REFLECTIONS ABOUT THE NUMBERS (popular etymology and more)      Introduction      Here it goes about different ideas, that are hidden behind each digit, its graphical representation, the meaning of its name in one or another (or a third) language, about some special bigger or very big numbers, about some bordering, if I can call them so, numbers (like Russian 4, till which the numbers are in singular but later on they are in plural; or French 16, till which firstly goes the second number and then the first, as also in many languages with 11 and 12, but later is on the contrary), as well also about the very name of the digit in various languages. The questions are obviously complicated, and lost in the darkness of centuries, as it is accepted to say, but the very ideas are not difficult, because they were invented and used by the common people, only that these layers in out minds have now entirely disappeared.      To all of the things explained here I have come alone (what means that on some of them might be argued, yet, as you will see, I am sufficiently convincing with my cumulative proofs, so that I don't advise anybody to begin to argue with me), but this was possible for me because of my mathematical education, where for the common readers, I'm afraid, the guesses will be very hard and downright impossible (in any case, I have tried with some school students, as persons with more awakened and non-rigid model of thinking than the adults, and they have guessed about almost nothing). And the theme is interesting practically for everyone, because there is nothing really scientifically, this is reflection of ordinary human thinking and views to the world. Every symbol means something, but in most cases this is a matter of insinuation, that it must mean something -- take for example the national coats of arms or banners --, like the letters, for example, which are many and have come though so many variations and rotations, and writing from left to right, or from bottom to top, and so on, that it is now hard to guess something simple and clear about them (for instance, the letter "A" was a bovine eye, but do you find it like it?; and if it is similar then why of a bovine?; etc.).      The letters carry some ideas, and in some cases, and on some places, I cite some of them, but with the digits it is easier, they are only 10, where the 0 and the 1 have obvious ideas (although here, too, something can be added), for the numbers 2, 4, and 7 the ideas are easy (for the 2 there is even something written in some children's primary books, but without explanations why), the 8 is a bit more difficult, but the ideas hidden behind the 3, 5, 9, and especially 6, are in such extent concealed -- though very interesting, at least for me it was quite interesting to detect them -- so that hardly one out of a hundred persons (maybe even one out of a thousand is nearer to the truth) would have guessed about them. I have explained this in two other places (in one multi-lingual dictionary with about 12 thousand chiefly roots of words; as well also in one big book in English) but these works are pretty large and are also not published officially. For this reason I decided to explain popularly what I can on some 20 pages here.      Because the digits, as I said, are part of our everyday life, and it is not bad to know how the ancient people -- the Arabs, but they have only carried them from Ancient India, so that the digits are from the Sanskrit -- have looked at them, this is simply interesting and mysterious (and this reasonably mysterious, not indoctrinated mysteries like the zodiacs, for example, where something reasonable exists, but this, surely, are not the stars -- though let us not be distracted by this here). So that I advise you to scratch a bit you head (or what other place you are accustomed to scratch when thinking intensively) and see to what you can come alone. Let us add to the these digits also the big ones, the thousands, millions, and some smaller, 40, 16, 4, as well also 12 (i.e. why the months, and the apostles, too, must have been exactly 12 -- at least this is very easy). And begin to think but stop to read further! After a month or two you return to this material, in order to check yourselves. And in order not to be pretty easy for you to look ahead I will begin first with the word about the very number.      The number      Well, this word has several variations, at least Slavonic and Western. As a Slav I think to begin with the Slavonic number (or because I am translating this paper from Bulgarian, what is also important reason), but let me first clarify some things, namely: normal citation of foreign words I will give in double quotes ("so"), especially if this is on the language of narration (here the English), but when the words are from foreign languages I will almost always miss them and will be content to apply only Italic font, although it can be used also for emphasizing (yet I hope you are intelligent enough to make the difference), and if there will be used Greek letters then surely without quotes (it is clear that the word is foreign); the single quotes I will use to mark how the word is to be read (in the nearest to the language of narration way) and will usually miss the Italic if the word is given in such quotes, but also very often 'this' quotes will be used when I am citing words in different from the Latin (usually in Cyrillic) alphabet (and then I normally will put Italic font to stress that the word is foreign); and the bold font is for underlining, something like subtitle.      Now about the reading, because there is no universal standard, the way out is to use some language with simple phonetics, like Italian (or rather Latin, and maximally simplified, say -ti will be read as 'ti'), or Bulgarian, but we have another alphabet, so that it is not suitable to be applied here; there is also one newest method that I have invented (in "Myrski's English Transliteration) but I will abstain from it here (because this paper was written earlier). Hence, if there are several adjacent vowels they must be read somehow so, with only this addition on new basic letters: "þ" is the so called soft sign in Russian and means softening of the previous consonant (like in the Spanish canyon-'kanþon'), and the "å" is this vowel like in your "girl"; it is supposed that "sh", "ch", and "zh" are obvious, "c" is like in Caesar (but in order to avoid any doubts this sound will be given as 'tz'), "j" is "yot" /"jot" what in English is usually given with "y" (or just "i", but there's a difference, the 'j' is not full vowel), your "w" remains for the moment, maybe something else (I am not very precise here in order not to bore you), and French nasal words will be marked with "~". And by "somehow so" I mean that, say, your "year" will be 'iår', "where" will be 'weår', etc., but the second vowel can have meaning of modifier, like also in Russian 'måi' what is "we", or their 'åokno' what is "window', or your "but"-'båot'. Well, and because there will be met many times names of various languages, I will shorten them to 3 (sometimes even to 2) letters, about which meaning you will be quite able to make the right guess; also lang. will mean "language". If there will be something else I will explain it on the very place.      So, and the Sl. number, which is 'chislo', has to be simply something pure ('chist' in Bul. or 'chiståij' in Rus.), and here is our 'chetà'-to-read (what we use not only for letters bur also for numbers, what is not correct); this is so also from mathematical point of view because the number, really, is some abstraction, numbers as such can't walk on the streets, figuratively speaking. And in order not to think that this root is only Sl. (and I am teaching you here something useless), let me tell you that here is also Eng. "gist" like (quint-) essence, Fr. geste ('zhest') as gesture (in the Lat. gestio means to make something, to launch), or Ger. Gestalt ('geshtalt'), what means kernel, image, essence, or also Tur. 'dzhaskam' as to hit, shove, push, or if you want also the Ar. ... jin /gin (or cin in Tur. but read again 'dzhin') as spirit, and others, what is to say that the 'chislo' is something squeezed, compressed, or abstracted.      The Western number, for its part, i.e. Lat. numerus, or Ger. Nummer, could be said that is something like Rus. 'nu' (or Eng. "now", or Ger. na, etc., particle for attracting of attention) + Ger. mehr (or your more, what ultimately is related with the mare-sea as something big), i.e. "something more"; or at least I think so, because this is how the numbers are built, with adding of one more. Well, specially one number in Eng. is digit, what is directly taken from Lat. digitus, only that it means a finger or fingernail, but this surely tells us that people have counted on fingers (or that the digits are as many as our fingers are, ten).      But if we make difference between one number as digit and many numbers, then in Rus. etc.(Sl.) a digit is 'tzifra', what is old Heb. word, cefir, and Ar. chifr, and from there also Fr. chiffre, Ger., etc., what is the cipher, something twisted, hidden, again some essence of the real things; and, when it begins with 'sh' or 's' then it can easily become 'tz' like in the Sl. langs; and here turns to be also Eng. "zero", maybe as the first "ciphered" thing. Let us, though, not go into many details because the very numbers are quite more interesting.      The zero and the one      The zero, obviously, is the "feminine" number, the "hole", naught, nothing, and for a long time if was not counted for number, because it is not natural number (and one number is natural, as I like to explain popularly to the school children, if it can ... run, otherwise it simply does not exist in the nature, i.e. the 0, the negative numbers, and the fractions of any kind, are not natural numbers), and in old Gr. was absent their contemporary word νουλα (read 'nula' because the Greeks -- can you imagine this? -- just have not a letter 'u' and are forced to combine 2 letters). This zero comes from the Skr. (for Sanskrit), where it is nullah, but the point is that this does not mean there zero, it means a valley, lowland, and then I think that here has to be added one ... river. Did you guess which? Well, as far as the nulirane in Bul. /Sl. (zeroing) often becomes nihilirane (nihilus in Lat.) or an- /nihilate in Eng., then we come to the root 'nil-', or to the river Nile. ( By the way, only the syllable 'ni-' in the Skr. means something low, lowland, valley, because is said -- for the author does not know Skr. -- that nivar meant lowland -- where from must come Bul. 'niva', what is a field (sown with something) --, and udvar meant height, hill, something cocked up, like, hmm, like the cited in Rus., out of decency, hoping the people there will not understand an once that this is some cynical word -- as it also happens -- Ar. 'ud', what in Bul. and Rus. is written with 3 letters, but in Eng. with 4, and means something utterly masculine, or said relatively decently, a cock. Well, when I translated this in Eng. I saw that in Ar. is given some oud or ud as stringed musical instrument, and the Sl. ud is old Sl. but both things have to be related to the Skr. ud, in my opinion. ) And to the zero being the Heb. cefir, this really has to be so because in Tur. sifir means also zero, although this is a bit strange for this is the most insignificant digit, but when it is the first one, then this has to be so.      The one in Rus. is 'odin' (or 'edin' in Bul.) and it has to be the same also on the West, though this is not clear to everyone. This is in the sense that here is also Eng. "one", Ger. eins, old Frisian an, en, Hol. (for Holland or Dutch or Netherlands) een, and so on, and old Greek οιοσ (but now is ενα), and Avs. (this is from the sacred books of old Persians, called Avestas, i.e. nearly old Per.) aeva, and Skr. ekas. Though, if you think what we will run away from the "cock" you are wrong, because even in Ger. the prefix ein- (read 'ajn' -- yet not 'adzhn' of course) is the same as Eng. (and Lat., too) in-, what means into, to enter somewhere (in the "zero', to be sure). And in addition to this, why must Sl. odin has this letter 'd', which is in the 'ud' (for there is no such letter in uno, eins, ενα, ekas, etc.)? Obviously because 'odin' is the masculine digit, and to confirm this let us mention also one well known on the West ... god, the Scandinavian Odhen or Woden (which in Rus. is given again as Oden), and somewhere in the etymological dictionaries is said that I.-E. (for Indo-European langs) root wodh- meant to burn, or to inflame, excite, cause erection.      Although the letter 'd', or the root 'od-', is also massively met on the West, for example in Ger. Öde (a desert, bare land), Eng. "odd" (as not even but the idea is that of the number 1, i.e. when you begin to count them by 2, first and second, then one number will remain alone, without brethren), or Heb. od (what means 7, and to which we shall come later, but 7 also is odd number), and here -- for the Slavs this should have been now obvious -- is the Sl. 'ad' what is a hell (and it has to be somehow related with our 'jad' what is an ire, rage, and it eats us -- jade in Bul. -- and makes us alone, like in the desert, what contacts also with Rus. jad what is a poison)! This Sl. ad-inferno is old Gr. Αδησ (Hades), but there is also one god of death, 'Aid' in Rus., who was son of Cronos and Rhea and ruled in subterranean kingdom, i.e. in the ad (so that the jad as rage or as poison can also not be accidental here, no matter that the jad-rage is related with the jadene-eating). We may add here also Rus. 'odnako' (but) as some objection, single exception, here most probably is the known ... poetic "ode", too, as something for singular or exceptional personalities, and (in my opinion) also the ... jod /iode /iodine, because it burns us like in the hell, and other things.      But together with 'od-' / 'on-' there is one more Western root for the 1 and this is 'mono-', where is Fr. monde (world, earth), Ger. Mond (this time the moon), Ger. Monat-month, Gr. μοναχοσ (monk, surely, i.e. lonely person), even your monarchy as well as the monarch (what is Lat.). And if you ask yourself what is the common thing between the Earth and the Moon (Fr. and Ger. "mond"), then this is that both things are something tight, single, and from here is the idea of monism in the philosophy. ( On this place, if you allow me -- and if you do not allow me this then jump everything till the end of the paragraph --, I would like to squeeze a remark about this, why ... are given as presents only odd number of flowers to living persons, and, resp., for the dead only even number. This comes from the meaning of "perfect" as finished, in some way even, there is nothing left or sticking out when one has died, and while the person is still alive he changes all the time, he is not perfect, like also the imperfect times. Yet in the Sl. langs this sounds better because in Bul. we have the word 'svårshen' as finished, and also 'såvårshen' exactly as perfect; similarly also in Rus. Now people don't take the numbers so seriously and may think that these are silly things, but the ancient people, in old Greece and not only, have even deified the numbers, especially the Pythagoreans, and the first difference between them is whether they are even or not. )      The two      The two, which in Bul. is 'dve', in Rus. 'dvoe' etc., can mutate a lot, changing to 'tv-' (in Eng. "two") or 'tzv-' (in Ger. zwei, 'tzvaj'; where some old Frisian "twa" can explain this Eng.-Ger. mutation), or in Lat. duo, or in old Gr. δυο ('dio'), or in old Heb. bina, and in the Skr. it was dwan. This, that here are all binary things, like It. bicicletta or Eng. "bicycle" and so on -- ah, also the "bio"-things (βιο in Gr.), because everything living divides, and prior to this it copulates or makes couples --, is clear, but before we proceed to some religious aspects (and also to the picture of the digit) let us explain what does here the Sl. ... door, which in Rus. is 'dverþ', or also Bul. court, which is 'dvor', what seems puzzling. But it just can't be otherwise (although I personally have not guessed about this before the etymologists have told it to me). Ah, the point is that the court divides the space in two parts, our and foreign (and for that reason it is surrounded with fence), and the same does the door (in Bul. it is 'vrata' and tells us that it rotates, 'vårtja', but it also divides, it has two sides).      The religious aspects must be clear, this is the god-two or pair, because it is Deos in Lat. (resp. dea is a goddess) and Θεοσ /Theos in old Gr., and this is so in accordance with Bul. saying that "he who knows 2, knows 200", i.e. when one exceeds the one, himself, then he comprises everything! And the graphical image of the two is, as it is given in some primers, the swan's neck! It is so, but nobody explains to the children (neither later, to the grown ups) why this is so, why the swan is the two. This surely is not because it is a nice bird, but because it is ... simply a bird! In the sense that since the swan is nice bird we say that this is its neck, and it is sufficiently characteristic for to symbolize the digit, but behind this beauty hides any bird, and behind every bird, say, behind the hen, which is 'kokoshka' in Bul., is hidden, hmm -- what is hidden, in your opinion? Ah, there are hidden two things (which in the end reduce to one thing), it is hidden the syllable "ko", respectively co in Lat., and from it comes Sl. "co" -- because in Cyrillic (Cyr. for short) the letter 's' is written exactly like the Lat. "c" --, what means "with", or very often just the Cyr. "c" means this, but together with this also the ... act of copulation, obviously! Well, at least for me it was quite obvious (after the swan's neck), and phonetically this fits well with the "co-co" of the hen, so that it remained only to explain why the ancient people have taken for such representative example the hen, not the pig, say, or the sheep, the bull, the dog, if you want, and so on?      Well, shortly, because the hens are under our noses. Id est hens were in every courtyard, while cows were far away from everywhere, and they are grazing during the day, the sheep for a whole season are outside, the pigs, in fact, stay in their pigsty, but all those animals, hmm, they copulate significantly less than the birds. So that thousands of words, even in one and the same lang., have started from these animals, like, for example: copulation, correlation, cooperation, coalition, Rus. kolkhoz (if you want), i.e. collective, congress, conspiracy, constellation (and, resp. in Rus. 'sozvezdie' where star is 'zvezda'), also the ... constipation (some tightening of the bowels), and what not else, plus Rus.: 'sojuz'-union, 'skleivanie'-gluing-together, 'svjazåivanie'-tying, and so on. And as to words for the hen and related with her things these are, say, Rus. 'kura'-hen, which goes in parallel with Ger. Hure, what is not a hen, it is a prostitute, then Fr, coquette ('koket', i.e. like a hen, because coq-'kok' is a cock), then Ger. Vogel (a bird -- for the reason that it flies like a 'foga' as we say, I'll tell you, what means very fast, and the word surely is twin with your "fog"), but then vögeln is already to copulate, to "screw", and then it is necessary to mention also Bul. jargon 'kopele' what is translated as "son of a bitch" and is the direct result of copulation. In the purest form, however, this root is presented in Sp. where coño ('konjo') is exactly vagina (and because of this those people have the hard curse "el coño le tu madre").      The three      By the number three the idea about its graphical image (to which I came at once, but till now have not met someone who has succeeded to find it) is simply a ... woman's breasts! Now, this is not cumulative proof, for it is only one and it isn't a proof at all, but in such cases I draw my strongest trump card and say: "But what else can it be, ah?". And really, what else can relate two semicircles if not two bursting female "peaches" (like the Arabs have the habit to say)? And the breasts of a woman, obviously speak already about a child (because the men can "use" them sometimes, but this is not their direct purpose). So, and what concerns the names of this digit, then in them always is present some friction, like in the triangle (which may be love one, but may also not be such), where Bul. /Sl. 'tri' /'troe' becomes drei by the Germans, tria /tre /tres in the Lat. langs, τρε in Gr., and trdyas in the Skr.      Hear are a heap of word, like the: triumph (thriumpus in Lat.), tribune, Christian Trinity, triangle, triviality (only three things, not much work, used initially for the 3 compulsory learning subjects: grammar, dialectic, and rhetoric), but also the ... tree in Eng. (which is not exactly old Gr. dendro but is a 'derevo' / 'dårvo' in Rus. / Bul.), and the curious thing is that in the same Rus. / Bul. 'trava' / 'treva' means not this but only ... grass (yet it has to here, too, there is no other possibility, right?), and the grass usually begins to grow with three leaves, if you have marked this, i.e. it has not pairs of opposed leaves. The 'treva'-grass is not at all accidental here, and there is also Eng. "thrive" (throve, thriven), as to grow, prosper, i.e. something like to triumph, and in Ger. this becomes treiben ('trajben') what is to move, spur, incite (where from Treib means instinct or drive, most often sexual, i.e. some driving force; this is derived from some Teutonic, Teu. further, dreiban as to sow, initiate). Somewhere here is also the rubbing of hands ('trija' in Bul.; in the Eng. may be mentioned the "try" as effort to push something), Ger. treten as entering (like your "trot"), their treffen as to meet, It. trovare (also to meet -- just as one 'tropa'-trotts-stamps on the "dromos"-path, I'll tell you, and 'tropam' is in Bul.), old Gr. τριβω (read then as 'tribo'), what means to rub, ruin; we can add also the known Fr. travail ('travaj', to work), what is as if spitting image of Eng. "travel" no matter that it means something else, and surely others.      Generally speaking the three is very important number, the most stable body in the plane (which is defined by 3 points), and it is used in many other places. For example, I strongly suppose (but can't prove this) that the meaning of number three is the reason to be 3 Eng. feet in their yard, and not, say, 5 or 10; in addition also one Eng. mile is about 5/3 of a kilometer (1,609 m), although here the things are a bit more twisted, i.e. (I suppose) that when one goes on foot one makes for 1 hour usually 5 km, and if this distance must consist of some 3 parts, then they have to be by 5/3 of it.      The four      The graphical image here is trivial, this is a square, eventually with a handle, in order to carry it raised. Phonetically, though, there is significant difference between Western and Sl. views on the matter (in sounding), because in Eng. it is "four", what is Ger. vier, and it as if has nothing in common with Sl. 'chetiri' (in Bul., in Rus. is 'chetåire'), but also with Lat. quattro (in fact in It.), what is the square. Only that in old Heb. this number was gevura, and it signified strength, courage (the hardness of diamond, which is pictured as rhomb). Yet here I recall myself Tur. ... gevrek (known also in Bulgaria) what is a circular bun in form of a torus, i.e. something twisted, curved, and to the gevrek, obviously stays also the 'cheverme' (in Tur. çeverme, what is something that not only is roasted on fire (on a grill) but is also rotated (because çevre, 'chevre', in Tur. means circle -- and then maybe this is the hidden meaning of Bul. archaic 'chevråst' as agile, quick, moves to everywhere, like a top-toy)! For the moment let us not digress to this how (and why) the square can sometimes become circle (and vice versa), and continue with similarly sounding words, like Bul. ... 'chervej', what is a worm and we maybe think that it is red ('cherven'), yet not this is the point here, but that it curves or rotates (well, also twists and writhes, but this is something similar for the common person), which word has to be here due to the fact that in Rus. it is 'chervþ' or 'chervjak' where the latter is the known in mechanics worm-gear, which spins like a worm and rotates the cogwheel in perpendicular direction.      Well, but when we begin to rotate then arise new words and ideas, because here is Lat. roto (to rotate, and from here comes Bul. 'rota' as military company, for the reason that they are three and rotate by 8 hours during the day), then Ger. werken (which has given also Eng. to "work" and means the same, yet also Bul. ... 'otrertka' as screwdriver, as well as the jargon 'chovårkam' meaning to do something insignificant, to repair -- nearly the same as the 'cheverme'), then (or before, don't formalize about the time, I'm moving in it, I am such person) in old Gr. the 4 is τεσσερα, and in Skr. is catvaras, what can lead us to 'katr', what is Fr. (quatre), but also vier /four now comes nearer to the old Heb. gevura, where our Sl. 'chetiri' can be derived directly from catvaras (i.e. the Russians sometimes take their words directly from the ancient Hindus, without being forced to go to the Latins). Well, but from "gever-" we can reach also to "kver-", and to "skver-", too, what is Rus. 'skver' (small garden), which is supposed to be square.      And here is the moment to explain you why the Russians take the numbers up to 4 for small (for they say "2, 3, 4 cheloveka" -- in singular), while from 5 and above they become at once big ("5, 6, etc. chelovek" -- in plural). Now, you have to look mathematically at the things, like in counting on ... fingers, of course, for the reason that when one counts he curls the fingers (beginning from the last one) and when he reaches 4 he has only the thumb left and he decides that this finger, as well also anything bigger than 4, will mean "much"! This is the idea, though the Russians will never explain it to you, because they have forgotten these rudimentary things, which earlier were inculcated in their heads, and today they say "2, 3, 4, goda" for years, and after this at once "5 let" for the same word "years", so that it turns that the 'godini' (this is in Bul.), although are synonymous with the 'let'-s, are as if smaller than the latter (which, in my opinion, though not only mine, simply fly, because this verb in Bul. is 'letja' -- well, it might be that I imagine things, and here maybe the summer comes in play, which in its turn involves Lat. ... laetus as fat, well-fed, pure, etc., but let us not go in deeper details here). More than this, the relation of 5, or this what is after 4, with the "many" can be found also in Ger., where the number 4 is vieR, and "many" is vieL (what is built not in the usual way, because in comparative it becomes mehr and then meisten, so that I hardly imagine wrong things).      But let us continue with the 4, which, as we have remarked, in result of the twisting can sometimes look like circle (like 'gevrek', which, by the way, in Rus. is 'bublik', something swollen, like the Eng. bubble-gum). Well, the task for finding of the quadrature of the circle has tormented the minds from deep antiquity, but this can never happen for the reason that in the circle enters one unit that can't be measured with the digits and their parts, the number π, which is such "beast" that with whatever measuring stick you try to measure it, it can't be measured exactly even with fractional parts (as much as we fracture then, even to the infinity -- this is something that both, children and adults, know, but don't understand, do not feel it). But the twisting remains, and because of this here are, for example, the following words: Tur. and Per. ... 'gjaur' /'gjavur' (gâvur), what is unbeliever, one who has gone "awry" from the proper faith, then Bul. ... 'gavrja se' (to hurt, abuse, in a way, like a 'gjavur', but which is also Western word because here is Fr. gouverner-governor and Lat. guberno (to rule, govern), respectively the governesses (who, as it turns, often 'se gavrjat'-abuse the naughty children, ah?). As far as all this is derived from old Gr. κυβερναω (to rule, govern), then here has to be also the ... cybernetics, which begins with 'si-', and the cyborgs, and even the ... shiffres-ciphers (in old Fr.), because they are also twisted, aren't they?      Generally said, the 4 can have two opposed aspects (what is wholly dialectical view), of something very good, square, double, diamond, or then of something very bad, twisted, made to a square (you see, now it turns that the circle is very nice thing, while the square is simply angular). We can add more "square" words like: Bul. 'gabårche' (a tack, and it can't be from the tree 'gabår' what is hornbeam, which, surely, is pretty twisted, something similar says us also the Eng. name), Bul. obsolete word 'guberka' (big needle), maybe also ... angel Gabhriel in Lat. ('Gavrail' in Bul., who probably 'se gavri'-abuses somehow, i.e. governs), and then maybe also our Sl. ... 'govor' (speech, talking, and this is in Bul., in Czech will be hovor, and in Pol. gwar), because the speech is a kind of command (as also Gabhriel, he might have been quite garrulous "man", or then uncompromising, who knows?). This, surely, is guttural sound, but it is very ancient, and in the Skr. gavate meant to sound (somewhere nearby is the known guru) and this does not preclude that there was also some twisting or rotating (i.e. rotating of the tongue in the throat).      And that around this fuzzy root there are many words in the world (with their own ideas) has to be clear. For example, there are old Gr. tetrarchs (τετραρχοσ), who were great rulers (either of 1/4 of some lands, or of the four directions of the compass, I suppose), then comes old Gr. (and Bul.) ... τετραδα ('tetradka') as notebook, because it is only one folded in four piece of paper, then is the tetrahedron (in Lat., or τετραεδρον in Gr., i.e. something with 4 sides, "edri"-s in Gr.), the tetragon or quadrangle, the ... cathedra (maybe), because it is quadrangular and raised up, Bul. 'edår' meaning big, surely (this isn't Sl. word, it is absent in the Rus.), as somebody with many (understand big) sides-"edri"-s. But there is also something else, there are "kaisers" (Keiser in Ger.) or 'kesarþ'-s in old Sl., what is Lat. Caesar ('tzezar'), obviously, and he might have been taken exactly for equivalent of old Gr. tetrarchs. There are also Lat. "teselations", something like "teslations", maybe, where the Tur. (also Bul.) tesla, meaning this useful axe-like tool called in Eng. adz, comes in play, the adze is used for cutting of pieces, so that the tessellation, what means covering (or dividing) of some area with equal figures, most often squares (though they might be also hexagons, and others; for triangles is used the word triangulation). And here, naturally, is also Sl. etc. 'kvartira'-quarters, the quadrangle in which we live, various square-carres (which can be also pieces of meat), the known old Eng. title esquire (which, in fact, is Fr., and will say simply one who owns some piece of land, which is supposed to be quadrangle), the squadron /escuadron, the It. squadra (which is squadron and some other things, but also football team), and other words. But in order not to think that I have forgotten about the bad, twisted "squares", let me tell you also that there is old Sl. word 'skverna', which is very similar to their 'skver'-garden, but means bad stain, shame, disgrace.      The five      The image of five, I am sure, you have not succeeded to guess (you might think that have, but surely haven't), yet it is very simple. This is ... a pendulum in Lat. ('mahalo' in Bul., or 'majatnik' in Rus.), where pendeo is to sway, dangle! As some combination of 'mahalo' and "pendalo" in Bulgaria is heard the word 'mandalo', but this mixing of roots have to come from quite ancient times because this is the Skr. 'mandala' (sacred circle). Be it as it may: why the five sways, ah? Have you guessed it? Well, until you "switch on" I will give you some other words, like: Eng. "depend" (and you rightly say "on", for it is hanged on something, where in Sl. it is "from" what isn't very correct), Bul. jargon 'pajantov' as ramshackle or unstable, also Bul. 'panta' as door hinge (because it hangs on it), Tur. (and archaic Bul.) 'pendari' as golden coins, yet not any such coins but only the swinging ones, those that are strung on a cord and are pending (or rather pendeo in Lat. meaning of the verb) on the bosoms of young brides (together with this on what they lean), the very number five in old Gr. which is πεντε, and from here also Bul. 'pet' or Rus. 'pjatþ' as five, until we come to the Skr. where this number was pañca (read 'pancha'). So till the moment it became clear where from is Sl. five, but Ger. fünf ('fjunf') or Eng. five are not from there, though in old Heb. it was tiferet and meant beauty or abundance, where is heard some 'fit- /fet-'.      Good, let us tell now why the five sways, because there are also other ideas and we must not become confused without necessity. But this is the idea of the wrist of the human hand, with its five fingers, that simply sways easy, right? And that is why it is perfect and abundant (in old Heb.) Yet here arises some mixing of 4 and 5, maybe as adjacent digits, which is quite old, because in old Gr., as we said, 4 is τεσσερα, what is pretty similar with old Heb. tiferet (5), and what may be the reason for the mentioned Ger. relation vier - viel, and, in general, for the names of these two digits in various Western langs (e.g., in Ger. vier - fünf, in Eng. "four" - "five", in It. specially fourth and fifth are quarto and quinto, what must not be accidental). And the five, when it is beautiful and flexible like our hand, is symbol of strength and security, because the pentagram lies in the basis of ... Pentagon, to be sure, and of the five-rayed star (as much as it is not liked now by many people), because all stars are pictured usually with five rays (if we don't count the Heb. Star of David, built from two interwoven triangles).      So that the five is the wrist of the hand, but also the span of the hand, or the sole of the foot, and from here are all "pedies"-children (as well also those who like children but not just so -- i.e. the pederasts, what is well known word in many langs, yet in the Eng. people prefer to say homosexual men), but the curious thing (even for me) was that the ... heel of the foot must also be here, which in Rus. is 'pjatka' and in Bul. 'peta' (i.e. the relation 'pjatþ - pjatka' or 'pet - peta' simply cannot be accidental). Well, the heel surely is part of the "span of the foot", it is stamped on the earth by walking, but in it for the first time is seen the curvature in the picture of five, because the wrist is just torn, like a rag (what also is not accidental, for in Ger. the rag is Lappen, and the foot-sole is Fußlappen, where Fuß is foot). ( Here emerges also the ... petal, or Lat. petalum which is old Gr. πεταλον, but it will be too much for you to digress now also in this direction. )      And one more small addition: many digits are written stylized with as many strokes, as there signifies the very digit; it is so with: 1, 4, 5, 6, and 8. And, because many school children confuse 2 with 5 as fractions, let us explain this, too, it is so because 1/2 = 0.5, and 1/5 = 0.2, so that it turns as if the 2 and the 5 are mirrored images (if you put the mirror below the 2); this is consequence of arithmetic, but it has also found its reflection in the pictures of these two digits.      The six ...      Here, naturally, is the place for the six, but because it is so important and interesting we will ... jump over it at the moment. In order to give you more time to think about it. Well, let me give you one important hint: what is the relation between six and ... sex?      The seven and the eight      We discuss them together because there is not much to be said about each of these digits, but also because in some cases they are related. First the simplest moment, the image of 7 is, of course, ... a banner, on a long handle, which undulates (with the "iron" argument that: "And how else?)! Ah, but have you guessed why? Well, a Hebrew thing, in two words. God has created the world for 6 days and rested at the 7th, but this is 1/4 of a lunar month, so that there are reasons for its usage, and this is also prime number (and the ancient people have paid much attention to such numbers, although it can happen that in them are hidden ... secrets of the creation, more precisely in the distribution of big and enormous prime numbers towards the infinity). So that in old Heb. the 7 was od, what is exactly your word for odd, but to me personally it sounds like ... "Oh (said "daddy God", I have finished at last -- and wiped the sweat from His forehead)" (yet let me remind you that we, the Bulgarians, bur also many other nations, read the "h", so that there is not big difference from 'oh' to 'od'). While the 8 in the same old Heb. was yesod /'jesod', what now must be "yeah + od", but however we split it the 8 is subjugated to the 7, is formed with adding of something to the 7.      Now, it is true that this is a Hebrew thing, but it turns out that also all Slavs now already thousand of years think in the same way, because, really, in Bul. 8 is 'osem' and it is close to 7 what is 'sedem' (i.e. osem = do-to + se(de)m), and in Rus. it is also so (vosemþ-8 = vot-here + semþ-7), what is not justified because the 8 is very good number (as we will see soon), while the 7, at least according to the West, is one ... well, rotten number! Is it so? Yeah, it not only is so, but the people there tie the 7 to the 6, not to the 8, because, for example, in Ger. we have sechs ('zeks') - sieben ('ziiben'), in Fr. six - sept -- and this is rotten due to the fact that it is septic --, in Hol. is zes - zeven, in It. is sei - sette, and so on (and exactly this is cumulative proof, by the way, with many examples). This "septic" (attracting of all bacilli, cocci, and whatever may happen) by the 7 exists also in the ancient langs (without Heb.) where in old Gr. it was επτα (and now maybe is εφτα), and in Skr. was sapta.      While look at the 8, very twisted thing, twisted torus, what is so because it is the first cube (2^3), and its name on the West is simply an exclamation of astonishment and delight! Let us check this: in Ger. it is acht ('aht', i.e. "ah", and as a verb achten means "beware"), in Eng. it is "eight" what says 'ej', in Fr. is huit ('jui', i.e. something like your "gee", in Bul. I would have said 'uhaa'), in It. is otto (exactly the thing, so to say, ottimo there means excellent), in Sw. is atta, and so on, and in old Gr. is οκτο (something like "oho", what has gone unchanged in the Lat.), in Skr. is aštau ('ashtau') and in Avs . ašta, what is directly ... astounding. So that, as there is a phrase, "to the court everything is clear".      The nine      Yeah, but the 9 is not reversed 6, as you most probably have decided, because there is no logic in this (from mathematical standpoint). No, it is not this, it is rather one ... "no"! But let us look around firstly on the West, where we have: Ger. neun ('nojn'), your Eng. "nine", Sw. nio, Hol. negen, Fr. neuf ('njof'), It. nove (but 9th is nono), Sp. nueve -- maybe enough "cumulating", ah? -- and in the old langs respectively εννεα in old Gr., and in Skr. and Avs. nava. If you still have not grasped why the 9 means "no", then look that in some langs it means also something new. Does this help you? Well, if you are of those people that watch the ads then this surely will say nothing to you, but if you still can think a little, you are bound now, if you close your eyes, to see why the 9 is symbol of the new. Right? Because with it the digits finish, and we must begin again (in another decimal position, as it is by the meters). And for this reason the graphical image of 9 consists of ... two digits -- the first two, the 0 and the 1, where the 0 is above, and the 1 is below. This is the whole philosophy here (i.e., we have begun with the 1 and have reached to the 0, as a 10).      And what is the situation in the Sl. langs? Well, again so, because, in this situation (but not otherwise -- without the above explanations one would have hardly guessed this), Bul. 'devet' or Rus 'devjatþ' mean that the digits have ... gone somewhere ('djavam se' in Bul. /'detþsja' in Rus. is to disappear, to hide somewhere) -- the bloody digits, ah! Id est this time we are wondering, like the West wonders at the 8, only that we do this with the 9, because where is 'devjatþ' there is also the 'deva'-virgin or 'diva'-beauty (this is Skr. Diva or Deva, meaning also a goddess), and our 'divak' (in Bul., a savage, yet also 'diven'-marvelous creature, if you make this relation, that everything alive is marvelous and beautiful God's creation), and Rus. 'devatþ' (to put, but the meaning is of wondering where to put is, to take it away from here), and so on.      The ten      Well, the ten is not a digit, from point of view of mathematics, but can sometimes be counted for such (especially if we do not begin with the 0). Anyway, let us say something about it. Here also exists mixing of ideas, for in Eng. it is :ten", in Ger. zehn, in old Gr. δεκα (dieci in It., decem in Lat.), and here are the "deans" ('dekan'-s or 'djakon'-s in Sl.) and the "decades" and the ... "doctors" or "docs", as well as the "docents" (for doceo in Lat. is to teach). Then we may add here also the various "doctrines" (or "doxies") together with the ... "paradoxes" (this what is around and out of the "doxy"), and the orthodoxes (exactly according to the "doxy"-norm), which come from old Gr. δοξα ('doksa', a thesis, account, name, reputation, etc. -- in the ancient langs one word often has quite different meanings, for the reason that the people have started from the hidden in it ideas, which can be found in different things, in this case this is the essence of the thing), as well also from Ger. decken what means to cover. Look, in short this is the idea of the "cap"-hat, which, now as Gr. letter (καππα, kappa in Lat.) is exactly the tenth, and it simply crowns the things. Because of this here is Fr. chapeau ('shapjo'), Eng. "cap" and "cape", and even "cup", Lat. capito, the Capitolium, the "captains", the "capitalism" (i.e. the capital is the main thing, not the human), and a heap of other words. And the ancient word was old Heb. keter meaning crown or wreath, from which has left at least the first letter, though it meant 0 (i.e. this is some circle which is put on the heads of people, on which is worth to put some circles, in order to distinguish them from the others).      Now, the roots are pretty mixed, at least 'kapa-' and 'doks-' are entirely different things, more so zehn or ten, but at least our Sl. 'deset' is the Lat. deci-, and the "cap" came here due to its tenth place in the order of letters. The Ger. zehn is something pulled out (from their ziehen, i.e. climbed above, if we take the ten as last digit), or then, what seems more logical, is related with their counting, zahlen, to what we will come later again (though it is possible that it has something in common with their ... Zehe as a toe, i.e. something wiry, strong), and from there also with the Eng. ten. ( I personally, however, don't exclude entirely the possibility that the old Teutons have made their zehn taking the second syllable of Lat. deci, for the simple reason that have thought that "de" is a kind of prefix. )      Other special numbers      About the special position of the 4, eventually of the 5, we have already spoken. Then comes 12, what, quite obviously, is a very nice number because it divides by first four numbers (2, 3, and 4), and from here come the hours, apostles, minutes (they are divisible also by 5), and there existed some ancient systems of counting based on the number 60. There also the "dozen" ('dusina' in Bul.) is something like a cap, from the root "doc-". Together with 12 become special also 11 and 13, the first number because it is before 12, and the second -- after it. But here are other moments, too, because 11 is simply beautiful number, it can give also ... 1001, what likewise looks beautiful, and in addition is divisible -- this even mathematicians nowadays don't know, because have not thought about it -- by 7, 11, and 13 ! So that, when we take the two adjacent prime numbers around 12 (and such two adjacent primes are not many, they are the nearest possible, like 29 and 31, and this is interesting by itself), and when multiply them, and once more time multiply this by the previous prime number, we get 1001, what, if we take away the zeroes, gives exactly the middle number of those 3 primes, 11. This is part of the magic of numbers, in the old times, but also nowadays, it has filled the heads of the people. In addition to this 1001 is good number in the present days for the Hindus, because they don't like to sell (or buy) something for round amount of money (these are a kind of "dead" numbers, remind yourself the even number of flowers), and with 1 less there simply something of the number is missing, so for this reason they prefer to be 1001, 12001, and other similar variants. And when 12 is such beautiful number, then 13 can now be unpleasant, right, and for that reason the Russians (but surely also other nations) call it "devil's dozen".      Well, and 16, what for the Latins (at least in Fr. and It. this is so) is the limit till which we say first the second digit and then the first, while later it becomes on the contrary, is also remarkable because it is the first (if we don't count the trivial 1) fourth degree (of the 2). The Germans, though, change nothing in the reading of the digits even to ... 99, and who does not know this will look at it as at something quite perverse. Well, this is so, but for the reason that the other nations don't do this (but the English until two centuries ago, in the time of Charles Dickens, have done this, say, they have said that somebody is on "6 and 50 years"), but otherwise there is some reason in this, for when we add the numbers we begin with the last digits and then come to the tens; this, what is not convenient, is that for all numbers bigger than 100 this is already not so, yet 100 is quite a big number, and for this reason the English say, for example, not 1984th year digit by digit, but "19 hundred and 84th", and the money they also count in this way.      In the Eng. there is one "score", what means literally a stroke, but with the numbers it means 20, archaic. So why is this so, how do you think? Well, this is obvious (how Sherlock Holmes would have said), this is because we have finished all our fingers, including the toes (which are named also fingers in the Sl. langs), so that when there is nothing on which to count further we put a stroke somewhere and begin anew. The English have "gotten" this bad habit, surely, from the French, who even nowadays can't say, for example, 80, but say 4*20, or do not say 96 (even not "6 and 90"), but 4*20+6+10, yet when they reach 97, then they say 4*20+10+7. Here the points can not be in the special position only of 16, but of 6, too (to which we will come soon), but that's that. By 70, though, they decide that 60 is quite a good number (divisible by: 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5) and call it 60 + 10 (soixante-dix). The number 60 is strongly attracting, and for this reason the degrees in the circle are 360, not 100, what would have been more correct, but here comes also the period of our rotation around the Sun, so that 1 degree is one day, and by one minute a day increases (or decreases) the length of the day in each of the directions (i.e. by 2 min). Yeah, such curious moments, which nowadays are pure rudiments.      Big numbers      Well, here we can start with the 100, but firstly in the Western variants. Ger. hundert speaks about some ... dog (Hund), what might have meant earlier something important, or big amount (in any case they, as also the Russians, have the saying: "This is where the dog is buried", in the sense of something important, the core of the things). And the Eng. thousand, which is from Ger. Tausend (obviously), hides some hitting, crashing -- from the throwing of the money (eventually with the purse) on the table, I suppose --, though the etymologists give some old Teu. forms like: tusund, dusund, dhüsundi, Sw. tusen, and others, and explain that this was combination of dhüs + hundi, meaning many hundreds, but, as you see, the "dogs"-hundreds are again here. And what concerns the hitting and thumping (dhüs), this was some I.-E. root meaning inflating, swelling, and there was their thumb (Daumen in Ger.), only that for me the thumping is more convincing than a possible inflation. Be it as it may, this is near to Rus. 1000, 'tåisjacha' (for where is 'djus-' there is also 'tåis-'), and in addition the root 'djus-' is simply the 2, which leads us to the dozen, where we can add also Lat. duodenum what is some special bowel, so that the point hardly is in the inflating.      And here we come to the 'djijm', which is Rus. (and Bul.), but means the same as Eng. "inch", and also the same as Ger. "tsol" (Zoll), so that let us clarify the things a little. Well, the 'djijm', in my view, is simply Sl. variant of pronouncement of the ... Eng. "thumb", where is necessary the following explanation: this is not the length of the last phalanx of the thumb, but the thumb looked athwart (which is normally broad about 2.5 cm), because in this way can be put thumb to thumb and to measure. And when you arrange in this way 12 "thumbs", this must give exactly 1 foot, i.e. sole of the foot, and I personally measured it and by me it turned nearly so (11.5 thumbs, i.e. on the 12th the sole ends)! So that these relations are not at all arbitrary, they may be adjusted a little, but are quite close to the truth, for an average man (by the women the hands are finer).      The very inch (for me obviously) means that this is something that is put "in" something what we measure. And the Zoll had come from Lat. telonium (what is not at all obvious, but has to be so, for the reason that 't' can easily become 'tz' by the Germans, I'll tell you), what was from old Gr. τελωνια and meant a tax or charge, but this is so because here the idea is of some dividing (compare with Ger. Teil, 'tajl', as part). So, but the more important thing is that from the Zoll we can come directly to Ger. zahlen (to count), or the variation zählen (to pay, understand, paying the money), which was entirely Heb., namely tsoln, what meant to count. So that the Zoll is a measuring stick, where the root is not only Lat., but first of all Heb., and from here quite easily can come the Ger. ten (zehn), and the very counting. ( Ah, there is something more here, by the thousand, here is a relation with the Rus. ... 'tuman', what is your fog, and this root is quite spread in the world, but the idea is for something that is very 'gåsto' (in Bul., or 'gustoj' in Rus.), what is closely, very thick, because the ancient people believed that the darkness is something that conceals the light, but it is not the place here to indulge in such digressions. )      And the millions and milliards, more so the Am. variant billion, are something very ... -- but you surely will not guess this, ah? Well, the root 'mili-' is just something very nice, exactly 'milo' in Bul., what is related with the ... honey, which is 'meli' in old Gr., and there is something Ar. of that kind, and also in the Skr., because out of honey was made from quite ancient times the alcoholic beverage mead, and in Bul. (and other Sl. langs) 'med' is exactly bee honey (while the mead is 'medovina'). Here I also have not the possibility to digress, but can add at least that in this heap are all ... military people, i.e. 'mili hora' (in Bul., and 'hora' is people)!      Yeah, but we have almost forgotten about Bul. 1000, which is 'hiljada', and this neither is something 'milo'-nice, nor is swollen like the thumb, so what can it be then? Surely nobody could have guessed, and such things are not written in etymological dictionaries, because this word is typical Bul., not Sl., and in such case has to be something ancient that has come to us, either from Per., or from ... Mongolian, or from the Skr. But we can relate it easy with one Bul. jargon, ... 'hilja se', what means to smile happily, or rather to giggle! Yet in order not to think that I am inventing something with the ancient langs then compare it with Lat. hilarious (merry), or with Ger., rather Tyrolean 'ailaripi' (what isn't exactly a word, but then with their heil-'hajl', only without Hitler). And the idea about this giggling number -- well, it, naturally, giggles not the very number, but we, that see so many money at once (because the people, usually, think about money) -- gave me one Pakistani word, Naulakha, which meant 900,000, so that if the beginning is related with the 9 /neun /nine, then the "lahing" has to symbolize the 1000 (and in Ger. lachen-'lahen' is exactly to laugh, where the root is very ancient at least because ... the wife of Vishnu was Lakshmi, and she was pretty hilarious "girl", and had many faces). So, and here can be added also Tur. (and Bul., too) laf, what are usually funny stories told at the table during the eating and drinking (what leads us to your Eng. laugh, of course).      And what about our Sl. 100, which is 'sto' (in Bul., or 'sotnja' in Rus.)? Now look, the etymologists derive it from old Gr. εκατον (where we can mention also Lat. ... hecatomb, hundreds of vaults-tombs), and include in this heap also the hundred, and Lat. centum, but this may be so only because we want it to be so, for the reason that it means the same, yet the ideas hidden behind the words are different. In the ekaton there is some musical "tone", and " let us not make here guesses about what says to the Greeks the "eka"; in the centum is hidden some ... tinkling, clanging, like by the cents, or like also by the weighing scales which are centenarium in Lat., which was Gr. κεντηναριον (and from there we can go to Bul. archaic 'cantar' as the same scales -- they are iron, they clang); and in the word 'sto', in my view, is hidden simply ... the exclamation "stop", i.e. enough (hundred hits with a rod, for example, ah?). For us 'sto'-hundred is not a few, and similar idea, only that twisted enough around the 4, exist by the Russians, who call the ... centipede exactly 'sorokonozhka" (where 'sorok' is 40 and 'nozhka' is a small foot). If you so much want more ancient root then take the Skr. or Avs. satam, or some pre-Sl. 'såto', what is the root of satiation.      Again the six      To have guessed what should have been the relation between six and sex I don't believe, but let us first convince ourselves that this is so (cumulating the things from various langs). For example, in Lat. the number is sexis, and the sex (which for many nations means the gender) is sexus, in Ger. the number is sechs, read 'zeks' (what is pure sex, because they read each first "s" as 'z'; the gender there is Geschlecht, 'geshleht', what means a "bad thing", schlecht is "bad", because they are -- well, were, I mean -- moral people), and in old Gr. the number is εξι ('eksi', what, surely, sounds pretty sexy). But let be clear also on the point that the sex is identified with the sexual organ, and more precisely with the masculine one (because who has counted earlier the women for humans?) so that it turns that this body organ has to be tightly related with the 6. Now it becomes clearer, right? Because, if one decides to look at one such "sex", more so if he is a man and looks at the river, he will see there that it is similar to the 6, i.e. it has its stick and its circle (well, two circles, but in profile they look like one). So that it turns out that from deep antiquity (some 3000 years is a good guess) the number 6 was compared and likened to the male penis.      But, of course, these are things with mathematical idea in them, because the number six was considered as the perfect number (and that the penis is perfect creation must be clear to all women, and to the men, too), what means that it is equal, as to the sum, so also to the product of all of his simple divisors: 6 = 1*2*3 = 1+2+3. For the prime numbers is clear that there is no other such number because their sum is always with 1 more than the product (which is equal to the number), but for the compound numbers, too, it is intuitively clear that this must be so, because for 4 the sum is 5 and the product is 4, for 6 they are equal, and further more the sum is always less than the product (for 8 the sum is 1+2+2+2 = 7, and the number or the product are 8; for 9 the sum is 1+3+3 = 7; for 10 the sum is 1+2+5 = 8, end so on, where for, say, 100 the sum is 1+2+2+5+5 = 15, and so on). ( Well, this depends on the definition, and I give you the simplest, but in the "Elements" of Euclid was accepted that a perfect number is such for which the sum of all its divisors is equal to the number -- now not to the product --, and then, for example, 28 is also such number because 1+2+4+7+14 = 28, and there are also big such numbers like 496, for which 1+2+4+8+16+31+62+ 124+248 = 496 = 16*31, and so on, they are not limited. But even by this definition 6 is the smallest such number and it is only one digit. )      So that this idea was present in the heads of ancient Greeks and other nations before them, because also the Star of David is with 6 rays, and the die, i.e. the cube, has six sides (and in Bulgaria up to the present day is used six-point grading system in the education, where 6 is the highest grade), what again shows that not the male penis looks like the number 6, but the image of number 6 was so designed in order to symbolize this perfect (maybe the most perfect, or at least most emotionally accepted) organic creation. But these ideas can, up to some extent, be found also in the Sl. langs, for the reason that in Rus. the 6 is 'shestþ' (in Pol. is szešč, 'sheshch', and was some Baltic sheshi), while the ... rod or the stick is 'shest' and: just say now that 'shestþ' and 'shest', and this in one and the same lang., are not related! Besides, the very name 'shest' (so is the number in Bul.) is not very different from "sex", or take It. sei, what, if we read it with 'sh" in the beginning, is quite like in Bul., and in the Skr. this number was šat ('shat', what is practically the same sound that is heard when we brandish some stick) or also šaštiš, what can't miss to ... "shashtisa" you (if you know Bul., where to 'sashtisa', surely of Tur. origin, means to astonish, stupefy), right!? Let us add also that in Tur. the number 6 according to the dictionaries is alti, what is impossible not to correlate with their altin ('altån', for them the Lat. "i" very often is read like Bul. 'å', for the simple reason that they have not a big choice, either so, or with "a"), or rather a golden coin, but in the game of backgammon I am sure that 6 & 5 is called 'shesh-besh', where beş, 'besh', really, means 5, so that this root is not unknown by them. And also don't forget that all Skr. gods, when they look like humans, are with 6 extremities.      And what concerns the stick 'shest' in Rus., then their etymologists say that there was some old 'shåstå', then Belarusian 'shost', and mention some Latvian shiekshtas as ... tree trunk without branches. Well, but "that thing" is exactly like a tree trunk without branches, isn't it? They, surely, don't explain this, they rather guess, but if so then I can continue with other words, like Rus.: 'zhjostkij' (hard), 'zhestjanka' (a tin), 'zhelezo' (iron), 'zhezl' (a rod, scepter), as well also the ... 'zhele'-jelly, which is liquid, liquid, and at once hardens (well, nor exactly like iron, but nearly so). Id est the iron is a kind of jelly (while is liquid), and there was some old Sl. 'zhelåi' what meant ... turtle (because it is with hard shell), but the very word 'zheljaso'-iron (that's in Bul) corresponds well with Ger. Stahl ('shtahl', steel) or Stiel (stem of a flower). ( We could have thought that the ... 'zhålt'-yellow colour (in Bul.) is also somewhere here, but this is mixing or roots, the 'zhålto' is rather "gålto", or "goldeno"-golden, so that let us not digress with it. ) Ah, the Russians have also the word 'shesternja', what is a cogwheel, what may be so for the reason that the profile of the cogs looks like hexagonal, or may be minded the stick on which the cogwheel is placed (for there can't be a gear without axis).      But enough accumulating, now everything is clear, the six is a "great thing", like the "thing" of the male. And let us on parting return to the Gr., where their εξι-6 can be written also as εξ, what, obviously, has given the Lat. prefix "ex-" (which is 'iz' in Bul., and in It, only "s-"), as something that jumps at once -- so, there is nothing, nothing, and at once something suddenly pops out, ah? This is the 'sashtisvasht'-astounding number six, with which, quite deservedly, we finish our opus about the numbers.      Oct 2012