110 A GRAMMAR OF THE MUNA LANGUAGE
The measure phrase usually precedes the noun it modifies, but it may also follow. There is a subtle difference between a pre-nominal and a post-nominal
measure phrase. In the case of a pre-nominal measure phrase the numeral is stressed, whereas in a post-nominal construction it is the nominal that is
stressed:
198 a. tolu-ghulu dahu THREE dogs
three-CLAS dog b. o dahu tolu-ghulu
three DOGS ART dog three-CLAS
Co-referential deletion can occur with head nouns, resulting in a measure phrase without head, which is retrievable from the immediate context:
199 a. de-wora-mo pughu-no kalei they saw a banana tree
3pR-see-PF tree-POS banana b. ingka se-pughu kaawu
but cant you see there is ENIM one-CLAS only
only one tree? Measure phrases cannot be expanded, except by the adverb labhi more. This
labhi can be added to a measure phrase, but it can also form the basis of a ko- derivation which may or may not be verbally inflected:
200 a. tolu-wula labhi more than three months
three-month more b. ko-labhi se-taghu
more than one year HAVE-more one-year
c. no-ko-labhi-mo raa-wula ne-late ne ini 3sR-HAVE-more two-month 3sR-live loc this
he has lived here for more than two months Occasionally a measure phrase is preceded or followed by a noun indicating
measure, such as ka-bhari-no quantity and ka-ompona-no duration:
201 ne-late ne ini raa-fulu-wula ka-ompona-no 3sR-live loc this two-ten-month NOM-long-its
she lived here for twenty months 202 anahi-hi-no kolaki-no liwu ka-bhari-no do-pi-pitu
child-PLUR-POS lord-POS village NOM-many-its 3pR-RED-seven the village chief had seven children
5.7.1. The numeral
The lower numerals one to nine have three variants, which can be called the free form, the prefixed form and the reduplicated form, as shown in the
following chart:
5 THE NOMINAL PHRASE 111
free prefixed
reduplicated one
ise se-
se-ise two
dua raa-
ru-dua three
tolu tolu-
to-tolu four
paa fato-
po-paa five
dima lima-
di-dima six
noo nomo-
no-noo seven
pitu fitu-
pi-pitu eight
oalu alu-
oalu nine
siua siua-
si-siua The following points can be made about these forms:
1. raa- two has the variants rua- and ra-; 2. dima five has the variant lima; li-dima is sometimes used for di-dima;
3. oalu eight free form has the variant alu; 4. the reduplicated form oalu eight is irregular probably because of the
initial vowels. The free forms are only used for counting, that is, they can only occur in
isolation, when they do not follow or precede a noun. The prefixed forms have a much wider usage:
a. Before units of ten fulu, hundred moghono, thousand riwu. Formally
these words are measure nouns, but for semantic reasons I treat them with the numerals.
b. Before classifiers and measure nouns. The reduplicated forms are used:
a. After units of ten in counting. b. In verbal and nominal derivations when the referents are human.
The only exception to these rules are ompulu ten instead of the expected but non-existent se-fulu, and moghono, which already means one hundred and
cannot be prefixed by se-: se-moghono, but raa-moghono two hundred. Counting, then, in Muna goes as follows:
1 ise 11
ompulu se-ise 21
raa-fulu se-ise 2 dua
12 ompulu ru-dua
22 raa-fulu ru-dua
3 tolu 13
ompulu to-tolu 30
tolu-fulu 4 paa
14 ompulu po-paa
40 fato-fulu
5 dima 15
ompulu di-dima 50
lima-fulu 6 noo
16 ompulu no-noo
60 nomo-fulu
7 pitu 17
ompulu pi-pitu 70
fitu-fulu 8 oalu
18 ompulu oalu
80 alu-fulu
9 siua 19
ompulu si-siua 90
siua-fulu 10 ompulu
20 raa-fulu
100 moghono
101 moghono se-ise
134 moghono tolu-fulu po-paa
200 raa-moghono
300 tolu-moghono
112 A GRAMMAR OF THE MUNA LANGUAGE
1,000 se-riwu
2,000 raa-riwu
10,000 se-lasa
1,000,000 se-juta
se-lila innumerable, without number but not: raa-lila
As shown above, the prefixed forms occur before units of ten, a hundred, a thousand, ten thousand, and a million. They are also found before classifiers
and measure nouns:
se-ghulu one ...
raa-ghonu two ...
tolu-wula three months
lima-kilo five kilometres
Examples of the reduplicated forms in counting after units of ten have been given above. The main use of the reduplicated numerals is as the base of
inflected verbs a-class, no um-form, when the referents are human. When the number is higher than ten, the complex numerals illustrated above are employed:
203 a. do-to-tolu we are three
1pR-RED-three b. ta-po-paa
we ex are four 1eR-RED-four
c. da-fato-fulu they will be forty
3pI-four-ten When these numeral verbs are used attributively, the active participle form of
the verb is usually employed, but the inflected form is also found:
204 a. kalambe-hi pi-pitu-no the seven girls
girl-PLUR RED-seven-A.PART b. kapitalao ru-dua-no
the two sea officers officials sea.officer RED-two-A.PART
in the old Muna kingdom 205 a. mie do-po-paa ini
these four people person 3pR-RED-four this
b. bhe ghata-no do-po-paa with his four slaves
with slave-his 3pR-RED-four The participle form is also found in the idiomatic expression bhasitie ompulu
rua-fulu-no the extended family lit. the ten twenty relatives. Reduplicated numerals are also found in temporal phrases which are translated
literally from Indonesian. This usage is frowned upon by many speakers of Muna:
206 a. tanggala to-tolu the third of the month
date RED-three
5 THE NOMINAL PHRASE 113
b. wula po-paa April the fourth month
month RED-four Ordinals do not exist in Muna. For first either bhaa-bhaano is used which is
not a numeral but probably a participle or the adverb paka-paka. It is not clear how the ordinal concept of second third and so on is expressed in
Muna. Nor do fractions exist, apart from se-tanga a half and se-wunta a half;
a year and a half is se-taghu se-tanga. Finally, mention must be made of the increasing use of the Indonesian num-
erals in Muna everyday speech. Some of these forms are partially adapted to the phonological shape of Muna; thus ampa four empat and ana six enam.
5.7.2. Derivations on numeral bases
