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Ekoid language of Nigeria and Cameroon From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The Jagham language, Ejagham, also known as Ekoi, is an Ekoid language of Nigeria and Cameroon spoken by the Ekoi people. The E- in Ejagham represents the class prefix for "language", analogous to the Bantu ki- in KiSwahili
Ekoi | |
---|---|
Ejagham | |
Native to | Nigeria, Cameroon |
Ethnicity | Ekoi people |
Native speakers | 120,000 (2000)[1] |
Dialects |
|
Nsibidi Latin script | |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | etu |
Glottolog | ejag1239 |
The Ekoi are one of several peoples who use Nsibidi ideographs, and may be the ones that created them.
A Jagham alphabet was developed by John R. Watters and Kathie Watters in 1981.
a | b | bh | ch | d | e | ə | f | g | gb | gh | i | j | k | kp | m | n | ny | ŋ | o | p | r | s | t | u | ʉ | w | y |
Ekoi is dialectally diverse. The dialects of Ejagham are divided into Western and Eastern groups:
Blench (2019) also lists Ekin as an Ejagham dialect.[5]
Ekoi has the following noun classes, listed here with their Bantu equivalents. Watters (1981) says there are fewer than in Bantu because of mergers (class 4 into 3, 7 into 6, etc.), though Blench notes that there is no reason to think that the common ancestral language had as many noun classes as proto-Bantu.
Noun class | Prefix | Concord |
---|---|---|
1 | N- | w, ɲ |
2 | a- | b |
3 | N- | m |
5 | ɛ- | j |
6 | a- | m |
8 | bi- | b |
9 | N- | j, ɲ |
14 | ɔ- | b |
19 | i- | f |
('N' stands for a homorganic nasal. 'j' is "y".)
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