The longest word I know in Hungarian is "elkelkáposztásítottalanítottátok", but it is a fun word, consisting of a prefix and several suffixes added to the word "kelkáposzta", "savoy cabbage". In English it would be "You have desavoycabbagized it", e.g. a garden overgrown with savoy cabbage, if we consider it to be a weed. :) Excepting this one, the longest single (non-compound and non-suffixed) word would probably be "visszaszolgáltatás", meaning "the act of returning something (e.g. a borrowed object)", but it is used mostly in a bureaucratic sense. A compound version is "erdővisszaszolgáltatás", returning forests to their original owners. Another one is the compound "forgalmiadó-visszatérítés" ("VAT recovery"), albeit this one perhaps does not count, being made up of two words. The longest placenames in Hungary (6 syllables) are Kiskunfélegyháza, Hódmezövásárhely, Mosonmagyaróvár, the shortest one I know is Bia, Bük and Ukk.
Ved,
=>Na, I still think it's easy-peasy.
Btw, where did you find a statistic that expresses the level of difficulty of various languages? Such a thing doesn't exist. And any European would learn Dutch much more easily than, say a polysynthetic North American language.
I still must insist that the morphology of Dutch is pretty simple, especially its inflectional morphology.<=
Ved,from this I understand you speak Dutch flawless ?!
=>Btw, where did you find a statistic that expresses the level of difficulty of various languages? Such a thing doesn't exist.<=
-This does exist...(Although a few very primary languages were not included) it uses; sound,spelling,Morfology,the effort to produce the sound exemple: French nazel sound...or a typpical Dutch troath sound (Yes.... I know it sounds like a cow farting and choking on a carrot at the same time),and peoples oppinion.
In fact the 2 languages most far apart from each other (The most differences...) are Japanese and Dutch.
=>I still must insist that the morphology of Dutch is pretty simple,<=
-Where did you get this idea ?! Dutch morphology is one of the most difficult in the world!
Really "Ved" read in on a subject before you respond on one.....
"Sanja, how about "prijestolonasljednikovica" (the wife of the heir to the throne)?"
Yes, Ved, that's a good one :) There are some more words like that, it just takes some time to remember.
Sander, I am a linguist, and your above posting does not make much sense in its part about there being a list of languages ranked according to difficulty. You cannot rank languages in such a way. Do you know that there are 6000 languages in the world and most of them are so rampantly different as a giraffe is from a jellyfish? I'm afraid you're mixing your apples and oranges here, which ain't really scientific at all.
I mean, have you ever come across a sentence in any North American language? THAT's complicated morphology, even compared to a Slavic language, or Latin. Dutch with its handful of inflectional suffixes and an occasional ablaut is a piece of cake.
Really ?! from this message I undestand that you speak Dutch fluently ?!
Besides you didnt gave an anser to all of my questions,but your going to arrent you? As a linguist this must interrest you ?!
Sander , calm down ...
Je stelt je wat aan ...
Ja ja ik weet het, maar die Ved gaat toch niet beweren dat Nederlands makkelijk is ?!
Hier moet ik je gelijk geven , Nederlands is verrekt moeilijk voor anderstaligen
!,
=>Hier moet ik je gelijk geven<=
Eindelijk een beetje erkenning!
:)
Well "Ved"im awaiting your response with envy.....
Sorry, I think you Dutch people are charming and I love being in the Netherlands, as well as in Belgium, I don't mind the sound of Dutch either. I know quite a bit about its morphology from being a linguist and I still maintain that its morphology is NOT among the most complex in the world. Not even in Europe.
Relax, man.
Ved,
I might have overreacted,
But I wil NOT let my language be put away as "simple".
Wenn I was on an exchange voyage to another university where they teach Germanic languages,EVERYBODY disliked Dutch for its complexity.They said that writing Dutch was hard,but speaking it was practically inpossible.But im going to let this discussion between us go,I dont think there is much chance of convincing eachother.
Though im right (ofcourse)
Ok. Ok. I concede: I'm right.
;-)
You dont know when to stop do you ?
/:-)