free morphemes

topic posted Sat, September 10, 2005 - 1:35 AM by  Inga
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I just wonder if there is any possibility for "co, de, re" and "un" to be free morphemes in any other languages: for example,latin, greek, german etc.?
posted by:
Inga
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  • Re: free morphemes

    Sat, September 10, 2005 - 8:34 AM
    Not quite sure what you mean. In languages other than English? The first three morphemes you've listed were all borrowed from Latin in loanwords. I guess you could say that they are bound morphemes in English. Un- is I suppose English and related to Latin in-. Only re- and un- are productive in English. In Latin co(m)- and de- seem to be related to prepositions cum 'with' and de 'from'. In other IE languages, such as Greek, Irish, Sanskrit, or Russian, there are morphemes that are related to these Latin verbal particles. So, do you mean are the other (IE) languages where possible cognates of co(m)-, de-, re-, and un- might be verbal particles and prepositions or some other kind of free morpheme? And are you limited to these four morphemes? Possibly.
    • Re: free morphemes

      Sat, September 10, 2005 - 9:36 AM
      Yes I meant other IE languages, not English this time, and these particular morphemes.

      Thank you for being so active again ;).
      • Re: free morphemes

        Sat, September 10, 2005 - 12:56 PM
        You're welcome. Latin co(m)- is related to German ge- (past participle marker on verbs, but also on some nouns like Geschwister 'sibling' from Schwester 'sister' and Gebrüder 'brothers' from Bruder 'brother'. But it's a bound morpheme. I seem to remember re- being related to Old Irish ro a verbal particle with some aspectual meaning.
        • Re: free morphemes

          Sat, September 17, 2005 - 12:07 PM
          I have just found out that "re" and "de" are free morphemes in Latin. Source: Saeed, J. "Semantics" 1997.

          Just need "co" and "un".
          • Re: free morphemes

            Sat, September 17, 2005 - 4:41 PM
            Sure, in fact the titles of many Latin works start with "DE RE"! Just Google it including the quotes.
            • Re: free morphemes

              Sat, September 17, 2005 - 9:47 PM
              Yes, as I said, re is a word / noun / morpheme in Latin. It means roughly 'thing'. But it isn't really related to the verbal particle re- 'meaning 'again'. They're two different words. They're homonyms. The verbal particle de- and the preposition de are more likely related to one antoher.
          • Re: free morphemes

            Sat, September 17, 2005 - 4:41 PM
            Latin de 'of, from' is a preposition. It is no doubt related to the bound verbal particle de-. What is re? The ablative singular of res 'thing'? It is not related to the bound verbal particle re- meaning 'again". Co(m)- may or may not be related to the preposition cum. Un- is not a morpheme, bound or unbound, in Latin.

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