Интерпретация на вариативност при изразяване на количествена характеристика в българския и полския език

The paper is an attempt to establish some basic regularities in the quantitative characterization of objects and phenomena on the word-formation and the syntactic level. Distinguished and discussed are four types of quantity-defining relations: (1) quantitative-substantive-possessive; (2) quantitative-metral; (3) quantitative-temporal, and (4) quantitative-directional. On the basis of data analysed, some basic semantic and formal restrictions in the expression of quantity characteristics in Polish and Bulgarian are defined contrastively; possible directions for general linguistic research are pointed out in connection with the problem of reflecting the picture of the world by speakers of different languages.