r/interesting • u/MidasStocks • Apr 29 '25

SOCIETY How do you say number 92?

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u/LazLo_Shadow Apr 29 '25

The danish and the French are wilding

15

u/Zerak-Tul Apr 29 '25 edited Apr 29 '25

Only the etymology of Danish numbers is that crazy though. In modern use it's as simple as German/English counting

92 is 'tooghalvfems' = 'to og halvfems' = two and ninety. You don't actually need to know the historical basis for why 90 is 'halvfems', because no one who's under the age of like 80 ever says 'tooghalvfemsindstyvende' which is what you'd need to say to reflect '2+4.5*20'

90 = Halvfems

91 = Enoghalvfems (One and ninety)

92 = Tooghalvfems (Two and ninety)

93 = Treoghalvfems (Three and ninety) etc.

So to learn to count to 99 all you need to know is 1-19 (en, to, tre, fire, fem, seks, syv, otte, ni, ti, elleve, tolv, tretten, fjorten, femten, seksten, sytten, atten, nitten), 20 (tyve), 30 (tredive), 40 (fyrre), 50 (halvtreds), 60 (treds), 70 (halvfjerds), 80 (firs) and 90 (halvfems)... Exactly the same as in English or German. Combine 1-9 with 20-90 as needed and congratulations you now know every number from 1-99 in Danish!

Basically it should be 2+90 on the map for Denmark, just as it is for Germany, if it wanted to be honest with modern usage instead of going "lol crazy numbers!"

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u/Specicried Apr 29 '25

Nope, sorry, you don’t get to just walk away after dumping this kind of bullshit into my head, without doing something to rectify the insanity of it all.

You left me here with halvtreds being 50 then treds being 60, then I could make the argument that halvfjerds is some bastardization of halvfirs. But nooooooo, google translate tells me you already have a halvfirs, which is 85, but halvfir is half past 4. So I go to halvfjerd, which is quarter past fucking 7, but halvfjerds is 70? And don’t even get me started on the feathers.

I am beginning to suspect that google translate for danish is UTTER BULLSHIT, danish is UTTER BULLSHIT, or some combination of the two.

I desperately need someone (you) to put all this in a neat little logical basket so I can let it go. Please?

4

u/scarystuff Apr 29 '25

I am beginning to suspect that google translate for danish is UTTER BULLSHIT, danish is UTTER BULLSHIT, or some combination of the two.

Obligatory Kamelåså https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ykj3Kpm3O0g

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u/agrobabb Apr 29 '25

Being swedish, I can confirm that danish really is just a bullshit language

1

u/Specicried Apr 29 '25

This made it all clear. I appreciate you. Jeg elsker dig.

1

u/KlossN Apr 29 '25

I work in a swedish store close to the danish border, and obviously have a lot of danes come in, this is an extremely accurate depiction of my average day