Indefinite and fictitious numbers

 ( Large Numbers ) 

The oldest reference to "umpty" — in a June 17, 1848 issue of the Louisville Morning Courier — indicates that at that time it was slang for empty. (Available online to subscribers.) This is confirmed by a humorous short story in the North Carolina Hillsborough Recorder of June 30, 1852. (Available online to subscribers.)

By 1905, "umpty", in the expression "umpty-seven", had come to imply a multiple of ten. (available online to subscribers)Warren Harding, quoted in Advertising & Selling 29:28-52:26 (1920) Umpty came from a verbalization of a dash in Morse code.

"Umpteen", adding the ending -teen, as in "thirteen", is first attested in 1884, (Available online to subscribers.) The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (2000), 4th ed. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. (available online to subscribers) Umpteen, Merriam-Webster. Accessed 2014-06-29. and has become by far the most common form.

In Norwegian, ørten is used in a similar way, playing on the numbers from tretten (13) to nitten (19), but often signifying a much larger number.

Similarly, though with a larger base, Portuguese has , which is derived from the words mil(har) (1000) and the suffix -entos, present in words like trezentos (300) or quinhentos (500), roughly meaning "hundred".

Spanish uses tropecientos/tropecientas in Spain and chorrocientos/chorrocientas in El Salvador and Mexico referring to a high number in a colloquial way. Cientos means "hundreds".

These words are intended to denote a number that is large enough to be unfathomable and are typically used as hyperbole or for comic effect. They have no precise value or order. They form Ordinal numeral and fractions with the usual suffix -th, e.g. "I asked her for the jillionth time", or are used with the suffix "-aire" to describe a wealthy person.

Some words that have a precise numerical definition can be used indefinitely. These include couple (2),"couple (noun)", Merriam-Webster Dictionary, definition 4 dozen (12), score (20), and myriad (10,000).

When a quantity word is prefixed with an indefinite article then it is sometimes intended or interpreted to be indefinite. For example, "one million" is clearly definite, but "a million" could be used to mean either a definite (she has a million followers now) or an indefinite value (she signed what felt like a million papers).

The title The Book of One Thousand and One Nights ( lit. "a thousand nights and one night") implies a large number of nights. Many book titles use this convention as well, such as 1,001 Uses for ....

In Basque, bost, "5", also means "a lot". Similarly, hamaika, "11", also means "a lot".

In Chinese language, , 108,000 li, means a great distance.

In Danish language, hundrede og sytten ("a hundred and seventeen") can mean any arbitrary number.

In French language, 36 and 36,000 are occasionally used as a synonym for "very many".

In Hebrew and other Middle Eastern traditions, the number 40 is used to express a large but unspecific number,A.D. Alderson, Fahir İz, The Concise Oxford Turkish Dictionary, Oxford, 1959, s.v. kırk: "Forty; used especially to denote a large indefinite number"Biblical Criticism", The Classical Journal 36:71:83 ff (March 1827) full text as in the Hebrew Bible's "forty days and forty nights", Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves, and the Forty Martyrs of Sebaste.Michael David Coogan, A Brief Introduction to the Old Testament: The Hebrew Bible in Its Context, Oxford, 2008, p. 116 "Forty: Stands in the Bible for a generation (e.g., the forty years of wandering in the desert), hence for any period of time the exact duration of which is unknown (comp. Gen. vii. 4, 12, 17; viii. 6; Ex. xxiv. 18, xxxiv. 28; Deut. ix. 9, 11, 18; x. 10; I Sam. xvii. 16; I Kings xix. 8; Jonah iii. 4). In later literature forty is commonly used as a round number (comp. Gittin 39b, 40a; Soṭah 34a; Jerusalem Talmud iv. 8; et al.)." This usage is sometimes found in English as well (for example, ""). Oxford English Dictionary, 1st edition, s.v. 'forty' A.b.

In Hungarian there are several expressions meaning "very many". A traditional expression is mint égen a csillag ("as many as the stars" in the sky). Sometimes specific numbers (e.g., 36,000 or 60,000) are used like in Danish or in French. Kismillió ("little million") is somewhat old, but a few decades ago it was still in use. From the end of the 20th century csillió began to spread. Csillió is a new word: it may be the result of combining the words csillag (star), e-nyelv.hu: Hogy alakult ki a csillió jelentés? and millió (million). Csillió szó jelentése Its enhanced version is csilliárd combining csillag and milliárd (billion). e-nyelv.hu: csillió, csilliárd

In Irish language, 100,000 ( céad míle) is used, as in the phrase , "a hundred thousand welcomes" or Gabriel Rosenstock's poetic phrase ("my hundred thousand loves").

In Japanese, , 8000, is used: ( lit. 8,000 herbs) means a variety of herbs and ( lit. 8,000 generations) means eternity.

In Latin language, (600) was used to mean a very large number, perhaps from the size of a Roman cohort.Lewis and Short, A Latin Dictionary, s.v. sescenti The modern word million derives from an Italian augmentative of the Latin word for thousand, .

In Polish language, tysiąc pięćset sto dziewięćset ("one thousand five hundred one hundred nine hundred") is used, to refer to an indefinitely large number.

In Scottish Gaelic, 100,000 ( ceud mìle) is used to mean a great number, as in the phrase ceud mìle fàilte, "a hundred thousand welcomes."

In Swedish language, or is used ( "fifty-eleven" and "seventy-eleven", although never actually intended to refer to the numbers 61 and 81).

In Thai language, ร้อยแปด ( roi paed) means both 108 and miscellaneous, various, plentiful.

In Welsh language, cant a mil, literally "a hundred and thousand", is used to mean a large number in a similar way to English "a hundred and one". It is used in phrases such as cant a mil o bethau i'w wneud "a hundred and one things to do" i.e. "many, many things to do".

The number 10,000 is used to express an even larger approximate number, as in Hebrew r^evâvâh, rendered into Greek as , and to English myriad. Oxford English Dictionary, 3rd edition, s.v. 'myriad' Similar usage is found in the East Asian or ( lit. 10,000; ), and the South Asian lakh ( lit. 100,000). Oxford English Dictionary 1st ed., s.v. 'lakh'