a man of four and fifty

Hi,

Mr. Warburton was a man of four and fifty.

Please, in what cases can we say so instead of “fifty-four” ? Is it bookish or outdated?

Thanks.

In the standard literary and spoken language, you simply wouldn't use that construction. When it is used, it sounds archaic and flowery.

"Four and Fifty" is flowery yes. Even nursery rhimish (eg. "Four and Twenty blackbirds baked in a pie")

Outside of an attempt to sound Medieval, or poetic, I would avoid it.

Although, in your example above:
"Mr. Warburton was a man of four and fifty. "
I could see ti being used for literary effect, so try it!

The constructive "four and fifty" comes from Old English and is of Germanic root. German still uses this construction: fifty-four in German is vier und funftig (four and fifty).

Or rather, vierundfünfzig. :)

Many thanks.

Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie
When the pie was opened, the birds began to fly.....

It's purely poetic.

<<Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie
When the pie was opened, the birds began to fly.....
>>

I thought they began to sing...

Sing a song of sixpence, a pocket full of rye
Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie
When the pie was opened they all began to sing:
'Oh wasn't that a dainty dish to set before the King!'

The King was in his counting-house, counting out his money,
The Queen was in the parlour, eating bread and honey,
The maid was in the garden, hanging out the clothes,
When down came a blackbird and pecked off her nose!

There you go, that was the version I was brought up with.

Lovely!

Fly...sing.....blackbirds do both! :-)

Not sure they could do either too well after being baked in a pie.

Did you know they actually did eat blackbirds way back in Tudor times? It'd turn my stomach to know that one of those gorgeous little birds was in a tasty looking pie......some people think that the song of the blackbird is sweeter and more melodious than that of the nightingale. We have loads of blackbirds in Scotland but nightingales don't extend any further north than the English Midlands.

I wouldn't suggest using four and fifty in any literary text. It is too archaic. As a former editor for a literary journal, if someone had written four and fifty, I would immediately have known them as an amateur with few exceptions. No poet or novelist writes like that now.

<<"Mr. Warburton was a man of four and fifty. " >>

Well, in the above, you really cannot directly replace "four and fifty" with "fifty-four" because of the "of"

--> "Mr. Warburton was a man of fifty-four??? "

The only other way to say it is close to the original would be:

-->"Mr. Warburton was a man fifty-four years of age. "

which changes the sentence meter and flow.

So in this type of instance I could accept it. It adds an air of quaint or deviating-from-the-customary type of charm