The other commenters have already explained it diligently, but I wanted to hop on for something related.
As a German speaker, it actually irritates me a little, that English doesn’t agglutinate. Let’s take the word “gum ball machine”.
Which is it? It’s a machine. So are “gum” and “ball” descriptors of “machine”? Well no, they’re all nouns. But they’re not all subjects or objects of a sentence. They’re one subject together. But they’re not written together.
If I had a red gum ball machine, is it a red machine made out of gum that produces balls? Ok, it can also be spelt gumball machine. But that’s still multiple words per concept.
I like my nouns to be one word if it’s one thing and one subject.
“Gumball” is the only correct spelling; “gum ball” is incorrect. So the gum and ball are at least connected. But you’re right about “red gumball machine.” The gumballs or machine might be what’s red.
Ah thanks, I googled it quickly and it gave me both (as titles on webpages, not like in a dictionary). But with the number of spelling mistakes on shopping sites, I shouldn’t have trusted the titles alone :)
Come on, I know there’s Germans about. What the hell does it say lol? Here’s what Claude says:
So I am guessing “Hilfeleistungslöschgruppenfahrzeug” is “rescue and firefighting group vehicle?”
Its more like “assistance for firefighting group vehicle”.
Probably a "supporting firefighter group vehicle“ to be exact.
Edit: this word is kind of bizarre, because it is a composition of 3 compound words which each are compound words themselves.
Hilfe-leistung (Help Giving = Support) Lösch-Gruppe (Extinguishing Group = Firefighters) Fahr-zeug (Drive Thing = Vehicle)
Yeah, that’s even better. Translating these kind of words is quite hard.
The other commenters have already explained it diligently, but I wanted to hop on for something related.
As a German speaker, it actually irritates me a little, that English doesn’t agglutinate. Let’s take the word “gum ball machine”.
Which is it? It’s a machine. So are “gum” and “ball” descriptors of “machine”? Well no, they’re all nouns. But they’re not all subjects or objects of a sentence. They’re one subject together. But they’re not written together.
If I had a red gum ball machine, is it a red machine made out of gum that produces balls? Ok, it can also be spelt gumball machine. But that’s still multiple words per concept.
I like my nouns to be one word if it’s one thing and one subject.
“Gumball” is the only correct spelling; “gum ball” is incorrect. So the gum and ball are at least connected. But you’re right about “red gumball machine.” The gumballs or machine might be what’s red.
Ah thanks, I googled it quickly and it gave me both (as titles on webpages, not like in a dictionary). But with the number of spelling mistakes on shopping sites, I shouldn’t have trusted the titles alone :)