ordinal interrogative pronouns

[Elena Maslova]

Yukaghir has an ordinal interrogative, derived from
the interrogative quantificational stem qam- in the same way as
the ordinal numerals are derived from the numeral stems:

Examples from Kolyma Yukaghir:

ataq- '2' --> ataq-un 'two' (cardinal attributive form) vs.
ataq-lesh-te 'second' (ordinal attributive), ataq-lesh-ki
(ordinal
substantive "the second one")

qam-un "how many" (attributive form) -->
qam-lesh-te 'wievielte' (attributive form) -->
qam-lesh-ki 'which one (in order)' (independent form)

(here -lesh- is a suffix used only for ordinal numerals, -te and
-ki are attributive and nominative forms respectively of the
nominal possessive cross-reference suffix (3 person), apparently
degrammaticalized in this context).

It also seems to me that the Russian interrogative adjective
"kotor-yj" has the ordinal meaning as its primary sense, although
a meaning like "which" (of a definite set) is also possible. A
question like

Kotoryj schnizel ty esh?
?which Schnitzel Du frisst

would most probably be understood as an equivalent of Frans's
first example and answered by an ordinal numeral (if adverbials
like "schon" or "jetzt" are added, this would be the only
option).

In addition, this meaning can be stressed by adding "po schetu"
(Prolative preposition + count-OBLQ), i.e. "Kotoryj po schetu" is
unambiguous and rather idiomatic, it can certainly be viewed as a
kind of ordinal interrogative.

Best,

Lena Maslova