ZERO  , the figure 0 in the Arabic notation for

numbers, nought, cipher . The Arabic name for the figure was sifr, which meant literally an empty thing . The old Latin writers on arithmetic translated or transliterated the Arabic word as zephyrum; this in Ital. became zefiro, contracted to zero, borrowed by F. zero, whence it came late into English . The Spanish form cifra, more closely resembling the original Arabic, gave O . Fr. cifre, mod. chiffre, also used in the sense of mono-gram, and English " cipher " which is thus a doublet . In physics, the term is applied to a point with which phenomena are quantitatively compared, especially to a point of a graduated instrument between a positive and negative or ascending and descending scale, as in the scales of temperature .