英语学了这么多年，有没有质疑过凭啥数字十一要被叫作eleven,而不是oneteen?正本所谓规则总结的都是些不规则表象，用的人多了、运用频率高了，天然也就成了约好俗成。

english number words are pretty logical after a point. from twenty-one to ninety-nine, the same principle applies: the tens place followed by the units place. but the teens are different.

英文数字从某个数初步就恰当契合逻辑。从21到29，运用的都是相同的理论:几十在前，后边跟着个位数字。但十几却并非如此。

eleven and twelve come from the old english words endleofan and twelf, which can be traced back further to a time when they were ain+lif and twa+lif.

11和12来自古英语endleofan和twelf，可以追溯到俩数字还ain+lif和 twa+lif的时分。

so then the question is, why don’t we have threelif, fourlif, fiflif, sixlif and so on? the answer has to do with the development of number systems over history.

所以，疑问来了，咱们为何没没有threelif, fourlif, fiflif和sixlif 呢？答案和前史上数字体系的打开有关。

a long, long time ago, when the number words were first being formed, most people didn’t have much reason to numbers above ten. in fact, some languages of cultures only have number words for one, two, and many. so the basic number words up to ten formed first, then they were extended a bit with the –lif ending.

好久好久早年数字刚刚构成的时分，大都人并没有太多身手去辨识十以上的数字。实际上，有些初始文明的言语里标明数字的词只需一、二和许多。所以乎，先有了到十的根柢数字，然后稍稍拓宽，以–lif 结束。

many number systems are based on 12 ause it’s by the most numbers, and because you can count to 12 on one hand by using your thumb to count three on each of the other fingers. if 11 and 12 are being used more frequently, the forms for them will stick, even when another system starts to develop.

许大都字体系都是根据12的，因为12可以被大都数字约分，还因为你可以一只手仅靠大拇指，数每个指头的指节，就能数到12。要是11和12如今运用更广泛的话，其方法便会固定下来，即便有其它体系逐渐打开起来。

you can extend that idea to other number words. we have more of pronunciation in the tens (twenty, thirty, fifty instead of twoty, threety, fivety) because we’ve been making everyday use of those numbers for longer than we have for two hundred, three hundred, and five hundred). 。thousand is an old word, but its original sense was “a at multitude,” a non-numerically-specific, but very useful idea. the words we needed earliest, and used the most frequently are usually the most irregular.

这样思维可以类推到其它数字。几十的数字 不规则(twenty, thirty, fifty 而不是twoty, threety, fivety)。一千是个陈旧的词，开始的意思是“量很大”，具体数值不详，但这一概念很有用。有些词汇咱们很早就有需要、 运用频率最高，也恰是最不规则的。

so the short answer is, we created words for 11 and 12 a long time ago by calling them “one left after ten” and “two left after ten.” they were more useful to us than the higher numbers, so we said them more and they ame a habit that we couldn’t shake.

所以，简略说来，我们好久早年创造出“十余一”和“十余二”这样的用语来标明11和12。比起更大的数字，11和12更为有用，所以咱们说的也多，因为这已变成习气难以改动。

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