines. From another
route, through the mists of time and long before the
invention of our decimal system, number nine grew
and developed its own archetypes and mystery.
Vishnu took three strides to create the universe.
Three times three is potency magnified beyond
measure. That beginning of the great rebirth of the
seasons, the winter solstice, is in the ninth house of the
Zodiac; and the infant takes nine months to be born.
Unaided by any mathematical proofs number nine
grew its own equations in the human imagination.
And Allah was honoured and blessed and was called
by ninety nine names.
 = fell
Ss
a-
iReee, a
a
Ee
-. aaa
eH a
212

Proverbs and Charms

A stitch in time saves nine \|
Possession is nine tenths (or nine points) of the law

Dressed up to the ninés \/

At the ninth hour (\

Right as ninepence : | "4

Nine times out of ten .

Nine sheets to the wind be |

Ninepence to the shilling Y

Nimble as ninepence [\
To look nine ways MV
Nine days wonder
Nine tailors make aman x

To be on cloud nine |
 Proverbs and Charms 213
Se ogiatinmaien — TT 1
°

When constructing a magic circle it should be nine feet

in diameter.
Se ee ee ee ee

Fairies come out to dance when you put nine grains of

wheat on a four leaf clover.
ee a ee ee eo

To bring good luck the ABRACADABRA is worn as a

charm around the neck, for nine days, and then
thrown away.
Se ee me

To charm away a sprained ankle you put nine knots on

it, made out of black wool.
SeeSeeaes ee te ee eae ee i ee ee Ee

To charm away an itch, a left handed man should whirl

a black cat round his head three times, make an oint-
ment from nine roasted barleycorns and nine drops of
blood from the cat’s tail and apply this while walking
round the person with the itch three times, calling on
the Trinity.
Sh ee LOO SO A vs a eS ae, PO SE ER NE

To bring grief to an enemy measure a corpse with

a piece of rope three times, from three different points
(3 x 3 = 9): from the elbow to the longest finger, from
the shoulder to the longest finger, and from head to
toe. Then ‘capture’ the person you want to inflict the
grief upon, and measure him or her in the same way as
you did the corpse!
214

Naming
The 99 Names of Allah

Allah The Mighty The Independent

The Compassionate The Forgiving The Powerful

The Merciful The Grateful The Dominant

The King/Sovereign The High The Giver —

The Holy The Great The Retarder

The Source of Peace The Preserver The First

The Giver of Faith The Protector The Last

The Overall The Reckoner The Manifest

Protector

The Strong The Sublime The Hidden

The Almighty The Bountiful The Governor

The Majestic The Watcher The High Exalted

The Creator The Responsive The Righteous

The Maker The Infinite The Relenting

The Fashioner The Wise ‘The Forgiver

The Great Forgiver The Loving The Avenger

 Naming 215
a a or ———7 9

The Dominant The Glorious The Compassionate

The Bestower The Resurrector The Ruler

of the Kingdom

The Provider The Witness The Lord of

Majesty and Bounty

The Opener The True The Equitable

The All-Knowing — The Advocate The Gatherer

The Restrainer The Most Strong _ The Self-Sufficient

The Extender The Firm The Enricher

The Humbler The Patron The Bestower

The Exalter The Praiseworthy The Withholder

The Empowerer The Numberer The Propitious

The Humiliator The Commencer _ The Distresser

The All-Hearing The Restorer The Light

The All-Seeing The Giver of Life The Guide

The Judge The One The Eternal

Who Gives Death

The Just The Living One The Everlasting

The Kindly One The Self- The Heir

Subsisting

The Gracious The Perceiver The Guide

to the Right Path

The Clement The One — The Patient

216

Symbol
3x3
In the field of all possibilities the Wise Ones decided to place a
system of markers. In the blankness there would be direction
and reference, how else was the race to go forward?

They put down one marker in the open landscape. Everyone

ran up to the great stone column shrieking at its newness.
They swarmed around it but could not judge what else to do.
In this infinite plane the stone column, a point, became an
infinity itself: it was everything. The point soon became point-
less. So the Wise Ones tried two points.
 Symbol 217
T T uy i
'aea
a |

Some of the people went to the old stone column, the

others ran to the new shining column, glinting in the land.
Some Clever Ones connected one point to the other in a
straight line and rushed up and down, between the points.
But that was all they could do and soon bumped into each
other. Some claimed one point as theirs. Why they chose one
stone column and not the other they could not say, but
each group thought their marker significant and the most
important one. The groups began to shout at one another,
claiming their marker was the right one. Fights broke out.
So the Wise Ones decided to try one more time and threw
down another marker, in a great tearing sound, through
the air.

Now there were three markers. Suddenly a kind of

democracy set in. People could not stand opposed one to the
other. It was more complex. There had to be intrigues. Three
points suddenly gave the people a sense of space, they could set
up enclosures and boundaries. They built fences. The people
got used to each other and soon the race began to think as one.
218 Symbol
 Symbol 219
fe a ee, ; cia: as ee =e 1

And more people came travelling through the blank

spaces. The crowd grew into a multitude. In relation to the
blank open space the three markers became an enclosure, a
closed point, the people swarming like ants around it,
hanging outside the imaginary walls, knowing not what else
to do.
But the Great Ones wanted a distribution of evenness in
the open spaces and they threw down another three markers.
There was a rush from all those who camped outside the
walls of the old triangle into the new region. But the two re-
gions, of three points each, opposed one other; it was as if they
glared across the divide at each other. What happened was
that those in each region became an entity, the space they
inhabited shrunk in their mind, as if to a point. And so point
opposed point again. War broke out. The Elders moved
swiftly then, streaming three more markers into the wide
blank plane; and this gave them what they wanted, an
evenness of distribution, a wider peace. No one camp could
fight another — the cross lines grew too complicated. They
argued and called each other names but no two could agree to
fight one another, so peace prevailed, crossed in three times
three ways.
The Elders called the idea wonderful; and three pillars, in
groups of threes, all nine of them, marked the land to bring it
out of the wilderness and blankness.
 Symbol 221
7 T io, TT me

Enjil’s Mark
The numbers 1-9 are symbols and exert a powerful
hold on the imagination — they act as some kind of
bridge to other worlds. Because they are inviolate and
basic, they become the hidden steps to another kind of
understanding, to prophecy and divination.
In researching this book I came across the Cabalah,
and the faith it had in Numerology, which used the
numbers 1 —9 to divine a person’s character. I tried the
method on Enjil and got the number 5, for the Self or
Life Number which is the number that describes the
essence of a character. It is also the number for magic
in Numerology. What was curious was that my first
name also came to this number.
I then tried out another aspect, the Personality
number, which is given by checking the consonants
in a name. The letters N J L in ‘Enjil’ added up to
nine. I was quite stunned and delighted. But so did the
consonants in my first name: C C L.
Was I destined to write this book? Had Enjil called
me up?
Was there another level operating here, a deeper
intuition, that guided me towards Enjil?
Sometimes I think with a slight touch of fear that
perhaps he was out there waiting to come in — an idea
looking my way, hovering. Then in the yellow light of
the moon, in one night of asking strange questions,
a ray enters my mind and illuminates the path. Enjil
invades. I feel as if he has invented a new pair of eyes
in me so that I can see clearer, undoing the clutter and
the learning I carry around like heavy baggage and I
learn to count again in simple ways, 1, 2, 3,....
222 Symbol
a eee ete Tr eS Oe ae a: aaa: |
T

The Last Movement

When I began looking into numbers I had no idea that
number nine was such fertile ground. I read the books
and followed certain well-worn explanations but
could not find what I really wanted, a picture, a dia-
gram. In mathematical books, number nine remained
a mental construction. But in the primitive belief that
numbers needed shape I tried to create a physicality
around the idea. Then Enjil showed it to me, the sigma
circle.
If I arranged the numbers one to nine, in a circle,
suddenly everything fell into place. I had looked
through all the books I had on numbers and searched
the contents of others on bookshelves — but did not
find a graphic explanation for the special behaviour of
nine. And when I found it, there were the pictures for
the other numbers as well, one to eight, the whole
thing held tightly by the character of nine. It was
simple and quite beautiful.
But Enjil had come to me previously.
I was working on another puzzle, on patterns, for
another book. I was looking into how to connect up
eighteen fixed points, laid out in 3 x 6 rows, in as
many ways as possible. Just as I was exhausting the
possibilities thrown up by a logical approach I thought
of the games I had played in childhood, skipping along
large stones by riverbanks, constructing special road-
ways beside the babbling water. And suddenly a spirit
sprang to life, a boy-wonder of mathematics releasing
a whole new set of patterns in miy mind. Like a
guardian angel, he skipped over the stones giving an
answer to the puzzle I was looking into. That boy’s
 Symbol 223
Se T =m 1

name was, of course, Enjil. So when I was struggling

again to find a picture and a pattern for number nine, I
thought of Enjil and invoked that spirit of invention.
That is when the answers came; the sigma circle of
nine numbers, the other orbits of the Mandalas, and
the meditations of moving patterns. I drew upon the
woman Soma who lives in the moon to inspire me, for
in Hindu myth she is the essence of wisdom, the drink
of the Gods, the nectar of a divine inspiration. She is
magic. And her Greek namesake, Sophia, is also an
essence, one of heavenly wisdom; who better than
these spirits to inspire Enjil and me into action?
After the Mandalas were found, looking for the
movements of nine and searching for the hidden se-
quences buried deep in mathematical constructions,
became absorbing research.
Prime numbers suddenly conformed under the
spell of the sigma code, despite their unique and stand-
alone indivisible nature. Nothing I had learnt about
primes had led me to believe that there was anything
to them but their oddness; yet the code opened a door
to speculation about their behaviour.
Perhaps the surface eccentricities of the distribu-
tion of numbers, as with prime numbers, have inner
and deeply buried movements of order, a gathering
together of certain essences so that nothing is truly
random. Perhaps for something to appear in our world
and to be tracked by our minds, there must be some
kind of hidden coherence, though that secret would be
buried deep and generally unknown to us. The sigma
code certainly points to this. conjecture and makes us
think of numbers in different and new ways. The
224 Symbol
ee.
ee ee 7 — ee 1 ay

sigma code and Enjil’s story give both animation to

numbers and new hope.
But the Mandalas also taught me something else:
that “modern” need not mean “different”, a fracture
from the past. What is interesting in the Mandalas
(pages 122 and 134) is that both diagrams, the classic
centred one of symmetry and the strange skewed one,
hold the same information; one static and concentric,
the other swinging in and out, and dynamic.
From our pasts, the images of completeness we
take in are symmetric; and perfection is said to radiate
outwards from a point, and what surrounds a source is
held at equal distances. That was how I constructed
the first Mandala, spaced out, evenly, around the
innermost sigma circle.
I was trapped by the static concept. I even called the
diagram a Mandala, a meditation along Eastern lines of
fixed centred thinking.
But to my mind, the Strange One, a modern
Mandala for today, is even more exciting than the
concentric one. The removal of symmetry lends a
particular dynamic; the contemplation is still there but
it is more informed, if anything, more focussed towards
a greater concentration on the true balance point, the
cross-over of all orbits.
What we learn from these diagrams is that a
modern notation is not necessarily a break from the
past. It is just a reworking of the same information in a
wholly new way, more relational than absolute. And
perhaps more accurate for that. We need not fear the
apparent disjointed and twisted surfaces of the non-
symmetric, it is just another way of looking, to my
 Symbol 225
rT T 7 a TT WT 2. T q

mind, a more accurate view perhaps of really what is

going on around us. And that gives me hope, some-
thing to look forward to in the realm of ideas.
226 Symbol
mi T T TT TT
T T ea

The End
In the end the numbers are all held by nine. It is as if in
the beginning there is a great stillness. Only the black
hole of nine reverberates.

Then the numbers slip out, first One and Eight, then
Two and Seven, Three and Six, and finally Four and
Five, in pairs, to take their place around the sigma
circle.
The farthest away are given the most movement,
to cut and dance across the inner space of the circle, as
we saw in the shape of multiplications. The other
numbers have less movement as they come nearer to
Nine: One and Eight just move around the circum-
ference of the circle. And the ninth spot remains
unmoving.
In this secret world of arithmetic, nine controls the
other numbers, releasing them into the world yet
holding onto them tightly. And the sigma circle is its
crucible into which all secret arithmetic flows, im-
printed by a hidden code. The beauty of NINE is that it
is the Alpha and the Omega of these fabrications, an
organising power of vanishing and emergence.
 Symbol 227
T eos |ms > |pat T 1
e

Nine is the centre and binding rim of the prayer

wheel of numbers.
And the last movement of nine never seems to
come, each revelation or discovery simply deepens the
mystery. The fascination grows. Like a spiral the shape
of nine continues to evade a simple end, winding itself
further into enigma and exploration. Enjil said that the
Mandala and his quest for nine was but a reflection on
life: Who is the man or woman, he asked, who would
not like to know the hidden path that holds on to all
movement? Was he not right?
In the labyrinth of appearances with all its shout-
ing, twists and turns, most of us become lost and
bewildered. To find our way we need a code. On the
surfaces of bent experience the straightness of our
logic is not enough — there are no clues to a deeper
understanding, no whispers that we must hear to
make our inner world hold strong and have meaning.
At the heart of the story of Enjil and the Mandalas
is the simple truth, that a secret in itself is beautiful and
once that is known, then somehow the fact gains
power and multiplies. The world that grows around it
is never barren or wasted, for in every part we see the
trace of the original idea. The many that is one has
always been the greatest treasure to find.
In the eternal abstraction of points, number 9, will
always find connections. To those who know how to
look, the insights will grow.
There is no end, as long as there are the numbers.
228

Acknowledgments

A book starts out as a solo journey but soon the help of others
is needed and a support team builds up whose advice and
help are fundamental to completing the mission. No one’s
help was more invaluable than Margaret Cashin’s who typed
and edited the manuscript and advised on layout plus helped
research original material.

I thank also Peter Speleers for his patience and skill in helping
with the computer drawings and transforming rough con-
cept scrawls into beautiful finished images.

I acknowledge the contribution I owe to many readers of the

manuscript who offered support and valuable criticism, in
particular Noel, Violetta, Christopher and Shirley; and to
Alfredo and Lee for checking the numbers so diligently.
A thank-you to Christian Brensing for introducing me to
Prestel whose staff have helped most creatively in supporting
this project. And a big thank-you to J. J., Sarah and James for
their support and enthusiasm and for never doubting this
(ad)venture.
|
230

Selected Bibliography
The books I read, studied and enjoyed:

A Mathematicians Apology, —- G.H. Hardy, (1940) Cam-

bridge University Press — a lovely soliloquy on mathematics,
the art and creativity. Hardy describes well the joy of
discovering something in mathematics, just for itself, an
invention being held only by its internal logic.
Recreations in the Theory of Numbers, Albert H. Beiler,
(1964) Dover Publications Inc., N.Y. — a treasure trove on the
manipulation of numbers with mathematical puzzles and
several problems set for the keen reader to solve. The
number pattern on page 167 in my book is obtained from
Beilers’s book.
Excursions in Number Theory, C. Stanley Ogilvey
& John T., unabridged, corrected (1988) republication
(originally published 1964) Dover Publications Inc., N.Y. —
a well written book on key aspects of numbers, primes, com-
plex numbers, continued fractions, etc. easy to follow for
someone with higher school maths.
Figuring: The Joy of Numbers, Shakuntala Devi, (1977),
Penguin (1990) — a simple highly enjoyable book on num-
bers for the lay reader on arithmetic process; plus tricks and
puzzles and easy to follow. Shakuntala Devi came to my
school once, doing huge calculations in her head at great
speed. She is billed as the world’s fastest human computer.
Numbers - Old and New, Irving and Ruth Adler, (1960)
Dennis Dobson —a small book for children on numbers and
their histories, with clear illustrations by Peggy Adler to
describe the concepts.
 Bibliography 231

The Magic of Numbers, Eric Temple Bell, (1991) Dover

Publications Inc., N.Y. — a celebration of the spirit of Pythag-
oras; an interesting read on the nature and meaning of
numbers from ancient times.
Multicultural Mathematics, David Nelson, George
Gheverghese Joseph and Julian Williams, (1963) Oxford
University Press — a book on the teaching of mathematics
from the background of several cultures. Interesting and
stimulating. I found the ancient Chinese method of counting
up to 99,999 on one hand here.
The Divine Proportion, H.E. Huntley, (1970) Dover
Publications Inc., N.Y. — comprehensive book on the golden
ratio and its beauty in art, mathematics and nature.
Numerology for the New Age, Lynn M. Buess, (1980)
De Vorss & Co —a modern interpretation on the old science of
how numbers are used to divine character and personality. A
very entertaining read for those who follow numbers beyond
the literal.
Nine Star Ki, Bob Sachs, (1996) Element Books — a full
explanation of the Chinese astrological system based on
bio 9:
The Masks of God, Joseph Campbell, (1973) Souvenir
Press (British Edition) — a huge and great book about the
psychology of myth and ritual. A classic work that inspired
me as a young man to trust in ‘magic’.
Man and his Symbols, Carl Jung, (1964) Aldus Books,
Picador (1978) — a work on the meaning of symbol and
archetype. I was interested in the reference to a Yantra (or
Mandala) of nine linked triangles.
232 Bibliography

I browsed through the following dictionaries and encyclo-

paedias of mythologies:

The Wordsworth Dictionary of Mythology, (1994) Words-

worth.
Brewers Dictionary of Phrase and Fable, (1959) 15th
edition 1995, Cassel Publishers Ltd.
Essential Teachings of Islam, Kerry Brown, (1990)
Arrow Books.
Man, Myth and Magic: The Illustrated Encyclopaedia of
Mythology, Religion and the Unknown, Richard Cavendish
(ed.) (1983) Marshall Cavendish.
Penguin Dictionary of Religions, John Hinnells (ed.)
(1986) Penguin Books.

And
The Bible.

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The Author - Cecil Balmond, who was
born in Sri Lanka, is a leading structural
designer working with several key
architects such as Rem Koolhaas, Daniel
Libeskind, Alvaro Siza and Arata Isozaki
on major international projects. He is a
Director of the engineering consultancy
firm Ove Arup & Partners in London and
lectures and teaches at various architectural
schools to promote his ideas on complex
forms and the overlap of art and science.
Cecil Balmond lives in London with his
wife and three children.

ae ee
Munich - New York
Number 9 takes the reader into a mysterious realm,

unlocking a secret world of numbers. On the surface

of arithmetic, Ponting calculations confuse

the eye, but underneath it all, there is

method and order. We are introduced to

Enjil, the boy mathematician who

discovers a code and its hidden

when challenged by a spirit to solve

the riddle, “What is the fixed

point in the wind?” But like a detective

story, the clues unravel, from

Corners of the Earth to the Four

Precious Mirrors of arithmetic, through

archetypes and myth to the symbols of nine

=

— a trail that leads to an astonishing truth.