The numeral

§ 130. The numeral as a part of speech is characterized by

1. its lexico-grammatical meaning of 'number',

2. the category of numerical qualification represented in opposemes like seven — seventh, nine — ninth,

3. its unilateral combinability with nouns (three children, the third child),

4. such typical stem-building suffixes as -teen, -ty,

5. its functioning as an attribute, less frequently as some other part of the sentence.

§ 131. The lexico-grammatical meaning of 'number' is not to be confused with the grammatical meaning of 'num­ber'.

1. The former is the generalization of a multitude of lexi­ cal meanings of individual numerals (five, ten, fifty-seven, etc.). The latter is the generalization of only two grammati­ cal meanings: "singular" and "plural".

2. The plural number, as in boys, shows indefinite plural­ ity, whereas the meanings of numerals, as in twenty, forty are definite plurality.

3. Like any grammatical meaning the "plural" of nouns is relative, dependent and indirect (§ 10). The lexical "plural" of a numeral like eight is not relative, being as much corre­ lated with the "singular" of one as with the "plural" of seven, or nine, or eighty. The "plural" of eight is independent inas- njuch as it is the lexical meaning of an independent word. Its reflection of reality is direct as that of any lexical mean­ ing

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¹ Грамматика русскою языка АН СССР, ч 1, М.— Л , 1953.

§ 132. Numerals are usually divided into two groups — cardinal numerals (one, five, twenty) and ordinal numerals (first fifth, twentieth). The former denote some numerical quantity, the latter — some numerical order.

The difference between these groups is sometimes exag­gerated to such an extent that they are treated as belonging to different parts of speech. For instance, A. I. Smirnitsky is of the opinion that only cardinal numerals form a separate part of speech, whereas ordinal numerals are adjectives ¹.

Language facts do not support such views.

1 Each cardinal numeral has a corresponding ordinal one. Cf. seven — seienth, thirty — thirtieth, eighty-four — eighty-fourth, etc.

2. Both cardinals and ordinals qualify substances quan­ titatively, as distinct from adjectives whose qualification is qualitative.

3. Cardinals often denote numerical order like ordinals. Cf. lesson fice = Иге fifth lesson.

4. Only numerals have the suffix -th. Nouns denoting number (gross score, etc.) cannot be associated with it. Formations of the type *grossth, *scoieth are impossible.

5. If -th were regarded as a stem-building suffix, it would be the only suffjx of this kind in the English language em­ bracing all the words of a part of speech (in our case — numer­ als) minus three (one, two, three).

6. The relation between ten and tenth resembles the rela­ tion between boy and boy's. As words of the boy's type are mostly used in the function of attributes, they might also be declared adjectives.

§ 133. In our opinion, the pair ten — tenth forms an oppo-seme of the grammatical category of numerical qualification.

The lexical meaning of the two words expressed by the lexical morpheme ten- is the same. They are opposed only grammatically by the opposition of the zero morpheme in ten and the -th morpheme in tenth. This opposition is as regular as that of the zero morpheme of the singular and the -(e)s morpheme of the-plural. Even more so, in fact, because there are fewer exceptions. The meaning of the zero morpheme is that of 'numerical quantity' and the meaning of the morp­heme -th is that of 'numerical order'. Like every grammatical

¹ Op. cit., p. 163.

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meaning the meaning of "numerical order" is relative (always correlated with the meaning of 'numerical quantity') and dependent on the lexical meaning of the word, i e. the suffix -th does not express "numerical order" in general, but the order of the number named by the lexical part of the word.

In the opposemes one — first, two — second, three — third the meaning of numerical qualification is expressed by means of suppletivity and sound interchange.

The words /mlf, quarter, zero, nought, gross, score, etc. which have no ordinal opposites, but possess plural opposites are nouns, not numerals.

§ 134. The combmability of numerals is rather limited. As a rule, they form combinations with nouns Numerals usually precede the nouns they modify, but when a cardinal denotes numerical order it follows the noun. Numerals are, naturally, associated with countable nouns. In cases like the first love, the first snow instances of the phenomena are meant. The definite article in combinations like the second dance is easily accounted for, as the numeral singles out the object or event by indicating its position in a series.

Numerals are, as a rule, not modified by other words. This negative combinability is also a characteristic feature of the part of speech.