Romen Numeral Clocks

[IndieSinger]

Anyone will tell you that the Roman Numeral for 4 is IV... why then, does every clock I can find with Roman Numerals on it show 4 as IIII?

[sddsddean]

I remember a bloke on the 'Antiques Roadshow' saying this. Because (very bad grammar,sorry) on the opposite side of the clock face from 4 there is 8. As 8 is written VIII, it looks more balanced to have 4 written IIII rather than IV. It is purely a question of 'looks'.

[firefly]

Roman numerals don't make sense though? After all, 99 should be IC, not XCIX. Calling 4 IIII makes as much sense as IV.

[bernardo]

No, firefly, 99 should not be "IC, not XCIX". Roman numerals are always translated one digit at a time, so 99 is 90+9 which is (100-10) plus (10-1) which is XC plus IX which is XCIX. I think the Romans did it deliberately to annoy and confuse people, a bit like Shakespeare deliberately torturing schoolchildren with his boring plays.

[Fitzer]

One story about the reason for the clock face having IIII is that one of the Louis' of France thought it looked better and when people quibbled about it he basically played the "Who's King around here" card

[Ember]

I hear that it was because Louis thought that was the correct way of showing it and insisted that the clockmaker alter his clock accordingly and it was a case of "The king's new clothes" and everybody since then has followed suit.

[IndieSinger]

These are all fantastic answers, thanks to all of you for answering! All very plausible too! So keep them coming if you have any more...

[Ewood27]

With regard to the "99" business, where a small Roman numeral is used before a larger one with the "less than" meaning, it is only used before numbers one or two steps up the ladder. So you can have I before V or X, but not before L or C, and X before L or C, but not before M. I'm indebted to one of my daughter's teachers for pointing this out, and I have no idea how the convention came about. Under that convention, however, IL and IC are simply not valid numbers, and we have to use XLIX and XCIX instead. Hmmm ... "Ten less than a hundred and one less than ten"? No wonder we prefer Arabic numerals!

[Caladon]

lol i like it pgreenwood...they followed "suit" boom boom. well i thought it was a funny punn, new clothes etc, ah forget it ;-)

[damien86]

i've always thought it was because 5 is displayed as V then IV means sort of 1 from 5 (i.e. 4)

[FredPuli]

The reason for this on clocks is simply one of balance; it looks better that way. The Romans themselves often used IIII for 4 too. It is often seen in inscriptions on monuments. However cynics may think that this is less to do with aesthetics than with ease of work. The stone mason carving a ' I ' has an easier task than he has carving a V and the chance of making an expensive error, perhaps ruining the slab of stone, was therefore less.