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Dual (grammatical number)

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Dual is the grammatical number used for two referents.

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Comparative characteristics

Most languages (though not all) make a distinction between singular and plural: English, for example, distinguishes between 'man' and 'men', or 'house' and 'houses'. In some languages, in addition to such singular and plural forms there is also a dual form, which is used when exactly two people or things are meant. If English had a dual (let's imagine it involved adding -a to the singular), 'man' might go something like this: one man, two mana, three men etc. In many languages with dual forms, use of the dual is mandatory, and the plural is used only for groups greater than two. In some languages, however (for example, many modern Arabic dialects, including Egyptian Arabic, and Ancient Greek), use of the dual is optional. In other languages (for example, Hebrew), the dual exists only for a few measure words and for words that naturally come in pairs (such as eyes). In Slovenian, strangely, the dual is used for most nouns, but not for nouns that come in natural pairs (like socks or eyes); the plural is used instead. In many other Slavic languages there is a special plural for counting 2, as well as 3 and 4.

Although relatively few languages have the dual number and most have no number or only singular and plural, using different words for groups of two and groups greater than two is not uncommon. English has words distinguishing dual vs. plural number, including: both/all, between/among, latter/last, either/any, and neither/none. Japanese, which today has no grammatical number, also has words dochira (which of the two) and dore (which of the three or more).

Use in modern languages

Among living languages, modern standard Arabic has a mandatory dual number, marked on nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns. (First-person dual forms, however, do not exist; compare this to the lack of third-person dual forms in the old Germanic languages.) Many of the spoken Arabic dialects have a dual marking for nouns (only), but its use is not mandatory. Hebrew, a related Semitic language, also has some forms of dual, largely for measurements of time, parts of the body and things that come in pairs, such as שבועות /ʃavuʕot'/ (two weeks), עינים /ʕeɪna'jim/(eyes), שינים /ʃina'jim/(teeth, even all 32), and משקפים /miʃqafa'jim/ (eyeglasses). Likewise, Akkadian had a dual number, though its use was confined to standard phrases like "two hands", "two eyes", and "two arms".

The Inuktitut language uses dual forms.

In Austronesian languages, particularly Polynesian languages such as Hawaiian, Niuean and Tongan, possess a dual number for pronouns but not for nouns (indeed, they tend not to mark nouns for number at all). Other Austronesian languages, particularly those spoken in the Philippines, have a dual first-person pronoun; these languages include Ilokano (data), Tausug (kita), and Kapampangan (ikata). These forms mean we, but specifically you and I. This form once existed in Tagalog but has largely disappeared, save for certain rural dialects, since the middle of the 20th century.

The dual was a standard feature of the Proto-Uralic language, and lives on in Sami languages and Samoyedic languages, while other branches like Finnish, Estonian and Hungarian have lost it. Sami also features dual pronouns, expressing the concept of "we two here" as contrasted to "we". Nenets, a Samoyedic language, features a complete set of dual possessive suffixes for two systems, the number of possessor and the number of possessed objects (for example, "two houses of us two" expressed in one word).

The dual form is also used in several modern Indo-European languages, such as Scottish Gaelic, Slovenian and Sorbian (see below for details). The dual was a common feature of all early Slavic languages at the beginning of the second millennium.

Dual form in Indo-European languages

From comparisons of existing and recorded languages, linguists have concluded that the Proto-Indo-European language had dual forms. This use was preserved in the earliest records of Indo-European languages. This is best represented in Sanskrit, with a mandatory dual number for all inflected categories: nouns, verbs, adjectives and pronouns. The Ancient Greek language used in the Homeric texts, the Iliad and Odyssey, likewise had dual forms for all inflected categories, although their use was only sporadic, owing as much to artistic prerogatives as dictional and metrical requirements within the hexameter meter. In the classical dialects, the dual tended to disappear but was continued in the Attic dialect of Athens through the fifth century B.C, again sporadically according the author's taste and certain stock conventions.

Old Church Slavonic and Proto-Slavic (the ancestor of the Slavic languages) had dual forms, as did Old Irish and Avestan. (Sanskrit and the Slavic languages agree in showing only three dual forms for nouns: nominative-accusative-vocative, dative-ablative-instrumental, and genitive-locative. Greek has only two forms, and Old Irish only one. Avestan has a genitive dual separate from the locative, but this may not go back to Proto-Indo-European.)

The dual form was present in the early Germanic languages. Gothic had first- and second-person dual marking on verbs and pronouns; Old English, Old Norse and other old Germanic languages had dual marking only on first- and second-person pronouns. The dual has disappeared from all modern Germanic languages -- although only quite recently in North FrisianHowe, Stephen. The Personal Pronouns in the Germanic Languages. A study of personal pronoun morphology and change in the Germanic languages from the first records to the present day. [Studia Linguistica Germanica, 43]. Berlin: de Gruyter,1996. (xxii + 390 pp.) pp. 193-195.. Interestingly, the old dual pronouns have become the standard plural pronouns in Icelandic.

Early Celtic languages show dual forms, and in modern Scottish Gaelic dual forms of nouns are required following the numeral 'dà' ("two"). However, when no numeral is present the plural form is used. In the case of masculine nouns, the dual form is identical with that of the singular, however in conservative usage some feminine nouns have a distinct dual form. Example: with a masc. noun - 'dà chù' "two dogs" (sg. 'cù') vs 'trì coin[pl]' "three dogs"; with a fem. noun - 'dà làimh' "two hands" (sg. 'làmh') vs. 'trì làmhan[pl]'.

Among Indo-European languages of the present day, the dual form endured for relatively long in the Slavic languages. Slovenian uses the dual number in full (although it tends to disappear in informal speech among young people), and Sorbian, the Slavic language of a very small minority in Germany, also uses the dual number. Among the Baltic languages, the dual form existed but is now obsolete in standard Lithuanian, being used in poetic contexts and some dialects.

Dual form in Slavic languages

Every Slavic language has retained lexical remnants of the dual. The old plural of "oko", eye, was "očesa". In almost every language in which the dual has disappeared, "očesa" has disappeared along with it, and the form "oči" has predominated. (Slovene "očesa" pushed out "oči" instead, becoming the proper dual (and plural) of "oko"). The same is true for "uho" ("ear"). In Bulgarian and Macedonian, "rące" and "noze" have become the regular plurals for old nouns "hands" ("arms") and "feet" ("legs").

Czech

Official Czech also has few remnants of dual: certain body parts in instrumental and genitive (and the modifying adjectives) require the dual, for example, "se svýma očima" (inst. dual with one's own eyes) and "u nohou" (gen. dual at the feet). However, it has lost its numerical meaning: it is used for these body parts regardless of their number ("skladba pro čtyři ruce" (composition for four hands)) and the plural is used for figurative meanings ("hrnec s dvěma uchama" (pot with two ears=handles)). Colloquial Czech substitutes the instrumental dual for the instrumental plural. Thus, while "s kamarády" (with friends) would be grammatically correct, this, in colloquial Czech, is rendered "s kamarádama", which reflects the form of the dual. The dual in old Czech was more extensive, and included such things as pronouns (onĕ - they for two females).

Polish

Polish had dual in normal use in its earliest forms. Today only some objects that come in pairs like "two hands", "two eyes" (but not "two ears" or "two legs") use it in some inflected forms -- both the plural and the "fossilised" dual form for them is correct:

Traces of the dual remain also in numerals like 20 and 200:

Serbian/Croatian

In Serbian and Croatian the dual form has been retained in nouns that appear together with numbers: two, three and four and with the word "both". This form is merged with singular genitive case, and the plural genitive is used with numbers of 5 and more:

For noun vuk ("wolf"):
singular 1 vuk
plural (without number) vukovi
dual (singular genitive) 2,3,4 vuka
plural with number (plural genitive) 5 vukova

Slovene

As already stated, Slovene (also known as Slovenian) uses dual in full, (except for natural pairs). This may be explained by the fact that Slovene as a formalised language is relatively new and the geographical situation of Slovenia (greatly mountainous) favored a strong inertia. For some declensions (like genitive), the dual form merges with the plural form. The presence of such a number does not invalidate the existence of the pronoun both (oba(dva) or obe(dve)).

Dual is one of the most distinctive feature of Slovene language and a mark of recognition, and is often noticed in touristic brochures. Some explanations (the both of us example) tend to make dual as a mark of closeness, while really by itself it has nothing to do with closeness, just with numbering (consider the intimacy of two cars…), although, of course, context may depict such a “real” closeness.

Slovene courses for foreigners tend to dismiss or, at least, delay the learning, of the dual number, further encouraging its “segregation”.

Nominative case of noun "city":

singular: 1 mesto dual: 2 mesti plural: 3-4 mesta, 5+ mest

Examples

Lithuanian

Singular Dual Plural
vyras ("Man") vyru vyrai
mergina ("Girl") mergini merginos
einu ("I go") einava einame

Polish

In Polish there is only singular and plural. But there used to be a dual, which (like in nearly all slavic languages) has become extinct.

Traces can still be seen in today's polish, though rarely, for example, with parts of the body: w ręce ("in one hand"), w ręku ("in both hands"), w rękach ("in the hands", for example, of enemies, that is, in many hands), which derives from ręka ("Hand"), dwie ręce ("two hands"), trzy ręki (archaic) ("three hands"). This is often seen in sayings and most recently in the work of polish write Adam Mickiewicz in the 19th century.

Latin

Austro-Bavarian

In Austro-Bavarian the old dual form is used today for all plurals. There is no separate dual form anymore.

Gothic

Languages with dual number

See also

Notes

 

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