When writing numbers why is Forty the accepted way to write this number

Why is it not written as fourty?
Who makes these rules?

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We live and at a Live concert also pronounced different but spelt the same

  • flower / flour: The bright petals of a plant versus a powder used for baking.
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A door Jamb pronounced ā€˜Jorm’ what’s that all about then… :thinking:

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I’ve always wondered that … as nine is ninety … not ninty.

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Hang on.
The number 40 is pronounced as for-tay. It is not pronounced four-tay.
The number 50 is pronounced fiff-tay and not five-tay
The number 90 is pronounced nine-tay, and not non-tay.
The spelling is very consistent with the way we say the numbers.
The bigger question is why not twoty and threetay?

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Twoty and threetay … you’re right there.

On the other hand at least we’re not like the French.
To say 90 … they say quatre vingt dix which is actually
4 x 20 + 10.

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At the dinner table one evening, my mother, who had been working on the checking account balance earlier in the day, asked my dad why he had written the church a donation for the very odd amount of $39. He just shrugged and went on about his eating.

The conversation went on for some minutes, and all of a sudden, the brilliant jet pilot dad of mine asked my mom, ā€œHow do you spell 40?ā€ There were a few seconds of silence, followed by everyone bursting out in laughter. :rofl:

It remains one of my favorite family stories

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And it’s a good one. It made me smile.

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The same people who decided it was four instead of for, and then said it’d be best is one wrote fourth instead of forth.

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It’s not an organisation or ruler who makes spelling rules but the people who started dropping the u in forty back in the 16th cent… After a long time it then became the accepted spelling. That’s the way it mostly works: codification follows usage.

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Why twelve and not twoteen?

I think I’ll start calling it that and see what happens. :exploding_head:

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They say you get paid bimonthly! Is that twice a month or every two months. Just like biweekly. Twice a week or every two weeks.

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Does life begin at Forty or Fourty or thoughty?

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Perhaps it’d be easier in Greek:

  • 4 – Ļ„Ī­ĻƒĻƒĪµĻĪ± – tessera

  • 14 – Ī“ĪµĪŗĪ±Ļ„Ī­ĻƒĻƒĪµĻĪ± (dekatĆ©sera)

  • 40 – ĻƒĪ±ĻĪ¬Ī½Ļ„Ī± (sarĆ”nda)

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Huh … now you’re showing off :pig:

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If you’ve got it, flaunt it.

I have no shame in showing off my skills of using Google :grimacing::grimacing:

Having said that, the Romans had the same sort of issues…

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But I don’t want no more math schoolin’ :exploding_head:!!!

(Interesting though!)

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You are the first person have ever known who also finds this maddening :+1:. I have no idea what it means and have to stop whatever I’m doing to focus my pea-sized brain on the context.

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These numbers are such a pain. When people reel of numbers, prices or phone numbers, my brain hears quatre … and thinks got it, four. Then they add vingt, Ok me thinks four twenty … wait no, it is eighty. Then they continue dix. Four, twenty, ten - this is a strange price. Then they finally finish with sept. My brain is fried and all they have done is say 97. Then they go for the next number pair in the phone number. Soixante, ok, me thinks, sixty. But they add quinze. Right that is sixty fifteen. That is surely four numbers of their phone number. Nope, that is 75.
I have also suspected that the phone company allocates english speakers with phone numbers full of such things - our house number ends 86 98. It is evil. But then again about half of the french language is full of evil things to catch out non-native speakers.

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That suggests you’ve had some already :grimacing::grimacing::crazy_face:

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