Talk:-o

English

I dont think that English -o is a diminutive at all. There is a somewhat similar suffix in Western Apache that has been called an "essentializing" suffix (termed coined by anthropologist David Samuels) — the idea being that the thing referred to by the word with essentializing suffix is reduced to just that essential property. I dont know the literature on English well enough to give the name others have come up for this -o (if they have). But, at any rate essentializing is closer than diminutive. Ishwar 04:47, 15 August 2008 (UTC)

As you can see, I agree that the -o suffix is not diminutive - however, I don't think it essentialising either. I changed "diminutive" to "colloquializing" ... the addition of this suffix does not carry the sense of diminution (like -ie does) - Davo is not a small/young David, garbo is not a small garbage man; arvo is not a short afternoon; rather adding -o renders the term colloquial, though also perhaps familiar - so perhaps we could add "familiarizing" to the definitionSonofcawdrey (talk) 07:56, 3 October 2015 (UTC)

English 2

From many Spanish or Italian words that end in o. Not just end in O, but that O is the marker of the singular masculine, from those Latin words ending in -US. Problemo is perhaps a misunderstanding of Spanish el problema (the problem); it is neither feminine *la problema nor masculine *el problemo, but one of a series of masculine nouns in -A from Greek, as planeta, atleta, etc.--Manfariel (talk) 19:43, 26 May 2019 (UTC)

RFD discussion: April 2023

The following discussion has been moved from Wiktionary:Requests for deletion (permalink).

This discussion is no longer live and is left here as an archive. Please do not modify this conversation, but feel free to discuss its conclusions.

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-o (compound verb)

Latin. The request for deletion also applies to Category:Latin terms suffixed with -o (compound verb). Currently defined as "suffixed to third-conjugation verbs in composition, forms regular first-conjugation verbs". I don't think this is a genuine word-formation process in Latin: pairs of base verbs and compound verbs where the prefixation appears to have caused a switch to the first conjugation are not common or generally productive, and in almost all cases, there seems to be an alternative more specific explanation for the alternation in conjugation, such as denominal formation from an unattested intermediate nominal form (the explanation given by De Vaan for alternations like capiō, nuncupō/occupō) or derivation of the prefixed verb from an alternative formation from the same root (see the page compellō). The only word that I have not been able to find such a better explanation for yet is prōflīgō, but it seems better to discuss that irregularity on its page in the Etymology section rather than reserving a whole sense and category for this exceptional and probably epiphenomenal situation. Urszag (talk) 14:48, 6 April 2023 (UTC)

OK, I did find one book that seems to support the idea that there is some category of compound verbs like this: "some compounds are inflected as verbs in -āre. cōnsternāre, beside O.H.G. stornēm 'attonitus sum' (§ 605) Gr. πτῡ́ρω 'I make shy, put in a fright'. in-clīnāre: O.Sax. hli-nōn 'I lean', cp. Lett. sli-nu (beside sléiju) 'I lean on, support'. dē-stināre, cp. Armen. sta-na-m 'I possess', Gr. στά-νω 'I place' and στα-νύω (§ 601 p. 144). So too com-pellāre from pellere, aspernārī from spernere. It is assumed that a similarity in the endings -nā-s(i) -nā-t(i), in this class, and -ā-s(i) -ā-t(i) in Classes X and XI caused a current to set in the direction of the last two (cp. end of § 598). But this does not explain why only compounds were carried by it: and apparently we must not separate pellere : compellāre, spernere : aspernārī from flīgere : prōflīgāre, capere : occupāre and others.The -nā- in cōn-ster-nā-s must therefore be kept quite distinct from -nā- in Skr. šr̥-ṇā́-mi Gr. δάμ-νη-μι." (Brugmann, translated by W. H. D. Rouse, "A Comparative Grammar of the Indo-Germanic Languages: Morphology, Part III", § 603, page 144)--Urszag (talk) 01:20, 25 April 2023 (UTC)

I'm de-tagging this as the original tagger since I found another source that suggests there is something special going on with some compound verbs: Schrijver argues that they tended to be thematized with -ye-/-yo-, which in the case of verbs like sternere and pellere resulted in the compounds ending up in the first declension. I'm not sure it's that accurate to call this a suffix synchronically in Latin itself, but it seems OK given how heterogeneous the other verbs we're including under that entry are anyway.--Urszag (talk) 17:22, 29 April 2023 (UTC)