alliterative
- adjective
- /əˈlɪtəˌreɪtɪv/
- Literature
- The Umbundu language, like my mother's native Xhosa, is a Bantu tongue, intense and alliterative.
- alliterative alliteration
- alliterative consonance
Examples
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Our guest teachers even started chattering when they heard "Keith kicks in Krakow" as we progressed through this alliterative-designed alphabet book.
Academic text (2004) -
Even the name Sandymount strand—lilting, alliterative—suggests a fantasy world somewhere in the vicinity of Brobdingnag or Narnia.
Academic text (2004) -
We ask this and all things in Thy precious and alliterative name.
-
Neil and Nadine - it had a nice, alliterative ring.
Fiction book (1994) -
More and more elections were decided, in the alliterative phrase of the mass media, by "gold, guns, and goons."
Academic text (1993) -
After a brief class discussion, the group decided that we would follow the exact alliterative format that Lobel followed in her work.
Academic text (2004) -
Years ago, we used to refer to Linardi's Laundromat as the only alliterative Italian laundromat in the West Village.
Fiction book (1995) -
The memorable or resonant phrase, for instance, is often alliterative or assonant: "I like Ike."
Blog text (25) -
By its delight in expressing meaning through elaborate patterns of alliterative sound, Welsh poetry honors the Goddess's fusion of substance with idea.
Academic text (1999) -
The poem was filled with alliterative phrases that made it sound musical.
Surface Forms
Morphology
alliterative = alliteration (transparent) = alliteration + ive
The adjective is a straightforward derivation from 'alliteration' using the productive adjectival suffix '-ive', meaning 'relating to or characterized by alliteration'.
Etymology
The word alliterative comes from Latin parts ad- 'to' and littera 'letter'. So alliterative describes speech that repeats the same starting letter or sound, like 'big blue balloon', which is why these lines are easy to remember.