2 Number in Eastern Dan

Number in Eastern Dan is marked, by default, by a plural word, dhȕn. There are also some other formal means: a specialized plural suffix for kinship terms and agent nouns; reduplication and tonal modifications for adjectives. The irregularities in plural marking are explained, to a great extent, by the Animacy Hierarchy. There are formal splits, marked in different ways: - between the 1st person and other pronouns; - between the pronouns for interlocutors and the 3rd person; - between the agent nouns and some kinship terms, on one hand, and all the other nouns, on the other; - between the names for humans, big animals and inanimate objects. There are two mechanisms to express verbal number. One of them, the full reduplication of the verb, is typologically common, while the other one, pluralization of the preverb, is unusual. Neither of these mechanisms can be regarded as an agreement with arguments; these are cases of a true pluriactionality.