A Grammar of Italian Sign Language (LIS)

Numerals can be classified into three categories: cardinal, ordinal, and distributive numerals. LIS exhibits all the three categories.

            Cardinals are used to specify the number of entities referred to and answer the question ‘How many?’. In the example below, the cardinal numeral three is used to specify the exact number of suitcases the signer noticed.

            airport inside suitcase three ix₁ see

            ‘At the airport, I noticed three suitcases.’

Ordinals combine a numerical quantity with order. They are employed to rank entities according to a certain order and answer the question ‘Which in order?’. In the example below, the ordinal numeral third is used to identify one particular suitcase in an ordered set.

            suitcase third ix₁ take

            ‘I grabbed the third suitcase.’

Distributives combine a numerical quantity with distribution. They indicate how a certain quantity is distributed over some entities and answer the question ‘How many each?’. In the example below, the distributive numeral three_distr indicates how many suitcases each person is allowed to bring on the airplane.

            suitcase three_distr maximum bring be_able

            ‘You can bring up to three suitcases each.’

For a discussion about the syntactic distribution of numerals within the nominal phrase, see SYNTAX 4.3.