Fòram na Gàidhlig

I've noticed that when expressing a certain amount of something using using teen numbers (i.e. x-deug) the subject - noun? - is placed in between 'x' and 'deug'.

For example:

Seventeen years old becomes seachd bliadhna deug a dh'aois - year(s) is sandwiched there in the middle!

Is there a simple reason why this is done? Does it only occur when teen numbers are involved?


Tapadh leibh,

Ruairidh

Well, I must confess it never struck me as odd - but then, that's pretty much like the way it's done in Welsh. You'll probably find there are different ways of counting things, or using cardinal numbers (i.e. not "ciad", "dàrna" etc but "aon", "dà" etc.), often depending on what you're using them for. Years is traditional, but (e.g.) school maths usually uses a more "decimal" system (much as in Welsh).

It's a system that probably seems odd to a modern English speaker, but you do still find the occasional fossil expression in English like "three score years and ten": really, this "funny teen" thing you've come across is nothing more than that sort of thing, like saying "seven years and ten".

I think with counting you have the noun in the middle more often than at the end - so the weirdness continues with higher numbers

e.g. 27 years is seachd bliadhna air fhichead (seven years over twenty), and 47 years is dà fhichead bliadhna is a seachd (two twenty years and seven).

If you want the complete list (don't try to learn all of it at once):

http://www.akerbeltz.org/beagangaidhlig ... merals.htm

I've come across both the 'decimal' and the traditional number systems in the resources that I've been using.

I took the concious decision to learn the decimal system first as this is now being taught in Gaelic Medium, hence 'Gàidheil òg' will be more familiar with this system.

I recognise that the traditional counting system is based on twenties e.g. 'thirty' being likened to 'twenty ten' so maybe this could have something to do with the word order?

There are some differences in word order, especially between 21 and 30. Starting from 40, you just say ceathrad instead of dà fhichead and have a new number word for 50, 60, etc.

17 years is seachd bliadhna deug in both systems.

I think it's best to just accept it. Languages are wonderfully varied when it comes to counting as it's in many ways a very non-natural but highly human behaviour (what I mean with that, everyone learns how to talk but not everyone learns how to count).

In Old Irish the system was decimal which then shifted to vigesimal and now by the looks of it back to decimal. Humans. Celtic mostly does 20s to 100/200, Nahuatl does 20's up to 399...

Anyway, at a basic level Celtic languages like to place the noun between the single digit and deciman so you get
1-9 NOUN DECIMAL

Many European languages use the
NUMBER NOUN
model but by no means all. Basque does
NOUN 1-2
3+ NOUN

Many Asian languages require the use of counting words, e.g. Cantonese
NUMBER CLASSIFIER NOUN (e.g. yat jeung ji - 1 flatobject paper)
Fractions in Asian languages often follow the noun:
NUMBER NOUN FRACTION

Eastern Indo-european languages have the baffling habit of having unpredictable numbers from 1-100. In Urdu for example 4 is cār, 10 is das, 20 bīs, 30 tīs, 40 cālīs, 50 pacās. However, 14 is caudah, 24 caubīs, 34 cauñtīs, 44 cauvālīs, 54 cauvan.

Go figure...

Xhosa places the numbers behind the noun but because that's too simple, 1-6 require different prefixes to 7-9 so something like 11 people turns into abantu balishumi alinanye which loosely word for word means the-humans they-ten they-with-one.

In other words, there's as many crazy ways as there are languages. English is just as crazy only it happens to be the nutter you grew up with so you don't every consider how bizarre it is that it doesn't require a noun classifier to distinguish little long things from little round things...

So best thing is, just learn to love the crazy way Gaelic does numbers and leave it at that