Thread: declensions and numbers

hi everyone,

I'm currently trying to go back to declensions of numbers. something I was never able to handle. are there any tips that would help me make fewer mistakes ? specific rules ? mnemonic devices ?

so far, declining numbers has been almost impossible for me. I always make mistakes and these declensions seem so hard to remember. first, I don't always know what case I have to use. then, when a number is more than 200, even knowing the case doesn't help a lot since it takes me several minutes to decline it. of course, for a numbe such as 542698 (just an example), I would just use nominative since I don't want to spend hours just for the sake of saying something accurately.

so do I have to memorize everything or can I use some special tips to learn faster ?
and is it sometimes also difficult for russian speakers ?

don't worry
for native speakers it is NOT difficult, becouse as for you in you native language it is simple (You do not think).
In scool childrens learn how say correct this numbers, but mathcorrect, not in him language.

listen:
0-9 - simple (as is)
10 - десять - in very more lang's has diff name
11 - одиннадцать - if you different this word = один (1) - над - цать (10) (One over ten) цать - old slavic word.
20 - двадцать - два(2)+д+цать(10) = Two times on ten
100 - simple
200 - двести = два + сто

and so-so

542698

in correct: пятьсот сорок две тысячи шестьсот девяносто восемь

oh, I don't have any problem (anymore) saying any number. my problem is declining it.
as in :
больше 4578025 человек
около 644875 человек
от 320546 до 401478 кубометров

there's no way I can say these numbers declined.
tips and mnemonic devices would be very very helpful

Originally Posted by possopo

oh, I don't have any problem (anymore) saying any number. my problem is declining it.
as in :
больше 4578025 человек
около 644875 человек
от 320546 до 401478 кубометров

there's no way I can say these numbers declined.
tips and mnemonic devices would be very very helpful

In colloquial Russian you can decline only the final element of the compound numeral.

In colloquial Russian you can decline only the final element of the compound numeral.

Not always, ex:

больше 4578025 человек

classic: больше четырех миллионов пятистасемидесятивосьми тысяч двадцати пяти человек
colloq: больше четырех миллионов пятьсотсемьдесятвосемь тысяч давдцати пяти человек
here and first and last are decline.

около 644875 человек

if you use 'около' then not be exact number
be something else: 644 000 - in this i trust

от 320546 до 401478 кубометров

and if you have a bussiness with a professional, ex. petroleum-prof, he say 3,2-4,0*10^5 m^3 - this i may say as oil ingeneer

Yes, native speakers often find it difficult to decline long numbers. That is why they have become pretty adroit in constructing sentences where numbers don't need to be declined. Failing that, they often use the technique that quartz have mentioned.

This is not a really big number but it will do for a demonstration:

Медицинская помощь была оказана
1) тремястам двадцати одному человеку ("overcorrect" version) (ironically, corrected in one of the later messages)
2) триста двадцати одному человеку
3) триста двадцать одному человеку

The radical solution, context permitting, would be
Медицинскую помощь получил триста двадцать один человек.

Originally Posted by E-learner

Медицинская помощь была оказана
1) тремястам двадцати одному человеку ("overcorrect" version)
2) триста двадцати одному человеку
3) триста двадцать одному человеку

I tried another number and found out that
3) [s:1vqbpvk6]триста двадцать пяти человекам[/s:1vqbpvk6]
doesn't work.

2) триста двадцати пяти человекам
still works.

Я бы сказала Помощь была оказана трёмстам двадцати одному человеку.

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/c ... le-coop-np

Originally Posted by Lampada

Я бы сказала Помощь была оказана трёмстам двадцати одному человеку.

Yes, this is better.
Come to think of it, "тремястам" isn't even a word. I must have derived it from "тремястами", which is a different grammatical case.

I am an active user of avoiding techniques.