In grammar, a frequentative form of a word is one which indicates repeated action. The frequentative form can be considered a separate, but not completely independent word, called a frequentative. English frequentative is no longer productive, but in some languages, such as Finnish, it is.

English

English has -le or geminate-er as a suffix. Some frequentative verbs surviving in English are listed below. Additionally, English will occasionally form a frequentative verb by reduplication of a monosyllable (e.g., murmur, coo-cooing). Frequentative nouns are often formed by combining two different vowel grades of the same word (as in teeter-tot, pitter-patter, chitchat, etc.)

• batter (bat)
• blabber (blab)
• bobble (bob)
• crackle (crack)
• curdle (curd)
• dazzle (daze)
• flicker (flick)
• flitter (flit)
• flutter (float)
• haggle (hag, =to hew)
• jiggle (jig)
• patter (pat)
• prattle (prate)
• prickle (prick)
• scuffle (scuff)
• slither (slide)
• sniffle (sniff)
• snuggle (snug)
• sparkle (spark)
• straddle (<'stride')
• swaddle (swathe)
• trample (tramp)
• waddle (wade)
• waggle (wag)
• wrestle (wrest)

Finnish

In Finnish, a frequentative verb signifies a single action repeated, "around the place" both spatially and temporally. The complete translation would be "go — around aimlessly". There is a large array of different frequentatives, indicated by lexical agglutinative markers. In general, one frequentative is -:i-, and another -ele-, but it is almost always combined with something else. Some forms:

• sataa — sadella — satelee "to rain — to rain occasionally — it rains occasionally"
• ampua — ammuskella — ammuskelen "to shoot — go shooting around — I go shooting around"
• juosta — juoksennella — juoksentelen "to run — to run around (to and fro) — I run around"
• kirjoittaa — kirjoitella — kirjoittelen "to write — to write (something short) occasionally — I write "around""
• järjestää — järjestellä — järjestelen "to put in order — to arrange continuously, to play around — I play around (with them) in order to put them in order"
• heittää — heittelehtiä — heittelehdit "to throw — to swerve — you swerve"
• loikata — loikkia — loikin "to jump once — to jump (again and again) — I jump (again and again)"
• istua — istuksia — istuksit "to sit — to sit (randomly somewhere), loiter — you loiter there by sitting"
• ajattaa - ajatella — ajattelen "to make someone drive — to think — I think"