Yeah, this problem comes up with 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90 in Danish, because those are counted in "number of twenties" for some reason. And not like "3-and-a-half-twenties" but rather "halfway-towards-the-fourth-twenty". That example is 70 by the way (halfjersindstyvende). And nowadays it's shortened to omit the "twenties"-part. So in this case just "halvfjers".

The naming convention is pretty whack, but it's just treated as irregular naming in normal use. The alternative, would be to rename those numbers to femti, seksti, syvti, otteti, and niti, but that's very much an uphill battle against habit. So for now. 50, 60, 70, 80, and 90 just have unique names...

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yes they really didn't want to go the easy way

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Yeah, and it's wrong.
Nioghalvfems is 9 + 1/2 * 5 * 20!
NOT that silly 9+(4+1/2)*20.

What do they take us for? Calculators?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (2 children)

9 + 1/2 * 5 * 20

9 + 2.5 * 20

9 + 50

59?

How does nioghalvfems make 99?

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The graphic is correct. "Halvfems" is shorthand for "halvfemsindstyvende" which roughly means; halfway to the fifth twenty. So 4,5 or 4-1/2 "twenties" so 90. But nobody rally thinks about that. To most Danes "halvfems" is just the name for 90, just like ninety is in English...

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

It should rather be 9 + (5 - 1/2) * 20. Halvfems is halfway from 4 to 5, but the 5 is the value explicitly mentioned

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Yes. That is what i said? "Halfway to the fifth" which i clarified to mean 4,5 in this context, so as to not be confused to mean 2,5.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago

Yeah 5-1/2 is 4.5, but the word "fems" is short for femsindstyvende, which means 5x20, so writing it out as (5-1/2) rather than 4.5 matches the word halvfems more closely. Could also write it out as (-1/2 + 5) i suppose

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Not Dane here but I know this:

"fems" is "five twenties"

"halvfems" is "halfway (between 4*20 and) 5*20" = 90

But don't forget that 100 has its own word and isn't fems, still 90 is halvfems.