# Roman numeral page numbering

I am writing a thesis that contains an abstract and acknowledgements page, but need to number the page numbers using Roman numerals. How would I do this? I don't want to include the title page but would like to start the abstract with roman numeral ii.

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Welcome to tex.sx! What document class (e.g. report) do you use? –  lockstep Aug 15 '11 at 23:14
–  Caramdir Aug 15 '11 at 23:17

If you're using memoir, you can use any page contents with an empty pagestyle for your unnumbered title page, and then use the \frontmatter command to set lowercase Roman numerals as the default page numbers.

In my university's case, since I'm using hyperref and other packages, I've found it's best to let the unnumbered first page be numbered with alph format, the rest of the front matter pages use Roman numbering, and the main matter pages use Arabic numbering. This avoids the dreaded "pdfTeX warning (ext4): destination with the same identifier (name{page.1}) has been already used, duplicate ignored" messages.

Our unnumbered first page includes:

\pagenumbering{alph}
\setcounter{page}{1}
\thispagestyle{empty}


and \frontmatter at the end of the page.

In the main thesis file, we put \mainmatter right before we include the chapter files. Details as of 2011/08/15 at this site (particularly ttuthesis.sty and thesis-manual.tex -- thesis.tex will be updated later).

In response to comments, here's a simple example similar to what I use normally. Since I try to isolate my users from the guts of the style file, I separate out the page layout (my problem, and the graduate school's) with the page contents (their problem).

\documentclass[oneside]{memoir}

\title{My Thesis Title}
\author{Me, The Author}

% Define the (unnumbered) title page layout here
\newcommand{\mytitlepage}{
\pagenumbering{alph}
\thispagestyle{empty}
\beforepartskip
\begin{center}
\thetitle

\theauthor
\end{center}
\afterpartskip
\newpage
}

% Define the abstract page layout (numbered ii) here
\newcommand{\abstractpage}{
\frontmatter
\setcounter{page}{2}
\pagestyle{plain}
\begin{center}
Abstract: \thetitle
\end{center}

\theabstract
\newpage
}

% Define the abstract page contents here
\newcommand{\theabstract}{
Abstract content goes here.
}

\begin{document}
\mytitlepage
\abstractpage
\tableofcontents*
\mainmatter
\chapter{One}
This is chapter 1.
\end{document}

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I am actually a newbie to tex. My document is a memoir. I don't know where to put these commands. Do I put it on the actual abstract and acknowledgements page? or place the commands between the "packages!}}}" commands? –  JC123 Aug 16 '11 at 0:54
Updated my answer with a short example. –  Mike Renfro Aug 16 '11 at 1:53
@Mike: Just out of curiosity: are both \thispagestyle and \pagestyle necessary? –  Neil G Aug 16 '11 at 4:14
I could have sworn there times I've experienced \pagestyle only affecting following pages (and not the current page), but I may have been misusing it, or getting hit with an unrelated bug elsewhere. This particular code is trimmed down from my regular thesis style, and I didn't put too much effort into minimizing it. Since this does work with just \pagestyle, I'll edit accordingly. –  Mike Renfro Aug 16 '11 at 11:44

At the appropriate location (on the page for which you want to change the numbering format), you could redefine the numbering of the counter page to roman by using

\renewcommand{\thepage}{\roman{page}}% Roman numerals for page counter


By "at the appropriate location" is meant that you can temporarily switch to one numeration style/format, and then switch back at another location by means of

\renewcommand{\thepage}{\arabic{page}}% Arabic numerals for page counter


Also, if you want the counter page to start with something different, try

\setcounter{page}{2}% Start page number with 2


For more details on counter formatting in LaTeX, see the Help page on LaTeX Counters page.

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Changing the \thepage command might confuse some things, therefore \pagenumbering{roman} and \pagenumbering{arabic} (and maybe \setcounter{page}{2}, if still necessary) are safer to use. –  Stephen Aug 16 '11 at 18:21

I suggest you use the following commands.

\documentclass{memoir}
[preamble stuff]
\begin{document}
\pagenumbering{roman} %
[titlepage stuff]
\thispagestyle{empty} % don't show (roman) page number on titlepage
\clearpage

\clearpage %% start of mainmatter
\pagenumbering{arabic} % restart page numbers at one, now in arabic style
[rest of document]

\end{document}

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Perfect! Thanks. –  Mukesh Chapagain Apr 3 at 9:53