zeldzaam

Dutch

Etymology

From Middle Dutch selsiene, selsane, selsene, also selsame, from Old Dutch *seldsiuni, *seldsāni, from Proto-Germanic *seldasiuniz (“rarely seen”), a compound of *selda- (“rare”) + *siuniz (“sight”). The formation with -zaam is by analogy and occurred in Middle Dutch because the original formation of the word was no longer understood. The same happened in for example German seltsam and Middle Low German seltsam (from which Swedish sällsam).

Pronunciation

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Adjective

zeldzaam (comparative zeldzamer, superlative zeldzaamst)

  1. scarce, rare

Inflection

Inflection of zeldzaam
uninflected zeldzaam
inflected zeldzame
comparative zeldzamer
positive comparative superlative
predicative/adverbial zeldzaam zeldzamer het zeldzaamst
het zeldzaamste
indefinite m./f. sing. zeldzame zeldzamere zeldzaamste
n. sing. zeldzaam zeldzamer zeldzaamste
plural zeldzame zeldzamere zeldzaamste
definite zeldzame zeldzamere zeldzaamste
partitive zeldzaams zeldzamers —

Adverb

  1. rarely, seldom

Derived terms

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