Nonnumerals

Nonnumerals is a term used in some discussions of writing systems and data processing to refer to all glyphs that do not themselves encode numeric values. In this sense, nonnumerals are contrasted with digits (0–9) and with numerals in various numeral systems, such as Arabic, Roman, or Chinese numerals.

The category encompasses letters of alphabets, punctuation, spacing, diacritics, and other symbols that appear in text but do not denote numbers by themselves. It can also include symbols used in mathematical notation that do not designate a numeric value, such as operators and parentheses, depending on context.

In practice, the term is descriptive rather than normative; there is no universal standard definition. Some authors prefer terms like non-numeric characters or non-numeric symbols. The concept is common in typography, typesetting, OCR, and natural language processing, where separating numeric content from nonnumeric content helps parsing, validation, and rendering. In Unicode and other encodings, nonnumeral characters occupy the broad ranges outside digit blocks, though the exact classification is application-dependent.

Limitations: context matters. A symbol might denote a numeral in some contexts (e.g., tally marks used as numbers) or function as an operator. Therefore, classification as a nonnumeral can be context-sensitive.

The term provides a concise label for discussing how text and data handle numbers versus other characters, informing tasks such as tokenization, font design, and data cleaning. See also numerals, digits, typography, and Unicode.