4.2.5. The Plural in the First Declension

1. The following table depicts the general system, common to the First and Second Declension.

NOTE. The inanimate plural forms, -a and -a, correspond possibly to an older theme vowel of an earlier stage of the language, *-h and *-eh after the Laryngeals' Theory.

2. Unlike in the Singular, in which only some Nominatives have an -s, in Nom.-Voc. Plural the -s is general, and there is always one fix-grade vowel, e. So, the opposition Singular-Plural in -s/-es is actually a Ø/e distinction. This opposition has also sometimes another mark, that of the vowel before the ending (see § 4.7).

3. The Nom.-Voc. Plural Animate is normally in -es; as in cowes

There are forms in -eies for -i themes, as in oweies; in -eues for -u themes, as in suneues; in ijes, -uwes for -i, -u; as in bhruwes;

4. The Accusative Plural Animate is in -ms: owims, sunums, coms/coums

NOTE. Many scholars reconstruct for IE III the accusative plural ending -ns, because most of the attested proto-languages show either -ns (as some endings in Sanskrit or Germanic) or long vowel, sometimes with -s. Most of them also admit an original, older -ms form (a logical accusative singular -m plus the plural mark -s), but they prefer to reconstruct the attested -ns, thus (implicitly) suggesting an intermediate phase (IE II -ms> IE III *-ns> proto-languages -ns/-_s), common to all proto-languages. We don't know if this intermediate phase happened, and if it was common to all languages, or even if it was common to those languages which present in some declensions -ns, and in other declensions another endings. What we do know is that the form -ms is older than any other, and that it existed already in the IE II dialects, as the Anatolian shows.

5. Nom.-Voc. Acc. Plural Inanimate in -a

6. Genitive Plural Animate in -om/-om and -em: owi-om, noqti-om, sunuw-em/sunuw-om, cow-om

NOTE. The -m of the Acc. sg. An., Nom.-Acc.-Voc. sg. Inan. and this case could sometimes be equivocal. It is disambiguated with the vocalic grade, full or lengthened, which the Genitive takes - as the singular is always Ø.

7. The Obliques are generally divided into two groups, that of the i.-i., gr., arm., lat., and cel. in -bh-; and another of the ger. and bsl. in -m-. There are, thus, -bhis, -bhos, -bhios, -bhi, and -mis, -mos: sunubhis / sunubhos / sunubhios / sunumis / sunumos.

There is also another possible ending, mostly (southern) dialectal, in -si: sunusi

NOTE. This has probably an origin in the plural mark -s-, to which the local case ending -i is added. This is a general oblique ending in the thematic declension.