Quick question: why does a minute have 60 seconds? Why not 100? It would be so much tidier. The answer takes us back 5,000 years — to ancient Babylon, in what is now Iraq.
The Babylonians didn't count in tens like we do. They counted in sixties, a system called sexagesimal. And the clever part? They didn't need a calculator. They used their hands.
The hand trick
Use the thumb of one hand to count the 12 segments on your four fingers (each finger has 3 joints). Use the other hand's 5 fingers to track how many groups of 12 you've completed. 12 × 5 = 60. A complete counting system using nothing but your own two hands. Try it.
Why 60 was genius
60 is a remarkably flexible number — it divides evenly by 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 10, 12, 15, 20, and 30. That makes splitting things into halves, thirds, quarters, and fifths effortless. Hugely useful for trade, astronomy, and timekeeping.
Their system never really left us. Every time you check the time, you're using Babylonian math:
- 60 seconds in a minute — straight from base-60
- 60 minutes in an hour — the same system, applied twice
- 360 degrees in a circle — Babylonians believed a year had 360 days, so they sliced a circle into 360 equal parts
- 24 hours in a day — borrowed from the Egyptians, who split day and night into 12 each
Five thousand years of history, sitting quietly on your wrist. Next time someone asks why clocks don't use base-10 — now you know.