Swahili nouns, like those in other Bantu languages, are noted for a system of semantically based classing, which affects not only nouns but also their modifiers (adjectives, numbers, demonstratives) and verbs. Just as gender accord is required in many Indo-European languages (e.g., French, Spanish, German, Russian), the modifiers and verbs associated with a given noun must show class agreement with the noun by using certain prefixes. This results in marked alliteration: