In grammar, a frequentative form of a word is one which indicates repeated action. The frequentative form can be considered a separate, but not completely independent word, called a frequentative. English frequentative is no longer productive, but in some languages, such as Finnish, it is. Grammar is the study of rules governing the use of language. ...

English

English has -le or geminate-er endings. Some frequentative verbs surviving in English are listed below. Additionally, English will occasionally form a frequentative verb by doubling a monosyllable (e.g., murmur, coo-cooing). Frequentative nouns are often formed by combining two different vowel grades of the same word (as in teeter-tot, pitter-patter, chitchat, etc.) Listen to this article · (info) This audio file was created from the revision dated 2005-07-20, and does not reflect subsequent edits to the article. ... The English language is a West Germanic language that originates in England. ...

• batter (bat)
• blabber (blab)
• chatter (chat)
• crackle (crack)
• curdle (curd)
• dribble (drip)
• flicker (flick)
• flitter (flit; <'fly')
• flutter (fleet, akin to float; <'fly')
• gamble (<'game')
• glimmer, glitter (<'glow')
• gruntle (grunt)
• hurdle (<'hard')
• jiggle (jig)
• muddle (muddy)
• patter (pat)
• prattle (prate)
• prickle (prick)
• scribble (scribe)
• slither (slide)
• sniffle (sniff)
• sparkle (spark)
• stammer (stab)
• straddle (<'stride')
• strickle (strike)
• stubble (stub)
• swaddle (swathe)
• tipple (tip)
• trample (tramp)
• waddle (wade)
• waggle (wag)
• wrestle (wrest)

Finnish

In Finnish, a frequentative verb signifies a single action repeated, "around the place" both spatially and temporally. The complete translation would be "go -- around aimlessly". There is a large array of different frequentatives, indicated by lexical agglunative markers. In general, one frequentative is -:i-, and another -ele-, but it is almost always combined with something else. Some forms: A verb is a part of speech that usually denotes action (bring, read), occurrence (decompose, glitter), or a state of being (exist, stand). Depending on the language, a verb may vary in form according to many factors, possibly including its tense, aspect, mood and voice. ...

• sataa -- sadella -- satelee "to rain -- to rain occasionally -- it rains occasionally"
• ampua -- ammuskella -- ammuskelen "to shoot -- go shooting around -- I go shooting around"
• juosta -- juoksennella -- juoksentelen "to run -- to run around (to and fro) -- I run around"
• kirjoittaa -- kirjoitella -- kirjoittelen "to write -- to write (something short) occasionally -- I write "around""
• järjestää -- järjestellä -- järjestelen "to put in order -- to arrange continuously, to play around -- I play around (with them) in order to put them in order"
• heittää -- heittelehtiä -- heittelehdit "to throw -- to swerve -- you swerve"
• loikata -- loikkia -- loikin "to jump once -- to jump (again and again) -- I jump (again and again)"
• istua -- istuksia -- istuksit "to sit -- to sit (randomly somewhere), loiter -- you loiter there by sitting"
• ajattaa - ajatella -- ajattelen "to make someone drive -- to think -- I think"

There are several frequentative morphemes, underlined above; these are affected by consonant gradation as indicated. Their meanings are slightly different; see the list, arranged infinitive~personal: Consonant gradation is a linguistic term for the changing of consonants. ...

• -ella~-ele-: bare frequentative.
• -skella~-skele-: frequentative unergative verb, where the action is wanton (arbitrary)
• -stella~-stele-: frequentative causative, where the subject causes something indicated in the root, as "order" vs. "to continuously try to put something in order".
• -nnella~-ntele-: a frequentative, where an actor is required. The marker -nt- indicates a continuing effort, therefore -ntele- indicates a series of such efforts.
• -elehtia~-elehdi-: movement that is random and compulsive, as in under pain, e.g. vääntelehtiä "writhe in pain", or heittelehtiä "to swerve"
• -:ia-~-i-: a continuing action definitely at a point in time, where the action or effort is repeated.
• -ksia~-ksi-: same as -i-, but wanton, cf. -skella

Frequentatives may be combined with momentanes, that is, to indicate the repetetion of a short, sudden action. The momentane -ahta- can be prefixed with the frequentative -ele- to produce the morpheme -ahtele-, as in täristä "to shake (continuously)" → tärähtää "to shake suddenly once" → tärähdellä "to shake, such that a single, sudden shaking is repeated". For example, the contrast between these is that ground shakes (maa tärisee) continuously when a large truck goes by, the ground shakes once (maa tärähtää) when a cannon fires, and the ground shakes suddenly but repeatedly (maa tärähtelee) when a battery of cannons is firing. An unergative verb is a special kind of intransitive verb, which is distinguished semantically by the fact that the subject is perceived as actively initiating or actively responsible for the action expressed by the verb. ... The momentane is a verb type, which indicates short-lived, sudden, intransitive action. ...

Since the frequentative is a lexical, not a grammatical contrast, considerable semantic drift may have occurred, as in the case of ajaa "to drive": regularly we have ajella "to drive around", ajattaa "to make someone drive", but irregularly ajatella "to think". Semantic drift, in historical linguistics, is a phenomenon whereby words change in meaning over a period of time, resulting in semantic differences between cognates. ...

For a list of different real and hypothetical forms, see: [1].

Loanwords are put into the frequentative form, if the action is such. If the action can be nothing else but frequentative, the "basic form" doesn't even exist, such as with "to go shopping". A loanword is a word directly taken into by one language from another with little or no translation. ...

• surffata -- surffailla "to surf -- to surf (around in the net)"
• *shopata -- shoppailla "*to shop once (impossible) -- to go shopping"

There's also this case with an adjective: iso -- isotella "big -- to talk big", or feikkailla < English fake "to be fake, blatantly and consistently".

Latin

In Latin, frequentative verbs show repeated or intense action. They are formed from the supine stem with -tāre/-sāre, -itāre, -titāre/sitāre added. Latin was the language originally spoken in the region around Rome called Latium. ... Supine as an adjective generally refers to any upward-facing position. ...

• cantāre, sing (<canere, sing)
• cursāre, run about (<currere, run)
• dictāre, dictate (<dīcere, speak, say)
• āctitāre, zealously agitate (<agere, do, drive)

Russian

In Russian, the frequentative form of verbs to denote a repeated or customary action is produced by insetring the suffix -iv/-yv", often accompanied with a change in the root of the word (vowel alternation, change of the last root consonant) The root is the primary lexical unit of a word, which carries the most significant aspects of semantic content and cannot be reduced into smaller constituents. ... In linguistics, the term ablaut (from German ab- in the sense down, reducing + Laut sound) designates a system of vowel gradations in Proto-Indo-European and its far-reaching consequences in all of the modern Indo-European languages. ...

• videt (to see) -> vidyvat (to see repeatedly)
• sidet (to sit) -> sizhivat
• hodit (to walk) -> hazhivat
• An interesting example is with the word brat' (to take); an archaic usage recorded among hunters, normally used in the past tense, in hunter's boasting: biral', biryval meaning "used to take (quite a few) trophies".

The Russian frequentative forms are now considered archaic and are used predominantly in idioms (e.g. vidyvat vidy, i.e. to have been through thick and thin) or in fairy tails, etc. Hunting is, in its most general sense, the pursuit of a target. ...

References

• Gildersleeve, B. L. (1895). Gildersleeve's Latin Grammar, Bolchazy-Carducci. 0865164770.