Hokkien numerals

This article possibly contains original research. Please improve it by verifying the claims made and adding inline citations. Statements consisting only of original research should be removed. (August 2017) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

This article contains Hokkien text. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Hàn-jī, Pe̍h-ōe-jī and Tâi-lô.

The Hokkien language (incl. Taiwanese) has two regularly used sets of numerals, a more ancient colloquial/vernacular or native Hokkien system and a literary system.

The more ancient vernacular numerals are the native numbers of Hokkien that trace back to Hokkien's origins itself, which is a Coastal Min language that spread southwest across the coast of Fujian from around the Min River. It was brought by the earliest Min-speaking Han Chinese settlers from the time of the Jin dynasty (266–420) settling the area around the Jin River around 284 AD.^[1] Meanwhile, the literary system came from Tang-era Classical Chinese/Middle Chinese that was loaned in for formal reading use during medieval times^[2] (e.g. Tang, Min, Southern Tang, Song dynasty times), similar to the Sino-Xenic pronunciations in Japanese, Okinawan, Korean, Jeju, Vietnamese, etc, but within the Sinitic family to the Min group.

Literary and colloquial systems are not totally mutually independent; they are sometimes mixed used. The specific pronunciation of each number depends on the specific dialect of Hokkien (e.g. Amoy-Tong'an, Quanzhou, Zhangzhou, Longyan, etc.), which each dialect may either share or use slightly different phonemes and tones on how each dialect may properly count numbers in the Hokkien language for both vernacular and literary systems.