Le Schéma Universel de Comptabilité de Paul Otlet (1901) : le tournant décimal

Unlikely to what one may imagine, the decimal numbering system in accounting recording and classification does not originate in accounting but in bibliography. Paul Otlet, a Belgian lawyer who became a bibliographer, published in 1901 the first decimal accounting code, entitled : The Universal Accounting Scheme. Through this scheme, he proposes a new technique of accounts classification but also a new problematisation of accounting uniformisation. Based on unedited archives, this article focuses on an accounting code unknown yet to literature. The article identifies its origins in its author?s writings during the nineteenth century ; clarifies its two main features, decimal principle and uniformity, and highlights its immediate reception in three European countries.