The plural stem is often not predictable from the singular stem, so it needs to be listed in any dictionary. Plural oblique cases are always regular. Some nouns have no plural: mass nouns (e.g. borc 'millet', zhuur 'corn meal', buolat 'Damascus steel'), abstract nouns (dienal 'courage', berkat 'abundance'), and unique nouns (q'ylbasieda 'north star, polar star', maalx 'sun'). Plural declension is as follows. (Numerals show the declension class the noun belongs to in the singular.)
 
 
 

	hen	earth	friend	neighbor	head	river	dog
Nominative sing.	kuotam (1)	leatta (5)	dottagh (9)	loalaxuo (9)	kuorta (3)	xii (1)	zhwalii (4)
Nominative plural	kuotamazh	leattaazh	dottaghii	loalaxoi	kuortozh	xizh/xyzh	zhwalezh
Genitive	kuotamii	leattaai	dottaghii	loalaxoi	kuortoi	xii	zhwalii
Dative	kuotamazhta	leattaazhta	dottaghazhta	loalaxozhta	kuortozhta	xizhta/xyzhta	zhwalezhta
Ergative	kuotamazh	leattaazh	dottaghazh	loalaxozh	kuortozh	xizh/xyzh	zhwalezh
Allative	kuotamazhka	leattaazhka	dottaghazhka	loalaxozhka	kuortozhka	xizhka/xyzhka	zhwalezhka
Instrumental	kuotamazhca	leattaazhca	dottaghazhca	loalaxozhca	kuortozhca	xizhca/cyzhca	zhwalezhca
Lative	kuotamegh	leattaajegh	dottaghegh	loalaxuojegh	kuortuojegh	xigh/xygh	zhwalegh
Comparison	kuotamel	leattaajel	dottaghel	loalaxuojel	kuortuojel	xil/xyl	zhwalel

 

The plural formative -zh- is spelled "sh" in the normative Cyrillic orthography and often so pronounced as a spelling pronunciation. Also in the normative spelling, the ergative plural has an ending -a which (in normative or spelling pronunciation) opens a preceding syllable and allows a preceding vowel to be long:
 

Usual pronunciation	leattaazh	loalaxozh	kuortozh
Cyrillic spelling:	Î?¸ÚÚ?¯?	ÎÓ?Î?iÓ¯?	ÍÓ*ÚÓ¯?
Spelling pronunciation	leattaasha	loalaxuosha	kuortuosha

 

The disyllabic lative and comparison cases also have a monosyllabic pronunciation:
 

 leattaajegh  /   leattaaigh
 loalaxuojegh  /  loalaxoigh
 kuortuojegh  /  kuortoigh
 

-zh     Productive; thousands of nouns take this ending. This is an extension, followed by case suffixes.  Te vowel that precedes it is determined by the stem:

 -azh with buffer vowel, added to consonant-final stems (like kuotam, above)
 -ezh nouns with stem-final -ie-, e.g. zhwalii 'dog', Esg zhwalie, Npl zhwalezh
 -ozh nouns with stem-final -uo-, e.g. porduu 'interface', Esg porduo, Npl pordozh

-aazh   (i.e. extension -aa- plus plural extension -zh)   Hundreds.  In normative descriptions nearly all nouns of declension 5 take this ending (though in fact -azh is also frequent on such nouns in actual usage).

-ii     About 100 nouns, most of them animate and most of them belonging to declensions 1, 3, and 5 in the singular, take this ending. Unproductive.

-oi     Nouns with the derivational suffix -xuo and nouns with plural extension -uo-.  This plural extension is unproductive (and where it occurs it more often takes the nominative ending -zh:  see 'head', below), though the derivational suffix -xuo is productive. Example  maar 'husband', Gsg meara, Dsg maaraa, etc. (no -uo- extension); pl. moaroi, Dpl moarozhta, etc.

-ozh (  i.e. extension -uo- plus ending -zh with regular shortening of -uo- in a closed syllable) The sequence -ozh occurs when nouns ending in -uo take the plural extension -zh (e.g. tq'ouruo 'root', pl. tq'ourozh), but also when nouns not ending in -uo take the extension -uo- in the plural only. Example: 'head' in the table above.

-rch     This is actually an extension. About three dozen nouns take this extender. They include a number of animal names:
 

	pig	bear
singular	hwaqa (1)	cha (3)
Nominative plural	hwaqarch	cherch
Genitive	hwaqarchii	cherchii
Dative	hwaqarchazhta	cherchazhta
Ergative	hwaqarchazh	cherchazh
Allative	hwaqarchazhka	cherchazhka
Instrumental	hwaqarchazhca	cherchazhca
Lative	hwaqarchagh	cherchagh
Comparison	hwaqarchal	cherchal

 

-amazh   (i.e. extension -am plus plural extensin -azh)   About three dozen nouns add this extension:  e.g. besh 'garden', Gsg biesha, Dsg bieshaa; pl. bieshamazh; koch 'shirt, dress', Gsg kuocha, pl. kuochamazh.  (The sequence -amazh also occurs when a noun ending in -am takes the regular plural extension -zh, e.g. q'oalam 'pencil', Npl q'oalamazh.  -am is a productive suffix forming deverbal nouns, so there are many such nouns.)