Timeline for What is the story behind "a-" prefix / suffix?
Current License: CC BY-SA 3.0
10 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Jan 30, 2012 at 13:55 | comment | added | Robusto | Interesting question. I was referred here when I asked about the topic in chat after I'd found other evidence and was going to ask my own question. IMO, an exhaustive and definitive answer is yet to come. | |
| Jan 30, 2012 at 13:51 | answer | added | Robusto | timeline score: 21 | |
| Nov 1, 2011 at 22:34 | history | edited | FumbleFingers |
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| Oct 24, 2011 at 13:21 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | @mfg: The third example is simply ellipsis, where -a stands for to. In other cases the -a suffix is mock Italian. | |
| Oct 22, 2011 at 10:06 | history | tweeted | twitter.com/#!/StackEnglish/status/127687236178292737 | ||
| Oct 21, 2011 at 20:26 | comment | added | mfg | Could you find another example of its usage as a suffix? While the prefix usages are all commonplace, I have a feeling that the usage in the third is not the same | |
| Oct 21, 2011 at 19:08 | answer | added | Barrie England | timeline score: 3 | |
| Oct 21, 2011 at 19:01 | answer | added | FumbleFingers | timeline score: 7 | |
| Oct 21, 2011 at 18:14 | comment | added | FumbleFingers | I think it often denotes some kind of "continuing activity or state" (asleep, abed, astir), so there's an element of tautology when used with -ing forms such as a-wassailing. | |
| Oct 21, 2011 at 18:02 | history | asked | tenfour | CC BY-SA 3.0 |