In its strictest sense, tmesis (; plural tmeses ;

Ancient Greek Ancient Greek (, ; ) includes the forms of the Greek language used in ancient Greece and the classical antiquity, ancient world from around 1500 BC to 300 BC. It is often roughly divided into the following periods: Mycenaean Greek (), Greek ...

: ''tmēsis'' "a cutting" < ''temnō'', "I cut") is the dividing of a word into two parts, with another word inserted between those parts, thus forming a

compound word In linguistics, a compound is a lexeme (less precisely, a word or Sign language, sign) that consists of more than one Word stem, stem. Compounding, composition or nominal composition is the process of word formation that creates compound lexemes. C ...

. Example: "un-freaking-believable" (an emphatic way to say "unbelievable"). In a broader sense, ''tmesis'' is a set phrase, such as a

phrasal verb In the traditional grammar of Modern English, a phrasal verb typically constitutes a single semantic unit consisting of a verb followed by a particle (e.g., ''turn down'', ''run into,'' or ''sit up''), sometimes collocated with a preposition (e. ...

, with one or more words interpolated within, thus creating a separate phrase.

Verbs

Tmesis of

prefix A prefix is an affix which is placed before the stem of a word. Particularly in the study of languages, a prefix is also called a preformative, because it alters the form of the word to which it is affixed. Prefixes, like other affixes, can b ...

ed verbs (whereby the prefix is separated from the simple verb) was thought to be an original feature of the

language, common in

Homer Homer (; , ; possibly born ) was an Ancient Greece, Ancient Greek poet who is credited as the author of the ''Iliad'' and the ''Odyssey'', two epic poems that are foundational works of ancient Greek literature. Despite doubts about his autho ...

(and later poetry), but not used in

Attic An attic (sometimes referred to as a '' loft'') is a space found directly below the pitched roof of a house or other building. It is also known as a ''sky parlor'' or a garret. Because they fill the space between the ceiling of a building's t ...

prose. Such

separable verb A separable verb is a verb that is composed of a lexical core and a separable particle. In some sentence positions, the core verb and the particle appear in one word, whilst in others the core verb and the particle are separated. The particle is t ...

s are also part of the normal grammatical usage of some modern languages, such as Dutch and German.

Ancient Greek

Tmesis in

is something of a misnomer, since there is not necessarily a splitting of the prefix from the verb; rather the consensus now seems to be that the separate prefix or pre-verb reflects a stage in the language where the prefix had not yet joined onto the verb. There are many examples in Homer's epics, the ''

Iliad The ''Iliad'' (; , ; ) is one of two major Ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Odyssey'', the poem is divided into 24 books and ...

'' and the ''

Odyssey The ''Odyssey'' (; ) is one of two major epics of ancient Greek literature attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest surviving works of literature and remains popular with modern audiences. Like the ''Iliad'', the ''Odyssey'' is divi ...

'', both of which preserve archaic features. One common and oft-cited example is (''kata dakrua leibōn;'' "shedding tears"), in which the pre-verb/

''kata-'' "down" has not yet joined the verbal participle ''leibōn'' "shedding". In later Greek, these would combine to form the compound verb ''kataleibōn'' "shedding (in a downwards direction)".

Latin

Tmesis is found as a poetic or rhetorical device in classical

Latin Latin ( or ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins (Italic tribe), Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area aroun ...

poetry, such as

Ovid Publius Ovidius Naso (; 20 March 43 BC – AD 17/18), known in English as Ovid ( ), was a Augustan literature (ancient Rome), Roman poet who lived during the reign of Augustus. He was a younger contemporary of Virgil and Horace, with whom he i ...

's ''

Metamorphoses The ''Metamorphoses'' (, , ) is a Latin Narrative poetry, narrative poem from 8 Common Era, CE by the Ancient Rome, Roman poet Ovid. It is considered his ''Masterpiece, magnum opus''. The poem chronicles the history of the world from its Cre ...

''. Words such as ''circumdare'' ("to surround") are split apart with other words of the sentence in between, e.g. ''circum virum dant'': "they surround the man" (circumdant (circum- prefix + dant)). This device is used in this way to create a visual image of surrounding the man by means of the words on the line. In the work of the poet

Ennius Quintus Ennius (; ) was a writer and poet who lived during the Roman Republic. He is often considered the father of Roman poetry. He was born in the small town of Rudiae, located near modern Lecce (ancient ''Calabria'', today Salento), a town ...

, the literal splitting of the word ''cerebrum'' creates a vivid image: ''saxo cere comminuit brum'' "he shattered his brain with a rock."

Old Irish

Tmesis can be found in some early Old Irish texts, such as Audacht Morainn (The Testament of Morann). Old Irish verbs are found at the beginning of clauses (in a VSO word order) and often possess prepositional pre-verbal particles, e.g. ''ad-midethar'' (ad- prefix) "evaluates, estimates". Tmesis occurs when the pre-verbal particle is separated from the verbal stem and the verbal stem is placed in clause final position while the pre-verbal particle/prefix remains at the beginning of the clause. This results in an abnormal word order, e.g. ''ad- cruth caín -cichither'' " hefair form will be seen" (where ''ad-chichither'' is the future third-person singular passive of ''ad-cí'' "sees").

Old Norse

Examples of tmesis have been found in

skaldic poetry A skald, or skáld (Old Norse: ; , meaning "poet"), is one of the often named poets who composed skaldic poetry, one of the two kinds of Old Norse poetry in alliterative verse, the other being Eddic poetry. Skaldic poems were traditionally compo ...

. In addition to the use of

kennings A kenning ( Icelandic: ) is a figure of speech, a figuratively-phrased compound term that is used in place of a simple single-word noun. For instance, the Old English kenning () means , as does (). A kenning has two parts: a base-word (a ...

skald A skald, or skáld (Old Norse: ; , meaning "poet"), is one of the often named poets who composed skaldic poetry, one of the two kinds of Old Norse poetry in alliterative verse, the other being Eddic poetry. Skaldic poems were traditionally compo ...

s used tmesis to obscure the meaning of the poem. One use of tmesis was to divide the elements of personal names.

English

Colloquial examples include ''un-bloody-believable'', '' abso-bloody-lutely'', and several variants. Numerous English words are joined with the vulgar element '' -fucking-'', such as '' unfuckingbelievable'' or '' fanfuckingtastic''; the tmesis often does not occur between a prefix and the root, but inside the root itself, as seen above in ''absobloodylutely'' and ''fanfuckingtastic''. In '' scrumdiddlyumptious'', the initial syllable of ''scrumptious'' is partially reduplicated. English employs a large number of

s, consisting of a core verb and a particle; placing a word between them is sometimes called tmesis. For example: :''Turn off'' the light OR ''Turn'' the light ''off''. :''Hand in'' the application OR ''Hand'' the application ''in''. When the object of the verb is 'it', tmesis is the norm, with ''turn it off'' and ''hand it in'' being nearly obligatory; *''hand in it'' is only possible with contrastive intonation. Such tmesis can also occur with an intransitive phrasal verb, typically with an adjunct. For example: :''Come back'' tomorrow OR ''Come'' on ''back'' tomorrow. :Let's ''head out'' OR Let's ''head'' right ''out''.

References

{{Figures of speech Rhetoric Figures of speech Poetic devices Word order Infixes