Adjective specialization

From Indo-European Languages

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The specialization of adjectives from nouns is not generally absolute, but a question of grade. Here are some examples:

1. Stems in -nt are usually adjectives, but sometimes they are assimilated to the verb system and become participles.

2. Words in -ter are nouns, and adjectives are derived usually in -trios and others.

3. Nouns in -ti have adjectives in -tikos, which usually has an ethnic meaning.

4. Sometimes the distinction is made with alternating vowels: neuters in -os and adjectives in -es, -es.

The accent is normally used to distinguish thematic nouns in -os with adjectives in -os (mainly -tos, -nos).

NOTE. There are sometimes secondary processes that displace the accent from an adjective to create a noun: gr. leukos, white / leukos, white spot. These correlations noun-adjective were often created, but from some point on the derivation of adjectives was made with suffixes like -ment, -went, -jo, -to, -no, -iko, etc. There are, however, abundant remains of the old identity between noun and adjective in IE III and hence in Europaio. An example of the accent shift is that of europai-o-, which as an adjective is europaios/europaia/europaiom, while as a noun it is Europaiom.