Rory Stewart came across these numerals, apparently still used to count sheep by Cumbrian farmers. They trot off the tongue like spring lambs, skippety, hoppity, gambol and stop:
‘yan, tan, tethera, methera, pimp, sethera, lethera, hovera, dovera, dick, yan-a-dick, methera, bamfit, gigot’.
The last one is reminiscent of the French version of roast lamb, ‘gigot d’agneau’.
Source: Rory Stewart, The Marches: Border Walks with my Father (London: Vintage, 2017), p. 154
Photo credit: 1899441 at pixabay

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