Wikifunctions:Human languages/Z1179

Tyap (Z1179): Niger-Congo language spoken in central Nigeria

• Tyap has six determiners/definite articles which determine the pronoun, number (1-5), etc. forms used.
  • ka & wu (basically for singular nouns and adjectives with a few exceptions)
  • hu & ji (for singular and plural nouns and adjectives)
  • ba & na (mainly for plural nouns.
    • Determiners come after nouns.
    • When an adjective comes before a noun, the determiner used is that of the adjective. E.g., a̱sham (ka) - (the) beautiful, kyang (hu) - (the) thing = a̱sham kyang (ka) - (the) beautiful thing.
• Tyap has a non-uniform noun class system used for noun pluralization and conversion from one part of speech to another. E.g., a̱bwom (song) and bwom (to sing), a̱fufwuo (ears) and fufwuo (ear).
• Affixation: Prefixes exist but suffixes hardly are found.