§51. Reduplicative derivatives are formed from nouns of one syllable, by prefixing အ to the noun reduplicated, or from nouns of two syllables, the first being a syllabic အ, by dropping the အ in the second number of the reduplication; and such derivations imply generality or universality; thus from ပြည် a country, is formed အပြည်ပြည်တို့ (with the plural affix), many or all countries; and for အမျိုး, a race, အမျိုးမျိုးတို့ many or all races.
§52. Compound derivatives will be considered under the head of verbal nouns.
number.
§53. Nouns have two numbers, the singular and plural. The simple noun may be regarded as being in the singular number, as လူ, a man; though the noun in its simple state, without any definite adjunct, has frequently a generic meaning, as လူသေတတ်သည်, man is mortal.
§54. The plural is formed by affixing တို့ (pronounced ဒို့), do, to the singular, as လူ, a man, လူတို့ men. The adjective များ is sometimes used instead of တို့, and sometimes both are combined, as လူများ, or လူများတို့, men.
gender.
§55. The Burmese language recognizes no grammatical or artificial gender, but that only which consists in the distinction of the sexes, viz, the masculine and the feminine.
§56. The two genders are distinguished, sometimes by different words, as ယောက်ျား, a man, မိမ္မ, a woman; sometimes by regarding the simple noun as masculine, and affixing မ for feminine, as ရဟန်း, a priest (of Boodh), ရဟန်းမ, a priestess; and sometimes by affixing ထီး, or ဖ, or ဖို, for the masculine, and မ for the feminine; as ခွေးထီး, a dog, ခွေးမ, a bitch; ကြက်ဖ, a cock, ကြက်မ, a hen; ငန်းဖို, a gander, ငန်းမ, a goose.
case.
§57. The relations of nouns expressed in most languages by prepositions or inflections, are in the Burmese language expressed
