KISWAHILI FOR BEGINNERS.POSSESSIVE PRONOUNS

In Swahili the possessive pronouns are treated like adjectives, They take nominal prefixes,as shown below:

-angu,my,mine                                  -etu, our,ours

-ako, your, yours.                               -enu, your, yours

-ake, his,her,hers.                              -ao there, theirs

The following are the class prefix:

NOUN CLASS.           PREFIX        EXAMPLES

M/WA.                            W.             mtoto wangu,my child watoto wangu ,my children

M/MI.                              W/Y.        mkono wake,her hand.mikono yake,her hands

KI/VI.                               CH/VY      kitabu chako, your book.vitabu vyako,your books

1. Y/Z. nyumba yetu,our house, nyumba zetu, our house
2. L/Y. jina langu ,my name.majina yangu ,my names
3. W/Z. ufunguo wake,their keys,funguo zao,their keys
4. P. pahali pale,your place
5. KW. Kusoma kwake,his reading.

The same prefixes are used to express “of”_a: for the class,”of”is denoted by wa for both singular and plural.

e.g. mtoto wa mwalimu,the teacher’s child

watoto wa mwalimu, the teacher’s children

For the class, you have;

kitabu Cha mwalimu, the teacher’s book.

vitabu vya mwalimu, the teacher’s book

Once you know that “of”is _a in Swahili, you can use it with the prefixes given above without any difficulty.

Exercise

Insert the right prefixes

1.wageni wameleta mizigo _ao

2.walikuwa na mizigo-ingi sana na -zito