Counting in Arbëresh

Language overview

Arbëresh (Arbërisht) is an ethnolect spoken by the Arbëreshë people, the Albanian ethnic and language group communities in Southern Italy and Sicily since the Middle Ages. Similar to Albanian, it derives from the Tosk dialect spoken in southern Albania. It counts about 100,000 speakers.

Due to lack of data, we can only count accurately up to 20 in Arbëresh. Please contact me if you can help me counting up from that limit.

Arbëresh numbers list

  • 1 – një
  • 2 – di
  • 3 – tre
  • 4 – kartë
  • 5 – pesë
  • 6 – gjashtë
  • 7 – shtatë
  • 8 – tetë
  • 9 – nëntë
  • 10 – dhjetë
  • 11 – njëmbëdhjetë
  • 12 – dimbëdhjete
  • 13 – trimbëdhjetë
  • 14 – kartëmbëdhjetë
  • 15 – pesëmbëdhjetë
  • 16 – gjashtëmbëdhjetë
  • 17 – shtatëmbëdhjetë
  • 18 – tetëmbëdhjetë
  • 19 – nëntëmbëdhjetë
  • 20 – njëzet
  • 100 – qind

Arbëresh numbering rules

Now that you’ve had a gist of the most useful numbers, let’s move to the writing rules for the tens, the compound numbers, and why not the hundreds, the thousands and beyond (if possible).

  • Digits from one to nine are specific words, namely një [1], di [2], tre [3], kartë [4], pesë [5], gjashtë [6], shtatë [7], tetë [8], and nëntë [9].
  • Ten is dhjetë [10]. From eleven to nineteen, the numbers are formed by agglutinating the digit to the morpheme sequence mbë + dhjetë (meaning onto ten) with no space: njëmbëdhjetë [11], dimbëdhetë [12], trimbëdhjetë [13], kartëmbëdhjetë [14], pesëmbëdhjetë [15], gjashtëmbëdhjetë [16], shtatëmbëdhjetë [17], tetëmbëdhjetë [18], and nëntëmbëdhjetë [19].
  • The tens are formed on the multiplier digit followed by the word ten, except for ten and twenty: dhjetë [10], njëzetnti [20]. The word fot twenty is formed on the old number name zet, not used anymore, meaning a score—trace of an old vigesimal system. Thus, njëzetnti [20] means one score (një + zet).
  • Numbers above twenty are expressed in Italian or Sicilian, except for one hundred (qind).

Write a number in full in Arbëresh

Let’s move now to the practice of the numbering rules in Arbëresh. Will you guess how to write a number in full? Enter a number and try to write it down in your head, or maybe on a piece of paper, before displaying the result.

Albanian languages

Albanian, and Arbëresh.

Other supported languages

As the other currently supported languages are too numerous to list extensively here, please select a language from the full list of supported languages.