suffix

… ‘hit, kill’ becomes *bu-m); case suffixes, such as the dative case marker *-ku and the accusative case marker *-n(a); and personal pronouns, such as first person singular *ŋay. (In the examples given, the asterisk marks a form that is reconstructed as having existed in Proto-Australian.)

…has a great number of suffixes but only one prefix and no compounds. In Unangam Tunuu the word forms are simpler, but syntax can be more complex. Suffixes often are accompanied by changes in the stem, such as the doubling of consonants in Inuit—e.g., nanuq ‘polar bear,’ dual nannuk ‘two…

…word level are expressed by suffixation. Roots can be extended by the addition of one or two suffixes, though the meanings of such suffixes is not always clear. The first possible extension is a vowel (V₂), always a, i, or u; it is added to roots that end in consonants.…

…were added tense and voice suffixes. In some languages these suffixes lost the tense signification but retained the distinction between intransitive and transitive voice. In these cases, the suffixes subsequently lost the voice distinction and became mere formatives or augments to monosyllabic roots. Derivations of the Proto-Dravidian root *tir- ‘the…

There were two Proto-Indo-European suffixes expressing mood: -e- alternating with -o- for the subjunctive, corresponding roughly in meaning to the English auxiliaries ‘shall’ and ‘will,’ and -yeH₁- alternating with -iH₁- for the optative, corresponding roughly to English ‘should’ and ‘would.’ Verbs without one of these two suffixes were marked…

Derivation by means of suffixes is the most popular and widespread device. Verbs in particular must be morphologically marked as members of a conjugation, of which those corresponding to Latin -āre form by far the most frequent and indeed in modern times virtually the only productive class (thus, Latin…

…and Huitotoan, or use many suffixes and some prefixes like Arawakan and Panoan. Also very numerous are those languages having few prefixes and suffixes, such as Ge, Carib, or Tupian. Languages employing only prefixes to show grammatical distinctions have not been reported. There are a few with many prefixes but…

A number of nonsyllabic suffixes are reconstructible for PTB, most of them dental (*-s, *-t, *-n). When the suffix was -s, it could result in postvocalic sequences of stop or nasal plus -s (e.g., -ps, -ms) or (quite rarely) final liquid plus -s (-ls…

Suffixes express such notions as negation, passive, reciprocal, reflexive, and causative, and they combine to produce long derived stems—e.g., Turkish seviştirilme ‘not to be caused to love each other.’ Personal suffixes indicate subjects—e.g., Kyrgyz kele-biz ‘we come.’ Infinite forms include verbal nouns, verbal adjectives (participles),…

Case suffixes and postpositions were and are used to show the function of words in a sentence. Prefixes and prepositions were unknown in Proto-Uralic. Adjectives, demonstrative pronouns, and numerals originally did not show agreement in case and number with the noun, as…