Phronesis
No. 018Word origin1972Language

Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo…

“Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo” is a grammatically correct English sentence.

1 min read

There are three ingredients:

  1. Buffalo: the city in New York state (used as an adjective, “from Buffalo”)
  2. buffalo: the animal (plural, the same as singular)
  3. buffalo: a verb meaning to bully or intimidate

Now read it with the hidden words added back:

(Buffalo buffalo) [that] Buffalo buffalo buffalo — buffalo — Buffalo buffalo.

Bison from Buffalo, [that] bison from Buffalo bully, themselves bully bison from Buffalo.

The trick relies on two features of English: nouns can be zero-plural (one buffalo, two buffalo), and the relative pronoun “that” can be dropped (“the cake [that] I ate”). Remove the signposts and the sentence becomes a puzzle.

Linguists use it to show that grammar is structure, not just word order. Your brain normally builds the structure so fast you never notice. You only notice when it has to work as hard as it does here.

Bring it up

“There’s a valid English sentence that is just the word ‘buffalo’ eight times. Want me to explain it?”

Follow the thread

  1. Same patternPalindromes are written into your DNA Both are wordplay where the constraint is the point.
  2. RelatedWhy English spelling makes no sense Another quirk of English: one spelling, many meanings.
  3. In contrastMany languages have two words for “we” English packs many meanings into one word; other languages split one meaning into several words.
  4. RelatedThe novel with no letter E Another case of English pushed to its limits by a self-imposed rule.

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