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Re: The English/French counting system (WAS: number systems from conlangs)

From:John Cowan <jcowan@...>
Date:Monday, September 15, 2003, 19:35
Mark J. Reed scripsit:

> That I've also wondered about. My impression was that the > Swiss system is a logical extension of the French, rather than > that the French is a reduction of the Swiss, but since > Latin had the full set of numbers up to 100 the French > system must have involved a reduction somewhere.
Probably a calque on a Celtic substrate; Celtic numbers do the base-20 bit in full. -- First known example of political correctness: John Cowan "After Nurhachi had united all the other http://www.reutershealth.com Jurchen tribes under the leadership of the http://www.ccil.org/~cowan Manchus, his successor Abahai (1592-1643) jcowan@reutershealth.com issued an order that the name Jurchen should --S. Robert Ramsey, be banned, and from then on, they were all _The Languages of China_ to be called Manchus."