English Numerals - Specialized Numbers

Specialized Numbers

See also: Number_prefix#Table_of_number_prefixes_in_English

A few numbers have special names (in addition to their regular names):

• 0: has several other names, depending on context:
  • zero: formal scientific usage
  • naught / nought: mostly British usage
  • aught: Mostly archaic but still occasionally used when a digit in mid-number is 0 (as in "thirty-aught-six", the .30-06 Springfield rifle cartridge and by association guns that fire it)
  • oh: used when spelling numbers (like telephone, bank account, bus line )
  • nil: in general sport scores, British usage ("The score is two–nil.")
  • nothing: in general sport scores, American usage ("The score is two to nothing.")
  • null: used technically to refer to an object or idea related to nothingness. The 0th aleph number is pronounced "aleph-null".
  • love: in tennis, badminton, squash and similar sports (origin disputed, often said to come from French l'œuf, "egg"; but the Oxford English Dictionary mentions the phrase for love, meaning nothing is at risk)
  • zilch, nada (from Spanish), zip: used informally when stressing nothingness; this is true especially in combination with one another ("You know nothing—zero, zip, nada, zilch!"); American usage
  • nix: also used as a verb; mostly American usage
  • cypher / cipher: archaic, from French chiffre, in turn from Arabic sifr, meaning zero
  • goose egg (informal)
  • duck (used in cricket when a batsman is dismissed without scoring)

• 1:
  • ace: in certain sports and games, as in tennis or golf, indicating success with one stroke, and the face of a die or playing card with one pip
  • birdie in golf denotes one stroke less than par, and bogey, one stroke more than par
  • solo
  • unit
  • linear the degree of a polynomial is 1

• 2:
  • couple
  • brace, from Old French "arms" (the plural of arm), as in "what can be held in two arms".
  • pair
  • deuce: the face of a die or playing card with two pips
  • eagle in golf denotes two strokes less than par
  • duo
  • quadratic the degree of a polynomial is 2
• 3:
  • trey: the face of a die or playing card with three pips
  • trio
  • trips: three-of-a-kind in a poker hand. a player has three cards with the same numerical value
  • cubic the degree of a polynomial is 3
  • albatross in golf denotes three strokes less than par. Sometimes called double eagle
• 4:
  • cater: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with four pips
  • quartet
  • quartic or biquadratic the degree of a polynomial is 4
  • condor in golf denotes four strokes less than par
• 5:
  • cinque: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with five pips
  • quintet
  • nickel (informal American, from the value of the nickel (United States coin), but applied in non-monetary references)
  • quintic the degree of a polynomial is 5
• 6:
  • half a dozen
  • sice: (rare) the face of a die or playing card with six pips
  • sextet
  • sextic or hectic the degree of a polynomial is 6
• 7:
  • septet
  • septic or heptic the degree of a polynomial is 7
• 8:
  • octet
• 9:
  • nonet
• 10:
  • decet
• 12: a dozen (first power of the duodecimal base), used mostly in commerce
• 13: a baker's dozen
• 20: a score (first power of the vigesimal base), nowadays archaic; famously used in the opening of the Gettysburg Address: "Four score and seven years ago..." The Number of the Beast in the King James Bible is rendered "Six hundred threescore and six".
• 50: half a century, literally half of a hundred, usually used in cricket scores.
• 100: a century, also used in cricket scores.
• 120: a great hundred (twelve tens; as opposed to the small hundred, i.e. 100 or ten tens), also called small gross (ten dozens), both archaic; also sometimes referred to as duodecimal hundred
• 144: a gross (a dozen dozens, second power of the duodecimal base), used mostly in commerce
• 1000: a grand, colloquially used especially when referring to money, also in fractions and multiples, e.g. half a grand, two grand, etc.
• 1728: a great gross (a dozen gross, third power of the duodecimal base), used mostly in commerce
• 10,000: a myriad (a hundred hundred), commonly used in the sense of an indefinite very high number
• 100,000: a lakh (a hundred thousand), loanword used mainly in Indian English
• 10,000,000: a crore (a hundred lakh), loanword used mainly in Indian English
• 10100: googol (1 followed by 100 zeros), used in mathematics; not to be confused with the name of the company Google (which was originally a misspelling of googol)
• 10googol googolplex (1 followed by a googol of zeros)
• 10googolplex googolplexplex (1 followed by a googolplex of zeros)

Combinations of numbers in most sports scores are read as in the following examples:

• 1–0 British English: one nil; American English: one-nothing, one-zip, or one-zero
• 0–0 British English: nil-nil, or more rarely nil all; American English: zero-zero or nothing-nothing, (occasionally scoreless or no score)
• 2–2 two-two or two all; American English also twos, two to two, even at two, or two up.)

Naming conventions of Tennis scores (and related sports) are different than other sports.