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From: stevemac@bud.indirect.com (Pascal MacProgrammer)
Subject: Eleven & Twelve
Message-ID: <D2yFvr.ApD@indirect.com>
Sender: usenet@indirect.com (Darin Wayrynen)
Organization: Grammar 'R' Us 
Date: Wed, 25 Jan 1995 09:33:27 GMT
Lines: 29

Not so very long ago, vorgert@fstop.csc.ti.com said...

>  * What is the basis for the words "eleven" and "twelve" ?

 I once heard that they are derived from words meaning "one left over" 
and "two left over", that is, after the first ten have been counted.

>  * Along the same lines; why are the numbers from "thir-teen" to
>    "nine-teen" constructed differently from the other decades ?
>    (twenty-one, Thirty-five)...

  They once were, except for eleven and twelve.  Think of the units 
"-teen" and "-ty" as both meaning "ten".  Now the numbers from thirteen 
to nineteen are "three-[and]-ten" through "nine-[and]-ten", just like 
ju-san through ju-ku, but with the units expressed first.
  Multiples of ten are twenty through ninety.  That is, "two-ten" through 
"nine-ten", with multiplication implied.
  So numbers between twenty and thirty are "one-and-twenty" through 
"nine-and-twenty", just like ni-ju ichi through ni-ju ku, but again with 
the units digit expressed first, and so on to "one-and-ninety" through 
"nine-and-ninety".
  This is still the way numbers are formed in German, but in English, we 
say the units digit last for numbers above twenty.

-- 
                              ==----=                    Steve MacGregor
                             ([.] [.])                     Phoenix, AZ
--------------------------oOOo--(_)--oOOo----------------------------------
  What would the world be like, if there were no hypothetical situations?
