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7.9 Numerals<br />
(41) dajd<br />
d-a-jd<br />
gulijd<br />
guli-jd<br />
giesijmä<br />
giesi-jmä<br />
tjielkajn<br />
tjielka-jn<br />
dik<br />
dik<br />
dem-dist-acc.pl fish-acc.pl pull-1pl.pst sled-com.sg to.here<br />
‘We pulled those fish here with a sled.’ [pit0906_Ahkajavvre_a.043]<br />
(42) men dut<br />
men d-u-t<br />
biehtse,<br />
biehtse<br />
men ånekatj<br />
men åneka-tj<br />
ja<br />
ja<br />
gassak<br />
gassa-k<br />
but dem-rmt-nom.sg pine\nom.sg but short-dim and thick-nmlz<br />
‘But that pine tree over there, how short and thick!’ [pit090519.284]<br />
7.9 Numerals<br />
Numerals in <strong>Pite</strong> <strong>Saami</strong> form a closed class and a distinct closed sub-class <strong>of</strong> adjectives.<br />
Syntactically, they are adjectives because they head an adjectival phrase;<br />
however, morphologically, they differ from other adjectives by never inflecting<br />
(neither for number in predicative APs, nor for case and number in ellipsis constructions).<br />
Furthermore, numerals do not consist <strong>of</strong> attributive/predicative sets<br />
differing in form. Instead, numerals are consistent in form, regardless <strong>of</strong> being<br />
in attributive or predicative position.<br />
<strong>Pite</strong> <strong>Saami</strong> numerals form a decimal system consisting <strong>of</strong> the basic numerals<br />
for the numbers one through ten, hundred and thousand. All other numerals<br />
are compounds based on these basic terms, with the exception <strong>of</strong> nolla ‘zero’.<br />
Basic and complex numerals are dealt with in §7.9.1 and §7.9.2, respectively; the<br />
derivation <strong>of</strong> ordinal numerals is described in §7.9.1.1.<br />
7.9.1 Basic numerals<br />
The basic numerals for the numbers one through ten in <strong>Pite</strong> <strong>Saami</strong> are reconstructable<br />
native <strong>Saami</strong>c numerals, and tjuohte ‘hundred’ is at least from Proto-<br />
<strong>Saami</strong>. 10 The numerals nolla ‘zero’ and tuvsan ‘thousand’ are likely more recent<br />
borrowings, although it is not entirely clear whether they are from North Germanic<br />
or Finnic. 11 These basic cardinal numerals are listed on the left side <strong>of</strong><br />
Table 7.7 on the following page.<br />
10 Sammallahti (1998: 234–235) indicates that tjuohte ‘hundred’ was originally a borrowing from<br />
Proto-Indo-European into Proto-Finno-Ugric or Proto-Finno-<strong>Saami</strong>c.<br />
11 The entries for the numerals ‘zero’ and ‘thousand’ in Álgu (2006) only provide etymologies for<br />
North <strong>Saami</strong> and Inari <strong>Saami</strong>; however, while Finnic is clearly a contact language for these two<br />
languages, North Germanic is a contact language for <strong>Pite</strong> <strong>Saami</strong>, and therefore also a potential<br />
source for these two numerals; cf. Swedish nolla ‘zero’ and tusen ‘thousand’.<br />
143
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