In Belgium and Switzerland, they have specific french words for 70, 80 and 90. In France we understand them, but we don’t use them

@jpc7118

2 жыл бұрын

Yes, it comes from "Académie française". Historically, the "gaulish" were using the 20s as base to count (10 fingers from the hand+10 fingers from the feet)... Then, Gaulish were saying 20, 2 20s (40), 3 20s (60), 4 20s (80) and so on... In middle age, slowly, in Francia then in France, the base became decimal (10)... big numbers were not used alot, and french mixed both bases system (10s and 20s)... then 4 20s was still used and French didn't like septante, huitante (even saw octante) and nonante. Under Louis XIVth, the Académie Française was created (still existing with same job) to regulate and rule the french language. In her first published book and dictionary, the french academicians chose soixante-dix, quatre-vingt and quatre-vingt-dix.

@muhammadisaac07

Жыл бұрын

Cool

@flamephlegm

Ай бұрын

Yeah, "nonante" for 90.

Let's not forget that Abraham Lincoln, in his famous Gettysburg Address said "four score and seven" years ago, rather than "eighty-seven", so there are [or at least were] remnants of the vigesimal system in English. Lesser known is the 'yan tan tethera' counting in England, which has Celtic roots and is also based on twenties. I do know one person whose father still used this, so if it's now extinct, it's been in usage relatively recently.

@timhex5251

3 жыл бұрын

Kudos Loved the information

That's the most I've learned in a video that wasn't even 2 minutes. Merci * 4 * 20.

So, I have often heard that claim, that French's counting system comes from Gaulish, and since the history of French interests me a lot, I have researched that claim, but unfortunately I have found out that this is likely not true. Here are some of the problem with the claim: 1) The claim that Gaulish's counting system was in base 20 doesn't appear to be grounded on any solid evidence. The Gaulish counting system is poorly attested to begin with, but what is attested of it appears to be a base 10 system similar to Latin. The claim that Gaulish counts in base 20 is possibly the result of a confusion with modern Celtic languages like Breton, Welsh or Scottish Gaelic, which do count (partly) in base 20. However, these languages have evolved distinctly from Gaulish for a good 3000 years; we cannot make strong claims about what Gaulish was like based on modern Breton or Welsh. 2) Gaulish likely went extinct in the 6th century AD. But the base 20 counting system is something that developed during the middle ages, centuries after any direct Gaulish influence would have ended. 3) We also find remnants of base 20 counting in the Danish language, well outside of the historical Gaulish/Celtic area. The correct view appears to rather be that during the middle ages, western and northern european language collectively innovated a system of base 20 counting mostly meant for concrete counting (eg: counting sheep, or coins). This system then started to decline in the 16th century, but traces of it remained in French, Danish, and the Celtic languages - and even in French the erasure was very slow: in early 20th century France, many people still said "trois-vingt-dix" (three twenty ten) for "soixante dix" (sixty ten, seventy).

@TheTravellingLinguist

3 жыл бұрын

Thanks for sharing your research on this! Sounds like you've dug quite deep in your search. I found it challenging to find a huge amount of information on Gaulish. Feel free to share any interesting articles you came across if you have them handy. I'd love to read more about it! :-)

@lcatalamusic

3 жыл бұрын

@@TheTravellingLinguist I've tried to dug back articles but the thing is, as I said, Gaulish numerals are poorly attested, so much so that everything we know about them can be summarized in a few wikipedia paragraphs: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaulish_language#Inscriptions - notably, it shows that the only number higher than 20 attested, "tricontis" (30) appears to be be constructed in base 10, since it is based on "tri" (3)

@xolang

3 жыл бұрын

Thank you for your information! Actually I sometimes say: deux vingt dix, trois vingt and trois vingt dix just for fun. I didn't know that it was actually used in France.

@Gesufal

3 жыл бұрын

Where in France do they say "trois-vingt-dix" ? In Paris, there is the "Hôpital des Quinze-Vingt" (" The Fifteen Twenty Hospital"). Built during the thirteenth century for 300 beds. At least it's what i was told.

@lcatalamusic

3 жыл бұрын

@@Gesufal it was apparently still said in the south-east in the early 20th century (but no longer today)

Basque language, euskera, which is the unique pre-indoeuropean and paleo-european still alive in western Europe, uses the numerals according with the vigesimal system.

Great video + explanation + perfect length thumbs up people we gotta beat the algorithm

Also, the money used a sort of vigesimal system (20 shillings to 1 pound, 20 francs to 1 napoléon), or, as my grand-mother still said around 1970, 100 sous instead of 5 francs...

I never ever understood why we would say soixante-dix and such.....Only today did I finally get an explanation. I used to find those numbers so dumb, and wanted to switch to "septante" or "nonante" like in Switzerland, but now it makes me want to keep them this way even more. Super proud of those Celtics roots.

@TheTravellingLinguist

2 жыл бұрын

Agreed! I love these little language quirks and relics from the past!

Thanks for that great video, I'm French and did not know that ! Just a tip : it is "nombres" not "numéros" in this occasion 😉

Thank you so much👍

The only explanation I can give is French spoken in Paris was by people from all parts of France : They have different way to pronouce. So « cinquante » and « septante » were different but not far. But for people from other province the accent was not the same and the difficulty was to not confuse 50 and 70 they progressly said for 70 :60 et 10 to distinguish it from 50. But in the other part of France the way to say 70 remained until the begining of XX and became standard French in Belgium and Switzerland. In Canada, French spoken takes root in XVIII parisian French and they use like standard French the way to say 70. This is only a theory .

One of the problems with referring back to the Gaulish language is that the Gauls mostly didn't use writing so most of our information comes from secondary (mostly Roman) sources. Also, while the vigesimal counting system of Celtic languages is widely known and accepted, there does not seem to be a good explanation for why modern French only uses this system for 70, 80 and 90. Finally, of course, Latin always used the decimal system and most research suggests that French widely used the words for 70, 80 and 90 adapted from Latin (today still used in Switzerland and Belgium: "septante," "huitante/octante" and "nonante") until the 17th century, when the current vigesimally-based numbers were officially adopted by the Académie Française. If this timeline is correct, then it suggests it is not directly descended from Gaulish usage and, as far as I have read, no explanation seem to be provided as to why these vigesimal numbers were adopted.

As far as I know, people used to have a duodecimal system (1-12). In many languages there are separate words for one to twelve (then thirteen, which is derived from three and ten). In fact it is still used a lot, although many don’t realise that: hours of the day, a dozen of eggs, for china ware (plates, cups and so, go by 6 or 12) and the English money until 1971 for deviding pences and shillings.

@muhammadisaac07

Жыл бұрын

Seems interesting

In Swiss French it's septante, huitante and nonante.

Very interesting. In the summary table starting at 1:30 there are a few mistakes though: the first column should contain 60+ ... and the pronunciation of 71 should contain an "et": soixante-et-onze (yeah, we can't have it too simple, can we? ;-)

@TheTravellingLinguist

4 жыл бұрын

Oups ! Merci beaucoup de m’avoir fait conscience de la faute d’orthographe de 71. 😄 Apparemment, j’ai complètement raté ça. 😅 Mais j’ai intentionnellement omis la colonne 60+ pour conserver l’espace, puisque le mot soixante est assez prévisible (par rapport à soixante-dix, quatre-vingts et quatre-vingt-dix).

"The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by reason of strength they be fourscore years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away". Psalm 90 verse 10, Authorized Version of 1611, also known as the King James Version. Likewise the version used in the Book of Common Prayer, 1662 (Coverdale's translation, as printed in The Great Bible of 1540): "The days of our age are threescore years and ten; and though men be so strong that they come to fourscore years : yet is their strength then but labour and sorrow; so soon passeth it away, and we are gone."

1:04 This map has nothing to do with the Roman conquest of Gaul (which happened under Cesar). This map shows the "Gallic Empire" (which also comprised Britannia and parts of Germania) which was a Roman state of the 3rd century under Tetricus (when different emperors were proclaimed at the same time in different part of the empire by their own troups).

I know I am danish. We start at fifty, halvtreds or halvtredsindstyve, which is halv tredje sinds tyve. Sinds means multiply by. Halvtredje is 3- 0,5, so you yield: 20*(3-0,5). Easy is'nt?

Now a video about why Hindi counting is so irregular and hard to learn.

Celtic numeral system of count based on twenty

You made a mistake (min 1:29) with the numbers from 80-99. 80 (quatre-vingts) is 4x20 not 4+20 and so on.

@gaoda1581

17 күн бұрын

I think he meant the word for 4 spoken "plus" (AND) the word for 20 after that, rather than the mathematical logic

Laughing in Swiss 😏

1:25 (60* + 10)

Try to memorize the Hindi or Urdu numbers, and you will find 70,80,90 in French extremely easy.

Who else is watching this for school

@TheTravellingLinguist

4 жыл бұрын

Hope it helps! If you have any questions about French, send me a suggestion and I might make a video about it 😄

is anybody watching this from school

Dude, you used 70 for all English numbers in the brackets. It should have been 60! So 70 = 60 + 10, 71 = 60 + 11 and so on (minute 1:28 of the video)

70 = 3A 80 = 40 90 = 4A

You're wrong. It's all about weed smoking... 420

We learn it young, and we don't found it weird. Only anglophone think it is a problem.

@Sungawakan

3 жыл бұрын

Everyone using the decimal system

@joshuddin897

3 жыл бұрын

@@Sungawakan but they use the metric system for measurement