Khmer numerals are the
numerals
A numeral is a figure, symbol, or group of figures or symbols denoting a number. It may refer to:
* Numeral system used in mathematics
* Numeral (linguistics), a part of speech denoting numbers (e.g. ''one'' and ''first'' in English)
* Numerical d ...
used in the
Khmer language. They have been in use since at least the early 7th century, with the earliest known use being on a
stele dated to AD 604 found in
Prasat Bayang, near
Angkor Borei
Angkor Borei ( km, អង្គរបូរី, ) is a district located in Takéo Province, in southern Cambodia. According to the 1998 census of Cambodia, it had a population of 44,980.
Administration
The district has 6 communes, 34 villages ( ...
,
Cambodia
Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailan ...
.
Numerals
Having been derived from the
Hindu numerals
Hindus (; ) are people who religiously adhere to Hinduism. Jeffery D. Long (2007), A Vision for Hinduism, IB Tauris, , pages 35–37 Historically, the term has also been used as a geographical, cultural, and later religious identifier for ...
, modern Khmer numerals also represent a
decimal positional notation system. It is the script with the first extant material evidence of
zero as a numerical figure, dating its use back to the seventh century, two centuries before its certain use in
India
India, officially the Republic of India (Hindi: ), is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by area, the second-most populous country, and the most populous democracy in the world. Bounded by the Indian Ocean on the so ...
.
Old Khmer
Old Khmer is the oldest attested stage of the Khmer language, an Austroasiatic language historically and presently spoken across Cambodia, Southern Vietnam, and parts of Thailand and Laos. It is recorded in inscriptions dating from the early 7th ...
, or Angkorian Khmer, also possessed separate symbols for the numbers 10, 20, and 100.
Each multiple of 20 or 100 would require an additional stroke over the character, so the number 47 was constructed using the 20 symbol with an additional upper stroke, followed by the symbol for number 7.
This inconsistency with its
decimal system suggests that spoken
Angkorian Khmer used a
vigesimal system.
As both
Thai and
Lao scripts are derived from Old Khmer, their modern forms still bear many resemblances to the latter, demonstrated in the following table:
Modern Khmer numbers
The spoken names of modern Khmer numbers represent a
biquinary
Bi-quinary coded decimal is a numeral encoding scheme used in many abacuses and in some early computers, including the Colossus. The term ''bi-quinary'' indicates that the code comprises both a two-state (''bi'') and a five-state (''quin''ary) ...
system, with both
base 5
Quinary (base-5 or pental) is a numeral system with five as the base. A possible origination of a quinary system is that there are five digits on either hand.
In the quinary place system, five numerals, from 0 to 4, are used to represent any ...
and
base 10
The decimal numeral system (also called the base-ten positional numeral system and denary or decanary) is the standard system for denoting integer and non-integer numbers. It is the extension to non-integer numbers of the Hindu–Arabic numer ...
in use. For example, 6 () is formed from 5 () plus 1 ().
Numbers from 0 to 5
With the exception of the number 0, which stems from Sanskrit, the etymology of the Khmer numbers from 1 to 5 is of
proto-Austroasiatic
Proto-Austroasiatic is the reconstructed ancestor of the Austroasiatic languages. Proto-Mon–Khmer (i.e., all Austroasiatic branches except for Munda) has been reconstructed in Harry L. Shorto's ''Mon–Khmer Comparative Dictionary'', while a ...
origin.
* For details of the various alternative romanization systems, see
Romanization of Khmer
The romanization of Khmer is a representation of the Khmer (Cambodian) language using letters of the Latin alphabet. This is most commonly done with Khmer proper nouns, such as names of people and geographical names, as in a gazetteer.
Romanizat ...
.
* Some authors may alternatively mark as the pronunciation for the word ''two'', and either or for the word ''three''.
* In neighbouring
Thailand
Thailand ( ), historically known as Siam () and officially the Kingdom of Thailand, is a country in Southeast Asia, located at the centre of the Indochinese Peninsula, spanning , with a population of almost 70 million. The country is b ...
the number three is thought to bring good luck. However, in
Cambodia
Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailan ...
, taking a picture with three people in it is considered bad luck, as it is believed that the person situated in the middle will die an early death.
Comparison to other Austroasiatic languages 1-5
Whilst Khmer and Vietnamese are very different languages, the numbers 1-5 both retain
proto-Austroasiatic
Proto-Austroasiatic is the reconstructed ancestor of the Austroasiatic languages. Proto-Mon–Khmer (i.e., all Austroasiatic branches except for Munda) has been reconstructed in Harry L. Shorto's ''Mon–Khmer Comparative Dictionary'', while a ...
origins.
Numbers from 6 to 20
The numbers from 6 to 9 may be constructed by adding any number between 1 and 4 to the base number 5 (), so that 7 is literally constructed as 5 plus 2. Beyond that, Khmer uses a decimal base, so that 14 is constructed as 10 plus 4, rather than 2 times 5 plus 4; and 16 is constructed as 10+5+1.
Colloquially, compound numbers from eleven to nineteen may be formed using the word preceded by any number from one to nine, so that 15 is constructed as , instead of the standard .
* In constructions from 6 to 9 that use 5 as a base, may alternatively be pronounced ; giving , , , and . This is especially true in dialects which elide , but not necessarily restricted to them, as the pattern also follows Khmer's
minor syllable
Primarily in Austroasiatic languages (also known as Mon–Khmer), in a typical word a minor syllable is a reduced (minor) syllable followed by a full tonic or stressed syllable. The minor syllable may be of the form or , with a reduced vowel, as i ...
pattern.
Numbers from 30 to 90
The modern Khmer numbers from 30 to 90 are as follows:
* The word , which appears in each of these numbers, can be dropped in informal or colloquial speech. For example, the number 81 can be expressed as instead of the full .
Historically speaking, Khmer borrowed the numbers from 30 to 90 from a southern
Middle Chinese
Middle Chinese (formerly known as Ancient Chinese) or the Qieyun system (QYS) is the historical variety of Chinese recorded in the '' Qieyun'', a rime dictionary first published in 601 and followed by several revised and expanded editions. The ...
variety by way of a neighboring
Tai language
The Tai or Zhuang–Tai languages ( th, ภาษาไท or , transliteration: or ) are a branch of the Kra–Dai language family. The Tai languages include the most widely spoken of the Tai–Kadai languages, including Standard Thai or S ...
, most likely
Thai.
This is evidenced by the fact that the numbers in Khmer most closely resemble those of Thai, as well as the fact that the numbers cannot be deconstructed in Khmer. For instance, is not used on its own to mean "four" in Khmer and is not used on its own to mean "ten", while they are in Thai (see
Thai numerals
Thai numerals ( th, เลขไทย, , ) are a set of numerals traditionally used in Thailand, although the Arabic numerals are more common due to extensive westernization of Thailand in the modern Rattanakosin period. Thai numerals follow th ...
). The table below shows how the words in Khmer compare to other nearby Tai and Sinitic languages.
* Words in parenthesis indicate literary pronunciations, while words preceded by an asterisk only occur in specific constructions and are not used for basic numbers from 3 to 10.
Prior to using a decimal system and adopting these words, Khmer used a
base 20
vigesimal () or base-20 (base-score) numeral system is based on twenty (in the same way in which the decimal numeral system is based on ten). ''Vigesimal'' is derived from the Latin adjective '' vicesimus'', meaning 'twentieth'.
Places
In ...
system, so that numbers greater than 20 were formed by multiplying or adding on to the
cardinal number
In mathematics, cardinal numbers, or cardinals for short, are a generalization of the natural numbers used to measure the cardinality (size) of sets. The cardinality of a finite set is a natural number: the number of elements in the set. T ...
for twenty. Under this system, 30 would've been constructed as ''(20 × 1) + 10'' "twenty-one ten" and 80 was constructed as ''4 × 20'' "four twenties / four
scores". See the section
Angkorian numbers for details.
Numbers from 100 to 10,000,000
The standard Khmer numbers starting from one hundred are as follows:
Although is most commonly used to mean ten million, in some areas this is also colloquially used to refer to one billion (which is more properly ). In order to avoid confusion, sometimes is used to mean ten million, along with for one hundred million, and ("one thousand million") to mean one billion.
Different Cambodian dialects may also employ different base number constructions to form greater numbers above one thousand. A few of the such can be observed in the following table:
Counting fruits
Reminiscent of the standard
base 20
vigesimal () or base-20 (base-score) numeral system is based on twenty (in the same way in which the decimal numeral system is based on ten). ''Vigesimal'' is derived from the Latin adjective '' vicesimus'', meaning 'twentieth'.
Places
In ...
Angkorian Khmer numbers, the modern Khmer language also possesses separate words used to count fruits, not unlike how English uses words such as a "
dozen
A dozen (commonly abbreviated doz or dz) is a grouping of twelve.
The dozen may be one of the earliest primitive integer groupings, perhaps because there are approximately a dozen cycles of the Moon, or months, in a cycle of the Sun, or year ...
" for counting items such as eggs.
Sanskrit and Pali influence
As a result of prolonged literary influence from both the
Sanskrit
Sanskrit (; attributively , ; nominally , , ) is a classical language belonging to the Indo-Aryan branch of the Indo-European languages. It arose in South Asia after its predecessor languages had diffused there from the northwest in the late ...
and
Pali
Pali () is a Middle Indo-Aryan liturgical language native to the Indian subcontinent. It is widely studied because it is the language of the Buddhist ''Pāli Canon'' or '' Tipiṭaka'' as well as the sacred language of '' Theravāda'' Buddh ...
languages, Khmer may occasionally use borrowed words for counting. Generally speaking, asides a few exceptions such as the numbers for 0 and 100 for which the Khmer language has no equivalent, they are more often restricted to literary, religious, and historical texts than they are used in day to day conversations. One reason for the decline of these numbers is that a Khmer nationalism movement, which emerged in the 1960s, attempted to remove all words of Sanskrit and Pali origin. The
Khmer Rouge also attempted to cleanse the language by removing all words which were considered politically incorrect.
Ordinal numbers
Khmer ordinal numbers are formed by placing the word in front of a
cardinal number
In mathematics, cardinal numbers, or cardinals for short, are a generalization of the natural numbers used to measure the cardinality (size) of sets. The cardinality of a finite set is a natural number: the number of elements in the set. T ...
.
This is similar to the use of ที่ ''thi'' in Thai, and ''thứ'' (from Chinese
第) in Vietnamese.
Angkorian numbers
It is generally assumed that the
Angkor
Angkor ( km, អង្គរ , 'Capital city'), also known as Yasodharapura ( km, យសោធរបុរៈ; sa, यशोधरपुर),Headly, Robert K.; Chhor, Kylin; Lim, Lam Kheng; Kheang, Lim Hak; Chun, Chen. 1977. ''Cambodian-Engl ...
ian and pre-Angkorian numbers also represented a
dual base (quinquavigesimal) system, with both
base 5
Quinary (base-5 or pental) is a numeral system with five as the base. A possible origination of a quinary system is that there are five digits on either hand.
In the quinary place system, five numerals, from 0 to 4, are used to represent any ...
and
base 20
vigesimal () or base-20 (base-score) numeral system is based on twenty (in the same way in which the decimal numeral system is based on ten). ''Vigesimal'' is derived from the Latin adjective '' vicesimus'', meaning 'twentieth'.
Places
In ...
in use. Unlike modern Khmer, the
decimal system was highly limited, with both the numbers for ''ten'' and ''one hundred'' being borrowed from the Chinese and Sanskrit languages respectively. Angkorian Khmer also used
Sanskrit numbers for recording dates, sometimes mixing them with Khmer originals, a practice which has persisted until the last century.
The numbers for twenty, forty, and four hundred may be followed by multiplying numbers, with additional digits added on at the end, so that 27 is constructed as twenty-one-seven, or 20×1+7.
Proto-Khmer numbers
Proto-Khmer is the hypothetical ancestor of the modern Khmer language bearing various reflexes of the proposed
proto-Mon–Khmer language. By comparing both modern Khmer and Angkorian Khmer numbers to those of other Eastern Mon–Khmer (or Khmero-Vietic) languages such as
Pearic, Proto-Viet–Muong,
Katuic, and
Bahnaric; it is possible to establish the following reconstructions for Proto-Khmer.
Numbers from 5 to 10
Contrary to later forms of the Khmer numbers, Proto-Khmer possessed a single decimal number system. The numbers from one to five correspond to both the modern Khmer language and the proposed Mon–Khmer language, while the numbers from six to nine do not possess any modern remnants, with the number ten *kraaj (or *kraay) corresponding to the modern number for one hundred. It is likely that the initial *k, found in the numbers from six to ten, is a prefix.
References
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Khmer Numerals
Numerals
A numeral is a figure, symbol, or group of figures or symbols denoting a number. It may refer to:
* Numeral system used in mathematics
* Numeral (linguistics), a part of speech denoting numbers (e.g. ''one'' and ''first'' in English)
* Numerical d ...
Numerals