How to count to 100 in Danish - Language Challenge

I'm trying to understand how to count to 100 in Danish. I met up with my Danish friend Kristine and she taught me the way to handle Danish numbers. The languages are sometimes very similar and sometimes very different. We filmed this in central wonderful Copenhagen on a quiet pedestrian street. We had so much fun.
Check the playlist for more language videos: • Language Challenge
My channel is packed with Swedish tutorials and language challenges where you can learn everything from nouns and verbs to grammar and special Swedish words. I also talk about places in Sweden and where you as a tourist can visit. I have made youtube videos for over 10 years and 10 Swedish Words started with me explaining 10 Swedish words that don't exist in English. You can also find videos about Norse Mythology, my deep-talk series Good Talk (which now has its own channel) and other info about Sweden and Swedish culture.
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Intro graphics by Oliver Holmgren & Erica Svejderud
Music used with permission from Epidemic Sound
Cheers
-Martin in Sweden

[@TheSwedishLad]

or technically, how to count to 99 in Danish 😂

[@esunisen3862]

If i understood is "translates" as 50= (3-0.5)*20. No idea how they came up with this. We have something similar in french where 80=4*20 (quatre-vingt).

[@SaturnusDK]

@@esunisen3862 It's actually extremely logical, and it's just every other language that makes no sense. Slightly joking obviously but an old word for twenty is a score, in Danish a "snes". So that's where the "treds" and "firs" comes from "tre snes" or 3 scores, and "fire snes" or 4 scores. To understand where the half comes in, it's important to understand in which context scores where originally used. They were used for counting livestock, and when you reached twenty you'd make a make mark, or a score. The expression is even still used in modern English, as "keeping score". And even in modern Danish you'd often hear farmers say they have a half score of cows. It is also important to understand that unlike in English, in Danish and many other European languages, we don't say it is half past 2 if it's 2::30, we say it's half 3, meaning that it was 2 o'clock but we're now half way to 3. We also say the glass is half full, or that you're half drunk, meaning tipsy. Confusingly both is "halvfuld". You wouldn't say something is half empty in Danish unless you're making a point that it was so contrary to your expectation. The same logic is applied to the number system, so we say halvtreds because it's halfway to 3 scores because that's what "halvtreds" literally means: half-way to three scores. Same again for 70 (halvfjerds) which is half way to 4 scores, and 90 (halvfems) which is half way to 5 scores. In Danish the word for one-and-a-half is similarly "halvandet", or half-way to second as another example so it's logically consistent. The ones before tens is actually a strange one, not in Danish or German but in other languages because in English for example it is logically inconsistent. In English the ones goes before the tens if it's a single ten but not if there's more than one ten. Eg., it's fifteen, or five-and-ten, but it's fifty-one, or five-tens-and-one. At least in Danish or German we apply the ones in front of the tens consistently.

[@JumpingCookie95]

She’s so adorable

[@TheBarser]

As a dane I would like to apologize for our number system. It is terrible.

[@TheBarser]

@@KruxyKross can't promise anything 🤫

[@reineh3477]

I saw an other video that explains it, danes count in twentys so 60 = tres (3*20) 50 = halvtreds (2,5*20) (half-three times twenty) "s" is short for sinstyve (times 20) So it isn't that hard to understand when you know how to do it. Greetings from Sweden

[@TheBarser]

@@reineh3477 It is just unnecessarily complicated. We would be able to change to the same number system as the swedes/Norwegians easily. There would be no shame in doing it, and better do it now than later.

[@oskich]

We fixed it for you: kzbin.info/www/bejne/iJbSoaKYqZWFeMU

[@xXxDerfoufixXx]

French: Finally a worthy opponent, our battle will be legandary.

[@EdMcF1]

In English, we have a nursery rhyme which starts 'Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie' an archaic counting of 24, perhaps it was that way when the Danes were ruling parts of England?

[@MulleDK19]

5:15 "Half of five". Actually, that's not too far off. The danish number system is based on an old unit called "snes" (plural: snese) which is 20. Or rather, 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90 are based on "snes". For 50, we *say* "halvtreds"; but that's actually a shortened form of "halvtredsindstyve"; which in turn is a shortened form of "halv-tredje sinde tyve" ("half third times twenty"). "halv-trejde" is an old way to say three minus a half. Another way to think of it is that "half third" means you have half of the third, implying you must already have all of the first two, thus two and a half. We still use this way of saying half numbers in common speech, but typically only "halv-anden" ("half second", I.E. "one and a half"). For example, "Jeg er klar om halvandet minut" ("I'm ready in a half second minute", I.E. "I'm ready in a minute and a half"). You don't typically hear "halv-tredje" ("half third"), "halv-fjerde" ("half fourth"), "halv-femte" ("half fifth"), and so on in common danish, though, with the exception of the aforementioned "halvanden" ("half second") which is used pretty much always to say 1½. But in our number system, these are still used. So we say 58 as "otte-og-halvtreds", where "otte" means eight, and "og" means "and", and "halvtreds" is then the shortened form of "halv tredje sinde tyve" ("half third times twenty"). So in full, 58 is "otte og halv tredje sinde tyve" ("Eight and half third times twenty"), or in other words: 8 + (2.5 * 20) = 58. Obviously, that's quite long to say, so typically one of the shortened forms are used. For cardinals (51, 52, 53, 54, etc.), typically the shortest form is used: "otte-og-halvtreds" ("halvtreds" is the contraction of "halv", "tredje" and "sinde": "halvtred(je)s(inde)"). However, for ordinals (51st, 52nd, 53rd, 54th, etc.), usually the longer form is preferred as it sounds better: "otte-og-halvtredsindstyvende". "halvtredsindstyve" is the longer form, while the -ende is the equivalent of -st, -nd, -rd and -th in english (one for all of them). Notice that it's "tyvende", not "tyveende", to avoid the double vowel. For cardinals, this longer form would be "halvtredsindstyve" (Which again is a contraction of "halv-tredje sinde tyve" ("half third times twenty")) plus the -ende suffix. and the full form of "halvtredsindstyvende" is "halv-trejde sinde tyvende" ("half third times twentieth"). 50 is thus "halvtreds" in its shortest form, "halv-tredje sinde tyve" ("half third times twenty") in its longest. 60 is "treds" in its shortest form, "tredje sinde tyve" ("third times twenty") in its longest. 70 is "halvfjerds" in its shortest form, "halv-fjerde sinde tyve" ("half fourth times twenty") in its longest. 80 is "firs" in its shortest form, "fjerde sinde tyve" ("fourth times twenty") in its longest. Who knows why it's "firs" instead of "fjerds". 90 is "halvfems" in its shortest form, "halv-femte sinde tyve" ("half fifth times twenty") in its longest. 100 is "hundred" ("hundred") or "ét-hundred" ("one hundred"). Of course, if 100 followed the same logic, it'd be "fems" / "femte sinde tyve" ("fifth times twenty"), but the madness is only from 50 to 99 (of course also from 150 to 199, and so on). What about 1-49? 1-19 are like any other language (for cardinals anyway). 20-29 are too. 20 is "tyve" ("twenty"). 25 is "fem-og-tyve" ("five and twenty"). Thirty and fourty look like they follow the same logic as 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90, but they actually don't. Thirty in danish is "tredive" and fourty is "fyrretyve" or "fyrre" in short. "Fyrretyve" has twenty in it, but unlike 50, 60, 70, 80 and 90, it has nothing to do with twenty. It's actually derived from old danish "fyritiughu", which means "four tens". How it turned into basically "four twenty" from that, I don't know. "Tredive" likewise is derived from old danish "thrætiughu", meaning "three tens". So from 1-49 the numbers are actually like most other languages. Except for ordinals. For numbers 1-39, we basically have a different suffix or word for each number (like -st, -nd, -rd, -th). Here, I've written the numbers up to 101, in the format Cardinal (eg. 52) | Ordinal (eg. 52nd). If there are multiple versions they are separated by /. 1: En/Et | Første 2: To | Anden/Andet 3: Tre | Tredje 4: Fire | Fjerde 5: Fem | Femte 6: Seks | Sjette 7: Syv | Syvende 8: Otte | Ottende 9: Ni | Niende 10: Ti | Tiende 11: Elleve | Ellevte 12: Tolv | Tolvte 13: Tretten | Trettende 14: Fjorten | Fjortende 15: Femten | Femtende 16: Seksten | Sekstende 17: Sytten | Syttende 18: Atten | Attende 19: Nitten | Nittende 20: Tyve | Tyvende 21: En-og-tyve | En-og-tyvende 22: To-og-tyve | To-og-tyvende 22: Tre-og-tyve | Tre-og-tyvende Same pattern all the way through 29. 29: Ni-og-tyve | Ni-og-tyvende 30: Tredive | Tredivte 31: En-og-tredive | En-og-tredivte Same pattern all the way through 39. 39: Ni-og-tredive | Ni-og-tredivte 40: Fyrre/Fyrretyve | Fyrrende/Fyrretyvende 41: En-og-fyrre/En-og-fyrretyve | En-og-fyrrende/En-og-fyrretyvende 42: To-og-fyrre/To-og-fyrretyve | To-og-fyrrende/To-og-fyrretyvende Same pattern all the way through 49. 49: Ni-og-fyrre/Ni-og-fyrretyve | Ni-og-fyrrende/Ni-og-fyrretyvende And then for the infamous 50-99 numbers, as mentioned earlier, the longer form of these numbers are typically preferred for cardinals, as the short forms sound weird with the -ende suffix. Including only the first couple in each tens, as they follow the same pattern throughout. 50: Halvtreds | Halvtredsende/Halvtredsindstyvende 51: En-og-halvtreds | En-og-halvtredsende/En-og-halvtredsindstyvende 60: Treds | Tredsende/Tredsindstyvende 61: En-og-treds | En-og-tredsende/En-og-tredsindstyvende 70: Halvfjerds | Halvfjerdsende/Halvfjerdsindstyvende 71: En-og-halvfjerds | En-og-halvfjerds/En-og-halvfjerdsindstyvende 80: Firs | Firsende/Firsendstyvende 81: En-og-firs | En-og-firsende/En-og-firsendstyvende 90: Halvfems | Halvfemsende/Halvfemsendstyvende 91: En-og-halvfems | En-og-halvfemsende/En-og-halvfemsendstyvende 100: Et-hundred/Hundred | Et-hundredende/Hundredende 101: Et-hundred-og-et/Hundred-og-et | Et-hundred-og-første|Hundred-og-første When written with digits instead of words, ordinals become a lot easier. You simply add a dot to make it an ordinal: eg. "Fem-og-halvtredsindstyvende" can be written simply as 55.

[@obiwankenobi3673]

MulleDK19 hold da op. Keder du dig i din fritid?😂

[@voidydog6769]

@@obiwankenobi3673 det tror jeg o.o

[@matejfele9971]

Oh fuck...

[@venicenow]

Det staves tres, og ikke treds👍🏻

[@floriankunde6699]

Better than any encyclopedia can ever explain! Thanks for that!!!

[@coyotelong4349]

She’s a cutie

[@coachmarcus9382]

That’s my sister. 👉🏻👈🏻

[@i.have.seen.god.1]

Kyle Sekenski u are creepy

[@i.have.seen.god.1]

Marcus. J and no its not

[@i.have.seen.god.1]

Marcus. J no its MY SISTER AND MY GF

[@sonnenblume1921]

@@i.have.seen.god.1 man, really, this is NOT funny

[@bjornthorsson4921]

Halvtreds is short for Halvtredsindstyve (Half third times twenty)=2,5×20=50. Yup,weird maths.

[@0s0sXD]

Woooooooooow

[@Ca11mero]

I always thought about it as counting with 20 and removing 10. So Halvtreds would be 3x20-10=50

[@bjornthorsson4921]

@@Ca11mero I mean,it does sorta follow the Roman logic XD removing half from three and times 20. Though your approach works well too ^^

[@UltraAntiEverything]

Yeah, Tom Scott had an explanation of this on the Numberphile channel. In Danish we got a base 20 system going. 20 = snes (in oooold Danish). Halvtreds = half to three snes (?) = 60-10= 50. Then we threw in the German way of counting, cause, why not? ...meaning: Last digit, read out first. But only for two digit numbers. 135 is read out '1 hundred, 5 and 30'. 48,459 is read out '8 and 40 thousand, 400 and 9 and 50'... Had got a 9th grade exam grade lowered because I wasn't able to pronounce a 7 digit number properly. Probably made up by some staggering noble wanting to fuck over the common man, lol.

[@martinwebermann4252]

Mathematically, the Danish way of saying 50, would be expressed as (-1/2 + 3)*20 = 2,5*20 = 50 75 in the same logic would be expressed mathematically as 5+((-1/2 + 4)*20) = 5+(3,5*20) = 75

[@provocase]

As a germanic mother tongue speaker myself, here I was thinking the French way of counting was totally bonkers... fascinating!

[@stefaniezutter]

Please make more videos with her Martin... I loved this one :)

[@herrbonk3635]

Halvtreds, halvfjerds, halvfems are most easily seen as half (of 20) *before* 3x20=60, 4x20=80 or 5x20=100. (We swedes use a similar convention for telling time: _Halv sex_ = half an hour before six, for instance.)

[@TomWaldgeist]

Danish counts in 20 steps. So 60 tres is 3x20 And fifty is halv tres because its 2 times 20 and a half of a twenty which is ten so 2x20+10. 70= halv fiers because 3x20+and a half of a twenty (10) And 80 is firs because 4x20

[@shaunmckenzie5509]

wtf

[@susanlarsen2040]

@@shaunmckenzie5509 🤣

[@ManuelGarcia-gk1pb]

In spanish, tres means three and in danish means sixty. Amazing languages!!!

[@shawnhapney8784]

He's gonna have an easier time learning simple Danish than a native English speaker any day.

[@benkiernan159]

The number system derives from old Norse and then the pronunciation just changed over time.

[@intercrossed]

The "halv" stems from an old way of counting that you can still find other places in the the language today. When counting in halves, you would say the next number minus a half, so "halvanden" 1,5 "halvtredje" 2,5 and so on. Another oldtimey way of counting was in dusins (twelves) and score (twenties). So halvtreds (halvtredsinstyvende, as seen in other comments) is three twenties minus half a twenty, 20 + 20 + 20 - 10 = 50. Simple! I swear this made more sense when society didn't deal a lot in decimal numbers.....

[@intercrossed]

Also the confusion with 70 "halvfjerds" and 80 "firs" has to do with cardinal and ordinal numbers in the system I described above. Again I swear it does make sense.... It is just an old system is all

[@NWEuroLangs]

If you think of it as counting in twenties it's easier . Then use halv as a subtraction of ten .

[@Starphixx]

Tack, jag åker till damnark för mycket för att inte kunna detta. Bra och glad lärare med! :D

[@mungofinalfi4480]

3:24, in the background.

[@_bina]

Mungo Finalfi 🥺

[@Odderup]

The woman doesn't understand the danish number system, she knows How to say them but doesn't understand the origin.

[@cyl742]

I decided to watch this, because I have been watching "The Rain" (great show!). Even tho the subtitles are great, I know sometimes they have said more. I can't differentiate the sounds from word to word sometimes. I thought this might help my ear. It did not, but it's fun to watch.

[@thiagodias7825]

If I try to speak like this , my friends would say that I got a sorethroat. LOL

[@Runeakb]

Halvtreds kommer fra halvtredsindstyve og betyder Halv tredie (2,5) sinde (gammelt ord for gånger, som i någonsinde) tyve (tjugo). Altså 2,5 x 20 = 50. Firs er fire sinde tyve, altså 4 x tjugo.

[@williamkeitaro8910]

Every language: tens + ones or ones + tens Danish and french: quick maffs

[@clarkkent8173]

20 = snes , means 60 = 3 snes = tres. 50 = 1/2 + 3 snes = halvtres. 80 = 4 snes = firs

[@michaeljohn5085]

Maybe this makes some sense: From 50 to a 100 the numbers are based on a snes (20). Halvtreds is 3 snese (60)minus half a snes (10). Tres is 3x20. Halvfjerds is 4x20 minus a half snes (10) Firs is 4x20. Halvfems is 5x20 minus 10.

[@permller9671]

Many danes doesn’t know why their numbers are called so. Example: 70 = halv-fjerds. It’s half way to 4 (3.5), witch you multiply with 20.

[@jhendin]

Theo Dias has a valid explanation, but more needs to be explained. Somehow, somewhere Danish developed a very unique way of counting. Basically they do it by twenties. 20 is the first twenty, 40 is the second twenty, 60 is the third twenty, 80 is the fourth twenty and 100 is the fifth twenty. A number like 50 falls in between the second and third twenty, so it's referred to as 'half the third twenty (a more simpler was of putting it). A number like 51 in Danish ends up as 'one and half the third twenty'. Of all the Scandinavian languages only Danish counts this way. I once wrote to the Danish Language Board and asked them where they got this from, and they wrote back a very polite letter, explaining: "We don't know".

[@user-dd4tf4zk1q]

We don't know. Lol😂

[@norwegian52]

I like Norwegian counting. Swedish counting sounds pretty similar to that

[@AC-uu7ut]

She is so cute😀

[@thofus]

50 - 60 - 70 - 80 - 90 is from old danish, where we counted in snes (or snese in plural) being 20... : 50 = halvtres which also is halvtredsindstyve. Halvtredsindstyve is actually : 2,5 x 20... "Halvtredje" being the number three deducted by a half : 3 - 0,5 = 2,5 and "sinds" being "multiplied by" and "tyve" being twenty (20). This works with 60, 70, 80 and 90 where you finde that number wich multiplied by a snes (20) gives the right number so 60 is tres or tredjesindstyve 3 x 20... 70 is halvfjers or halvfjerdsindstyve in old danish : 3,5 x 20... 80 is firs or firesindstyve in old danish : 4 x 20... 90 is Halvfems or halvfemsindstyve : 4,5 x 20... So there are reason behind the numbers. Look at MulleDK19's post to see the more thorough explanation.

[@dantedante839]

I can speak German and I know that In Dutch you also say "eenentwintig" (21) which is like in German too, BUT I really thought all Scandinavian languages were just like English when it comes to counting. Appart from its really difficult pronunciation, I'd never say that it would be another reason to not learn Danish, hahaha Spanish speaker would never get those sounds. I'm from the Dominican Republic and I've met some Norwegians and Swedes in my country and I could tell their accents are very similar. I'm learning Swedish by myself and it's not difficult at all because there are many words you can find in German (Vogel/ Fågel, Stuhl/stol) or English (get up/ gå upp, lip/läpp-Lippe in German). Germanic languages are so dramatic and beautiful. Swedish sounds like if you were singing childish songs and German is so clear and clean you can even hear their stomach when they speak, haha

[@alfredmendezalvarado1961]

I'm in the same way man

[@wereldvanriley7]

Why is everyone forgetting that Norwegian also sings as well? I am so disappointed

[@ramik81]

Reminds me how weird counting in French is. At eighty its 4×20. 81 is 4×20+1. 90 is 4×20+11. And so on.

[@9cookie2monster]

Wow...and I thought french counting was the worse :/

[@valdemarnielsen6900]

Halvtreds is the short version of "halvtredsenstyve" and it means half away from 3 times 20. And it is the same with halvfjerds. Half away from 4 times 20.

[@basharal-taleb8932]

Very instructive Video 🙂 Det är intressant att veta hur danskarna räknar även om det känns lite svårt :) På arabiska säger vi till exempel två och tjugo om talet 22 och samma gäller alla talen som kommer efter talet 10. Men räknesättet ändras efter 100 t.ex. 101 blir hundra och ett.

[@Zendemic42]

Jag undrar då hur man säger 121 på arabiska - är det hundra ett och tjugo eller ändras också hur man säger 21 efter 100?

[@WoodenViking]

the french of germanic language family

[@davidwilliams1234]

I used to get the words for 40 and 80 confused but now I remember that "fyrre" (40) sounds like the word "furry". In Russian the weird word for 40 is also connected with fur: сорок was originally the term for the bag that was the right size for packing 40 furs, which is the number of furs needed to make a Russian fur coat. If your mind works like mine: fine. If not find your own mnemonic!

[@leosidharta6723]

Woman, your smile is so adorable...

[@flatline9737]

the old way to say 50 in danish is halvtredsindstyvende which basically means half three times twenty, or in numbers if you like, 2½*20. so halv tredje sinds tyve.

[@ankra12]

In Norwegian we say both en og tredve, tretti en OR førti to, to og førti or even en og førr 😁

[@svaffe]

Det er hvad der sker når man har været under så stor indflydelse af både det Danske og det Svenske sprog :)

[@Massi94211]

bwahaha that zoom on your faces at 4:46 was so fitting hahaha

[@ducktorlarsen5574]

Yes the numberic system is in 20s, but no dane remember it this way. When I hear "halvtreds" (50), in my head I don't hear hear "half sixty", I just hear it as "halvtreds", I didn't even know it actually was pronounced half sixty before I turned 9-10 years old, I never realized it, you just remember how they are pronounced and that's it. In my eyes, just remembering how to say the words between 1-20 and the words 30, 40, 50, 60 , 70, 80, 90, 100, 1000, 1m etc you should easily be able to count any existing number in danish.

[@marionblees3596]

halvtreds is half way three times twenty to make it easy on you! I think it is derived from the french system of counting. Remember 80 in french is quatrevingt, which means four times twenty. Halvfjerds is you are half way to 4 times 20 en firs is four times twenty. Ninety is half way 5 times 20 so there comes the fem(s) from. :) Napoleon has given us this.

[@LS-oq3qh]

As a fracophonic person, i find Danish very interesting.

[@sebastianmadsen4592]

I am form Denmark

[@CleverNameTBD]

Halvtreds and other Danish numbers like 50-90 arent even actually the entire words. Oddly enough. Danes love clipping off words... anyway take 90. 90 is(5-0,5)×20 70 is (4-0,5)×20. 50 is (3-0,5)×20. 50: Halvtreds halvtredje means three minus a half = 2,5 50: Halvtredsindstyve (3-0,5)×20 English, Spanish, swedish, much easier to count. French similarly difficult but not as bad as Danish. Japanese and finnish kinda similar and fairly easy.

[@lmatt88]

Well I didn't understand shit but you 2 are very funny together lol. Greetings from Argentina

[@Zapy__]

Same

[@PIANOPHUNGUY]

You have to add "sinds tyve" which isn't said anymore. Sinde means "times". Similar to a famous Lincoln speech. Four score and seven years ago ......... A score is 20. Halvtres means half of the third score or 50. (3x20-10)

[@emanuelgreipel9074]

it would be interesting to count in Swedish and Danish (to compare)

[@elson.1990]

Swedish numbers are normal.

[@mikoajem675]

@@elson.1990 lol

[@persimonsen8792]

Easy, in danish it is 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,,9 and so on.

[@reineh3477]

@@persimonsen8792 yes the first numbers. The weird stuff beginns at 50

[@glegof999]

others languages use the base 20, for example breton language use it too. 40 is daou-ugent (two twenty) and 99 is naontek ha pevar-ugent (nineteen and four twenty). And you put the noun in the middle: 99 days is naontek deiz ha pevar-ugent (nineteen days and four twenty)

[@giuliafontanapena7226]

Danish pronunciation seems to be really difficult. I've been learning Swedish for a short time and in the very beginning, it was a little hard for me to pronounce, but nothing compared to Danish (though I still find it very hard to pronounce the "sj" sound).

[@xolang]

Among the different accents of Swedish the easiest one to learn for foreigners (except perhaps Norwegians) is probably Finlandswedish. Several reason: 1) the vowels are easier. probably only Norwegians find Swedenswedish vowels easy. even for Danes, the vowels in Finlandswedish are easier to pronounce. 2) the consonants too! again, Norwegians are probably the only ones who find Sweden consonants easier, but even they have trouble with the infamous sj-sound in Sweden (in Finland sj sounds close to English sh). 3) no contrasting pitch accents! once again, Norwegians would be an exception.. 4) that said, even most Swedes would say that swedophone Finns speak more clearly in general.

[@eck2x]

Thanks for the movie recommendation, I guess.

[@TheSwedishLad]

rivans ha ha

[@anthonyr1416]

We do the same thing in dutch i.e Tweeëntwintig = two and twenty

[@boghund]

eeë

[@volkishelf1088]

Same in German

[@Relish121]

zweiundzwanzig

[@NothingElse556]

It's like counting in German or Dutch, they put the number before it.

[@gustafradisson866]

the girl, how she talks and smiles is absolutely awesome.. and how she looks at the guy.. its a flirt and love really.. romanticism..

[@Diddi150]

80 in Danish sounds exactly like the word for feet in Viennese German. lol

[@cheeveka3]

Wow the Danish numbers are so similar to the English numbers never knew that so interesting.☺️

[@persimonsen8792]

They couldn´'t be more apart. Danish is the only language that use base 20. With the numbers from 50 to 90.

[@cheeveka3]

per simonsen I agree there are significant differences. Also there is difference between counting numbers and vocabulary. Like the imperial system and metric system the means of counting the system is different since one is base 10 and other base 12. In general the grammar and vocabulary may remain unchanged. The values may differ in terms of the utilisation of numbers. That’s just based on my observation.

[@persimonsen8792]

@@cheeveka3 For foreigners, our number system, makes no sense. Because it's not ex. 6 times 10 eg 60, but 3 times 20 (treds or tresindetyve). Even our nabo countrys, don't get it.

[@cheeveka3]

per simonsen per simonsen It doesn’t makes much but than again the imperial system doesn’t make sense either. What surprised me was how the numbers were pronounced it seems very similar to how English numbers is pronounced. That’s just based on what I heard. It is said it takes less time for English speakers to learn the Nordic languages. Just watch this video. m.kzbin.info/www/bejne/h5Koi2iVnct4mZY

[@alexrafe2590]

Danish counting sounds mind bogglingly confusing. But my question is what about Swedish counting Martin?! This is a Swedish themed channel isn’t it? The most interesting thing for me was when you queried her about the manner of counting deciles, i.e., one and twenty, two and twenty, three and twenty. So I’m assuming in Swedish you do it like English, twenty-one, twenty-two, etc., which is wild since I never knew another Germanic language aside from English, that counts that way. Very interesting. Long ago, you could also count that way in English, but now you only see it in old nursery rhymes. . . . four and twenty blackbirds all in a pie.

[@leosidharta6723]

A very cute danish woman.

[@ThorH]

From my Norwegian understanding. I cant really this, but i just remember "halv" as -10, and like halv"tres" tres is 3, so I add 0 behind, so 30 times 2, is 60. 60 -10 is 50.

[@ThorH]

Halvfirs, is then 4, 40 times 2, 80 - 10 is 70. Firs is of course just 4, 40 times 2. 80

[@JCMH]

_Firs_ is a shortening of _firsindstyve_ "four times twenty", not "forty times two".

[@Kathkere]

What I don't get is why Danes don't just adopt the same counting system we have in Sweden and Norway. I spoke with two university professors in Japan; one from Sweden and one from Denmark. I asked them if they spoke their native languages when speaking to one another, and they did, but the Danish professor said that when they were using numbers they used Swedish because it's so much simpler. Now, the Danish counting system is really cool and all, but it should belong in a history book.

[@clauspatzer9705]

Not sure when they tried, but efforts were made to reform the Danish counting system into a 10-based one. The habit just never caught on for people. So officially, saying femtién for 51 is a recognised form, but it's not one that Danes will use, when speaking with one another.

[@Kathkere]

@@clauspatzer9705 Thanks for sharing, I had no idea. I guess it's hard to change people's habits. Like with the metric system in America. Still, might change in a later generation!

[@xolang]

I wonder if there's any other language where the counting system is as complicated as Danish 🤔 in my language we even often drop the "-ty" from 20, 30, 40, 50, 60, 70.. so instead of ”sixty five", we'd simply say "six five" in the spoken language.

[@ioriyagamy4777]

Which language do u speak?

[@martinpetersen1974]

It is really good.

[@jatojo]

This is cool.

[@reineh3477]

So the small number before the big but how do a Dane say 3486? Or 76,55

[@helsingborgska]

varför tar man bakvänt i danmark o tyskland....?

[@Gumardee_coins_and_banknotes]

Oh dam. Iam sticking with Cantonese. Simpler.

[@viktoriahegelund953]

WHEN HE SAID THE THING WITH THE FRENCH 50... I DO THE SAME THING

[@zzzut]

I thought I understood Danish numbers. Not anymore.

[@chpoptart]

This is insanity!

[@scipioafricanus5871]

Luckily there is method in the madness.

[@vkt2805]

She's into you, dude

[@rickli84]

well, searching for cake recipes took me here. I speak Mandarin, Japanese and English, maybe I can teach someone how to count to 100 in Mandarin and Japanese with 1% of the effort, LOL

[@HPMICHAEL]

What is the Danish office?

[@megadismayed]

She is a looker...how do I sat that in Danish??? love from Sri Lanka

[@mangojuuls]

*Misses 100*

[@walht1847]

My name is not Sven! It's Marrrtin 😀😂

[@jessehendry2816]

Hello

[@kallefrancr]

I didn’t know that in Denmark they count in Chinese

[@runawayblackheart75]

Yay! :D

[@plerpplerp5599]

Danish sounds like Swedish after a stroke. 🤭

[@HPMICHAEL]

Jeg ved også hvorfor det hedder halvtreds, tres, halvfjerds, firs og så videre.

[@anjajacobsen9739]

I Danmark kalder vi også 90: Gamle Ole.

[@johanfagerstromjarlenfors]

Man räknar ju tjog från och med 50.. 50 är tre tjog med det sista är halvt... därav halvtreds osv...

[@reineh3477]

Det blir snurrigt om man ska räkna ägg eller nått men helt självklart när man pratar om tid. Halv tre = 2:30 Jag såg en annan video som förklarade att de räknar i 20-tal (tjog), konstigt att den danska tjejen inte kunde förklara det

[@warysoaprider733]

7:16 syv og fis

[@flemishblue]

Interesting, I didn't know! I'm learning Swedish and so I thought all Scandinavian languages were counting as in English: twenty-one, twenty-two... But actually it's the same system in Danish as in German and Dutch. énogtyve - einundzwanzig - eenentwintig ('one-and-twenty'). Thx!

[@vkt2805]

in czech they also count it like danish, one-twenty, two-twenty. It's all german influence

[@wereldvanriley7]

Actually in Norwegian they used to count the same way you would do in German and Dutch, but that form accounting is very old-fashioned nowadays so Norwegians don’t do that anymore

[@johanvajse8410]

But what is 100?

[@TheSwedishLad]

Would totally have made sense to include that, ha ha. It's "et hundrede" = one hundred so quite close to English.

[@johanvajse8410]

Tak!

[@dabeschnder1810]

puedes contar del 1 al 20 en español y portugues ? it could be achallenging for you xD

[@aleksejsusakovs5302]

Числительные после включая 50..кажется долбанутыми...но они взяты из французской логики и непривычны обычной сотневой логики....короче я их не понимаю ...цыфры легче написать на бумаге или говорить по английско-немецки

[@themorethemerrier281]

They have serious vibes going on. Cute!

[@treksta2009]

I'm definitely learning..........hmmm man o_O

[@geographydragon3016]

#potatoelanguage

[@thestreamer1481]

Black Car.. Hhhhhh

[@jonasbrown1]

this is so awkward

[@esunisen3862]

I'm quite sure the danish number system was invented by a British.

[@NaNook490]

Should be "How to count to 99" :P What's 100?

[@TheSwedishLad]

ha ha, oops

[@NaNook490]

@@TheSwedishLad I really enjoyed learning how to count to 99 though! :D

[@SimonLarsson]

But ... you never got to 100 D:

[@xingmieh1709]

i guess she loves him

[@Jacob-lb2pp]

Men du glömde 100

[@kylejohnson6924]

Came here for halvtreds.