Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee

(a) The words for the numeral one assimilate in the specimens 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9: again, but distinctly, in 14, 12, 15, 16: also in 26, 25, 13: in 21, 18, 20, 19: in 27, 28, 29, (making apparently five roots), but they remain solitary in 11, 17, 22, 23, 24 30 and 31. The numeral one in 14 is not unlike the two in 8, 9, 2, 3, and the one in 12, would, with the prefix of y, be precisely the same as the two of 25. Excepting Kakee, one, the Inkran numerals seem to have been adopted as those of Adampë, for the convenience of trade and intercourse, but I will add a few words, to show that the languages are radically different:

(b) The numeral two is the most general word, and may be assimilated in 2, 3, 8, 9, 4, 5, 1, 6, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. There is little difference between the numerals two and five in most of these, and five in 15 and 16, precisely answers to two in 1 and 2.

(c) Three may be assimilated in 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. In 12, 13, 14, 16, it approaches to the Congo and Mozambique tatoo and atatoo.

(d) I have observed that in most African languages there is less distinction in the words for four and five, than between any other of the numerals and that frequently the word for five in one language, is identical with that for four in another, geographically remote. Four may be assimilated in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 6, 14, for the two latter deviate only in the substitution of one liquid for another, which is as common in the languages of Africa as in those of America. The words for four in the above suite do not seem of a different root from those in 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, and 21, from which it only varies in 20 by the prefix of nabo. With the difference of a single letter, the same word for four is found in the Yngwa (13) and the Empoöngwa (31) which are 1000 miles distant. Four in Congo is m’na, in Empoöngwa, nahee. Sanu, the Kaffer four, is approached in 18.

(e) Five may be assimilated from 1 to 17, (11 excepted) one liquid being substituted for another in 14, an leer being prefixed in 13. It is remarkable too that we again identify this numeral in the Malemba, Embomma, and Empoöngwa languages, by removing the prefixes t, to, and neh, from the words tanoo, toanoo, and nehanee. Below five, the numerals in the Inkran lose all identity with those of the languages with which it has been hitherto assimilated.

(f) Six assimilates from 1 to 9, in 12 to 17 (14 excepted) in 20, 23, 24, in 17 and 22; but remains distinct in all the others. The Sanbal of Oöngobai (30) approaches the Sambanoo of the Embomma.

(g) Seven assimilates in 1 to 9; in 12, 13, 16, but in no others.

(h) Eight assimilates in 2, 3, 6, 7; in 11 to 17, (14 excepted) all of which, with 31, approximate to E’nana, the word for eight in the Malemba.

(i) Ten assimilates in 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 12, in 4, 5, 6, in 17, 19, 25, 26, 29, in 13, 15, and in 14, 20, 22, 23, 24.