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People often regard Chinese, including Standard Mandarin, as a monosyllabic language.

Classical Chinese apparently was a monosyllabic lanuagelanguage, where worswords consisted of a single syllable (a single character also equals a single syllable).

Modern Standard Mandarin still has quite a few single-syllable words/terms, but more common are two-syllable (two-character) terms, to the point where many common words have an "empty" second syllable literally meaning "child". This turns old single-syllable words into two syllable words, and it's a bit like a diminutive in western languages.

There are also very many 4-syllable words and terms. Some seem to be made up of two 2-syllable words and others seem to be made up of four single-syllable words.

But are there also three-syllable and five-syllable words? How common/rare are they?

People often regard Chinese, including Standard Mandarin, as a monosyllabic language.

Classical Chinese apparently was a monosyllabic lanuage, where wors consisted of a single syllable (a single character also equals a single syllable).

Modern Standard Mandarin still has quite a few single-syllable words/terms, but more common are two-syllable (two-character) terms, to the point where many common words have an "empty" second syllable literally meaning "child". This turns old single-syllable words into two syllable words, and it's a bit like a diminutive in western languages.

There are also very many 4-syllable words and terms. Some seem to be made up of two 2-syllable words and others seem to be made up of four single-syllable words.

But are there also three-syllable and five-syllable words? How common/rare are they?

People often regard Chinese, including Standard Mandarin, as a monosyllabic language.

Classical Chinese apparently was a monosyllabic language, where words consisted of a single syllable (a single character also equals a single syllable).

Modern Standard Mandarin still has quite a few single-syllable words/terms, but more common are two-syllable (two-character) terms, to the point where many common words have an "empty" second syllable literally meaning "child". This turns old single-syllable words into two syllable words, and it's a bit like a diminutive in western languages.

There are also very many 4-syllable words and terms. Some seem to be made up of two 2-syllable words and others seem to be made up of four single-syllable words.

But are there also three-syllable and five-syllable words? How common/rare are they?

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hippietrail
  • 4.1k
  • 3
  • 31
  • 61

How common are three-character or five-character words/terms in Standard Mandarin?

People often regard Chinese, including Standard Mandarin, as a monosyllabic language.

Classical Chinese apparently was a monosyllabic lanuage, where wors consisted of a single syllable (a single character also equals a single syllable).

Modern Standard Mandarin still has quite a few single-syllable words/terms, but more common are two-syllable (two-character) terms, to the point where many common words have an "empty" second syllable literally meaning "child". This turns old single-syllable words into two syllable words, and it's a bit like a diminutive in western languages.

There are also very many 4-syllable words and terms. Some seem to be made up of two 2-syllable words and others seem to be made up of four single-syllable words.

But are there also three-syllable and five-syllable words? How common/rare are they?