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Preamble of the Arabic Numerals
While the false thought that the form of numerals commonly used in the oriental Islamic countries (From Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran to Egypt and Sudan) has spread among the cultured Arabs as being Indian numerals, and Arabs had abandoned their Arabic numerals that have been taken by the European West, numerous references of the Western World, together with references of Indian subcontinent, insist that even the numerals' form taken by Europe from Arabs are Indian in inventing and origin, and that Arabs have no favour in them but the transmission into Europe..!Is it true that the oriental Arabic form of numerals is Indian? Is it true that Arabs were not but transmitters of the Western form of numerals they taught to the Occident after they (had learnt them - allegedly - from India)? Is it true that the "Zero" is a following Indian invention (excerpted) by Arabs - as allegers saying - as they (excerpted) the nine digits before?
Starting with the answer: No, the oriental form of numerals is not Indian; rather it is a sibling transformed form of the Arabic-Western one (known as Ghebariya [غِباريّة]) that has been transmitted into Europe. The two forms go back to a single Arabic ancient origin, not Indic. The "Zero", too, is an original Arabic invention the Indian have learnt - as they had learnt the other nine digits - from the Arabs, not the reverse.
But when was that, the answer to which my research has come up with is: At an early time of history before Christ through the maritime trade with Indian subcontinent via Arabian Sea, Arabian Gulf and Red Sea. The land-trade trans-Arabia (Arabian Peninsula) - especially The "Two-Trips-of-Summer-and-Winter" - has played a role in passing on the Arabic digits and "Zero" (Sefro [صفرُ]) Northward, but such passing-on was not inclusive, rather it was exclusive.
At this point, a question rises: Why then Arabs used two forms of numerals..?
The answer is: Arabs did not mean to use two forms of numerals. Both forms have emerged from one origin - as aforesaid - then that origin has transformed and prevailed in the Arabic-East - as I will make clear, God willing. Meanwhile, it has not much transformed in the Arabic-West and Andalusia (Iberia peninsula: now Spain & Portugal). The Arabic-Western form of numerals (Ghebariay) then transmitted into Europe mainly via Andalusia through the educational houses (Cordoba University as the most famous one) that were established therein, and to which pupils came from Europe to educate, and via Sicily that has - among other Italian costal towns - represented the mercantile and civilized portal of Arabs to Europe.
The history and origin of the Arabic numerals was a spring where a lot of researchers, Levant and Western intellectuals have hanged down without - in my opinion - the majority coming up with the true proposition or even closer to certainty. Yet, a Western multitude intended not to be just with Arabs in hating them and Islam rather than in loving or being just with Indians. Moreover, some of the Arabs have not come to a persuasion that the numerals been transmitted into Europe and being in use to this date are originally Arabic numerals such as the Third Decision of the (Feqhi [فقهي] or jurisprudent) Congregation in Makkat (Saudi Arabia) went, which is published on the Internet, saying that it has not been proven that the numerals in use in the West are Arabic numerals! To the contrary too to what has been mentioned in the seminar: "Arabic Numerals - A Cause and Identity", that had been held by The Egyptian Assembly of Arabizing the Science, Ain-Shams University, Cairo (Egypt)..!!
Among the hypothesis or suppositions is what has gone that Arabic numerals (Western form) - that had indeed transmitted to Europeans from Arabs and in use to date, with naturally some transformation in the shape - were invented by Arabs based on the number of the angles in the bends of each digit, so the number of such angles represents the value of that digit. For example, the thinker supposes that the shape of the nine was: 
, but of course without the dots which were put to clarify the idea (that this digit contains nine angles). This means, first, that the numerals' shape has not been smooth, as the supposing himself confirms, but of broken lines.
That is, in my opinion, a completely improper hypothesis or analysis, because the first thing that refutes it is that writing of the Arabic alphabet in all its classic scripts (Koofi, Naskh, Faresi.. even Andalusi) have not known breakings in such way nor close to. So, it is illogic for the numerals - whose mien is part and parcel of its alphabet general mien - to be written in broken lines. What looks in some shapes of writing such numerals being of broken lines recently in Europe but refers to Europeans themselves as some sort of artistic transformation thereafter, the thing that quit fits and is homogeneous to line-broken forms of their scripts themselves. Added to this too, that the supposing considered that the digit four was: 
; and considered it to not be: 
; so that the number of consisting angles to be six not four; the shape of the digit six was: 
; and considered it to not be: 
; so that the number of consisting angles to be nine not six; nor he considered the shape of the digit nine as: 
; so that the number of consisting angles to be eight not nine, what making this hypothesis to be a mere imagination!
Some people have alleged that Mohammad Ben-Ebraheem Alfazari (? - 796 G) was the one who introduced the (Indian numerals) to Arabs' land through translating an Indian book in [astronomy]!
Some have alleged it to be Mohammad Ben-Moosa Alkhawarezmi [Algorismi] (? - after 846 G)..
Others have alleged it to be Mohammad Ben-Ahmad Albairooni [Biruni] (972 - 1048 G)..
To those who have alleged it to be Abu-Alhassan Ben-Alhaitham [Alhazen] (965 - 1039 G)..
Or that the contemporaries, Arabs and orientalists have mistakenly interpreted Moslem historians' and scholars' words to this basis. The truth from the point of my research is that the inventors of the Arabic numerals were not but the Arab merchants. Perhaps, with this research, I provide - God willing - stronger proofs to the Arabs' proprietary of their ten numerals.
Such proofs, I will bring, fall in five sorts: Logical, historical, geographical, analytical and manuscriptic.
