Today I am starting another post series on English numbers. If you want to look back on my last post series on numbers, from more than a year ago, here are the links: Numbers Review – Part I, Numbers Review – Part II, and Numbers Review – Part III.

This new series will be a bit less basic, and I hope a bit more fun. The posts in this series will come out this November, (November is for numbers!) on this Transparent Language blog, starting now!

I started thinking of writing more about numbers after listening to a very interesting podcast (podcast = an audio program that is downloaded from the internet) about number.  Here is the link to this 20-minute Radiolab podcast.  I highly recommend intermediate to advanced level English language learners take a listen to this podcast, beginners may find it too difficult as it is intended for native speakers. I have another link for beginners below, so don’t worry.

http://www.radiolab.org/story/love-numbers/

In this first post of the November Numbers series, we are going to look at the number seven! In upcoming posts in this series we will look more broadly at other numbers in English, but today we are just going to look at the number seven, and here is why:

I learned from listening to the podcast (that I told you about above) that the number seven is the world’s favorite number!

The author Alex Bellos, did some research on this, including a poll online with people from around the world and he found that overwhelmingly the number seven is the world’s favorite number. Seven actually happens to be my favorite number too! You can see the poll results for the world’s favorite number at Alex Bellos’ website:

http://pages.bloomsbury.com/favouritenumber/7

At this website you can also see the YouTube video I have pasted below. This video is about the number seven and why Bellos thinks people like it so much. This video is the easier listening exercise I mentioned above, for English language learners of all levels.

Now, since this post is about the number seven, let’s look at things that come in “sevens” and their names in English. Here is a list of different groups that come in sevens.  As you look at this list see if you can think of the names (in English) for the seven items that make up each group or category.

–    days of the week
–    continents
–    seas
–    wonders of the world
–    dwarfs (from the story Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs)
–    “deadly sins” (according to the Catholic church)

Here is something else that English speakers say happens in seven:

If you break a mirror, you are said to have seven years of bad luck! So, it is always good to be extra careful around mirrors.

 

 

Now, let’s look at the English names for the groups of sevens listed above.

The seven days of the week: Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

The seven continents: Asia, Africa, North America, South America, Antarctica, Europe, and Australia.

The seven seas: This is tricky! The term “the seven seas” has meant different things to different people and cultures throughout history. Here is what the Oxford online dictionary lists as the seven seas: the Arctic, Antarctic, North Pacific, South Pacific, North Atlantic, South Atlantic, and Indian Oceans.

The seven wonders of the world: These are now considered the seven wonders of the ancient world, but here they are: Great Pyramid of Giza, Hanging Gardens of Babylon, Statue of Zeus at Olympia, Temple of Artemis at Ephesus, Mausoleum at Halicarnassus, Colossus of Rhodes, Lighthouse of Alexandria.

The seven dwarfs: Doc, Grumpy, Happy, Sleepy, Bashful, Sneezy, and Dopey.

The seven deadly sins: lust, gluttony, greed, sloth, wrath, envy and pride.

Can you think of any other things that come in groups of seven? Please add to this list if you can. Also, stay tuned for my next post in the November Numbers series!