Tag Archives: cardinal

Cardinal Numerals, 11-100,000’s

There are four central aspects to the Latin numeral:

  • The cardinal: ūnus, duo, trēs, quattuor
  • The ordinal: prīmus, secundus, tertius, quārtus
  • The distributive: singulī, bīnī, ternī, quaternī
  • The adverb: semel, bis, ter, quater

The numerals 11-19 are indeclinable:

  • note that 18 and 19 start counting back from twenty, while the others count up from ten
  • French and Spanish (and other Romance languages?) also seem to freak out and shift form somewhere after 15; I’m not sure why no one thought a standardized 11-19 was a good idea

The numerals 20-100 are expressed as follows; bases of ten do not decline:

To achieve a number like 85, the Romans have two preferred methods:

  • tens+ ones= (octōgintā quīnque mīlitēs)
  • ones + et + tens =(quīnque et octōgintā mīlitēs)
  • note that octōgintā et quīnque (a third option) is less common, but may appear
  • also, note that numbers like 28 and 29 nine subtract as 18 and 19 above: duodētrīgintā, ūndētrīgintā, ūndēoctōgintā (79), etc.

The hundreds above 100 decline as adjectives like bonus, bona, bonum

Mille is an odd bird: it’s indeclinable as a singular (mīlle mīlitēs) but declines as a neuter plural (tria mīlia mīlitum)

  • Note that there’s no typo here (though I am prone to typos): the singular mīlle has two l‘s; the plural mīlia/mīlium/mīlibus/mīlia/mīlibus has only one.
  • He came with a thousand soldiers: cum mīlle mīlitibus vēnit.
  • To express this sentence with three thousand, we decline tria mīlia and make mīles a partitive gentive
  • He cam with three thousand soldiers: cum tribus mīlibus mīlitum vēnit.

To express numbers with three digits or more:

If et appears anywhere, it appears only between the two highest demoninations:

  • 1776: mīlle (et) septigentī septuāgintā sex
  • 2012: duo mīlia (et) duodecim
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Cardinal Numerals, 1-10

There are four central aspects to the Latin numeral:

  • The cardinal: ūnus, duo, trēs, quattuor
  • The ordinal: prīmus, secundus, tertius, quārtus
  • The distributive: singulī, bīnī, ternī, quaternī
  • The adverb: semel, bis, ter, quater

From 1-10, only cardinals 1, 2, and 3 decline.

A few things to consider:

  • ūnus will often mean ‘only’ (cf. sōlus) and occasionally ‘the same’ (cf. idem)
  • where ūnus means ‘only,’ it may initiate a subjunctive clause of characteristic (the only man who may: ūnus cuī liceat.)
  • the compound ūnus quisque = every single one
  • the compound ūnus + superlative = the one most (the one most learned man, ūnus doctissiumus)
  • duo may also have the plural genitive duum
  • the word ambō (both, which retains the long ō of the lost Latin dual) declines like duo
  • the compound ūnus + superlative = the one most (ūnus doctissiumus, the one most learned man)

Here’s a chart I found showing the descendents of the Latin cardinals:

(courtesy N.S. Gill; http://tiny.cc/eoiqmw)(For those of you who are curious, there are between 30 and 40 standing Romance languages, but we’ll get to numbers above 10 next post…)

The Essential AG: 133-4