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Fun feature: verbal deminutives
Everybody knows about the Swiss German's predilection for deminutives, signifying a small, insignificant or cute version of the base word:
Baum 'tree' - Bäumli 'little tree, sapling, bonsai, christmas tree'.
Chorb 'basket' - Chörbli 'little basket to put on the bike', 'dog's basket'.
What we also do is to put a -l- on verb stems to mark agent, patient or the action itself as small, insignificant or cute.
schlaafe 'to sleep' - schlööfele 'to sleep like a baby, to nap'
bade 'to bathe' - bädele 'to bathe while being a baby, to bathe a baby, to have a nice little bath'.
hocke 'to sit' - höckle 'to sit while being cute, to sit for a short time, to sit cozily in one's little corner'.
What other stuff can we come up with?
u/Captain_Grammaticus — 7 days ago