Google| Subject | Re: Even *MORE* Scandinavian linguistics; was: Republicanism still an offence in England? |
| From | Troels Forchhammer |
| Date | 2002-05-15 23:42 (2002-05-15 23:42) |
| Message-ID | <3CE2D662.D33B9A3E@ThisIsFake.dk> |
| Client | |
| Newsgroups | alt.fan.tolkien |
| Follows | Raven |
Raven wrote:
RavenVery _very_ close:
"?jevind L?ng" <ojevind.lang@swipnet.se>skrev i en meddelelse news:HIvE8.4731$iB4.13753@nntpserver.swip.net...?jevind L?ngRaven
The Danes have a counting system which is as convoluted as that of the French; I will not try to describe it. But the Norwegians and the Swedes have the same system as the English-speakers. In Swedish "twenty" is "tjugo", "twenty-five" is "tjugofem", "thirty" is "trettio", "thirty-six" is "trettiosex", and so on.
In Norway we use both systems. The "five-and-twenty" one is oldest. The Danish system has the tens over forty as multiples and half-number-multiples of "snes", which means "score", that is "twenty". We have a somewhat convoluted way to say "something and a half" in Scandinavia. One and a half is "half-second", two and a half is "half-third" and so on. Only "half-second" is in regular use now. But Danish 50 is "halvtreds", from "halvtredie snes"
Actually the 'full name' of 50 in Danish is "halvtredssindstyve" - a contracted form of "halvtredje sinde tyve" = half-third times twenty 60 is "tresindstyve" - or "tre sinde tyve" = three times twenty. The varying between using the ordinals in the half-third, half-fourth etc. and the normal numbers in the three, four etc. makes it even more confusing - especially when you try to spell it :-)
Why on earth we use that completely illogical system I don't know, but I can't believe my ancestors felt that twenty was more natural because their feet were naked - the archaeological evidence indicates that footwear was common ;-)
The way we do the half numbers can also be recognized when we say the time. In Danish half two is 1:30 (for some odd reason this is not done with ordinals), which makes it difficult for many Danish kids to learn the clock in English...
-- Troels Forchhammer Please reply to t.forch@mail.dk
They both savoured the strange warm glow of being much more ignorant than ordinary people, who were only ignorant of ordinary things. -- Discworld scientists at work (Terry Pratchett, Equal Rites)
2002-03-30-
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