Agglutinative language

An agglutinative language is a type of language where words are made up of different types of morphemes to determine their meaning. (A morpheme is the smallest part of a word that has a meaning.) What makes these languages different from others, is that if one removes the morphemes from the word, they will be able to stand on their own.

Examples

Chinook

  • a–č–i–m–l–ud–a: (future–he–him–thee–to–give–future): "He will give it to you"[1]

Hungarian

  • szent: holy
  • szentség: holiness
  • szentségtelen: holinessless

Persian

Bozorgtarinhashunra niga mikardam - I was looking at their biggest ones.

  • Bozorg: big
  • Bozorg-tar: bigger (lit. more big)
  • Bozorg-tar-in: biggest (lit. the more big one)
  • Bozorg-tar-in-ha: biggest ones (plural)
  • Bozorg-tar-in-ha-shun: their biggest ones
  • Bozorg-tar-in-ha-shun-ra: at their biggest ones

Turkish

  • ev–ler–den: (home–plural–from): "from the houses"[1]

Kazakh

  • бару: (baru) — to go
  • бара алмау: (bara almau) — not being able to go
  • бара алмаған: (bara almağan) — the one that couldn't go
  • бара алмағандар: (bara almağamdar) — the ones that couldn't go

List

Below is a list of modern agglutinative languages:

References

  1. 1.0 1.1 "Agglutination – GRAMMAR". Britannica.