Nouns may be classified into three sets according to how they behave as the possessum in possessive phrases. Set 1 is a broad but closed class of inalienably possessa which take pronominal possessor marking similar to the S/O marking on perfective and imperative verbs. Set 2 is a small closed class of alienable possessa which do not require modification by a possessive classifier. Set 3 is a huge open class, to which almost all nouns belong, which do require possessive classifiers.
Set 1 words tend to refer to body parts, kin terms, and some states and emotions. Though their first and second person pronominal possessive suffixes are identical to (or nearly identical to) those found on perfective and imperative verbs (1st person sg: –b(e), 1st plural –(o)n, and 2nd person –I), they indicate third person possessors according to either of two strategies. Just as third person reference on verbs, third person possessors may be Ø-marked, or indicated by a suffix –(o)ño. The word byone is singularly irregular in that it indicates a third person possessor through a prefix ka-. Some Set 1 words are: face, ear, nose, lips, teeth, gums, tongue, throat, shoulder, elbow, arm, wrist, finger, breast, heart, stomach, back, legs, feet, heel; the voice and one’s name; mother, father, son, either grandmother, either grandfather, mother’s brother, mother’s brother’s son.
An inalienable form may be transformed into an alienable form by one of several strategies. This is necessary to indicate differences such as ‘my bones (in my body)’ versus ‘my bones (from an animal I killed)’. In the case of those forms that mark a third person possessor in –(o)ño, the alienable counterpart is identical to the lemma. Those that take a Ø-third person may form the alienable through suffixation (cwol ‘milk (inalien.)’, cwom ‘milk (alien.)’), a system of suppletion in which the alienable form is a Set 2 noun (byore ‘skull (inalien.)’, rākonam ‘skull (alien.)’ – although byorem is also available; łalwa ‘bone (inalien.)’, yārorem ‘bone (alien.)’), or through a quite irregular process of compounding (keao ‘toes, foot (inalien.)’, lerkea ‘foot (of a piece of furniture)’).
Set 2 contains words for more distant kin and some less integral body parts, as well as a set of words which would correspond to quantifiers in other languages. These words tend not to require the support of a classifier (although some speakers may use them with byone). The possessor may optionally take the linking morpheme. Some Set 2 words are one’s daughter and her children, and one’s spouse and the spouse’s family; the word ‘friend’; semen, the kidneys, liver, hair of the head, the one’s smile, shit, vomit, blood and blood vessels, fingernails, and muscles; chronic pain and some diseases; beliefs and words for trust and promise; a few words that refer to one’s language and the town he was born in; a few personal affects: gardening tools, rope, and some clothing.
Set 3 is the broad and open class that contains the overwhelming majority of the vocabulary. Strictly speaking, these forms may not themselves be possessed, but instead are in apposition to a directly, inalienably possessed ‘classifier’. There are five weakly grammaticalized ‘classifiers’ which combine with a Set 3 noun based on its semantics. The territory covered by each of these cover is not particularly well-demarcated, and one Set 3 noun may occur with more than one classifier. All of the classifiers except for byone may be used as full, Set 1 nouns, and all these classifiers except omagkwe are open in that they may accept new vocabulary.
1.) omagkwe ‘tongue’ – eating utensils, mass nouns for food, liquid, language, thought, alienable kin relations, some fish, birds, dead animals
2.) byone (no longer used as a noun, used to mean ‘clavicle’) – Wheeled vehicles, boats and ships, steam and steam technology, travel, weapons (swords, knives, axes, spears and poles, bows and arrows, explosives, guns but not ammunition), large pieces of furniture, large domestic animals, fire receptacles, buildings and architecture and rooms in the house, trees, wild animals. – This marker is increasingly used with NP’s that belong to one of the other four domains.
3.) bicil ‘hand’ – Containers for food, countable nouns for food, most clothing (see below), printed and written works (relatively thin), smaller pieces of furniture (notably chairs and hanging artwork), flowers, leaves, small domestic animals
4.) yorta ‘tooth’ – Ammunition, insects and food from insects, jewelry, metal, precious stones, electricity and electric technology, some diseases
5.) wulu ‘liver’ – Thought, perception, written and printed works (relatively thick), some diseases, religious paraphernalia, ‘lumpy things’ (pillows, arthritis), some fish, snakes
This group is classifiers is to an extent, though, an open class. Some forms closely associated with a specific inalienable possessum may select that possessum in lieu of one of the five on this list. This is specifically true of clothing and adornment that is associated with just one body part.
Possessors are generally expressed in their nominative (not absolutive) form. There is a stylistic tendency to place words for female possessors in the oblique in –ał, although this isn’t necessarily correct from a diachronic standpoint. – There is a tendency for byone, as the most common and arguably most grammaticalized classifier, to lose its stress and become an enclitic on the word before it.
Explicit full word possessors are generally immediately before the NP they modify, although this order may be manipulated for pragmatic purposes – when it is reversed, the possessum (in first position within its phrase) will be marked with the linking morpheme. As the classifier-possessum relationship is an appositive relationship and not a matter of dependent marking a head, either phrase is free to come before the other (although we could say there’s a slight preference for the order classifier-possessum). In poetry, the classifier and possessum can be widely separated – this is possible too in spoken language, but exceedingly rare.