Is "twenty hundred" normal English?
Jens Brix Christiansen
In order to shed some light on Swedish usage, namely what to call the
year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
without documentation.
Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
A feeble but inconclusive attempt at documentation follows:
An AltaVista search of the Web yielded 149 occurrences of "twenty
hundred" and more than 40000 occurrences of "two thousand". A not so
random sample of the context of three of the occurences of "twenty
hundred" yielded two cases of military jargon for "8 PM" and one
occurrence in Shakespeare: 'Romeo and Juliet', act 4.
Larry Krakauer
Here's one data point from a native English speaker in the US:
"Twenty hundred" is *not* used, except in the context of 24-hour time.
As I think about it, in idiomatic English we can say "X hundred"
for any X between 1 and 99 inclusive, *except* 10, 20, 30, 40,
50, 60, 70, 80, and 90.
So we can say "nineteen hundred" and "twenty-one hundred", but
*not* "twenty hundred".
Don't ask me why; this is English we're talking about. It's
possible that the advent of the year 2000 ("the year two
thousand") will produce some changes in these idioms.
If it stays as-is, we won't be able to refer to the "twenty
hundreds" the way we now refer to the "nineteen hundreds".
If we use "the twenty-first century", we run afoul of those
who object that the 21st century doesn't actually start until
January 1, 2001.
In the only exception I can think of: 24-hour time is not often
used by the general public, even on railroad timetables, in the US.
The military uses it, and would read "09:00" as "oh-nine hundred".
Following this model, "20:00" becomes "twenty hundred".
I haven't looked up the Shakespeare, but I imagine that the usage
is poetic.
--
Larry Krakauer (lar...@kronos.com)
Robert Lipton
In article <344617...@dksin.dk>, Jens Brix Christiansen wrote:
>In order to shed some light on Swedish usage, namely what to call the
>year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
>discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
>influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
>
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
>
Regardless of Alta Vista checks, while 'twenty-three hundred' is correct
(I use it on checks, when occasion arises), 'two thousand three hundred'
is also correct.
However, if you are talking about even tens of hundreds, using "thousand"
sounds more natural. Thus: "twenty-three hundred," but "between two and
three thousand."
Bob
Charles A. Lee
On Thu, 16 Oct 1997 16:33:44 +0200, Jens Brix Christiansen
<j...@dksin.dk> wrote:
>... A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
>
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
>
In U.S. English, it is quite common to refer to street addresses as
belonging to or being found in the "xx hundred block", where the xx
can be any number that precedes the last two digits of the address.
If my address were 9925 Montana Drive, you would look for my house in
the ninety-nine hundred block of Montana Drive. It's not unusual to
hear this for addresses even when they exceed 10,000. "The
ten-five-hundred block (10500)". One would never say, "the one
hundred five hundred block."
Informally, the same convention is used for non-address numbers,
although the numbers are nearly always roundings and rarely exceed ten
thousand: years ("in the sixteen hundreds"), quantities ("about
fifteen hundred dollars", "forty-five hundred dozen eggs"). But "a
hundred and one centuries (never a hundred and one hundred years)" and
"twelve thousand miles" (never "a hundred and twenty hundred miles)."
Your specific example of twenty-hundred dollars is an exception, and
follows Rule of Eternal Shortening (which I just entitled). Most
writers (and especially speakers) simplify and shorten whenever
possible. So twenty hundred would always be referred to as two
thousand since the mental image of the simpler number (two) takes
precedence. A larger single-term number could not be simplified so:
thirteen hundred miles.
Charles A. Lee
http://www.concentric.net/~azcal
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
+"A fatal freeway pileup of random metaphors... +
+ ...a grisly shooting spree of meaningless analogies." +
+ +
+ - Mark Steyn's editorial, "Bite the Bullet, Marv" +
+ Wall Street Journal. p A18. 10-9-97. +
+ describing a book by Sarah, Duchess of York. +
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Geoff Butler
>year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
>discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
>
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
"Nineteen hundred" yes, "twenty-one hundred" yes, but "twenty hundred"
does not strike me as idiomatic English. On the other hand, that's what
I expect to call the year, once it arrives.
-ler
Mark Barton
On Thu, 16 Oct 1997 7:33, Jens Brix Christiansen <mailto:j...@dksin.dk>
>In order to shed some light on Swedish usage, namely what to call the
>year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
>discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
>influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
>
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
As a synonym for the number two thousand it's not absolutely impossible,
but it would be extremely rare. You would have to have some very strong
reason (much stronger than usual) for wanting to emphasise the analogy with
other "hundred" phrases. Otherwise the sequence would go quite naturally,
"..., eighteen hundred, nineteen hundred, two thousand, twenty-one hundred,
twenty two hundred...". My guess is that come the millenium you will see
forms such as "twenty-oh-one" and "two thousand and one" but not "twenty
hundred and one". (That's for the UK/Australia - perhaps the US will omit
one or both of the "and"s or do something else entirely.)
Cheers,
Mark B.
----------------
Please remove the spam filter from my address before replying.
David Nebenzahl
Jens Brix Christiansen wrote:
[...]
> Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
> contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
No, definitely not (at least in my experience in the U.S.).
"Two thousand" or "two grand" would be used instead.
Mike Barnes
In alt.usage.english, Jens Brix Christiansen <j...@dksin.dk> spake
thuswise:
>In order to shed some light on Swedish usage, namely what to call the
>year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
>discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
>influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
I use "twenty hundred" instead of "the year two thousand". But not many
other people do (yet).
--
-- Mike Barnes, Stockport, England.
-- If you post a response to Usenet, please *don't* send me a copy by e-mail.
Larry Phillips
>year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
>discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
>influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
'Twenty hundred' would only be used by someone specifying a time of
day (8 PM). It would usually be said; "Twenty hundred hours"
Jonathan Sachs
Note also that phrases like "nineteen hundred" are not used in formal
written English. In a personal letter this usage would be OK. In a
business letter, probably not. In a legal document, absolutely not. In
formal spoken English (e.g., for a radio announcer or a public
address) this rule does not seem to apply, or at least is much weaker.
- -
Jonathan Sachs
Sand River Software, Inc.
Jessica
> >year that will roll around in another 26 months or so, we have been
> >discussing whether the phrase "twenty hundred" in English could be
> >influencing Swedish. A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
> >claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
> >without documentation.
>
> other people do (yet).
Somehow, the phrase "twenty hundred" just sounds very wrong to my ears.
Having a phobia for numbers anyway ;) this phrase can sound somewhat
confusing. I personally would say the year two thousand. However, in
2001 I just might say twenty-oh-one.
Jessica
Ronald D. Cuthbertson
Larry Phillips wrote:
>
> Charles A. Lee writes:
>
> > In U.S. English, it is quite common to refer to street addresses as
> > belonging to or being found in the "xx hundred block",
>
> > ... even when they exceed 10,000. "The ten-five-hundred block
> > (10500)". One would never say, "the one hundred five hundred block."
>
> 'Ten-five-hundred' would get you strange looks, and absolutely no
> glimmer of communication would occur.
>
> I am still at a loss to explain how Intel microprocessors ever became
> known as 'eigthy-three-eighty-six', instead of
> 'eight-oh-four-eight-six'. The latter would be perfectly understandable
> to me, while the former, I would parse as '8386'
It probably started from the days of the 8086, 8087, and 8088 chips.
These were spoken as 'eighty, eighty-six' etc. Then came (briefly) the 80186,
the 80286, the 80386, the 80496, the '586', and the '686' chips.
In your question, the 'eigthy-three-eighty-six' usually had a slight pause
after, or emphasis on, "eighty" and would be spoken as 'eigthy, three-
eighty-six'. But I don't recall this lasting very long and it gave way
to simply 'three-eighty-six', etc.
The 8086/7/8 were aka the XT chips and the "286" was the AT chip.
Regards,
Ron
Stan Brown
In article <344617...@dksin.dk>, j...@dksin.dk (Jens Brix Christiansen)
wrote:
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
Suddenly I thought of the _Jeopardy!_ TV show, on which Alex Trebek often
says that someone has "two and a half thousand" dollars rather than
"twenty-five hundred" dollars.
Does "two and a half thousand" sound quite odd to others? Is it perhaps a
Canadianism?
--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Cleveland, Ohio, USA
http://www.concentric.net/%7eBrownsta/
"Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go fill my freezer with
my own blood." -- Seinfeld
Lauri W.
>I am still at a loss to explain how Intel microprocessors ever became
>known as 'eigthy-three-eighty-six', instead of
>'eight-oh-four-eight-six'. The latter would be perfectly understandable
>to me, while the former, I would parse as '8386'
Well, in (at least) NZ, Australia, and most of Europe, they are
'eight-oh-four-eight-six', and the 'four-eighty-six' from a Statesian
born techy always has and probably always will take a few extra
seconds for me to understand.
On the original subject of this thread, a quick phone around of the 12
or so Swedish people I know (and who were at home on a sunny autumn
afternoon) got a unanimous result: "Well, twenty hundred in Swedish
sounds fine, but in English it sounds silly..."
Admittedly none of these people are in Sweden, and none had heard of
the theory the original poster was speaking of. And yes, I know it's
a very unscientific sample, just thought it was interesting.
Lauri
=============================
A kiwi lost in Europe
Make a stand on Usenet Spam: Join Cauce (www.cauce.org)
=============================
Larry Phillips
Stan Brown wrote:
> I'm writing from Cleveland, in the north central U.S. "Twenty hundred"
> sounds wrong to me in all contexts that I can think of, except
> possibly for the year.
Even 'twenty-hundred hours' as in military time? It is THE way it is
said in the military.
> Someone posted about addresses. I would say "Two thousand Prospect
> Avenue" and not "Twenty hundred Prospect Avenue".
But the usage mentioned was not a specific address, as it would be
in your example, but rather the block, as in 'the twenty-hundred block'.
Larry Phillips
Peter Moylan wrote:
> The first member of this processor family was the 8086, pronounced
> "eighty eighty-six". We'd have called it the "eight oh eighty-six"
> if Intel had had the decency to warn us that they were going to
> produce a successor called the 80186.
Actually, the 8080 preceded it, and before that came the 8008 and 4004.
They were knownm as the 'four-oh-oh-four', 'four-thousand-and-four'
'eight-oh-oh-eight', 'eight-thousand-and-eight', and the
'eighty-eighty', all of which were unambiguous.
Peter Moylan
Larry Phillips <lar...@bc.rogers.wave.ca> wrote:
>I am still at a loss to explain how Intel microprocessors ever became
>known as 'eigthy-three-eighty-six', instead of
>'eight-oh-four-eight-six'. The latter would be perfectly understandable
>to me, while the former, I would parse as '8386'
The first member of this processor family was the 8086, pronounced
"eighty eighty-six". We'd have called it the "eight oh eighty-six"
if Intel had had the decency to warn us that they were going to produce a
successor called the 80186.
--
Peter Moylan pe...@ee.newcastle.edu.au
http://www.ee.newcastle.edu.au/users/staff/peter/Moylan.html
Ronald D. Cuthbertson
Larry Phillips wrote:
>
> Ronald D. Cuthbertson wrote:
>
> > It probably started from the days of the 8086, 8087, and 8088 chips.
>
>
> > In your question, the 'eigthy-three-eighty-six' usually had a slight
> > pause after, or emphasis on, "eighty" and would be spoken as 'eigthy,
> > gave way to simply 'three-eighty-six', etc.
>
> with Intel chips until recently, so I may not have heard it often
> enough to notice. On the other hand, I am constantly hearing people
> speaking with no pauses, or inappropriate pauses, in other contexts.
I became familar with it before the first IBM PC hit the market.
Before it, there was the Z-80 chip, by Zilog (sp?). I never did
ask why Intel had the 80xx line, I just assumed that it was a
takeoff of the Z-80 nomenclature.
Regards,
Ron
Lennart Regebro
Jens Brix Christiansen <j...@dksin.dk> wrote:
>In order to shed some light on Swedish usage, namely what to call the
>year
Just for the record:
The above is incorrect. The discussion is what to call the period
2000-2099, not the year 2000.
Since this is a period of hundred years. Som people want to call it 'the
twenty-hundreds. Some people want to call it 'the two-thousands' for
reasons beyond me.
Most people agree that you can call the year 2000 what you want.
"Twothousand" and "twenty-hundred" means exactly the same thing, anyway you
look at it.
--
Lennart Regebro, Svensk Aktuell Elektronik AB
lennart...@stockholm.mail.telia.com
Andrew Virnuls
On Thu, 16 Oct 1997 16:33:44 +0200, Jens Brix Christiansen
<j...@dksin.dk> wrote:
>... A skirmish broke out today, where an undocumented
>claim that "twenty hundred" is normal English is being disputed, also
>without documentation.
>
>Hence this question: Would "twenty hundred dollars" strike the
>contributors to alt.usage.english as idiomatic English?
I don't think I've ever heard anyone say "twenty hundred", or any expression
of the form "n hundred", where n is greater than 19, except for fans of
British cars of the 60s and 70s, who refer to the Austin/Wolsley/Princess
2200 as "the twenty-two hundred".
--
A N D R E W vir...@argonet.co.uk Honey traps more flies than vinegar
http://www.argonet.co.uk/users/virnuls Fine words butter no parsnips
Markus Laker
brow...@concentric.net (Stan Brown):
> Does "two and a half thousand" sound quite odd to others? Is it perhaps a
> Canadianism?
It sounds perfectly okay to this Brit. It's a more approximate way of
saying 'two thousand, five hundred'. You could reasonably say if you'd
paid UKP2600 for something that it had cost two-and-a-half thousand
pounds. Someone with a practised eye might estimate that there were
two-and-a-half thousand people at a public gathering, but saying there
were two thousand, five hundred would be ridiculously precise.
Markus Laker.
--
My real address doesn't include a Christian name.
Emailed copies of responses are very much appreciated.
Peter Moylan
Ronald D. Cuthbertson <inm...@flash.net> wrote:
>I became familar with it before the first IBM PC hit the market.
>Before it, there was the Z-80 chip, by Zilog (sp?). I never did
>ask why Intel had the 80xx line, I just assumed that it was a
>takeoff of the Z-80 nomenclature.
Quite the opposite. The Z-80 was consciously a copy of
Intel's 8080A, with some modifications that made it
a little more powerful.
The 8080 was, in turn, an improved version of the 8008.
On the other hand, the "8086" label was a little silly,
because the 8086 had almost nothing in common with
the 8080. It was the beginning of a completely new
family of processors.
Gwen Lenker
Lennart Regebro <lennart...@stockholm.mail.telia.com> wrote in
article <345a6f78...@news.kth.se>...
the
> >year
>
> Just for the record:
>
> The above is incorrect. The discussion is what to call the period
> 2000-2099, not the year 2000.
Since Jens Brix Christiansen *began* this particular discussion with
the words you quoted, I don't think he ought to be faulted for failing
to anticipate the way the discussion would turn.
Lars Graadal
Hi Lennart!!
Just want to ask you this: Is your mother a prostitute???
If not, tell her that I want my money back!
Lars Graadal
Candy Brock
What about military time? The hours between 8 and 11:59 pm are twenty-something
hours.
Andrew Virnuls wrote:
> ...snip...
Stan Brown
In article <3452bcdb...@news.karoo.co.uk>, m...@mcgoff.karoo.co.uk
(Mike Ford) wrote:
>if it's written 2,000 then it's "two thousand" and if it's written
>2000 then it's "twenty hundred". Also, previous century years
>-- e.g. 1800, 1900 -- were "eighteen hundred", "nineteen
>hundred", so the next in the sequence is clearly "twenty
>hundred".
I've reasoned in a similar way.
But then I thought about the year 1000: "ten hundred"? I don't think so.
--
Stan Brown, Oak Road Systems, Cleveland, Ohio, USA
http://www.concentric.net/%7eBrownsta/
I have an almost immeasurable lack of interest in what you're saying.
--from _Over the Top_
Larry Krakauer
Christian R. Conrad wrote:
> Heh, heh.
> Guess what we've been arguing about for a while, over in our Swedish ng?
>
> How about the battle of Hastings then, in ten-hundred-and-sixty-six?
We say "Nineteen ninety seven" for the current year. We can also
say "Nineteen hundred ninety seven", which is more accurate, but
less common.
For 1066 we usually say "Ten sixty six". I have *never* heard
"Ten hundred sixty six", because "ten hundred" is just not used.
If you want to be accurate, say "One thousand sixty six".
> (I'm pro, some say that's deplored among historians.) And what do you
> call the _century_ between the nine-hundreds and the eleven-hundreds?
> The "thousands"? Isn't that a _millenium_, one that is still on-going?
What we *don't* call it is the "ten hundreds". We don't have a lot of
occasion to refer to it at all these some 900 years later, but if we
do, we are most apt to refer to the "eleventh century".
--
Larry Krakauer (lar...@kronos.com)
Stan Brown
[posted and emailed]
In article <34560b1d...@news.eunet.fi>,
christia...@hedengren.fi (Christian R. Conrad) wrote:
>On Tue, 28 Oct 1997 06:58:05 -0500,
>brow...@concentric.net (Stan Brown) said:
>
>> In article <3452bcdb...@news.karoo.co.uk>, m...@mcgoff.karoo.co.uk
>> (Mike Ford) wrote:
>> >if it's written 2,000 then it's "two thousand" and if it's written
>> >2000 then it's "twenty hundred". Also, previous century years
>> >-- e.g. 1800, 1900 -- were "eighteen hundred", "nineteen
>> >hundred", so the next in the sequence is clearly "twenty
>> >hundred".
>
>> I've reasoned in a similar way.
>> But then I thought about the year 1000: "ten hundred"? I don't think so.
>
>How about the battle of Hastings then, in ten-hundred-and-sixty-six?
In English, that date is "ten-sixty-six". Magna Carta was signed in
"twelve-fifteen", and the Wars of the Roses ended on Bosworth Field in
"fourteen-eighty-five".
In English, years are pronounced like addresses:
101 = one oh one
200 = two hundred
325 = three twenty-five
1900 = nineteen hundred
The problem arises with the ones that end in three zeroes, because "ten
hundred and twenty hundred" sound odd to many English speakers (but not
to all), yet "one thousand and two thousand" don't follow the customary
pattern.
Disclaimer: All the above is standard American. I'm not so sure about
standard British, but very likely it's the same. From "1066 and All
That": "In the year 1066 occurred the other memorable date in English
History, viz. WILLIAM THE CONQUEROR, TEN SIXTY-SIX."
(I believe that the book is written in U.K. English not only because of
its subject matter and the Briticisms(*) like "failed M.A., Oxon" but
because its last sentence is (note spacing and punctuation) "America was
thus clearly top nation, and History came to a ." As a child I couldn't
make sense of that -- "History came to a period"? Later I found out that
"." is a full stop in the U.K. So the joke makes sense only in U.K.
English, and therefore I believe that "ten sixty-six" is normal in the
U.K. as it is in the U.S.)
(*) I wrote "Britishisms", but my spell-checker flagged it and AHD3 calls
"Britishism" a variant of "Briticism".
Thomas Scharle
In article <MPG.ec1ab4ab...@news.concentric.net>, brow...@concentric.net (Stan Brown) writes:
...
|> In English, that date is "ten-sixty-six". Magna Carta was signed in
|> "twelve-fifteen", and the Wars of the Roses ended on Bosworth Field in
Except for the detail that the Magna Carta was not "signed".
--
Tom Scharle scha...@nd.edu "standard disclaimer"
Echo S
Alex Elliott wrote:
>
> I think it will be interesting to see what name the media comes up with
> for the decade that follows the nineties.
>
I heard "twenty twenty" on NPR last week.
Hugo Fernbom
Christian R. Conrad wrote:
>
> > I come to think of the old popular song that goes "In the year
> > twenty-five twenty-five...".
>
> Hmm. The Temptations? Or was that a cover of somebody else's work?
It was Danny Zager & Rick Evans in 1969.
I have GREAT cover of that song by Visage! A synthpop version from 1983!
--
Hugo Fernbom
Homepage: http://www.ludat.lth.se/~dat94hfe/
--
Peter Wright
In article <Pine.LNX.3.91.97102...@jasper.knox.net>,
Craig Butz <cbu...@knox.net> writes
>Perhaps if we think of dollars instead of years we will see a larger
>pattern. In my experience we count like this:
>
>1 hundred, 2 hundred, 3 hundred, 4 hundred, 5 hundred,
>6 hundred, 7 hundred, 8 hundred, 9 hundred, 1 thousand
>11hundred, 12hundred, 12hundred, 14hundred, 15hundred
>16hundred, 17hundred, 18hundred, 19hundred, 2 thousand
>...
>96hundred, 97hundred, 98hundred, 99hundred, 10thousand
>10thousand1hundred
Do you believe that some numbers are unlucky, then?
--
Peter Wright
Westwind Services
Edgmond, Shropshire E-mail: Pe...@westwind.demon.co.uk
Henry McGilton
Well, when I were a lad, we used to say
Twenty Hundredweight in a Ton
........ Henry