Buryat

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Etymology

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Apocopated from the first-person singular nominative pronoun би (bi). Compare also Khamnigan Mongol -би (-bi), Kalmyk (-v).

Pronunciation

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Suffix

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(-b)

  1. agglutinated after a vowel, forms a first-person singular predicate

Usage notes

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is agglutinated to a word ending in a vowel, whereas for a word ending in a consonant, variant -би (-bi) is used. and -би (-bi), as well as other personal suffixes in Buryat, are placed after all other morphemes of a predicate, e.g. нүхэдтэйб (nüxedtejb, I’m with friends), би байналби (bi bajnalbi, I am), жаргалтай гүбди? (žargaltaj gübdi?, are we happy?). Their agglutination is mandatory. In a complete sentence, personal predicates can be either independently (less formally) used or used along with an extra subject (more formally), e.g. sense ‘I do; I make’ can be translated as би үйлэдэнэб (bi üjledeneb) or just үйлэдэнэб (üjledeneb).