Re: Numerals in Maggel (Was: Re: Judajca)

En réponse à "H. S. Teoh" <hsteoh@...>:

>
> Not in my case :-) It took me a while to come up with the numbering
> system
> of the Ebisedi.
>
Hehe, it took me a while to organise the numerals of Maggel too :)) .

>
> Cool. Ebisedian also distinguishes between the *quantity* a number
> represents, and the numerical *entity* itself. For example:
>
>         _y'i_   "zero", "none";
>         _ivei'_ the mathematical entity called "zero".
>
>         _kei'_  "one" (i.e., one of something)
>         _ikei'_ "oneness", or the mathematical entity called "one".
>
>         _3jei'_ "two" -- notice this is inflected as a plural because
> it
>                 represents a plural quantity
>         _ijei'_ the mathematical entity, "two". This is inflected as a
>                 *singular*, because it is a single mathematical
> entity.
>
Maggel's numbers are never inflected. Even the declarative forms are not nouns.
But they are not adjectives either. They are just another kind of words with
their own rules ;))) . Of course, this doesn't include the large numbers like
|iuemahl| ['yImIL\] (nobody saw the pun yet?) or |muorhiadf| ['mIr\_j&d] (how
ugly in ASCII-IPA ;)) ) which are nouns and behave like normal nouns. Also, the
multiplicative form of the combined numbers is definitely treated as adverbial
and the distributive forms are adjectives. As for the personal numbers, they
are nouns (and are best translated as "duo", "trio", "quartet", etc...,
although in Maggel they are used in normal conversation to count people).

>
> > "distributive" numbers (meaning "one by one", "two
> > by two" or "each one", "each two"...)
>
> Now this is a very cool idea.
Stolen from Classical Latin which had a class of distributive numeral
adjectives:
singuli: one by one
bini: two by two
trini: three by three
quaterni: four by four
quini: five by five
etc...
I've always thought they were one of the coolest part of Latin grammar ;))) .

 I've been thinking about this aspect of
> the
> Ebisedian grammar recently: how to express "each other", "one by one",
> "each", "every one of", etc.. So far, I have _zoro_, a nominal
> conjunction
> used to mean "every". For example:
>         pii'z3di zoro pii'z3di  "each and every man"
>
Nice construction. The reduplication of the noun really serves its meaning.

> Literally, _zoro_ is a contraction of _zo oro_, "and the next". So, a
> construction like the above literally means "a man and the next man".
> (This is sorta stolen/borrowed from the colloquial expression "every
> man
> and his neighbour".)
>
Actually, I think that's a pretty good history for the creation of such a term.
I wouldn't be surprised if some real language did the same.

> I should think of a way to express your "distributive" concept here.
> Hmm,
> actually, now that I think of it, maybe something like the following
> would
> do it:
>         jei' zoro jei'  "two by two" (lit. "two and the next two")
>
> So I can, for example, say:
>         3mir33'nojei zoro 3mir33'nojei.
>         "Two children by two children."
>
> What do people think of this new idea? ;-)
>
It would work, although you might think of abbreviating the expression by
omitting the noun once (although if your numbers cannot be used by themselves,
it may be difficult). But since such distributive expressions are not used much
too often, it may not be necessary to think of abbreviating it.

> [snip]
> > 400: gdhmabgis [dvE:Iz] (remember that one ;))) )
>
> Yes, well remembered. :-)
>
Good :)) .

>
>         quantity                entity
> 0       y'i     ["?y?i]         ivei'   [?iB&"?i]
> 1       kei'    [k&"?i]         ikei'   [?ik&"?i]
> 2       3jei'   [?@\dZ&"?i]     ijei'   [?idZ&"?i]
> 3       3rei'   [?@\r`&"?i]     irei'   [?ir`&"?i]
> 4       3dei'   [?@\d&"?i]      idei'   [?id&"?i]
> 5       3Pei'   [?@\p_h&"?i]    iPei'   [?ip_h&"?i]
> 6       3sei'   [?@\s&"?i]      isei'   [?is&"?i]
> 7       3Tei'   [?@\t_h&"?i]    iTei'   [?it_h&"?i]
> 8       3Cei'   [?@\tS_h&"?i]   iCei'   [?itS_h&"?i]
> 9       3Kee'i  [?@\"k_h&:?i]   iKee'i  [?i"k_h&:?i]
>
Wow! And your Ebidesians never have a problem recognising all those quasi-
identical words?

> Note that one does not count above 9 in Ebisedian in this way, as I've
> mentioned in a post on Ebisedian numbers some time ago. Instead, one
> counts by "groups", or "triads", as I like to call them:
>         kekrei'         3
>         jekrei'         9
>         rekrei'         27
>         dekrei'         81
>         Pekrei'         243
>         sekrei'         729
>         ... etc.
>
> These are collective nouns (which is why they are inflected as
> singulars)
> representing different levels of "granularity" that one might want to
> count at. They are combined with the basic numbers 1--9 (above) to
> form
> higher quantity nouns. For example:
>         kekrekei'       = "one of _kekrei'_" = 9
>         3kekrejei'      = "two of _kekrei'_" = 18
>         3kekrerei'      = 27
>         3kekredei'      = 36
>         3kekrePei'      = 45
>         ... etc.
>
The system is extremely nice (I like the idea of "level of granularity") but
the form of the numbers themselves makes me wonder how well recognisable they
are. I guess counting is not an easy activity there ;))) .

>
> But of course, we cannot forget:
>         Pe'rokrei ["p_h&r`okr&?i]
> which has a base value of infinity. To mathematicians, that is. It is
> used
> by lay people to refer to large numbers beyond their ability to count,
> and
> is best understood to mean "countlessly many".
>
I have to add this feature to Maggel. Since I've just decided that most
quantitative nouns will be of the same nature as the numerals (except things
like "each" which will be more like distributive numerals, and thus
adjectives), it will fit very nicely!

>
> Good idea. I'm thinking of adding subtractives to Ebisedian as well
> (mainly out of convenience, although there is a semantic reason for
> it).
What would be the semantic reason?

> Currently, Ebisedian has additives. For example:
>         _3kekrere3kei'_ = 10
>         Literally, "three three's and one", i.e., 3*3 + 1.
>
Hehe, since I saw it in Classical Latin (like in "duodeviginti":
19, "undecentum": 99), I always found substractive counting extremely neat.
I've even read about a language (quite exceptional in this respect) which
counts mainly substractively!! (without Internet at home lately - damn! my
modem broke, and those stupid people send me a new modem which is as broken as
the previous one!!! :(( -, I cannot give you the reference, it's in my booklet
about the structure of languages. If people are interested I can give it on
Monday.

Christophe.

http://rainbow.conlang.free.fr

Take your life as a movie: do not let anybody else play the leading role.

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