Re: EAK numerals (reply-to corrected!)

Philip Newton wrote:
> On 8/29/07, R A Brown <ray@...> wrote:
>
>>I've put more stuff onto my website about the EAK (Greek without
>>inflexions) numerals:
>>http://www.carolandray.plus.com/EAK/Numerals.html
>>
>>I would appreciate feedback
>
>
> My first thoughts when reading about ordinal numbers were "so you
> can't say 'the three placed pigs' since that'll be interpreted as 'the
> third pig'?"
No. I must make the relevant paragraph clearer. What I meant is that JP
had adopted the somewhat uncommon ancient adjective θετό to use to
denote ordinal position. Even in the ancient language it is not a
perfect passive participle. "Placed" in "The three placed pigs" will
have to have whatever form the EAK equivalent of the passive participle
takes. θετό is not the normal EAK word for "placed."

> and "Had you considered το υπ' αριθμό τρία χοίρο 'the
> number three pig'?".
I had considered similar things - but placing τρία right in front of
χοίρο does suggest 'three pigs.'

> The latter thought of mine was, no doubt,
> influenced partly by Japanese syntax, which has the ordinal marker at
> the front followed by regular numbers (dai-san no buta = # 3 'no'
> pig).
Yes, but there is also the difference that cardinal numbers in Japanese
IIRC have a 'counter marker' after the cardinal according to the type of
thing being counted. EAK does not do this. As I said, τρία χοίρο looks
like "3 pigs" - I'd rather put the ordinal marker between τρία and χοίρο.

> Also, you write τρία κόσιο καιρό = 300 times, but would it not be
> τριακόσιο καιρό with 300 in one word?
It would. the thing is that until yesterday, words like 20, 30, 200,
300, 400, 2000, 3000 etc were written as _two_ words (in the modern
Welsh fashion) - I had been hesitating for some time over this, e.g.
whether 30 should be τρία δέκα or τριάδεκα. Having used the former,
yesterday I decided on the latter and hoped I'd made all the changes.
But obviously this one escaped   ;)

> As for fractions, I don't know how AG did them but in MG (as you may
> know), they are formed as in English, with cardinal number (numerator)
> + ordinal number (denominator), e.g. τρία πέμπτα "three fifths".
Much the same in AG - the phrase being short for 'three fifth parts'.

>Which
> is probable hard to translate into EAK given the resemblance of
> ordinal to cardinal numbers.
Exactly  :)

> Perhaps the Japanese/Chinese(/Korean?) approach might be worth looking
> into? They start with the denominator and say things such as "of five
> parts, three" ("go-bun no san" in Japanese, "wu fen zhi san" in
> Chinese). On the other hand, they express possession as "possessor
> PART possessed"; I forget how EAK does it but if the word order is the
> other way around (as in MG "to possessed tou possessor"),
You haven't forgotten how EAK does possession, because I don't know yet  :)

If you recall, we had a thread about this some while back before I put
any stuff in my website, but no conclusions were reached.

> that might
> make the proposed syntax about as (un)natural as "five parts' three"
> would be in English. Though I vaguely recall you could switch the
> order around if you repeated the article; perhaps that would help? "το
> πέντα μερίδιο το τρία" _vel sim_?
I was hoping to get something slightly shorter  ;)

> Your word δύριοι/δύριο appears to have a breathing, rather than an
> accent, on the upsilon. (Twice.)
Oops - so it is! I've changed it.

>
> On another note, I wonder whence comes this pronouncement on your
> Nouns page: "If the noun is indefinite, the adjective must precede,
> thus ανδρό σοφό is as ungrammatical in ΕΑΚ as *'man wise' is in
> English." ?
>
> IIRC, both word orders (ADJ-NOUN and NOUN-ADJ) are licit in Ancient
> Greek;
Certainly both occur in NT Greek - but that might be Semitic influence.
Goodwin's Greek Grammar is unclear about this. In one place it even
suggests that NOUN-ART-ADJ would be used!

> what made you forbid one of them? Simplicity in an (for Peanos)
> auxlang?
Yes - although I have no intention of pushing EAK as an auxlang, in WHAT
Peanou was doing just that   :)


--
Ray
==================================
ray@carolandray.plus.com
http://www.carolandray.plus.com
==================================
Nid rhy hen neb i ddysgu.
There's none too old to learn.
[WELSH PROVERB]

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