Is that a French stereotype I am not aware of?
Because, I’ve got a bit of experience in teaching math, and I wish most kids in that class could speak math naturally.
They count very weird. For example to say 87 in french you say four twenties seven (quatre vingt sept) 92 in french is four twenties twelve (quatre vingt douze).
Don’t ask the danish how they say 92
Oh my lord, that is even worse!
I lucked out living in a place with a completely logical numbering system thankfully :3… even english is slightly weird with 11 and 12 not following the -teen pattern (guessing a holdover for using dozens/base12)
Eleven and twelve still do kinda follow base 10 rules. They literally mean “one left” (ain-lif) and “two left” (twa-lif) with the “over ten” being implied.
I’m not quite sure why we have different words for those two, though. Maybe when we added the 'teens, those two just sounded better than firsteen and seconteen?
Oh, it’s about that. It’s just leftover from an old base 20 counting system really. Kind of like how time is still using base 60 (though it’s kinda convenient for dividing), stuff like that.
Really, English is not completely safe from that. Ask yourself why eleven to nineteen instead of, you know, ten-one, ten-two…
