Phonetic Dozenal Number Names

Title: Phonetic Dozenal Number Names
Subtitle: Words for Twelve Numbers Constructed A Priori

To construct words for dozenal numbers logically, twelve numbers would be formed out of as many contrastive features as are necessary to distinguish them from each other. To distinguish twelve items, the quickest way is by two binary contrasts and one ternary contrast. Every word must be one syllable long at a minimum. Since the smallest possible syllable consists of one nucleus or monophthongal vowel, there would need to be twelve different vocalic nuclei if the word for each number is to contain only a vowel.

However, it is possible to form single syllables for twelve numbers using an inventory of fewer phones if the syllables can consist of both consonants and vowels. In the case of single consonants followed by single vowels, the minimum number of phones in the inventory of phonemes to form twelve syllables is seven as the sum of either four consonants and three vowels or three consonants and four vowels. Generally it is easier to distinguish more consonants from each other than vowels, so it would be better to choose the inventory of four different consonants and three different vowels. The feature producing greatest distinction among the consonants is place of articulation, so the consonants may differ by four places of articulation. For arrangement of these logically on a phonetic basis, they could be in order to anteriority of articulation. They could be represented by the letters P, T, S, and K. For greatest contrast of the three vowels, they would be chosen from the three most extreme corner points of the formant chart. They would be the vowels A, U, and I. Twelve numbers could thereby by formed in a number of arrangements, such as by cycles of the consonants and vowels in the manner of the Chinese Heavenly Stems and Earthly Branches:

Table of Phonetically Constructed Digraphic Monosyllabic Number Names by Cycles of Consonants and Vowels

Number	Phonetically constructed name
one	pa
two	tu
three	si
four	ka
five	pu
six	ti
seven	sa
eight	ku
nine	pi
ten	ta
eleven	su
twelve	ki

However, the Potency of syllables can be increased by allowing more phonemes and an equal number of available phones in each position. I would rather have twelve different types of consonant and twelve different rhymes. In the topic on Mnemonics, I constructed twelve vocalic rhymes by four vocalic nuclei and two diphthongalising codal vocoids. I can here use a terminal letter h to indicate the absence of a coda to the nucleus. Instead of assigning these rhymes to the random order of vowels in words for numbers from natural languages such as Indo-European incorporated into the Power Prefixes, they can be organised by cycles of similar principle to the syllables of consonants and vowels:

Table of Phonetically Constructed Rhymes

Number	Phonetically constructed name
one	ah
two	ou
three	yi
four	eh
five	au
six	oi
seven	yh
eight	eu
nine	ai
ten	oh
eleven	yu
twelve	ei

In this scheme the numbers that are divisible by three have the codal i in common. These rhymes could be combined with consonants for the same twelve numbers to form twelve mnemonic words for the consonants and vowels representing numerals at each dozenal positional place, but where there would be twelve dozen possible syllables. However, last week I constructed an order of twelve rhymes by a somewhat different yet reasonably consistent phonetic procedure.

Consonants phonetically assigned to numbers
Earlier last week, for differentiation of the consonants into twelve of them on purely phonetic principles:

• In addition to them being arranged in three cycles of four by order from anterior to posterior place of articulation,
  
• I split them into two equal groups by binary state of the glottis or unvoicing and voicing, with the consonants for the first six number words being unvoiced and the second group of six being voiced.
  
• Next, I differentiated the consonants by aperture manner of articulation, with lesser contact of the articulators for the numbers at and adjacent to those that are the simpler fractions over twelve. This is analogous to my proposal for graduation marks of rulers whereby longer marks were allocated to the rounder fractions; specifically the whole or unit first, then half and quarters.
  
• Thus a binary furcation was made of the halves of twelve divisible by six and their adjacent numbers being made continuants while the consonants for the remaining numbers were made plosives.
  
• A further dichotomy was made between the simpler whole and the less simple half. Thus, to the whole or twelve and its adjacent numbers the consonants were to be sonorants, whereas the consonants of the numbers around six were made fricatives.
  

In the following image illustrating how phonetic features were assigned to the consonants standing for the twelve numbers in a cycle,

• the rubine right half represents unvoicing while the sea green left half is for voicing;
  
• the most darkly shaded quarter sector around twelve represents sonorant consonants;
  
• the most lightly toned tints around six represent fricative consonants;
  
• the intermediate grayed tones represent plosives;
  
• the sectors tiled with squares represent labial consonants;
  
• the sectors with brick tiling represent coronal consonants;
  
• the sectors with honeycomb or hexagonal tiles represent palato-alveolar consonants, retroflex, or palatalised consonants;
  
• and the sectors with dots represent guttural consonants.
  

Image figure of differentiation of consonants assigned to numbers using phonetic features.

Rhymes assigned phonetically to numbers

• Four cycles of vocalic nuclei and diphthongalising codas were assigned as tabulated above; with the monophthongal nucleus without coda and the codas U and I cycling anticlockwise as in the formant chart of vowels,
  
• but the order of the monophthongal nuclei was different from the above tabulation. They are nevertheless arranged phonetically in their crosses of four according to their same consistent anticlockwise sequence from the formant chart.
  
• In each cross of four rhymes, there is the same coda or absence of a coda.
  

In the following image:

• square tiling represents monophthongal vowels without codas;
  
• horizontal hatches represent a high back rounded coda;
  
• vertical hatching represents a high front unrounded coda;
  
• blue represents the high vowel Y;
  
• rubine represents the mid front vowel E;
  
• yellow represents the low open central vowel A; and
  
• sea green represents the mid back rounded vowel O.
  

Image figure of phonetic features assigned to rhymes representing numbers in a cycle of twelve.

The following image represents superimposition of the diagrams for the consonants and vowels to form the syllables for the numbers:


Image figure of phonetic features of syllables assigned to the twelve numbers in a cycle.

The resulting syllables of consonants and vowels for the twelve numbers were as follows:

Table of Phonetically Constructed Words for Numbers

Number	Phonetically constructed name
one	hwah
two	tou
three	trei
four	koah
five	fyu
six	sai
seven	zhyh
eight	geu
nine	boi
ten	deh
eleven	liau
twelve	uhyi

In that table, I attempted to spell the number words with ordinary letters of the English version of the Roman alphabet available on the keyboard. Certain digraphic combinations of letters were used to denote phones.

• hw represents an unvoiced labial sonorant;
  
• oa represents a monophthongal vowel;
  
• zh represents a voiced palato-alveolar fricative;
  
• li represents a palatalised lateral liquid; and
  
• uh is an attempt to represent an unlabialised velar approximant. The closest single English letter for this would probably be w.
  

I also considered syllables in which the vowels were rotated by a half turn in the cycle relative to the consonants and the numbers.

References:

• https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexagenary_cycle
  
• https://dozenal.forumotion.com/t54-potency
  
• https://dozenal.forumotion.com/t27-mnemonics
  
• https://dozenal.forumotion.com/t26-proto-indo-european-numbers
  
• https://dozenal.forumotion.com/t57-unit-power-prefixes
  
• https://dozenal.forumotion.com/t47-graduation-subdivisions