Roman Numeral Converter
How it is built
| Part | Value | Running total |
|---|
The symbols
| Symbol | Value | Symbol | Value |
|---|---|---|---|
| I | 1 | C | 100 |
| V | 5 | D | 500 |
| X | 10 | M | 1000 |
| L | 50 | IV / IX | 4 / 9 |
Reading a Roman numeral
Symbols are written largest first and added up. When a smaller symbol appears before a larger one it is subtracted instead: XIV is ten, then one-before-five, so fourteen. That subtractive trick is the only complication in the whole system.
Where you still meet them
- Clock faces, book chapters and the preface pages of a printed book.
- Film copyright dates and the Super Bowl.
- Monarchs and popes — Elizabeth II, Louis XIV.
- Outline numbering in legal and academic documents.
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Frequently Asked Questions
Because standard Roman numerals have no symbol above M for a thousand. Larger numbers needed a bar over the letter to multiply it by a thousand, which is not part of the ordinary system and is rendered inconsistently, so it is left out.
No. The system has no zero and no negative numbers — it was built for counting things, and the concept of zero as a number reached Europe much later, from India via the Arab world.
Putting a smaller symbol before a larger one to subtract it: IV is 4 and IX is 9, rather than IIII and VIIII. Only I, X and C are used this way, and only before the next two larger symbols.
Tradition rather than rule. IIII balances the VIII opposite it visually, and it predates the strict subtractive convention. Both are read as four.
Yes. Case is ignored when reading a numeral, and spaces are removed, so "mcm xiv" is understood the same as MCMXIV.