German 
French 
English 
Spanish 
Chinese 
Japanese 
Korean 
Hindi 
Norwegian 
The four letters French numbers ignore
Take any number and write it out in full. Do it again. Count as high as your courage allows. You could spend the whole day on it: you will never write the letter J, nor K, nor W, nor Y. And to see a simple B appear, you have to reach… one thousand billion. A small exploration of a territory nobody thinks to roam: the spelling of numbers.
A hunt for letters
The idea is simple: spell out numbers one by one — « zéro », « un », « deux », « trois »… — and note, for each letter of the alphabet, the first number in which it appears. I gave the chore to a program that can write French numbers according to the usual rules (« quatre-vingt-dix-sept », « deux cent mille », etc.). The result draws an unexpected geography of our alphabet.
Four letters missing in action
The first surprise is what never comes. Four letters are totally excluded from the vocabulary of numbers: J, K, W and Y. You may count to infinity; none of them will show up. The reason is clear once you think about it: no French number word — from units to the highest scales — contains them. The « y » in « pays » or the « k » in « kilo » was never invited to the counting table.
The B that keeps you waiting
The second surprise is more spectacular. The letter B does exist in numbers… but it hides very, very far away. From zero to 999,999,999,999, there is no trace of a B: not in the units, nor in « cent », « mille », « million » or « milliard ». You have to climb to mille milliards — a French billion, meaning 1012 — before the first occurrence of the letter finally appears. In other words, you can name every number up to nearly one thousand billion without ever drawing a single B.
English speakers know a related oddity: in their language, you have to count to one thousand to meet the first letter A. Every language has its shy letters.
The ranking of first appearances
For the rest, the parade starts earlier. From « zéro », you already get E, O, R and Z. « Un » adds U and N. « Deux » brings D and X. « Trois » slips in I, S and T. A waits for « quatre », C waits for « cinq », P hides in « sept », H in « huit », F in « neuf ». Then the pace slows: V and G only arrive with « vingt », and the very common L and M wait until « mille ». Who would have guessed that M, so ordinary, is absent from every number below one thousand?
Counting what nobody counts
None of this is useful, of course. But it is the kind of observation that quietly changes how you look at things: the next time you write a check or fill in a form in words, you will know you are moving through an alphabet missing four letters, and that a B there is worth its weight in billions. Numbers, which we imagine neutral and cold, have spelling habits too.
Method: numbers written according to French convention (France), with « billion » meaning one thousand billion (1012). Results are fully reproducible by program.
The four letters French numbers ignore
Take any number and write it out in full. Do it again. Count as high as your courage allows. You could spend the whole day on it: you will never write the letter J, nor K, nor W, nor Y. And to see a simple B appear, you have to reach… one thousand billion. A small exploration of a territory nobody thinks to roam: the spelling of numbers.
A hunt for letters
The idea is simple: spell out numbers one by one — « zéro », « un », « deux », « trois »… — and note, for each letter of the alphabet, the first number in which it appears. I gave the chore to a program that can write French numbers according to the usual rules (« quatre-vingt-dix-sept », « deux cent mille », etc.). The result draws an unexpected geography of our alphabet.
Four letters missing in action
The first surprise is what never comes. Four letters are totally excluded from the vocabulary of numbers: J, K, W and Y. You may count to infinity; none of them will show up. The reason is clear once you think about it: no French number word — from units to the highest scales — contains them. The « y » in « pays » or the « k » in « kilo » was never invited to the counting table.
The B that keeps you waiting
The second surprise is more spectacular. The letter B does exist in numbers… but it hides very, very far away. From zero to 999,999,999,999, there is no trace of a B: not in the units, nor in « cent », « mille », « million » or « milliard ». You have to climb to mille milliards — a French billion, meaning 1012 — before the first occurrence of the letter finally appears. In other words, you can name every number up to nearly one thousand billion without ever drawing a single B.
English speakers know a related oddity: in their language, you have to count to one thousand to meet the first letter A. Every language has its shy letters.
The ranking of first appearances
For the rest, the parade starts earlier. From « zéro », you already get E, O, R and Z. « Un » adds U and N. « Deux » brings D and X. « Trois » slips in I, S and T. A waits for « quatre », C waits for « cinq », P hides in « sept », H in « huit », F in « neuf ». Then the pace slows: V and G only arrive with « vingt », and the very common L and M wait until « mille ». Who would have guessed that M, so ordinary, is absent from every number below one thousand?
Counting what nobody counts
None of this is useful, of course. But it is the kind of observation that quietly changes how you look at things: the next time you write a check or fill in a form in words, you will know you are moving through an alphabet missing four letters, and that a B there is worth its weight in billions. Numbers, which we imagine neutral and cold, have spelling habits too.
Method: numbers written according to French convention (France), with « billion » meaning one thousand billion (1012). Results are fully reproducible by program.
The four letters French numbers ignore
Take any number and write it out in full. Do it again. Count as high as your courage allows. You could spend the whole day on it: you will never write the letter J, nor K, nor W, nor Y. And to see a simple B appear, you have to reach… one thousand billion. A small exploration of a territory nobody thinks to roam: the spelling of numbers.
A hunt for letters
The idea is simple: spell out numbers one by one — « zéro », « un », « deux », « trois »… — and note, for each letter of the alphabet, the first number in which it appears. I gave the chore to a program that can write French numbers according to the usual rules (« quatre-vingt-dix-sept », « deux cent mille », etc.). The result draws an unexpected geography of our alphabet.
Four letters missing in action
The first surprise is what never comes. Four letters are totally excluded from the vocabulary of numbers: J, K, W and Y. You may count to infinity; none of them will show up. The reason is clear once you think about it: no French number word — from units to the highest scales — contains them. The « y » in « pays » or the « k » in « kilo » was never invited to the counting table.
The B that keeps you waiting
The second surprise is more spectacular. The letter B does exist in numbers… but it hides very, very far away. From zero to 999,999,999,999, there is no trace of a B: not in the units, nor in « cent », « mille », « million » or « milliard ». You have to climb to mille milliards — a French billion, meaning 1012 — before the first occurrence of the letter finally appears. In other words, you can name every number up to nearly one thousand billion without ever drawing a single B.
English speakers know a related oddity: in their language, you have to count to one thousand to meet the first letter A. Every language has its shy letters.
The ranking of first appearances
For the rest, the parade starts earlier. From « zéro », you already get E, O, R and Z. « Un » adds U and N. « Deux » brings D and X. « Trois » slips in I, S and T. A waits for « quatre », C waits for « cinq », P hides in « sept », H in « huit », F in « neuf ». Then the pace slows: V and G only arrive with « vingt », and the very common L and M wait until « mille ». Who would have guessed that M, so ordinary, is absent from every number below one thousand?
Counting what nobody counts
None of this is useful, of course. But it is the kind of observation that quietly changes how you look at things: the next time you write a check or fill in a form in words, you will know you are moving through an alphabet missing four letters, and that a B there is worth its weight in billions. Numbers, which we imagine neutral and cold, have spelling habits too.
Method: numbers written according to French convention (France), with « billion » meaning one thousand billion (1012). Results are fully reproducible by program.
