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bratteolas trabibus sublevit, ut omnis aurulenta lux esset intus, ceu iubar sub ortu. subdidit et Parias fulvis laquearibus columnas, distinguit illic quas quaternus ordo.
1953 translation by H. J. Thomson
He laid plates on the beams so as to make all the light within golden like the sun’s radiance at its rising, and supported the gold-panelled ceiling on pillars of Parian marble set out there in four rows.
c. 1450 – 1500, Ludovico Lazzarelli, De gentilium deorum imaginibus 225:
To whom all are under, to whom is subject the Primum Mobile As well as eight globes in perpetual motion And to whom subsides the fourfold rank of the elements Whom anything that breathes in the entire world worships.
Usage notes
This is part of the Latin series of distributive numerals. These numerals are inflected as first/second-declension adjectives; in Classical Latin, they typically accompany plural nouns (with which they agree in case and gender) and have the following functions:
to express the sense “ s each/apiece”, as in hominis digiti ternos articulos habent, “a man’s fingers have three joints each” (Pliny the Elder, Natural History 11.244.3).
to express multiplication after a numeral adverb, as in Gallinaciis enim pullis bis deni dies opus sunt, pavoninis ter noveni "hens' need twice ten days, peahens' thrice nine" (Marcus Terentius Varro, Res Rusticae 3.9.10)
to express the sense of cardinal numerals when used with pluralia tantum (plural-only nouns) such as castra "camp": for example, "twelve camps" is expressed by duodēna castra (Pliny the Elder, Natural History 7.105.5). Distributive forms are regularly used in this context for the number 2 and for all numbers greater than 4. For 1, plural-only nouns are used with plural inflected forms of the cardinal ūnus(“one”), as in ūnaescālae "one flight of stairs" (rather than with forms of the distributive numeral singulus). For 3 and 4, plural-only nouns are used with the plural inflected forms of trīnus and quadrīnus, as in trīnacastra "three camps" (rather than with forms of ternus and quaternus, which tend to be used in distributive function).
These adjectives do not normally occur in the singular. However, some singular forms are attested in Classical Latin poetry, possibly motivated by metrical considerations (e.g. corpore bīnō "twofold body" in Lucretius De Rerum Natura 5.879, and bīnus ... honor "double/twofold honor" in Ovid Epistulae ex Ponto 4.9.64). Singular forms are also attested in postclassical Latin, where these adjectives sometimes have non-distributive meanings (taking an ordinal, cardinal, or collective sense instead). These alternative senses are sometimes continued by Romance descendants (e.g. Spanish noveno(“ninth”) from Latin novēnus).
The genitive plural of singulus is usually singulōrum/singulārum, but distributive numerals greater than one commonly use short genitive plural forms ending in -um rather than the longer forms ending in -ōrum and -ārum.
Declension
First/second-declension adjective (distributive, normally plural-only; short genitive plurals in -num preferred).
↑ 1.01.11.2Henry John Roby (1876) A Grammar of the Latin Language from Plautus to Suetonius, volume 1, pages 443-444
↑ 2.02.1J. P. Postgate (1907) “The so-called Distributives in Latin”, in The Classical Review, volume 21, number 7, page 201
^ S. E. Jackson (1909) “Indogermanic Numerals”, in The Classical Review, volume 23, number 7, page 164
↑ 4.04.1Karl Gottlob Zumpt (1853) Leonhard Schmitz, Charles Anthon, transl., A Grammar of the Latin Language, 3rd edition, page 101
^ Николае Сараманду, Мануела Невачи (2019) “Лингвистичен мотивационен анализ на балкански и романски характерни особености в Европейския лингвистичен атлас ”, in БЪЛГАРСКИ ЕЗИК / BULGARIAN LANGUAGE (in Bulgarian), volume 66, number 3, →DOI, →ISSN, page 17