Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2016 October 3

= October 3 =

Dual, trial, and quadral words
The article on dual says:

''Although relatively few languages have the dual number and most have no number or only singular and plural, using different words for groups of two and groups greater than two is not uncommon. English has words distinguishing dual vs. plural number, including: both/all, either/any, neither/none, between/among, former/first, and latter/last.''

Do some languages (I'm sure English has none) have special trial/quadral words separate from the plural words?? Georgia guy (talk) 00:05, 3 October 2016 (UTC)


 * I am not aware of any actual languages that use the trial (my ignorance not being evidence of absence), but Tolkien uses the paucal number vs. the total, which means some elves, versus all elves. μηδείς (talk) 00:27, 3 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Here is one reference describing a trial number in Fijian, although they say it is "probably best described as paucal". Here is a description of a trial number in Taiwanese sign language. One more in Larike. DTLHS (talk) 04:35, 3 October 2016 (UTC)


 * There are traces of a paucal in Russian, where two, three and four all take the genitive singular, but numbers above four take the genitive plural. --ColinFine (talk) 15:22, 3 October 2016 (UTC)


 * Navajo has singular, dual, and plural (3 or more). Arabic has singular, dual, and plural. Arabic nouns have as many as five numbers. For example:
 * tree
 * شَجَر ‎(šajar) = trees (in general) (singular collective)
 * شَجَرَة ‎(šajara) = a tree (singulative)
 * شَجَرَتَان ‎(šajaratān) = two trees (dual)
 * شَجَرَات ‎(šajarāt) = 3 to 10 trees, some trees, a few trees (paucal, little plural)
 * أَشْجَار ‎(ʾašjār) = (kinds of) trees (big plural) —Stephen (talk) 09:47, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Larike (Larike-Wakasihu) is said to have singular, dual, trial, and plural. Yimas language is supposed to have singular, dual, paucal, and plural. Baiso language is said to have singular, paucal, and plural. Paamese language has singular, dual, paucal, and plural. Mokilese language has singular, small plural, big plural. Sursurunga language has singular, dual, small paucal, large paucal, and plural. Mele-Fila language has singular, dual, paucal, small plural, and big plural. Ngan’gityemerri language has singular, dual, trial, and plural. —Stephen (talk) 10:41, 4 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Thanks, Stephen. I am curious if the languages you describe as having paucal and plural actually have paucal and total/collective?  An example of the latter would be humans are related to chimps, where as the paucal would be, a few men joined the women at the table.  I understand you may just be "quoting the sources", so no pressure.  The languages I have studied historically have mostly had singular/dual/plural, which is reconstructed for PIE as well as many other north Eurasian languages.  I wish I had the opportunity to get more into the Bantu languages, since their system seems to have moved from one that focused on class, but not number, to one that focuses on number, to which it subordinates class. μηδείς (talk) 00:04, 5 October 2016 (UTC)
 * Paucal varies a bit depending on the language. In Sursurunga, the small paucal means 3 or so (a minimum of 3). The large paucal means 4 or so (a minimum of 4). It is unclear what "or so" means. In the Baiso language, paucal mean 2 to about 6. In the Yimas language, paucal means 2 to 7. In the Paamese language (and many other oceanic languages), the paucal is 3 to about 7, but when contrasting groups (such as one's male ancestors to the male ancestors of the whole village), the paucal is used for the smaller group, plural for the larger group. In Mele-Fila language, it depends on the type of object. For oranges, the paucal would be 3 to about 10. For the population of a country, the paucal could be a few hundred thousand. —Stephen (talk) 07:00, 5 October 2016 (UTC)