View example sentences, synonyms and word forms for Geminate.
Geminate meaning
Forming a pair. | Pronounced longer and considered as being doubled.
Example sentences (11)
Estonian and some Sami languages have three phonemic lengths: short, geminate, and long geminate, although the distinction between the geminate and overlong geminate includes suprasegmental features.
A few languages have regained secondary geminate consonants.
As with vowels, long (geminate) consonants may also be written with a macron, so this transcription can be ambiguous.
In many recent loanwords, there is vacillation between representing an original voiceless consonant as single or geminate: this is the case for example kalsium (~ kalssium) and kantarelli (~ kanttarelli).
Italian is well known for its geminate stops, as the double t in the name Vittoria takes just as long to say as the ct does in English Victoria.
Japanese also prominently features geminate consonants, such as in the minimal pair 来た kita 'came' and 切った kitta 'cut'.
Later, the same variant was also used where r followed other lower case letters with a rounded loop towards the right (such as b, h, p) and to write the geminate rr (as ꝛꝛ).
Length In a geminate or long consonant, the occlusion lasts longer than in simple consonants.
Unrelated roots are differentiated in various languages such as Italian, Japanese, and Finnish, with two length levels, "single" and " geminate ".
When the nine geminate consonants are excluded as mere variations, there are 39 consonants, and excluding rare consonants further decreases the count.
Where the syllable onset is a geminate consonant, e.g. in Italian, the consonant is commonly split by the stress mark, which means that the length sign is not used for gemination.