On the back wall of the Borgo's church, there's a date inscribed in Roman Numerals: "CDDCXXIV"
We know "XXIV" is 24 but we're stuck on the "CDDC." CD is 400 and DC is 600 so it could be 1024? That date pre-dates the first mentions of the Borgo in the historical record in the 12th Century, but even if it is accurate, and they wanted to write 1000 why wouldn't they use M? Perhaps roman numerals have changed over the last several hundred years? Or maybe it's an early typo?
Answer:
"Sometimes 500, usually D, was written as original |Ɔ, while 1,000, usually M, was written as original C|Ɔ. This is a system of encasing numbers to denote thousands (imagine the Cs and Ɔs as parentheses), which has its origins in Etruscan numeral usage.
An extra Ɔ denoted 500, and multiple extra Ɔs are used to denote 5,000, 50,000, etc."
Therefore, the actual inscription reads "C| Ɔ|ƆCXXIV"
C| Ɔ = 1000
|Ɔ = 500
C = 100
XXIV = 24
1624
Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roman_numerals
Credit: Eric Coomer, Official Smarty Pants, via Facebook Post
