Re: count words

On Thu, 5 Aug 1999, J. Barefoot wrote:

> I was working on a dialect of Asiteya and it occured to me to ask before =
I
> proceed: Do count words/numerators/numeratives/counters, like in Chinese =
and
> Japanese, have independant meanings, or are they just grammatical operato=
rs?
>=20
> Thanks in advance, 'cause I'm anxious to know,
>=20
Chinese classifiers generally have a more or less transparent
etymological meaning - I would guess that other sinified SEA languages
and Japanese have borrowed the Chinese measurewords, and that in
those languages the etymology isn't transparent anymore.

Examples seem to be (Li and Thompson _Mandarin Chinese, A Functional
Reference Grammar_, 1989: 104-113):

ku=E0i  piece
l=EE    mile
j=EFn   tael
li=E2ng ounce
ch=EE   foot
ti=E4n  day=20
ge    person
q=FAn   flock
du=EF   pile
p=EDng  bottle
ch=E2ng arena
d=E0o   dish, course
ti=E1o  long, thin object - this one isn't very transparent anymore,
                          and isn't used for brushes, for instance.

Boudewijn Rempt  | http://www.xs4all.nl/~bsarempt