Tuesday, May 12, 2020
Y no English prefixes?
Why did English never use its own abbreviations for numbers?
We stuck with roman numerals.
C for hundred is the most constant of all number terms.
Even in purely English measures with English names, hundredweight = cwt.
Some old radio and movie dialog has bills for hundreds, but I've never heard that in real life. It's always been C. Never H for hundred or H for hekta.
Thousands are looser. M is old business practice, still seen sometimes in stock discussions. G for grand is still fairly common. K has been most common since the '70s. Never T.
The only common slang for ten is also Roman via metaphor: Sawbuck.
English could have used letters for fractions, unambiguously up to 32.
1h = 1/2, 3f = 3/4, 5e = 5/8, 13s = 13/16, 17t = 17/32.
But these were never used.
Labels: Asked and not worth asking
¶ 11:36 AM
