Number of Possessive Nouns
Noun phrases · one world map for each value
WALS codes 243 languages for this feature. The most frequent value, “None reported”, covers 233 of them (96%); 2 values tie for least frequent, with 3 languages each.
That value is most frequent in Eurasia (100% of the 50 languages coded there) and least frequent in South America (84% of 25).
All 17 Trans-New Guinea languages coded have “None reported”.
Austronesian is the most divided, its largest group reaching only 11 of 15.
None reported233 languages · 96%
One3 languages · 1%
Two to four4 languages · 2%
Five or more3 languages · 1%
One map per value; each dot is a language WALS codes with that value.
By macro-area
| Value | Africa | Eurasia | Papunesia | Australia | North America | South America |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| None reported | 41 | 50 | 54 | 25 | 42 | 21 |
| One | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
| Two to four | 0 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Five or more | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 |
| All values | 41 | 50 | 58 | 25 | 44 | 25 |
Inside the largest families
| Family | Coded | Most frequent value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Trans-New Guinea | 17 | None reported | 100% |
| Austronesian | 15 | None reported | 73% |
| Afro-Asiatic | 11 | None reported | 100% |
| Niger-Congo | 11 | None reported | 100% |
| Indo-European | 10 | None reported | 100% |
| Pama-Nyungan | 9 | None reported | 100% |
Languages to explore
From the same chapter
- Obligatory Possessive Inflection 244 languages