DD, This is very much like Craig's example, "rolling sevens". These instances of number words are numerals functionally shifted to nouns. In your second example, "three" is not numerical but indexical, and in the third "sevens" now is the name of the symbol. These multiple uses have to be covered at some point in school grammar, but I don't know where, probably quite late. The fact that these words take plural inflection is good evidence that they either belong to both classes or that they have undergone functional shift. I'll have to think a little about how to tell those two possibilities apart. Language is messy, and we can't expect grammar to be a whole lot less so. Think how boring it'd all be otherwise. Herb -----Original Message----- From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of DD Farms Sent: Friday, August 11, 2006 2:42 PM To: [log in to unmask] Subject: Re: Greenbaum's word classes At 07:24 AM 8/11/2006, Stahlke, Herbert F.W. wrote:. . . >As to the status of "numeral", number words do not inflect. Lifer military DD: "Columns of twos to the left, HUT!"; "Count out by threes, Hut!" Teacher DD: "All the threes are acting strange today."; "The Europeans write their sevens like this." To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/ To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/