[78-L] Longest title

[Steven C. Barr]

----- Original Message ----- 
From: <goldenbough at arcor.de>
> This is a 'fun' title, even for native German speakers. The word
> 'Donaudampfschiffartsgesellschaftskapitän' refers to the ship operating
> company based in Vienna, called 'Erste 
> Donau-Dampfschiffahrts-Gesellschaft' -
> 'First Society for Steam Shipping on the Danube'.  This company, founded 
> in 1829,
> is still in operation today and runs many tourist and river cruise ships. 
> Of course,
> it is better known as DDGS.
> During the 19th century it sort of controlled most of the ship traffic on 
> the Danube
> and in the Black Sea. Even if you travelled from, say, Constantinople to 
> the Crimea,
> you most likely took one of their ships. While Genoa with its ships had 
> control over
> the Western Mediterranean, Austria had the Black Sea/Western Mediterranean 
> quasi
> monopoly, (Alexandria, Athens, Beyrouth, Tunis, Constantinople)
> 'Ship language' in Austria-Hugary, as a matter of interest,  was German on 
> the Danube and
> in the Black Sea, Croatian in the (military) Navy, and Italian on 
> passenger and cargo
> ships in the Adriatic Sea and Mediterranean (because most ships were based 
> in Venice and
> were manned with Italian sailors).
> The longest PUBLISHED word in German language, according to the Guinness 
> Book of Records, is: 
> Donaudampfschiffahrtselektrizitätenhauptbetriebswerkbauunterbeamtengesellschaft.
> However, no company of that name has yet been found.
> Yet, there is a law, published by the German state of 
> Mecklenburg-Vorpommern:
> Rindfleischetikettierungsüberwachungsaufgabenübertragungsgesetz
> (Law concerning the assignment of duties for the control of the labelling 
> of beef meat)
> Oh, almost forgot, the song title on the Telefunken disc means:
> 'Captain of the Company for Steam Shipping on the Danube'. I'm sure he 
> sports a cap, which would be his
> Donaudampfschiffahrtsgesellschaftskapitänsmütze.
>
The German language (unlike its English/US counterpart) creates new nouns by 
extending
words to include any applicable adjectives! In fact, Mark Twain wrote an 
article (or part
of a story) on this ever-extensible quality of German nouns!

I shall try to see if I can create an EXTREMELY long German word based 
thereupon...?!

Steven C. Barr