Re: [tied] Gender (Was: Dating PIE)

In the North Caucasus there are languages with up to eight noun classes or "genders"; Chechen, for example, has five or six depending on who's counting (Class I, "human", shows a m./f. subdivision). Originally the "non-human" classes correlated with such semantic characteristics as roundness, length and size.

Piotr

----- Original Message -----
From: Glen Gordon

To: cybalist@yahoogroups.com

Sent: Monday, November 05, 2001 1:07 AM

Subject: Re: [tied] Gender (Was: Dating PIE)
Ya know, Burushaski is a fun language to learn about "gender", George. It has four genders. The language also has some unintuitive and even sometimes downright amusing gender classifications.