Hey guys, again I found two different ways to translate numbers to Dothraki, but now it's the 1 and 2 in ordinals. This is how they were translated:
#1 - Ataki - Atak
#2 - Akataki - Akatak
Which are the right? Thanks!
Zhey GreyGandalf, welcome to the Dothraki/Valyrian forums! I hope you enjoy our forums and come back here often.
Now, to answer your question: Both forms are correct. The form to use depends on how you use the ordinal number. We'll consider the second form first.
An ordinal number is created by adding the nominative case marker /-ak/ to the number. Thus at-ak, akat-ak, etc. (In case you are not familiar with noun cases, noun cases indicate what role a noun has in a sentence. In this particular case,
nominative case is the case used on nouns that are the subject of a sentence.) Use as such, the term would mean 'first one', 'second one', etc. This also makes the ordinal number an
animate noun, which has different rules for usage than an inanimate noun. Noun animacy is a big subject!
The first form is the form of an ordinal number when it is used to directly modify a noun. The addition of the /-i/ places the ordinal number noun in the
genitive case, a noun case that generally indicates possession. This would be used for such Dothraki phrases as
hrazef mekaki “the fifth horse” or
diaf qazataki “the ninth skull”.
You can learn all about numbers at this blog post by David Peterson:
http://www.dothraki.com/2011/10/numbers-numbers-everywhere/Make sure you also check out the Dothraki/Valyrian wiki, where almost everything we know about Dothraki or Valyrian is posted.
http://wiki.dothraki.org/Main_Page (Note the URL for this site had a minor change about 24 hours before this post.)
