http://organelle.org/tetra/tetraktys.html

The modern sciences emerged from precursors that had nothing to do with what moderns imagine as superstition or magical thinking. The originary knowledge-ways were far more sophisticated than we imagine. They were so sophisticated that they left no traces. Part of this was purposeful, for traces became… of themselves, matters of interest and strife, as they are in our world today.

But just as the precursor-ways become first astrological systems and then astronomy, and as other routes that are considered as alchemical became chemistry, there were ancient precursors to arithmetic and algebra — something we might call numerics, or the ‘arts of the derivation of unities’ coupled with those of distinguishing ‘elements or organs, parts or sections’. These arts had little or nothing to do with calculation, except as exercise. They structured memory and intelligence according to discernible relationships that required minds to forge, refute, or assert them. These arts were interwoven with those of alphabetics, forming an almacabala.