Can I claim that my goal to learn a hundred words in French is complete since I learned to count to 100? I guess that doesn’t seem quite the challenge I was looking for, but I’ll give myself another twenty words. My total is 32, then.
French has some charming quirks in the numbers from 0 to 100. Like English, the numbers from 0 to 12 are all uniquely named. Unlike English, the French don’t have the equivalent of “teens” at 13 — instead, you have to memorize the words treize, quatorze, quinze, and seize before you get to dix-sept (ten-seven).
The next odd number for English speakers is 21, which is vingt-et-un — literally twenty-and-one. Other numbers don’t utilize the superfluous “and” word, only the numbers ending in 1. So, twenty-two is vingt-deux.
Things go along what seems pretty normal, with each new decade getting a new number, until we get to 70 where things start to get quite strange for English speakers. Instead of a new word for seventy, the French say soixante-dix, literally sixty-ten. More confusing yet, 71 is soixante-et-onze, sixty-and-eleven. For 72 , we get soixante-douze or sixty-twelve and we go right on through the teens.
The fun doesn’t stop at 80, which is quatre-vingts, or four-twenties. And the 90s take the cake (are you ready for this?): quatre-vingt-dix (four-twenty-ten), quatre-vingt-onze (four-twenty-eleven), quatre-vingt-douze (four-twenty-twelve), quatre-vingt-treize (four-twenty-thirteen), quatre-vingt-quatorze (four-twenty-fourteen), quatre-vingt-quinze (four-twenty-fifteen), quatre-vingt-seize (four-twenty-sixteen), quatre-vingt-dix-sept (four-twenty-ten-seven), quatre-vingt-dix-huit (four-twenty-ten-eight), and quatre-vingt-dix-neuf (four-twenty-ten-nine),
The number 100 is easy enough — cent.
The most fun way I found to practice counting to 100 in French is this video on You Tube:
Are there similar quirks in numbers in other languages that you know?
Wondrous Words Wednesday is hosted by Bermudaonion’s Weblog. Kathy says: “Wondrous Words Wednesday is a weekly meme where we share new (to us) words that we’ve encountered in our reading.”
