German
In German, whole numbers (smaller than 1 million) are expressed as single words, which makes siebenhundertsiebenundsiebzigtausendsiebenhundertsiebenundsiebzig (777,777) a 65 letter word. In combination with -fach or, as a noun, (das ...) -fache, all numbers are written as one word. A 79 letter word, Donaudampfschifffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft, was named the longest published word in the German language by the 1996 Guinness Book of World Records, but longer words are possible. The word refers to a division of an Austrian steam-powered shipping company named the Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaft which transported passengers and cargo on the Danube. The longest word that is not created artificially as a longest-word record seems to be Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz at 63 letters.
The longest known word that is not a compound word seems to be the 23 letter word Unkameradschaftlichkeit. It uses only derivations.
Read more about this topic: Longest Words
Famous quotes containing the word german:
“Sometimes, because of its immediacy, television produces a kind of electronic parable. Berlin, for instance, on the day the Wall was opened. Rostropovich was playing his cello by the Wall that no longer cast a shadow, and a million East Berliners were thronging to the West to shop with an allowance given them by West German banks! At that moment the whole world saw how materialism had lost its awesome historic power and become a shopping list.”
—John Berger (b. 1926)
“That nameless and infinitely delicate aroma of inexpressible tenderness and attentiveness which, in every refined and honorable attachment, is contemporary with the courtship, and precedes the final banns and the rite; but which, like the bouquet of the costliest German wines, too often evaporates upon pouring love out to drink, in the disenchanting glasses of the matrimonial days and nights.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“I am particularly interested in the indications that the people seem to understand and approve the necessity of pursuing the course that will prevent a further effort on the part of the German peoples to continue the struggle for world domination, even though they are thoroughly beaten in this war.”
—Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945)