How many 虾 are 三只半虾？

Question

I was reading about 《三只半虾》齐白石，以画虾享誉画坛。

三只虾：3 prawns

半虾：half a prawn

一半只虾： half a prawn

三只半虾：3 and 1 half prawns?? or 3 half prawns = 1 and 1 half prawns??

*三半只虾？？？= ？

score 3 · Answer 1 · answered Aug 07 '20 at 14:28

三只虾：3 prawns

good

半虾：half a prawn

Wrong. It should be 半只虾

一半只虾： half a prawn

Wrong. See above.

三只半虾：3 and 1 half prawns?? or 3 half prawns = 1 and 1 half prawns??

Three and a half prawns.

Chinese grammar wiki has a page about Expressing half with ban.

The structure "Number + Measure Word + 半 + Noun" means "Number and a half nouns"

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Aug 07 '20 at 14:25

2

三只半 = 三只 + 半只 = 3.5只

三半只虾 Is wrong, but you can say 三个半只虾, which means there are 3 pieces, and each piece is a half prawn. It doesn't equal to 1.5 只虾 (一只半虾), because there is not a complete one.

answered Aug 07 '20 at 14:25

River

2,626
5
15

score 1 · Answer 3 · answered Aug 07 '20 at 17:59

1

3.5只。

‘半’ following a measure word means 'and a half' (e.g. 两年半： two years and a half; 三只半虾：three prawns and a half), while followed by a mearsure word it means 'half a' (e.g. 半只虾： half a prawn).

answered Aug 07 '20 at 17:59

Mu Young

47
2

两年半 doesn't have any measure word – blackgreen Aug 07 '20 at 21:04
两年半 is actually a shorter form of 两年半（时间）and the latter is quite common in both written and spoken language (e.g 这个项目花了我两年半时间。It took me 2 years to finish the project.). So here 年 is better to be interpreted as a measure word - it specifies the time is measured by 'year', instead of 'day/week' etc, and would make more sense in the general 'number + measure word + noun' framework in Chinese. – Mu Young Aug 09 '20 at 08:26

How many 虾 are 三只半虾？

3 Answers3