Definition

1. Indefinite pronoun:
   • How many tens / How many decades: Used to ask about an approximate quantity in multiples of ten, often implying a large but indefinite number.
   • Not many / Not much / Of little value: Used to indicate that something is insignificant, not worth much, or of small quantity.

Usage Examples

• Indefinite pronoun:
  • Công trình này tốn biết mấy mươi năm. (This project took many tens of years.)
  • Chiếc thoa là của mấy mươi. (That hairpin is a thing of little value.)

Advanced Usage

• The phrase is often used in classical or literary Vietnamese, particularly in poetry (like the works of Nguyễn Du), to convey a rhetorical sense of quantity or worth.
• It can be used in a rhetorical question to emphasize the large, often uncountable, number of something (e.g., hardships, years).

Variants and Related Words

• Mấy (indefinite pronoun): a few, several, how many.
• Mươi (numeral suffix): -ty (as in twenty, thirty), used to form tens.

Synonyms

• Bao nhiêu: how much, how many.
• Không đáng bao nhiêu: not worth much.
• Vài ba: a few, several (but typically smaller scale than "mấy mươi").

Related Idioms

• Biết mấy mươi: An intensified form meaning "who knows how many tens," used to emphasize a large, indefinite amount.
  • Anh ấy đã trải qua biết mấy mươi khó khăn. (He has gone through who knows how many tens of hardships.)