An old one-two consisting of two quick punches delivered one after the another is just that: dos puñetazos, uno tras otro but the closest to the one, two that is followed by buckle my shoe would be a la una mi aceituna, a las dos mi reloj - my olive at one, my watch at two.
Not exactly a nursery rhyme, it was – still is? - chanted by girls while bouncing a ball against a wall. It goes up to six, unlike the similar one, two, three a-laira played by English-speaking girls which reaches ten.
Uno es ninguno – one is none refers to a completely different activity and was an often-heard admonition aimed at couples who in the past chose to have just one child. This tended to be pronounced by the parents of the type of large family – familia numerosa that was commonplace until Spain over-reacted by having the lowest birth rate in Europe.
One is one and all alone is lonely in Spanish, too: más solo que la una but to say one by one, opt for uno por uno or uno a uno. One of a kind is a concise único, a word you also need when translating the one thing, so the one thing I want is la única cosa que quiero.
One and only in a phrase like the one and only Elvis is the faintly fulsome el incomparable Elvis or el irrepitible Elvis.
There are occasions when one doesn’t enter picture and is implied, not stated: I prefer the new one - prefiero el nuevo but a loved one is un ser querido, literally a loved being, and a little one that is a child turns into una pequeña when female and un pequeño when male.
Manco is a specific but stark word meaning one-armed that now verges on the politically incorrect and a one-armed bandit or fruit machine is una máquina tragaperras (literally a coin-swallower).
In one word - as in in one word it was awful - multiplies itself by two to become en dos palabras, fue horroroso but the one moment, please that requests patience or permission to interrupt stays singular: un momento, por favor.
On the other hand there is a touch of testiness when momento stands unadorned but because Spanish always damns with diminutives, it is infinitely more tetchy when turned into momentito.
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