Re: [tied] Re: IE right & 10

> Harald:
> > The point is that it's highly unlikely that they had numerals up to
> > exactly 6. If you look at the world's huntre-gatherer languages and
> > their dialects you will not find a great variety in the cutoff point
> > of their numeral systems. The cutoff point will almost invariably be
> > 2-4, [...]
>
> I would argue that modern hunter-gatherers are not representative of
> the state of affairs some six thousand years ago. Currently, modern
> life fragments most hunter-gatherer populations to a severely limited
> area.

Don't be silly. Most hunter-gatherers in e.g Papua and Amazonia still
trade as much today, and with little correlation to their numeral system.
One does not even need numerals to trade.

Besides, the tendency is exactly same in vocabularies gathered in the
17th to 19th centuries. The only really old attestation I know of of
a hunter-gatherer numeral system is in Greek sources and is up to (incl.)
4.

> They have little other hunter-gatherer bands around them to trade
> with. I can't see how this doesn't affect how hunter-gatherer cultures
> nowdays operate. The question is how hunter-gatherers typically use
> number systems in a world where hunter-gatherers are the norm,

Look at 19th century Australian aboriginal languages. Almost nowhere
is anything but a 2-4 numeral system attested (compared to 300 or so
cases to the contrary).

> not
> post-industrial cultures.

Post-industrial cultures either die or acquire larger numeral systems
(which are never that of 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, more). There are still
hunter-gatherers today with only negligible contact with modern life.

/H