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That’s so interesting Mike. I speak French and an old Italian dialect I learned from my grandparents, so I can usually follow languages that are Latin based, but this is a whole new world to me!

The pebble story reminded me of our own family story. My grandfather would fill his right pocket with pebbles in the morning, and then transfer one pebble to his left pocket every time there was a stone delivery to a job site. At the end of the day he would empty his left pocket on the table with an admonishment to only pay for this many deliveries. Worked very well !

Laurene wrote: ↑Mon Jun 17, 2024 3:14 pm That’s so interesting, Mike. I speak French and an old Italian dialect I learned from my grandparents, so I can usually follow languages that are Latin based, but this is a whole new world to me!

It's all Greek to me. Sorry! I couldn't resist

Actually, it's all Celtic based. If you know Welsh (I lived in Wales for a few years), you'd see similarities. For example, 12345 in Welsh is:
Un, Dau, Tri, Pedwar, Pimp - pronounced (as I recall):
Een, Dai, Tree, Pedooar, Pimp.
In Borrowdale, it's:
Yan, Tan, Tethera, Methera, Pimp

And your pebbles story is fascinating. Surely it must be connected to the sheep-counting system? Just substituting stone deliveries for batches of 20 sheep.

Our Linda (LindasPencils) is on her way back home to Australia from London as I type. 12k miles/ 20k km. Wishing her well and a very smooth flight.

Love the pebble counting stories from around the world! I wonder how many other cultures have similar means?
Our original Australian peoples used their body to count with - each body part was a different number: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Australia ... numeration
They didn't have sheep to count, and from my very limited understanding much of this numbering system was common across various language groups and was used as a way of indicating times to meet for coorooborees and the like.
The flight home was fine, very long, but that is just a fact of life when you live down here. I highly recommend anyone making the trip to go Premium Economy at least. Getting the body clock reset has been a struggle, I want to sleep until noon every day!

btw; I just posted some further images from my travel sketchbook on my blog if anyone would like to see more of my journey.
https://lindaweilfineart.blogspot.com/

I really enjoyed your blog Linda! I’ve read about the Yorkshire Dales and the Lake District all my life, and it was such a pleasure to visit them through your drawings. Scotland is another dream destination.