Re: Types of numerals; bases in natlangs.

>Interestingly, he reports that, among the numbers between eleven and
>nineteen, the most frequently used numbers in seven languages (English,
>French, Japanese, Kannada, Dutch, Catalan, and Spanish) are twelve and
>fifteen.
>If a language does not have base three or base five, why is "fifteen" a
>common numeral?
Obviously it's "half-round" in base 10 and "quarter-round" in base 20.


>If a language has base five or base eight or base ten or
>base twenty, why is "twelve" a common numeral?
The majority of the languages surveyed are European, so the measure systems
of 12 inch in a foot and 12 ounces in a pound may have influenced this. I
can't think of a directly numerical explanation.


>ObConLang; Human natlang multiplication-and-addition based numeral systems,
>seem to have bases of seventy-four or less.  Would a conlang for a non-
>human language work well with a base of eight-four, ninety, ninety-six,
>one-
>hundred-eight, one-hundred-twenty, or one-hundred-sixty-eight?  What sort
>of rationale would make this plausible?
>
>-----
>
>Tom H.C. in MI
I've contemplated a double-base system, where there's a smallish number
(say, 5) acting as a base for small numbers, and some exponent of it (say,
3125) acting as a base for larger numbers that would be "round" in the
smaller base.
For example, basic words would exist for 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 25, 125; and for
625, 1250, 1875, 2500, 3125 and powers of 3125.
Of course, there's no reason for the upper system to have the same amount of
basic words if we choose a non-prime base, eg 6, for the lower system
instead. In this case 3, 4, 12 etc. would also work.

This is already done to a smaller extent in languages that shift from base 5
to base 10; the *illion system for naming certain bases of 10 could also be
seen as a similar(ish) structure.

(I have a reply to the main thread underway, too - will probably finish it
later today.)

John Vertical

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