onze
“onze” — eleven in Catalan. Numeral, level A1, topic — numbers and counting. A fused ten-one: from ten up, Catalan builds its numbers with no conjunction. In a live sentence: “El tren surt a les onze” — The train leaves at eleven. One of 56 words in the set “numbers and counting” in the Catalan course.
In short
| Written in Catalan | onze |
| Translation | eleven |
| Part of speech | numeral |
| Level | A1 |
Why it looks that way
A fused ten-one: from ten up, Catalan builds its numbers with no conjunction
A word with a story stays in memory longer than one learned as a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.
In a live sentence
A single word almost never appears alone in conversation. A sentence shows where it fits and what stands next to it.
- El tren surt a les onzeThe train leaves at eleven
Nearby words: numbers and counting
A price, the change, a house number, the time you agreed on, the floor. Numbers are the first thing you have to catch by ear — and the first thing people say fast.
- unoneMasculine: un cafè. For a woman or a feminine thing: una. Counting has no full uno in Catalan
- dostwoIt does not change by gender: dos cafès and dos cases alike
- tresthreeHence trimestre — three months — and triple
- quatrefourThe qu reads k, the u is silent: KWA-truh. Its neighbor què is the question word 'what'
- cincfiveThe final c devoices and sounds like k: sink
- sissixSixteen is setze, literally ten-six: numbers past ten are fused
- setsevenThe same word means 'thirst': tinc set — I'm thirsty, literally 'I have thirst'
- vuiteightNot Spanish ocho: the Catalan word is its own, buoyt. Eighteen is divuit
- nounineThe same word means 'new': un llibre nou. Only the context tells them apart — and the hint nearby
- deutenNineteen is dinou, literally ten-nine: the tens go first
Test yourself
Five questions from the same set — “numbers and counting”. Recalling a spelling from meaning is harder than knowing a familiar word on sight, and therefore more useful.
- How do you say “eleven” in Catalan?
A fused ten-one: from ten up, Catalan builds its numbers with no conjunction
- How do you say “seven” in Catalan?
The same word means 'thirst': tinc set — I'm thirsty, literally 'I have thirst'
- How do you say “three” in Catalan?
Hence trimestre — three months — and triple
- How do you say “ten” in Catalan?
Nineteen is dinou, literally ten-nine: the tens go first
- How do you say “six” in Catalan?
Sixteen is setze, literally ten-six: numbers past ten are fused
How not to forget this word
Reading a word and remembering it are different jobs. A day later, little survives of a single reading — and that is not bad memory, that is how memory works.
- This has been tested on foreign words too. The difference shows up most when you test yourself a few days later rather than straight away.checked many timesKim & Webb, 2022, Language Learning 72(2) · 48 experiments, 3,411 participants, 98 comparisons.
- Recalling beats re-reading. Covering the translation and trying to remember it does more than reading it ten more times.checked many timesAdesope, Trevisan & Sundararajan, 2017, Review of Educational Research 87(3) · 188 experiments, 272 comparisons. g = 0.61; against plain re-reading 0.51, against passive review 0.93.
- An answer you worked out yourself sticks better than one handed to you.checked many timesBertsch et al., 2007, Memory & Cognition 35(2) · 86 studies, 445 comparisons, d = 0.40.
Frequently asked
How do you say “eleven” in Catalan?
«onze». In a live sentence: “El tren surt a les onze” — The train leaves at eleven. Numeral, level A1, from the set “numbers and counting”.
Why does this word look the way it does?
A fused ten-one: from ten up, Catalan builds its numbers with no conjunction. A word with a story stays in memory longer than a “spelling — translation” pair: memory holds on to meaning, not to a string.