diff --git a/BayesianKDEy/_bayeisan_kdey.py b/BayesianKDEy/_bayeisan_kdey.py
index 3c58900..356b259 100644
--- a/BayesianKDEy/_bayeisan_kdey.py
+++ b/BayesianKDEy/_bayeisan_kdey.py
@@ -68,7 +68,8 @@ class BayesianKDEy(AggregativeSoftQuantifier, KDEBase, WithConfidenceABC):
             raise ValueError(f'parameter {num_samples=} must be a positive integer')
         assert explore in ['simplex', 'clr', 'ilr'], \
             f'unexpected value for param {explore=}; valid ones are "simplex", "clr", and "ilr"'
-        assert prior == 'uniform' or (isinstance(prior, Iterable) and all(isinstance(v, Number) for v in prior)), \
+        assert ((isinstance(prior, str) and prior == 'uniform') or
+                (isinstance(prior, Iterable) and all(isinstance(v, Number) for v in prior))), \
             f'wrong type for {prior=}; expected "uniform" or an array-like of real values'
         # assert temperature>0., f'temperature must be >0'
         assert engine in ['rw-mh', 'emcee', 'numpyro']
@@ -247,7 +248,7 @@ class BayesianKDEy(AggregativeSoftQuantifier, KDEBase, WithConfidenceABC):
         # move to jax
         test_densities = jnp.array(test_densities)
         n_classes = X_probs.shape[-1]
-        if self.prior == 'uniform':
+        if isinstance(self.prior, str) and self.prior == 'uniform':
             alpha = [1.]*n_classes
         else:
             alpha = self.prior