The difference between Ordinal and Ordinal number

When used as nouns, ordinal means an ordinal number such as first, second and third, whereas ordinal number means a word that expresses the relative position of an item in a sequence.

Ordinal is also adjective with the meaning: indicating position in a sequence.

check bellow for the other definitions of Ordinal and Ordinal number

  1. Ordinal as an adjective (maths, of a number):

    indicating position in a sequence

  2. Ordinal as an adjective (taxonomy):

    Of or relating to the groupings called orders

  3. Ordinal as an adjective (nautical):

    intercardinal

  1. Ordinal as a noun:

    An ordinal number such as first, second and third.

    Examples:

    "The most common numerals in Latin, as in English, are the "cardinals"...and the "ordinals"...'' — F. M. Wheelock, ''Wheelock’s Latin'', 6th ed. revised (2005), p97"

  2. Ordinal as a noun:

    A book used in the ordination of Anglican ministers, or in certain Roman Catholic services

  1. Ordinal number as a noun (grammar):

    A word that expresses the relative position of an item in a sequence.

    Examples:

    "First, second and third are the ordinal numbers corresponding to one, two and three."

  2. Ordinal number as a noun (arithmetic):

    A natural number used to denote position in a sequence.

    Examples:

    "In the expression a<sub>3</sub>, the "3" is an ordinal number. "

  3. Ordinal number as a noun (set theory):

    Such a number generalised to correspond to any cardinal number (the size of some set); formally, the order type of some well-ordered set of some cardinality a, which represents an equivalence class of well-ordered sets (exactly those of cardinality a) under the equivalence relation "existence of an order-preserving bijection".

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