4 ms·
Welsh occasionally does things similar to German, where things end up squished together to make a new thing. Other examples would be Aberystwyth (aber - river m
by petewailes 11y ago
Welsh occasionally does things similar to German, where things end up squished together to make a new thing. Other examples would be Aberystwyth (aber - river mouth, Ystwyth - the river in question), rhagddodiad and olddodiad (prefix and suffix), trosgais (a converted try in rugby) and so on. So yes, it's a compounding of two other words, but that's kinda how it's done. Not entirely sure if that makes it an argument for or against what you're saying though.
- abrowne 11y agoI don't know if any language lacks compound words. Your first example is shard with English: (River) Dart + mouth -> Dartmouth (also Plymouth), Dart + moor -> Dartmoor.
- petewailes 11y agoThe difference is English compound words were historically actually separate words, which got compounded together through common usage. Brittanic and German style languages intentionally compound words to form new ones.
- 1wd 11y agoAh, interesting thanks. German has hellrot for example. (And dunkelrot, hellblau, dunkelblau, ... even blaugrün) They don't "count" as basic color terms though. https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/hellrot https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/hellrot https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/blaugr%C3%BCn https://de.wiktionary.org/wiki/blaugr%C3%BCn