Hi, I did a few searches of the forums and can't find my answer anywhere. I was wondering how large numbers are said. For instance, in Spanish, or English, you can say 1900 like nine-teen-hundred or 3545 like thirty-five-fourty-five instead of three-thousand-five-hundred-fourty-five. Which way is more common?
As far as know Czechs use '-teen hundred' only for years and only up until 1999. Thus you'd say: Nineteen hundred eighty four - devadenáct set osmdesát čtyři but: two thousand five - dva tisíce pět three thousand five hundred fourty five - tři tisíce pět set čtyřicet pět There is nothing of 'twenty times four' (80) as in French in the Czech langauge, but you can say (just as in German) the smaller number first in two digit numbers: dvaadvacet - 'two and twenty', 22
So, you can say 22 either: dvacet dva or dvaadvacet Is that correct? Which is used more often? Another question - when counting, how do you say: jedna or jedno? dva or dvě ? Ahoj.
Both are correct, but dvacet dva ist more 'correct' or formal, dvaadvacet is mostly used in informal language. I suggest you stick to dvacet dva when you speak, but don't be surprised when Czechs use dvaadvacet. Whether you say jedna, jeden or jedno (and dva/dvě) of course depends on what you are referring to. It seems that if you're not sure what you're referring to (ie what gender) you'd use jedna.
Mravenče! I can't agree with you: "dvaadvacet" is absolutely as same correct as "dvacet dva". However, there may be a small difference in use: you should use "dvacet dva" if you dictate only numbers or if numbers aren't connected with people, animals, things... Otherwise it's more usual to use "dvaadvacet". :wink:
Sounds like a good rule for me to remember! withoutaim wrote a slightly different reply. Thank you both for your replies! Oh, I was referring to something like "this is how we count to ten: jedna, dvě????, tři, čtyři, pět, šest, sedm, osm, devět, deset"
I can only agree, withoutaim's explanation is more precise and correct. Although i'm not entirely sure i'd go for: nula, jedna, dvě, tři... (maybe withoutaim has an opinion on this)
Hm... The way I understand this, I should use dvacet dva if I am dictating a list of numbers and 22 is part of the list. But if I want to say 22 Kč I should say dvaadvacet korun, is that correct? Here is where I get confused. When I went to Prague, whenever I bought something at a store, the store clerk said either dvacet pět or dvacet pět korun but I never heard the inverted form.
That's my experience too. In my experience it's (pětadvacet) more common in everyday, relaxed colloquial speech. You'd use it for telling your age, or maybe to say 'The coffee cost me 35 crowns!'. Perhaps there is also degree of increased stress on the first digit (i'm 27 not 28). I'm on thin ice now though, and hopefully some native speaker could throw in a few real-life examples. I suspect when and how to use it varies with personal habits, dialects, etc Do a search in Google and you'll come up with quite a few hits, eg: Miláček Wall Streetu půjde na pětadvacet let do vězení. Třiadvacet dialogů o rakovině. Pod smlouvou v NHL je třiadvacet Čechů
I try to explain more clearly! However, You should know if you use a modality "dvacet dva", you can never make a mistake (although it wouldn't be a solecism, but only very very small stylistic mistake). Mostly it doesn't matter which modality you use. Some examples:
Dvaadvacet is anachronism. It simply is not regular, correct and formal - it just keeps it place in spoken language.
"Dvacet dva" is original czech (slavic) form. It is always correct. "Dvaadvacet" is germanism. It is usual in colloquial speech (it is easier to decline one word).
