SAPIR 861 · Research
Which numbers are named most often: 1 023 values across 8,629 attestations
We collected gematria statements from 834 works of the 11th–19th centuries and counted which numbers appear in them. A table, a distribution, and what follows from it.
What exactly was counted
An attestation is a place where an author says outright: this word or phrase equals this number. We did not look for equalities ourselves; we collected the ones already stated. That gives 8,629 attestations in 834 works, naming 1,023 distinct numbers. Each was recomputed by machine: 6,494 matched exactly, 2,135 with im hakolel, the plus-one adjustment.
The fifteen most frequent numbers
First place is shared. 86 is named 155 times in 57 works — it is אלהים; 13 is named 154 times in 56 works — it is אחד, “one”. Then 65 (129), 345 (127, משה, “Moses”), 72 (110), 110 (106), 12 (104), 52 (97), 45 (92), 70 and 21 (90 each), 100 (83), 216 (82), 620 (75), 248 (72).
The long tail
Twelve numbers are named more than fifty times each. And 267 values appear exactly once in nine centuries. Another 327 appear between two and five times. So more than two thirds of all numbers mentioned turn up only a handful of times. This matters whenever someone calls a number “well known”: most numbers have no tradition behind them, just one entry in one book.
When this was written
By the century of the earliest source, the attestations fall out like this: 11th century — 116, 12th — 49, 13th — 970, 14th — 2,313, 15th — 1,473, 16th — 627, 17th — 121, 18th — 194, 19th — 26. The peak is the 14th–15th centuries. Most statements trace to Baal HaTurim (2,012), then Sefer Karnayim (876), Rabbeinu Bachya (494), Midrash le-Perushim (423) and Shaar HaPesukim (315).
What to do with this
The whole table is open: a CSV with all 1 023 values and 8,629 attestations downloads without sign-up, and it says who stated each one and where. Checking us is normal. If your number lands in the rare part of the list, that is neither better nor worse: it only means little was written about it.
The attestation database · Download the CSV · Exact and ±1
The structure of 354 pages of 861 letters follows the edition Binyamin Pichkhadze, “Chumash 354” (חומש 354), Bnei Brak, 2002. The calculation was reproduced independently from the Westminster Leningrad Codex (CC BY 4.0); 31 of 31 control pages match the edition.