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    From Matthew Phillips@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 27 08:49:23 2021
    In message <[email protected]>
    on 27 Oct 2020 John Williams (News) wrote:

    In article <[email protected]d>,
    Russell Hafter News <[email protected]d> wrote:

    I have read that Welsh does something similar

    I remember fondly Jake Thakeray's "Yam tam tether mether pip, she counted!" with reference to counting sheep.

    So Yorkshire also has a contribution to make to this thread.

    Sheep-counting is actually a survival of the Celtic languages that people
    would have used before the Anglo-Saxon influx. The Celtic-speakers were not "driven out" of England, they just gradually switched language, and counting was something that survived in the Celtic form longer, particularly in rural communities.

    mether relates to pedwar, the Welsh for 4, and pip is pump -- the u in Welsh
    is pronounced like the short "i" sound in English, so "pimp".

    Many of the words have become thoroughly corrupted over time, but the
    structure is very clear, with numbers from 16 to 19 being additions onto 15.

    See https://omniglot.com/language/numbers/celtic2.htm
    and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Welsh_numerals

    --
    Matthew Phillips
    Durham

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  • From Matthew Phillips@21:1/5 to All on Sat Mar 27 08:31:40 2021
    In message <[email protected]d>
    on 28 Oct 2020 Frederick Bambrough wrote:

    In message <[email protected]d>
    Russell Hafter News <[email protected]d> wrote:

    [snip]
    I have read that Welsh does something similar - you are right about the Celts. Except that when doing arithmetic the welsh have realised their counting system does not work, and have a completely separate one just
    for arithmetic!

    I believe the decimal version is now taught generally and used interchangeably, being easier to learn.

    un, dau, tri, pedwar... deg, un deg un, un deg dau, un deg tri, un deg
    pedwar

    When my wife was learning Welsh at Aberystwyth they were taught the decimal names for the numbers for general purposes, but for dates in a month the old-style base 20 numbers were still taught.

    --
    Matthew Phillips
    Durham

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