Dvandva

A dvandva (Sanskrit द्वन्द्व dvandva 'pair') or twin or Siamese compound refers to one or more objects that could be connected in sense by the conjunction 'and', where the objects refer to the parts of an agglomeration described by the compound. Dvandvas are common in some languages such as Sanskrit where the term originates, as well as Chinese, Japanese, and some Modern Indic languages such as Hindi and Urdu, but less common in English (the term is not often found in English dictionaries). Examples include Sanskrit mātāpitarau (मातापितरौ) for 'mother and father'; Chinese shānchuān and Japanese yamakawa (山川) for 'mountains and rivers'; Modern Greek "maxeropiruno" (μαχαιροπήρουνο) for 'fork and knife', "anðrojino" (ανδρόγυνο) for "married couple (lit. man-woman)", "benovjeno" (μπαινοβγαίνω) for 'go in and out'. Note such compounds as singer-songwriter, in the sense 'someone who is both a singer and a songwriter' are not dvandva compounds. Within the Sanskrit classification of compounds these are considered कर्मधारय karmadhāraya compounds such as राजर्षि rājarṣi 'king-sage,' i.e. 'one who is both a king and a sage' (राजा चासावृषिश्च).