Definitions
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.
- adjective Occurring without an article. Used especially of Greek nouns.
from The Century Dictionary.
- In zoöl.:
- Without joints; not jointed; inarticulated.
- Having no articulated limbs; anarthropodous.
- In grammar, without the article: applied especially to Greek nouns so used exceptionally.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- adjective (Gr. Gram.) Used without the article.
- adjective (Zoöl.) Without joints, or having the joints indistinct, as some insects.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- adjective linguistics Not having an
article (especially of Greek nouns). - adjective linguistics Not having a determiner.
- adjective biology, of a limb Not having
joints .
Etymologies
from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 4th Edition
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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Basically, it appears that compound nouns that start with Oxford University can be arthrous (introduced by the article the, as discussed at length by Arnold Zwicky), but Oxford University itself is anarthrous (not introduced by an article).
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Basically, it appears that compound nouns that start with Oxford University can be arthrous (introduced by the article the, as discussed at length by Arnold Zwicky), but Oxford University itself is anarthrous (not introduced by an article).
Bad grammar tests I: The Third World Challenge « Motivated Grammar 2008
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You noticed my own careless deployment of anarthrous occupational nominal premodifiers?
Hullabaloo 2006
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In v. 5 Daniel claims God to be ton zōnta theon, but Cyrus claims for Bel to be only zōn theos; in v. 24 Cyrus makes the same claim for the Dragon, and then in v. 25 Daniel makes only a like claim for God (anarthrous), for
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The anarthrous exclamatory fragments are contrained in ways that are not entirely clear to me.
Language Log Mark Liberman 2010
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The anarthrous refers to a word or group of words that appear without a definite article.
Possessing the Treasure Mike Ratliff 2010
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These are the same words used in 1 Thessalonians 5: 1, but here they are in the anarthrous form while they are not in Paul's letter.
Possessing the Treasure Mike Ratliff 2010
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That version can't be used predicatively: "This is big deal" might be the boast of a Russian who never mastered the English determiner system, but it's not something that a native speaker would say "to express contempt for something regarded as impressive by another person". idiomatic contempt aside, the anarthrous exclamatory fragment "big deal" is syntactically regular, in that there are lots of other adjective+noun combinations used in a similar way.
Language Log Mark Liberman 2010
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Careful translators recognize that the articular construction of the noun points to an identity, a personality, whereas a singular anarthrous predicate noun preceding the verb points to a quality about someone.
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"wow, this soup is really salty!", but the anarthrous exclamative "salty soup!" doesn't seem to me to work.
Language Log Mark Liberman 2010
fbharjo commented on the word anarthrous
anarthrous unjointed: without an article in Greek
January 22, 2007