How Portuguese numbers are built

Portuguese numbers are built, not memorised: learn zero to fifteen and the tens, then join the parts with e. One and two change for gender, and cem becomes cento. That is nearly the whole system.

• vinte e um - twenty-one

Zero to nineteen

Zero to fifteen are words to learn as they come:

• doistwo
• trêsthree
• quatrofour
• cincofive

Brazil writes fourteen quatorze or catorze; Portugal writes catorze.

From sixteen, the pattern shows through: ten, a joining vowel, then the unit, written as one word.

Both sets are correct Portuguese; the vowel after dez sounds different in each country, and the spelling follows. Pick one set and do not mix them in one piece of writing.

• Ela tem dezesseis anos. - She is sixteen. (EP: Ela tem dezasseis anos.)

Reading out a phone number in Brazil, people say meia (short for meia dúzia, half a dozen) instead of seis, so it is not misheard as três: nove, meia, dois is 962.

The tens, and e between every part

Sessenta and setenta are the pair to watch: sixty has the double s of seis, seventy the t of sete.

Everything between the tens is built by addition with e, and:

English puts one and into a hundred and twenty-three; Portuguese puts e between every part:

• cento e vinte e três - a hundred and twenty-three

Bigger numbers keep the same habit, with one twist after mil: Portuguese big numbers has them.