Re: Number system

On Sunday, April 24, 2005, at 06:38 , Gregory Gadow wrote:

> #1 wrote:
>>
>> What do you think of it? Does it sound natural?
>
> It looks good to me.
>
> You may be interested in looking at some of the Celtic languages like
> Gaelic, Welsh and Breton; I believe they also use a base 20 counting
> system.
Well, sort of ....

In fact the modern Welsh system is purely & strictly decimal. The numbers
from 1 to 10 are:
un, dau (f. dwy), tri (f. tair), pedwar (f. pedair), pump, chwech, saith,
wyth, naw, deg.
'pump' becomes 'pum' when used before a noun, and 'chwech' becomes 'cwhe'.

After 10 we have:
11 un deg un
12 un deg dau
13 un deg tri
etc
20 dau ddeg ['dau' causes soft mutation]
21 dau ddeg un
22 dau ddeg dau
etc
30 tri deg; 40 pedair deg; 50 pum deg; 60 chwe deg etc
can(t) = 100.

The older 'traditional' system is partly vigesimal; it is now used in
restricted contexts such as telling the time and giving one's age up to
about 30.

Breton AFAIK does still retain the older system in all contexts. But it is
still mainly decimally based with some vigesimal bits. The Breton numbers
from 1 to 10 are:
unan, daou (f. div), tri (f. teir), pevar (f. pevar _or_ peder), pemp,
c'hwec'h, seizh, eizh, nav, dek.

BRETON & TRADITIONAL WELSH FROM 11 TO 20
The numbers from 11 to 20 in the traditional Welsh system and in Breton
are:
      Welsh                   Breton
11  un ar ddeg            unnek (<-- un+dek)
12  deuddeg               daouzek
13  tri ar ddeg           trizek
14  pedwar ar ddeg        pevarzek
15  pymtheg               pemzek
16  un ar bymtheg         c'hwezek
17  dau ar bymtheg        seitek
18  daunaw                triwec'h
19  pedwar ar bymtheg     naontek
20  ugain                 ugent

Note:
1. Welsh 'ar' = "on" and causes soft mutation in the following word
2. Welsh 'deuddeg' and 'pymtheg' are fairly obviously compounds of
'dau+deg' and 'pump+deg' [sic] respectively.
3. In Breton _zek_ is the regular soft mutation of 'dek', and 'tek' is the
hard mutation (Welsh doesn't have that one  :)
4. All the numbers from 11 to 19 inclusive are formed from those from 1 to
10, i.e. it ain't vigesimal. The only interesting thing is 18 which in
Welsh is _daunaw_ (2 x 9) and in Breton is _triwec'h_ (3 x 6), _wec'h_
being the soft mutatiion of _c'hwec'h_.
5. ugain/ ugent is derived from the same PIE root as Latin _ui:ginti:_ and
Greek _eikosi_.

After 20, there are vigesimal bits to both systems, but they do not
exactly work the same way in both.

TRADITIONAL WELSH FROM 21 TO 100
 From 21 to 39 we just put the numbers 1 to 19 in front of _ar hugain_ (on
20), thus:
21 un ar hugain
22 dau ar hugain
   ...
30 deg ar hugain
31 un ar ddeg ar hugain
32 deuddeg ar hugain
etc

40 is _deugain_ (2 x 20), but we used it only up to _naw ar ddeugain_ (49)
, since:
50 is _hanner cant_ (half a hundred)
51 un ar hanner cant
etc.
60 is _trigain_
61 un ar drigain
62 dau ar drigain
etc.
70 deg ar drigain
71 un ar ddeg ar drigain
etc
80 is simply _pedwar ugain_
Then we just use 1 to 19 in front thus:
81 un ar bedwar ugain etc until _pedwar ar bymtheg ar bedwar ugain_ (4 on
15 on 4 twenties) 99.
100 is _cant_

BRETON FROM 21 TO 100
This is remarkably similar to French in that we count decimally through
the 10s until we reach 70, which is in both languages the equivalent of
"sixty ten", while in both languages 80 is "four twenties" and 90 is "four
twenties ten", thus:
21 unan warn-ugent
22 daou warn-ugent
etc .
(_warn_ means "on" - but it's used only for the 20s)

30 tregont; 31 unan ha tregont (one and 30); daou ha tregont etc
40 daou-ugent; 41 unan ha daou-ugent; 42 daou ha daou-ugent etc
50 hanter-kant; 51 unan hag hanter-kant; 42 daou hag hanter-kant etc (_ha_
becomes _hag_ before a vowel or _h_)
60 tri-ugent; 61 unan ha tri-ugent; 62 daou ha tri-ugent etc
70 dek ha tri-ugent; 71 unnek ha tri-ugent; 72 daouzek ha tri-ugent etc
80 pevar-ugent; 81 unan ha pevar-ugent; 82 daou ha pevar-ugent etc
90 dek ha pevar-ugent; 91 unnek ha pevar-ugent; 92 daouzek ha pevar-ugent
etc
100 kant

In _all_ the systems above, the hundreds always precede the tens-and-units
combo, the thousamds always precede the hundreds and so on.

> Traces of it can be found in English (a score of something) and
> French (vignt=20; quatre-vignt=80)
I would say also that only traces of it are found in the Brittonic
varieties of Insular Celtic; it's just that there's slightly more trace of
it than in standard French. I believe the same is true for the Gaelic
langs. But we have people on this list far more familiar with those
languages than I am, so I'll leave it to them   :)

Ray
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