Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics
Grammatical category of nouns which marks quantity. Number can also be applied to other parts of speech (
adjective, pronoun, finite verb form) through agreement. The most common categories of number are singular and plural; there are also systems which have a dual ( Greek, Sanskrit, and Gothic) and a trialis (e.g. some South-West Pacific languages). In some languages there is a paucalis for indicating a small number, as in Arabic.
Another kind of more complicated number system can be found in languages which differentiate between a basic form (collective) which is indifferent in respect to number, and a more complicated derived form for single entities (singulative) ( Breton). Often not all nouns in a language can occur in all numbers (cf. single-only, plural-only, mass nouns). Classifying languages generally have no formal number system.
References
Bartsch, R. 1973. The semantics and syntax of number and numbers.
In P.Kimball (ed.), Syntax and Semantics. New York. Vol. 2, 51–93.
Greenberg, J.H. 1988. The first person inclusive dual as an ambiguous category. SLang 12. 1–19.
Hurford, J.R. 1987. Language and number: the emergence of a cognitive system. Oxford.
Reid, W. 1991. Verb and noun number in English: a functional explanation. London.
Wickens, M.A. 1991. Grammatical number in English nouns: an empirical and theoretical account. Amsterdam and Philadelphia.
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