Diminutives in _ag_ or _og_; as, caileag _a girl_, cuachag _a little cup_.
Derivatives in _achd_; as, iomlanachd _fulness_, doillearachd _duskiness_, doimhneachd _depth_, rioghachd _kingdom_, sinnsireachd _ancestry_, &c.
Abstract nouns formed from the genitive of adjectives; as, doille _blindness_, gile _whiteness_, leisge _laziness_, buidhre _deafness_, &c.
Many monosyllables in _ua_ followed by one or more consonants are feminine; as, bruach _a bank_, cruach _a heap_, cuach _a cup_, cluas _an ear_, gruag _the hair of the head_, sguab _a sheaf_, tuadh _a hatchet_, tuath _peasantry_.
Almost all polysyllables, whereof the last vowel is small, except those in _air_ and _iche_, already noticed, are feminine.
A few nouns are of either gender; Salm _a Psalm_, creidimh _belief_, are used as masculine nouns in some places, and feminine in others. Cruinne _the globe_, talamb _the earth, land_, are masculine in the nominative; as, an cruinne-cé _the globe of the earth_. Psal. lxxxix. 11., xc. 2.--D. Buchan. 1767. p. 12. 15; an talamh tioram _the dry land_. Psal. xcv. { 43} 5. The same nouns are generally feminine in the genitive; as, gu crìch na cruinne _to the extremity of the world_. Psal. xix. 4.; aghaidh na talmhainn _the face of the earth_. Gen. i. 29. Acts xvii. 24.
Nouns undergo certain changes significant of Number and of Relation.
The forms significant of Number are two: the _Singular_, which denotes one; and the _Plural_, which denotes any number greater than one.
The changes expressive of Relation are made on nouns in two ways: 1. On the beginning of the noun; 2. On its termination. The relations denoted by changes on the termination are different from those denoted by changes on the beginning; they have no necessary connection together; the one may take place in absence of the other. It seems proper, therefore, to class the changes on the termination by themselves in one division, and give it a name, and to class the changes on the beginning also by themselves in another division, and give it a different name. As the changes on the termination denote, in general, the same relations which are denoted by the Greek and Latin cases, that seems a sufficient reason for adopting the term case into the Gaelic Grammar, and applying it, as in the Greek and Latin, to signify "the changes made on the _termination_ of nouns or adjectives to mark relation".[32] According to this description of them, there are four cases in Gaelic. These may be { 44} named, like the corresponding cases in Latin, the _Nominative_, the _Genitive_, the _Dative_, and the _Vocative_.[33] The Nominative is used when any person or thing is mentioned as the _subject_ of a proposition or question, or as the _object_ of an action or affection. The Genitive corresponds to an English noun preceded by _of_. The Dative is used only after a preposition. The Vocative is employed when a person or thing is addressed.