-kuhĩ

Kikuyu

Etymology

Hinde (1904) records -kuhi as an equivalent of English short in “Jogowini dialect” of Kikuyu, listing also “Ulu dialect” (spoken then from Machakos to coastal area) of Kamba -kubi, “Nganyawa dialect” (spoken then in Kitui District) of Kamba -gube, and Swahili -fupi as its equivalents.[1]

Pronunciation
  • IPA(key): /kùhé/
As for Tonal Class, Benson (1964) classifies this term into Class 4 with a disyllabic stem, together with kĩng'ang'i, ngũkũ, kĩeha, and so on.

Adjective

-kuhĩ

  1. short[2]
    Antonyms: -raihu, -raya
    Mũthuuri ũyũ nĩ mũkuhĩ. ― This man is short.[3]
  2. near, close[2]
    Antonyms: -raihu, -raya

Inflection
agreement of -kuhĩ
Singular Plural
Class 1, Class 2 mũkuhĩ akuhĩ
Class 3, Class 4 mũkuhĩ mĩkuhĩ
Class 5, Class 6 ikuhĩ makuhĩ
Class 7, Class 8 gĩkuhĩ nguhĩ
Class 9, Class 10 nguhĩ nguhĩ
Class 11, Class 10 rũkuhĩ nguhĩ
Class 12, Class 13 gakuhĩ tũkuhĩ
Class 14, Class 6 mũkuhĩ makuhĩ
Class 15, Class 6 gũkuhĩ makuhĩ
Class 16 hakuhĩ -

Derived terms

(Proverbs)

  • njĩra nguhĩ nĩ ya ũrĩrĩ
  • njĩra nguhĩ no ya kanua

(Nonus)

References
  1. Hinde, Hildegarde (1904). Vocabularies of the Kamba and Kikuyu languages of East Africa, pp. 52–3. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
  2. “-kuhĩ” in Benson, T.G. (1964). Kikuyu-English dictionary, p. 233. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
  3. Mugu, Muturi Anthony (2014). "Antonymy in Gĩkũyũ: a cognitive semantics approach", p. 57.
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