top two univesities or two top universities

They mean different things, IMO. "Top Two Universities" would mean the two that were ranked No.1 and No.2 in some kind of league. "Two Top Universities" might mean that they could be, eg. No.2 and No.5 out of hundreds. I would use "Two of the top universities", as this makes things clearer.

And welcome to A2K.

Ahhh, the Queens English never becomes outdated.

Somewhere I've read that it is a common misconception that English nouns have a genitive case, marked by the possessive -'s ending.
But it is perhaps posh to write the same way as the royalty speaks.


[And your new tv?]

Walter, the trip was a failure. Couldn't decide between a handsome Sony and an American RCA that cost half as much...such is life.

But yeah, Queen's English, eh?

When using more than 1 adjective to describe a noun, it does not matter what order they appear in, and two and top are both adjectives.

The order "two top" seems a bit less clear to me. "Top two" has a better sound to it. Sorry, that's not avery scholarly approach, but I think it's very accurate.

top two is more frequently used, and therefore it will sound more natural because we have heard it more...but every concept has a most frequently used phrasing which will sound most natural, and we don't always have to use the top choice if there are other valid ones.

I considered that, Stuh, but in a way the most frequent usage of words becomes the correct usage. Some adjectives should have precedence.

Think of "A big green monster" vs. "A green big monster". "Big green" would be the preferable order, and could almost be registered as one adjective subconsciously. However, for "green big" to sound right you almost need a comma.

Just my thoughts. More of an opinion, but I think I've breezed past the subject in a grammar book.

That's a good example. It's interesting...descriptions of size seem to preceed color or other characteristics, and descriptions of light seem to preceed color -- in terms of what sounds natural.

eg,

"humongous spiked tail" is another example of size before other characteristics

and "dark blue", "shiny red", "mottled green" are all descriptions of light before color

It sort of goes from abstract to concrete. For example, I think "silly" would normally come before the subtleties of light... give me a little more time to think about it.

I've been analyzing a few different adjective sets, trying every type of order. In one case, ancient, red, shiny, and large applying to a coin. (I consider words like ancient or silly to be the most abstract, since they are not directly physical, albeit they may have physical manifestations).

And I came to the conclusion that I'm just being silly.

so top two=two top, but the former is preferable? and two top is not the same as two of the top ..?

correct

"top two" refers to the best and the second best, or the two that are tied for best

"two of the top" refers to any combination of 2 which are among the "top" which is an arbitrary amount, so you cannot assume that either of them will actually be one of the top two

thanks.