Tamil Numbers(Tamil: தமிழ் எண்கள், இலக்கங்கள்), refers to the numeral system of the Tamil language used officially in Tamil Nadu and Singapore, as well as by the other Tamil-speaking populations around the world including Mauritius, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Réunion, and South Africa, and other immigrant communities around the world.
History
Many linguists such as Bhadriraju Krishnamurti say that Tamil, as a Dravidian language, descends from Proto-Dravidian, a Proto-language. Linguistic reconstruction suggests that Proto-Dravidian was spoken around the third millennium BC, possibly in the region around the lower Godavari river basin in peninsular India.
The material evidence suggests that the speakers of Proto-Dravidian were of the culture associated with the Neolithic complexes of South India. The next phase in the reconstructed proto-history of Tamil is Proto-South Dravidian. The linguistic evidence suggests that Proto-South Dravidian was spoken around the middle of the second millennium BC, and that proto-Tamil emerged around the 3rd century BC. The earliest epigraphic attestations of Tamil are generally taken to have been written shortly thereafter. Among Indian languages, Tamil has the most ancient non-Sanskritised Indian literature. Scholars categorise the attested history of the language into three periods, Old Tamil(300 BC– AD 700), Middle Tamil(700–1600) and Modern Tamil(1600–present).
In November 2007, an excavation at Quseir-al-Qadim revealed Egyptian pottery dating back to first century BC with ancient Tamil Brahmi inscriptions.Tamil numbers are rooted way back in the past, but the exact time of emergence of these is still unknown to us. Tamil Alphabets and hence there is a total of 247 characters in Tamil. Many civilizations had cropped in India over time and this country has been ruled by many dynasties. With each dynasty, changes were made in the country in more than one aspect, language being one of them.
Numbers 1 to 10
Tamil Numbers, as in any other language start with the number Zero(0) or Poojyam. Below is the list of numbers starting from one to ten:
Number in English
Tamil Number Name
Pronunciation
0
பூஜ்ஜியம்
Poojyam
1
ஒன்று
Ondru
2
இரண்டு
Irandu
3
மூன்று
Mundru
4
நான்கு
Naangu
5
ஐந்து
Aintu
6
ஆறு
Aaru
7
ஏழு
Aelu
8
எட்டு
Ettu
9
ஒன்பது
Onbadhu
10
பத்து
Pathu
Tamil Numbers 10 to 100
These are a set of two-digit Tamil Numbers which are formed by using the above mentioned single digit numbers. Ten is the first two digit number and Hundred being the first three digit number.