Knowledge base · Part X — The Personal-Affix System and Alignment · this topic as a network
63. First- and Second-Person Singular Affixes (ku=/en=, e=/e=)
What are the first- and second-person singular verbal affixes in Hokkaido Ainu, and how do they distinguish or merge subject and object roles?
In Ainu oral literature, the inflectional prefix i- functions as the first-person objective marker, and the use of this first-person singular or plural object prefix is restricted to oral literature (Satō 2016, Satō 2022: 16.4).
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Forms and alignment
For first- and second-person singular, does Hokkaido Ainu use distinct affixes for subject and object, or is there syncretism?
First-person singular verbal agreement exhibits a nominative/accusative alignment, marking subjects (A and S) with ku= and objects (O) with en=, contrasting with second-person verbal agreement, which follows a neutral alignment without distinction between A, S, and O, marking the singular with e= and the plural with eci= (Bugaeva 2006: 186, Bugaeva 2008). In the Saru dialect, the first-person singular has the pronoun káni, the nominative affix ku-, and the objective affix 'en-, which has singular grammatical number and refers to the speaker (Tamura 1972: 18). Also in the Saru dialect, the first-person singular subject is marked by ku- across one-, two-, and three-argument verbs, and the first-person singular object is marked by en- (Bugaeva & Kobayashi 2022: 15.2). Correspondingly, in the Saru dialect, the second-person singular is marked by e- for both subjects across one-, two-, and three-argument verbs and objects, and the second-person plural is marked by eci- for both subjects and objects (Bugaeva & Kobayashi 2022: 15.2). In the Shizunai dialect, in combined nominative-objective forms, the first-person nominative is always realized as a- or an-, identical to the indefinite pronominal affix (Refsing 1986). In the classical language, a second-person subject acting on a first-person object is marked by prefixing e-i- for a singular subject or echi-i- for a plural subject to the verb (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936). In Classical Ainu, second-person and third-person zero subject marking are the same for both intransitive and transitive verbs (Shibatani 1990: 24). In Classical Ainu, the first-person singular intransitive verb suffix -an retains its vowel a even when the stem vowel is o, as in hosipi-an 'I returned' (Shibatani 1990).
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First-person singular subject: ku= and k=
Which affix indexes a first-person singular subject in Hokkaido Ainu, and what allomorphs or variants does it show?
The first-person singular subjective personal affix is ku- ~ k- (Satō 2008: 29). These subject personal affixes k- and ku- cannot stand as independent words and must be placed immediately preceding the verb (Satō 2008: 29). The affix takes the form k- before vowel-initial verbs and ku- before consonant-initial verbs (Satō 2008: 25), specifically appearing as ku- before consonants and as k- before vowels except i (Satō 2008: 30). In colloquial Ainu, the first-person singular transitive verb prefix ku- is not affected by the stem vowel, as in ku-kor 'I have' (Shibatani 1990). In the colloquial subjective conjugation of Class I verbs, the first-person singular is ku-, the first-person plural exclusive is chi-, and the first-person plural inclusive is a- (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936), and more generally in Colloquial Ainu, the first-person transitive subject markers are ku- for singular, ci- for exclusive plural, and a- (an-) for inclusive plural (Shibatani 1990). In Southern Hokkaido, the prefix ku= (first-person singular A/S) loses its vowel /u/ before a vowel-initial verb stem (/a, e, o, u/), becoming k= (Bugaeva 2012: 468–469). In Western Hidaka and Chitose dialects, before verb stems beginning with a, u, e, or o, the vowel u of the first-person singular subject prefix k(u)= drops, and k fuses with the initial syllable (Nakagawa 2024: 166). In the Saru dialect, the person affixes ku= 'I' and ci= 'we' lose their vowels /u/ and /i/ respectively before words beginning with /a, u, e, o/ (Nakagawa 2024: 33). In the Saru dialect, when quoting one's own speech, the quotative first person is not used, and regular first-person forms such as káni and ku- are retained (Tamura 1972). In the Shizunai dialect, the first-person singular nominative is marked by the prefix ku- (Refsing 1986). This prefix ku- in the Shizunai dialect never occurs in yukar epics, belongs strictly to everyday colloquial speech (Refsing 1986: 215), is restricted to a personal and concrete first person, and is avoided in quotations and pretended first-person contexts in favor of the indefinite person (Refsing 1986: 215). In Sakhalin Ainu elder speech, the youth speech first-person plural affix 'an=/='an is used as the first-person singular personal affix instead of ku= (Murasaki 2025: 86).
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First-person singular object: en=
Which affix indexes a first-person singular object in Hokkaido Ainu, and what semantic roles (patient, recipient) does it cover?
In the spoken language, the first-person singular object of a transitive verb is marked by the prefix en- (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936). The first-person singular objective personal affix is en- ('me / to me'), distinct in form from the subjective ku- or k- (Satō 2008: 31, 32, 120). In Colloquial Ainu, the first-person object markers are en- for singular, un- for exclusive plural, and i- for inclusive plural (Shibatani 1990). The prefix i- also marks the first-person singular objective (Satō 2008: 368). The objective prefix en- basically means 'me' in the accusative, but when used with ditransitive verbs of giving such as kore 'give', it corresponds to or is translated as the dative 'to me' (Satō 2008: 100, 119). In colloquial speech in Hokkaido, the combination of a second-person singular subject with a first-person singular object is not *e-en- but en-, with the second-person singular subject prefix e- not appearing, a characteristic also shared by the elevated or poetic language (Satō 2008: 336). In the Chitose dialect, an action from a second-person singular or plural subject to a first-person singular object is expressed solely by en-, lacking an overt second-person subject prefix and thus not forming *e-en- or *eci-en- (Satō 2008: 147). In Chitose Ainu, the poetic or elevated first-person object personal affix meaning 'you to me' as a combined subject/object marker is i- (Satō 2008: 92). In the Saru and Chitose dialects, the combination of a second-person singular subject and a first-person object is expressed as en= for a singular object and un= for a plural object, identical to the forms for a third-person subject with a first-person object, rather than e=en= and e=un= as found in other dialects (Nakagawa 2024: 173). In the Shizunai dialect, the first-person singular objective is marked by the prefix en- (Refsing 1986: 215), which belongs exclusively to colloquial language and is restricted to concrete, personal reference (Refsing 1986: 215). In the Sakhalin dialect, in- functions as a first-person objective prefix (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936).
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Second-person singular: e=
Which affix marks second-person singular in Hokkaido Ainu, and does it treat subject and object alike or distinguish them?
The second-person singular subjective personal affix is e- (Satō 2008: 29), and the second-person singular objective personal affix is likewise e- ('you sg.') (Satō 2008: 32, 120). Second-person personal affixes show no morphological distinction between subjective and objective case, appearing as e- for singular and eci- for plural in both roles (Satō 2008: 31). In Colloquial Ainu, the second-person intransitive subject markers are e- for singular and eci- for plural, alongside -es-, which is unique to the Ishikari dialect (Shibatani 1990). In the colloquial subjective conjugation of Class I verbs, the second-person singular is plain e- or honorific a-, and the second-person plural is plain echi- or honorific a- (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936). In spoken Hokkaido Ainu, the second-person singular object is marked by e- or honorific i-, and the second-person plural object is marked by echi- or honorific i- (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936). Second-person subject markers always appear as prefixes regardless of whether the verb belongs to Class I or Class II, yielding the order 'object/complement + (subject-)verb' when the verb takes an object or complement (Kindaichi & Chiri 1936). Because of this syncretism, forms such as e-kore are ambiguous between 'you give him' (with a second-person singular subject and zero third-person object) and 'he/she gives you' (with a zero third-person subject and second-person singular object) (Shibatani 1990: 26). In Classical Ainu, the second-person singular intransitive subject is marked by the prefix e- (Shibatani 1990: 24), the second-person singular transitive subject is marked by the prefix e- (Shibatani 1990: 24), the second-person object markers are e- in the singular and eci- in the plural (Shibatani 1990: 26), and the affixes e- (singular) and eci- (plural) thus mark both subject and object (Shibatani 1990: 26). In the Shizunai dialect, both the nominative and objective cases of the second-person singular are marked by the prefix e- (Refsing 1986: 217). In the Saru dialect, the second-person singular pronoun is 'e'áni, and the corresponding affix is 'e- without distinction between nominative and objective case (Tamura 1972: 27). This Saru second-person singular form 'e'áni ('e-) is used for a single addressee, except when a woman addresses an adult male (Tamura 1972: 27). In Chitose Ainu, the second-person affixes e- (singular) and eci- (plural) are not purely neutral forms, but correspond to informal expressions like Japanese omae(ra) or anta(ra) (Satō 2008: 210). In self-directed speech in the Chitose dialect, the second-person prefix e= can be used to refer to the narrator or speaker for vividness (Nakagawa 2024: 183), and more generally across Ainu, the second person is used when talking to oneself in monologue (Satō 2008: 287).
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