Page:Hausa Proverbs.djvu/125

 Gender Formation in Hausa. 113 of words if a feminine is used at all, it is formed in two ways : — (1) By adding nia, (2) By adding ua, (weh). These terminations are directly borrowed from SoNG- HAi, in which language nia means " mother producer," as, — you nia bee, I.e. producer ( of honey touri nia tree,, fruit bearing and in which iveh means woman, as, — boro = man boro wey = woman fegi = ram f egi wey = sheep The first termination nia is merely added to the masculine. The second weh is more usually used with adjec- tives, and becomes '?^a. The following are examples : — sariki fem. saraunia barau j> baraunia gado }i gadonia yaro 5> yarinia kanne W kanua da )) dia dogo JJ dogua (dogo weh) Nearly all words ending in a are feminine, but this is probably due to the influence of Aeabic, and also to a desire to assimilate all words to a common rule.