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One of a limited class of noun modifiers that determine the referents of noun phrases
Answer for the clue "One of a limited class of noun modifiers that determine the referents of noun phrases ", 13 letters:
determinative
Alternative clues for the word determinative
Word definitions for determinative in dictionaries
Wiktionary
Word definitions in Wiktionary
a. determine (gloss decide deciding) something. n. 1 (context linguistics English) An ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts. 2 (context grammar English) A member of a class of words functioning in a noun phrase to identify ...
The Collaborative International Dictionary
Word definitions in The Collaborative International Dictionary
Determinative \De*ter"mi*na*tive\, n. That which serves to determine. Explanatory determinatives . . . were placed after words phonetically expressed, in order to serve as an aid to the reader in determining the meaning. --I. Taylor (The Alphabet).
Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
Word definitions in Douglas Harper's Etymology Dictionary
1650s, from French déterminatif (15c.), from Latin determinat- , past participle stem of determinare (see determine ). As a noun from 1832.
Wikipedia
Word definitions in Wikipedia
A determinative , also known as a taxogram or semagram , is an ideogram used to mark semantic categories of words in logographic scripts which helps to disambiguate interpretation. They have no direct counterpart in spoken language, though they may derive ...
WordNet
Word definitions in WordNet
adj. having the power or quality of deciding; "the crucial experiment"; "cast the deciding vote"; "the determinative (or determinant) battle" [syn: crucial , deciding(a) , determinant , determining(a) ] n. one of a limited class of noun modifiers that determine ...
Usage examples of determinative.
But what gained greatest attention, especially from ranchers in the west, was his discovery in subsequent years of handsome skeletons of four of the progenitors of the horse: eohippus, mesohippus, miohippus and the crucial, determinative merychippus.
Perhaps the determinative of the word Duat, the star within a circle, illustrates the idea of this enveloping of the star.
The Egyptians never took the logical (to us) next step of discarding all their logograms, determinatives, and signs for pairs and trios of consonants, and using just their consonantal alphabet.
Later Sumerian cuneiform did become capable of rendering prose, but it did so by the messy system that I've already described, with mixtures of logograms, phonetic signs, and unpronounced determinatives totaling hundreds of separate signs.
The advent of the Field Process shield and the lasgun with their explosive interaction, deadly to attacker and attacked, placed the current determinatives, on weapons technology.