Does your language have "more --> morely"?

Discussion in 'All Languages' started by binary_death, May 10, 2013.

  1. binary_death Member

    Galicia, Spain
    Spanish, Catalan
    This thread is related to the previous one about comparisons. Sorry if I become annoying... but I really want to get to the bottom of this matter.

    I noticed that in English (not my native language, so sorry if I make any mistake), as well as in Spanish, "more" can be used either as a adjective or adverb without any morphological distinction. You can say "I killed more zombies than you" or "I am more stupid than you". In the first case more modifies a noun, so it must be an adjective. In he second one, it modifies an adjective, so it must be a adverb. "Than" would be a conjunction that introduces a phrase or a clause.

    On the other hand, we have the example of "equal". I'm not sure whether it's often used, but I think it's fine to say "I'm equally stupid as you" (correct me if I'm wrong, please).

    More doesn't change its form, whereas equal does. I'm looking for some language whose "more" counterpart changes its form depending on whether it's adjective or adverb.

    Thank you, guys and girls.
    Last edited: May 10, 2013
  2. Montesacro Senior Member

    Italian is not one of those languages:
    Adjective: più
    Adverb: più
  3. myšlenka Senior Member

    I don't think it's very likely that you will find a such a language. More is classified as a quantifier and quantifiers aren't adverbs.
  4. arielipi Senior Member

    In hebrew more acts as in english.
  5. apmoy70

    apmoy70 Senior Member

    Greek does distinguish between the two, but not morphologically:

    Adjective: «Περισσότερος, -η, -ο» [peri'soteros] (masc.), [peri'soteri] (fem.), [peri'sotero] (neut.) < Classical adj. «περισσός, -σσὴ, -σσόν» pĕrissós (masc.), pĕrissḕ (fem.), pĕrissón (neut.) (Attic «περιττός» pĕrittós) --> abundant, excessive, superfluous (PIE *per-i-, crossing, passing cf Skt परि (pAri), around; Lat. per, through, across; Lith. per, through) + productive suffix for synthetic comparative form «-ότερος, -ότερη, -ότερον» -ótĕrŏs (masc.), -ótĕrē (fem.), -ótĕrŏn (neut.) (PIE *tero-, suffix for contrastive form).
    Adverb: «Περισσότερο» [peri'sotero] --> exceedingly, morely (in reality it's the singular comparative neuter form used with adverbial sense which is a continual feature in Greek).
    There's also a fossilized expression in Modern Greek which can be taken as an adverbial clause: «Ως εκ περισσού» [os ek peri'su] < Classical expression «ὡς ἐκ περισσοῦ» hōs ĕk pĕrissoû --> ex abundanti
    Last edited: May 10, 2013
  6. bibax Senior Member

    Czech (Prague)
    But in many languages the quantifiers are adverbs.

    In the IE languages the adverbs are often frozen forms of the adjectives of neuter gender, there is no morphological distinction in such cases. For example in Latin: multum (sing. nom. or acc., neuter gender), multo (sing. abl.), plus/minus (comparatives, neuter gender), hence Italian molto, più, etc. 

    In Czech the qualifier/adverb více (= more) is a frozen neuter nominative/accusative of the comparative větší (= bigger), similarly like plus in Latin. It has a nominal function in the sentence (behaves as a noun), essentially it can be replace by the expression "větší množství" (= bigger amount). Thus the noun after více must be in genitive plural, e.g. více jablek (gen. plur.) = more [of] apples (= bigger amount of apples).

    Ty máš více jablek než [má] on. = You have more [of] apples than he [has].
    Ty máš větší množství jablek než on. = You have a bigger amount of apples than he.
    Last edited: May 10, 2013
  7. myšlenka Senior Member

    The diachronic development of quantifiers is one thing and I don't intend to discuss that here. A different question is whether you have languages where the word for more can be modified morphologically with the productive adverbializing suffix. The Greek example from apmoy70 comes close.
  8. LilianaB Banned

    US New York
    Yes, I agree with Bibax. In such languages as Polish and Lithuanian the quantifiers are definitely adverbs, and the English constructions you are quoting may be expressed in a totally different way, and they often are, in fact -- especially the various grades of adjectives. The comparison of the equivalent of "more" in those languages, either as an adjective or an adverb, may not apply at all -- since they are all adverbs.
  9. myšlenka Senior Member

    What is the motivation for classifying quantifiers in Polish and Lithuania as adverbs?
  10. bibax Senior Member

    Czech (Prague)
    There is no adverbializing suffix in Czech. The Czech adverbs are fossilized locatives (sometimes nominatives/accusatives) of the adjectives (in singular, neuter gender, positive or comparative grade). Thus the answer to the original question is NO.
    Probably because we use the classical Latin terminology. There is no such term like quantifier.
    Last edited: May 10, 2013
  11. myšlenka Senior Member

    What about:
    Ona zpívá pěkně.?

    I believe the Czech grammars refer to quantifiers as neurčité číslovky.
  12. bibax Senior Member

    Czech (Prague)
    Pěkně is locative of *pěkno (not used), like dobře (= well) is locative of dobro (= good).

    You are right, mnoho, více, etc. are neurčité číslovky (indefinite numerals), morphologically adverbs (or even adjectives?).
  13. LilianaB Banned

    US New York
    I don't know such details Myslenka -- about those languages -- I only know that this is what they are considered from a grammatical point of view. The gradation of adjectives is usually achieved by suffixing.
  14. myšlenka Senior Member

    Are you sure it's not from pěkný?Which locative form is this? Feminine singular?
    Well, if they were adverbs or adjectives we could have called them přídavná jména or příslovce instead.
  15. bibax Senior Member

    Czech (Prague)
    Pěkný, pěkná, pěkné (m. f. n., = nice) are long/compound/definite forms. *Pěken, *pěkna, *pěkno (m. f. n., not in use) are short/nominal/indefinite forms, declined like the nouns. The adverb pěkně (= nicely) is locative of *pěkno (nom. sing. neuter). Hypothetically: nom. sing. *pěkno město (= a nice city), loc. sing. *v pěkně městě (= in a nice city), pěkně adv. = nicely.

    In Czech the quantifiers are adverbs from morphological point of view (i.e. fossilized cases of the adjectives), thus we cannot make adverbs from quantifiers as we cannot make adverbs from adverbs.
    Last edited: May 10, 2013
  16. myšlenka Senior Member

    Are you sure about this, that words like five, twenty, many, few, most in Polish and Lithuanian are put in the same category as seldom, usually, always, slowly?
  17. myšlenka Senior Member

    The locative neuter singular is perhaps the origin of the Czech adverbializing suffix -ě/-e (even -o) but it sounds rather cumbersome to describe it as a synchronic locative based on hypothetical nominal forms of adjectives. Especially when there are locative forms for adjectives already which are distinct from -ě.

    I don't know much about the historical development of Czech quantifiers and adverbs but I would generally assume that they have different syntactic distributions.
  18. myšlenka Senior Member

    I actually found an article which supports this: Adverbs are Adjectives with Nominal Case endings :)
  19. bibax Senior Member

    Czech (Prague)
    Definitely. The quantifiers like many, few, more, less behave syntactically like five, twenty, hundred. With the adverbs they share the origin, they are derived from adjectives.

    Mám pět/mnoho jablek. = I have five/many [of] apples.
    Chci pět/více jablek. = I want five/more [of] apples.
  20. Ёж! Senior Member


    One thing that I learned is that no language is unlikely. :) To be or not to be a quantifier is a semantical difference, it does not have to have or not to have implications on grammar…

    Now, in Russian. In Russian, "I killed more people than you" is "Я убил больше людей, чем ты", and "I am more stupid than you" can be said as "Я более глупый, чем ты", although usually it is a shorter "Я глупее тебя" (here the adjective "глупый" takes its comparative degree). So, there is a difference. In derivation, both words look like comparative degrees of adjectives. Grammatically, the first is akin to a numeral (there is such a part of speech in Russian); the second is more like an adverb.

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