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Morphology in Northwest Caucasian languages
Northwest Caucasian languages display a high degree of polysynthesis (manifested in complex words which bear much information on arguments and the characteristics of a situation), prefixes and suffixes, with some morphemes being capable to appear both as prefixes and suffixes, ergative-based cross-reference of core arguments and indirect objects introduced by applicatives, highly developed means of expressing locational semantics within the predicate, and intricate tense-modality-aspect systems. Although classical noun-to-verb incorporation does not occur, there are constructions akin to incorporation, especially in the nominal domain. Nouns constitute a subclass of a broad class of predicates (both morphologically and syntactically) and form word-like nominal complexes with their attributes. Morphemes demonstrate features which are not typical of morphemes in Standard Average European languages, including much autonomy reflected in affix order variation and ability to attach to complex syntactic constituents.