Part 4 · grammar — Chapter 12 · numbers
Building numbers
A number is digits counting units, largest unit first, remainder after, and nothing else:
| 3 | ta shao | one three-group |
| 4 | ta shao ta | one three-group and one |
| 5 | ta shao wi | one three-group and two |
| 6 | wi shao | two three-groups |
| 7 | wi shao ta | two three-groups and one |
| 9 | ta phoi | one nine-group |
| 14 | ta phoi ta shao wi | a nine, a three, and two |
No conjunction joins the parts; position does the work, as it does everywhere. Read ta phoi ta shao wi left to right and you watch a quantity assemble the way a Phi sentence assembles: the big frame announced first, the detail delivered inside it.
Say the numbers aloud as you read this chapter. The system is learned in the mouth, not the eye, and after a dozen numbers the composition stops feeling like arithmetic and starts feeling like grammar, which is what it is.