On 05/23/2014 12:37 PM, Kracked_P_P---webmaster wrote:
On 05/23/2014 11:54 AM, Doug wrote:
On 05/23/2014 02:53 AM, David Love wrote:
MR ZenWiz <mrzen...@gmail.com> wrote:
The longest word in any English language is the name of a small
town in
Wales - Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyrndrobwyllllantysiliogogogoch
(see
Wikipedia if you're curious about what and where this is). I had
thought it was 56 letters, but this one is 59. Hmm.
Sorry, that's the second longest. The longest is in the North
Island of
New Zealand.
Sounds like it was Māori in origin and became part of the en_ZA language.
Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatahu
(85 letters) which means "The summit where Tamatea, the man with
the big
knees, the climber of mountains, the land-swallower who travelled
about,
played his nose flute to his loved one"
See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_long_place_names
David
I would have to say that the big word above is not English.
German is a language where there really _are_ long words in the
language,
since German, much more than English, strings words together to make
longer ones. We have things like fireplace and carwash. (Fireplace
translates directly: Feuerplatz.) If you ask the average German what is
the longest word, he is likely to tell you,
"Oberweserdampfschiffahrtgeschäftskapitän"
which also happens to be the name of a song! (Perhaps the word was
invented by the songwriter?) Translating, it means the "Upper Weser
excursion boat company captain." But my German teacher, eons ago,
told me about a word of 100 letters, involving a a miscreant Hottentot
from Trödelstadt who was jailed in a latticework kangaroo cage for
killing
his mother-in-law. I suppose it might actually have existed, back when
Germany had a presence in Africa.
--doug
Any word used in use in the language, can become part of the language
as more and more people use it.
English came into being as more and more groups came to "England" and
became part of its early language/culture. There was a multi-part PBS
about the origin of the "modern" British English language - i.e. up to
around the 1800's.
I'll bet there aren't more thn 50 people in the world who use
"Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanatah"!
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