Why are strings of attached particles a notable feature of Hittite sentences?
In Hittite, the use of strings of attached particles is a notable feature because the language has exploited the practice of attaching enclitic pronouns and various particles to the first accented word of a sentence to an unusual degree compared to other older Indo-European languages.1
These strings can include conjunctions, particles indicating direct quotations, and markers for direct or indirect objects. For example, in the sentence nu-war-at-si-kan dānzi ("they take it from him"), the initial word contains:
* nu: a conjunction.
* -war-: a particle indicating a direct quotation.
* -at-: the direct object ("it").
* -si-: the indirect object ("to him").
* -kan: a particle whose precise meaning remains undetermined.1
This system allows for complex grammatical information to be concentrated at the beginning of a sentence, a characteristic that distinguishes the Anatolian group's syntactic structure.1