        THE EXPRESSION OF NOMINAL PLURALITY IN EGGON Linda Chinelo Nkamigbo Abstract This paper examines the various ways of forming nominal plurality in Eggon, a Central Nigerian language. Plural formation is a crucial phenomenon in human languages. In an attempt to examine pluralization of Eggon nouns, the following methods were revealed: zero affixation, ‘mo’ prefixation, vowel alternation, reduplication, tonal permutation and vowel insertion. It was observed that vowel alternation involved the vowel ‘o’ changing to ‘e’ and the vowels ‘/o’ changing to ‘a’. In complete reduplication, the whole word repeats itself. Partial reduplication involves the repetition of the second syllable of a noun in order to form its plural. The vowels ‘a’ and ‘e’ are inserted immediately after the onset of the second syllable. Introduction Counting is an indispensable phenomenon in language. The basic evidence of the category of number is observed in the distinction between singular and plural in relation to nouns (see Lyons, 1968 and Robins, 1971). Eggon belongs to Plateau language group of Benue Congo language family (Greenberg, 1963). It is spoken in Nasarawa state of Nigeria. Some scholars have studied plural formation in different languages. Ejele (1997) examined the expression of plurality in Esan. She established five different ways of pluralizing involving different word-classes. These are by (a) vowel alternation in nouns examples: úkpn ‘cloth’ íkpn ‘clothes’ /u/ /i/ óràn ‘wood/tree’ éràn ‘woods/trees’ /o/ /e/ (b) The choice of the form of the determiner as in nì ‘the’ (singular) nì g ‘the bottle’ énì ‘the’ (plural) énì g ‘the bottles’ (c) The reduplication of nouns. For instance àbá ‘father’ àbáàbá ‘grandfather/mainly fathers’ èkhù ‘door’ ékhúékhú ‘doors’ (d) The addition of the suffix – nV to verbs as can be seen in d ‘buy’ dn ‘buy many times’ Department of Linguistics, Nnamdi Azikiwe University, Awka, Anambra State. 154