In ancient Egypt as well as in China, Greece and Rome used special signs, to express large numbers. This invention was a major advance in writing numbers. Imagine the difficulty and the time, that you would have needed, to represent a million by carving single cuts in sticks or by lining up single stones in the sand. Calculate just one second, to make a notch or place a stone, that's how you would 278 hours or 11 Having to count days and 14 hours continuously, to reach a million.