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French numbers ... arg | ||
Tags: Number System | French | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Specific Languages |  | |
| Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4472 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes  Speaks: English*, German | Message 17 of 23 05 December 2012 at 6:19pm | IP Logged | ||
LOL. Sounds scary. I'm doing a lot better now. My language courses (Rocket French, Pimsleur, and Rosetta Stone) all had drills that I've been going through. They've helped a lot. So did the site French-Spanish online. I think the problem was I was trying to learn the numbers all at once. I broke them down into smaller sections and that's made a big difference. Then the course drills put things into context with things like, "We're seventy-eight kilometers from Paris" and "The camera costs 95 Euros." The lesson: Don't try to cram too much into your brain at once. Do a little at a time and you'll learn better. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Spinchäeb Ape Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 4472 days ago 146 posts - 180 votes Speaks: English*, German | Message 18 of 23 08 December 2012 at 11:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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One more quick question about French numbers. For most of the sets of ten, you use "et" for the number one. Examples: quarante et un, cinquante et un, soixante et un. Of course 70 and 90 are the oddballs that add 11, 12, 13, etc. However, 80 (quatre-vingts) adds 1, 2, 3, etc. I figured 81 would therefore be quatre-vingts et un. However, on the French/Spanish Online study page (http://www.frenchspanishonline.com/beginnersfrench/school/n ombres100/nombres100.html#current) it sounds like he's saying "quatre-vingts un." Is this correct? For quatre-vingts, do you leave out the "et"?
Also are the Swiss variants regular just like 20 through 60? In other words: septante et un, septante-deux, septante-trois, etc. huitante et un, huitante-deux, huitante-trois, etc. nonante et un, nonante-deux, nonante-trois, etc. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4709 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 19 of 23 08 December 2012 at 11:38pm | IP Logged | ||
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For septante and nonante, I would think so. Huitante: no idea.
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| Arekkusu Hexaglot Senior Member Canada bit.ly/qc_10_lec Joined 5383 days ago 3971 posts - 7747 votes Speaks: English, French*, GermanC1, Spanish, Japanese, Esperanto Studies: Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Estonian | Message 20 of 23 09 December 2012 at 12:27am | IP Logged | ||
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Use et from 21 to 71 only (for standard numbers).
Vingt only has an s when it is multipled but not followed by another number, so quatre-vingts, but quatre- vingt-un. Edited by Arekkusu on 09 December 2012 at 12:28am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| lecavaleur Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4779 days ago 146 posts - 295 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish | Message 21 of 23 09 December 2012 at 6:01am | IP Logged | ||
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For a couple years, I was in a situation where the only other Francophones I had to
hang out with were Swiss friends from the Valais canton, and they all said septante, huitante and nonante (but never octante). Along with a dozen or so "helvétismes" I picked up, I also got so comfortable using their decimal counting system that I still, to this very day, use it in my personal life when I count to myself or in my head in French. However, since the system in Québec is the same as in France, I have to "convert" back to the vigesimal system when talking to anyone but close friends who are aware of my idiosyncrasy. What I find strange is that so few people in Québec have ever heard of these variants. If I tried to use them in everday life, people would simply not understand what I was talking about. It's a shame, because it does make a lot more sense. Edited by lecavaleur on 09 December 2012 at 6:03am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| lecavaleur Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4779 days ago 146 posts - 295 votes Speaks: English*, French Studies: German, Spanish | Message 22 of 23 09 December 2012 at 6:06am | IP Logged | ||
Huitante works in the very same way. Huitante-et-un, huitante-deux, etc... 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Tsopivo Diglot Senior Member Canada Joined 4473 days ago 258 posts - 411 votes Speaks: French*, English Studies: Esperanto | Message 23 of 23 09 December 2012 at 11:58am | IP Logged | ||
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As French natives, we do not see "quatre-vingt" as "4 x 20", we just see it as the word for "80". Kids who do not even know what "multiplication" is and who would not be able to give you the answer to "what is 4 x 20 ?" are able to say that "80" is "quatre-vingt".
I am not sure I explain myself very clearly but what I am trying to say is basically, it might be easier if you do not treat "quatre-vingt" any differently than you treat "dix, vingt, trente, quarante, cinquante...". Forget that you are an adult who knows multiplication and that you can perfectly see that it's made of the word "quatre" and "vingt" and that it"s "4 x 20". Do not juggle the math in your head. Just accept and learn that "quatre-vingt" is the word for "80", just like you would have accepted and learnt "huitante". Edited by Tsopivo on 09 December 2012 at 12:04pm 5 persons have voted this message useful |
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