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    n-ixuɛ̃ [ ˩ / ˩ \ ˩ ] “the Ɔxwahɛ of
    Ixuɛ̃”. It occurs also in a
    reduplicated form: nene [ ˥ ˦ ]
    which probably is more em-
    phatic, e.g. n-ɔʋ̃a [ ˥ (4-1) ] “the man
    (spoken of)”, nen-ɔʋ̃a [ ˥ ˦ (3-1) ] “that
    very man”. If a noun is re-
    peated with the ne placed be-
    tween the two repetitions, the
    meaning of the noun is aug-
    mented by the notion “big”, or
    “real, main, principal”, e.g.
    imazɛ y-ɔʋ̃a n-ɔʋ̃a-ɽe, amaw-
    uwɛ [ ˥ ˥ ˥ ˩ ˩ ˥ / ˩ ˥ ˩ \ ˩ ] (wɛ [ / ]) I do
    not mind a big (i.e. important)
    man, how much less you;
    inwina n-inwina‿inwina nɛ na
    [ ˩ ˩ ˩ \ ˩ ˩ ˥ ˩ ˥ / ˩ ] something like
    “this is a good job of work I
    did for him”. When preceding
    nouns expressing time like ɛdɛ
    [ ˩ ˥ ] “day”, ɛɣɛ [ ˩ ˩ ] “time”,
    ukpo [ ˩ ˥ ] “year”, it conveys
    the idea of “ago”, e.g. n-ɛdɛ
    [ \ ˥ ] or [ ˥ ˦ ] “in the old time”,
    “in the old days”, as in
    ɛkpo n-ɛdɛ ot-uwa na‿iherh-ũkpɔ̃
    [ ˥ ˥ ˦ ˧ ˩ ˥ / ˩ ˥ ˥ ˥ ˩ ] “in the old times
    your age-group did not yet wear
    cloth” (to a young boy); fur-
    ther: n-ukpo [ \ ˩ ] “last year”
    (cf. ukpo na [ ˩ ˥ ˩ ] or n-ukpo na
    “this year”), with the forms
    n-ɛkp-ia [ ˥ (4-1) ‿ / ] “two years ago”,
    lit. “three-years ago”, as the
    current year is included in
    the calculation, n-ɛkp-enɛ [ ˥ ˦ ˧ ]
    “three (lit. four) years ago”,
    n-ɛkp-isɛ̃ [ ˥ ˦ ˧ ] “four (lit. five)
    years ago”, etc.; v. n-ɛv- [ ˥ ],
    ɛɣɛ [ ˩ ˩ ], ɛdɛ [ ˩ ˥ ], nodɛ [ \ ˩ ].
    Finally, ne is often used in front
    of the ordinal numbers, e.g. in
    n-okao [ ˥ ˩ ] “the first”, n-ogieva
    [ ˥ ˩ ˩ ] “the second”, etc. which
    can also (without the exception