二万 vs 二十千 does it matter

Japanese Language
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Is there any preference between using 二万 or 二十千 or does it not really matter???

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二十千 is not used in Japanese, just like two ten hundred is not used in English

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I like this visual representation of how the Japanese counting system works compared to ours ^^

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But in English you can say fifteen hundred, while in Japanese you can’t say 十五百, so it’s not exactly worth comparing English to Japanese here.

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I was reminded of this for some reason

image

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Imagine at the store if you ask for Teeen dollars. :joy:

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Just to point out that this isn’t really done in British English, it’s more of an American thing, so it’s not universal.

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It’s done in Swedish! #relevant

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That’s good to know!

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I’m not a native but from living here I got the impression it was reasonably common in the UK for 1100-1900 (but not higher numbers) and Wikipedia seems to agree.

The 1100-1900 thing is also common in Germany. It’s standard for years but common (while technically incorrect) for everything else.

For more irrelevant facts, languages with a “long scale” (e.g. most of continental Europe; also UK before 1950 or so) kinda group in terms of 6 first and then 3.

1,000 thousand
1,000,000 million
1,000,000,000 milliard
1,000,000,000,000 billion (million million has also been used in English)
1,000,000,000,000,000 billiard
1,000,000,000,000,000,000 trillion
1,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 trilliard
etc.

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Also in Dutch! #stillrelevant?

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Also in Dutch one trillion is een biljoen (pronounced ‘billioon’). A billion is een miljard (milliard) instead

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Slightly more relevant fun fact:

Several absurdly large numbers in Japanese are ambiguous because of typos in the oldest text that introduced them to Japan (from China).
e.g. 恒河沙 can be 10^52 or 10^56
I guess you have to be careful when talking about the number of atoms in the Sun.

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I think what plant-chan uses as an example is perfectly valid, The comparison was used to provide to the answer with a practical example so to make it clearer.

Of course English is not the same as Japanese, that’s the caveat.

Anyway, i was also curious about if it was correct to say it as in the OPs question

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Thanks for pulling up my post from ages ago!

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I have never seen or heard anyone in Japan ever use 二十千. I may have seen something like that used in a Japanese textbook for foreigners highlighting the mistake and there’s an incredibly confused Japanese friend/teacher/colleague who thinks for a few minutes puzzling it out, and then says something along the lines of 「スミスさん、did you mean 二万？」(because it’s always スミスさん)

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Another question on the topic, is 一千 interchangable with just 千?
Same goes for 一万 and 万, 一億 and 億.

WK includes both versions, so is there a difference in usage?

Also are 一十 and 一百 used or is it just wrong to say/write it like that?

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Obligatory YouTube video.
WARNING: contains high levels of stupid

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一百 and 一十 aren’t things that exist.

一万 is used almost exclusively over 万

千 is more common than 一千 when talking about 1000 alone, but you do hear 一千, somewhat confusingly, when it’s 一千万. You don’t really hear 千万.

一億 is like 一万

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… “Issengoku”?