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Sentence composed of homonyms
Simplified parse tree<br>S – sentence<br>NP – noun phrase<br>RC – relative clause<br>VP – verb phrase<br>PN – proper noun<br>N – noun<br>V – verb
City of Buffalo, New York<br>American bison, colloquially referred to as buffalo<br>"Buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo " is a sentence that is grammatically correct in English that is often presented as an example of how homonyms and homophones can be used to create complicated linguistic constructs through lexical ambiguity. It has been discussed in literature in various forms since 1967, when it appeared in Dmitri Borgmann's Beyond Language: Adventures in Word and Thought.
A semantically equivalent form preserving the original word order is: "Buffalonian bison [whom other] Buffalonian bison bully [also] bully Buffalonian bison."
Sentence construction
Reed–Kellogg diagram of the sentence<br>The sentence is unpunctuated and uses three different readings of the word "buffalo". In order of their first use, these are:
a. a city named Buffalo. This is used as a noun adjunct in the sentence;
n. the noun buffalo, an animal, in the plural (equivalent to "buffaloes" or "buffalos"), in order to avoid articles.
v. the verb "buffalo" meaning to outwit, confuse, deceive, intimidate, or baffle.
The sentence is syntactically ambiguous; one possible parse (marking each "buffalo" with its part of speech as shown above) is as follows:
Buffaloa buffalon Buffaloa buffalon buffalov buffalov Buffaloa buffalon.
When grouped syntactically, this is equivalent to: [(Buffalonian bison) (Buffalonian bison intimidate)] intimidate (Buffalonian bison).
Because the sentence has a restrictive clause, there can be no commas. The relative pronouns "which" or "that" could appear between the second and third words of the sentence, as in Buffalo buffalo that Buffalo buffalo buffalo buffalo Buffalo buffalo; when this pronoun is omitted, the relative clause becomes a reduced relative clause.
An expanded form of the sentence that preserves the original word order is:<br>"Buffalo bison that other Buffalo bison bully also bully Buffalo bison."
Thus, the parsed sentence claims that bison who are intimidated or bullied by bison do themselves intimidate or bully bison (at least in the city of Buffalo – implicitly, Buffalo, New York):
Buffalo buffalo (animals called "buffalo" from the city of Buffalo) [that] Buffalo buffalo buffalo (that the same kind of animals from the city bully) buffalo Buffalo buffalo (bully these animals from that city).
[Those] buffalo(es) from Buffalo [that are intimidated by] buffalo(es) from Buffalo intimidate buffalo(es) from Buffalo.
Bison from Buffalo, New York, who are intimidated by other bison in their community in turn intimidate other bison in their community.
The buffalo from Buffalo who are buffaloed by buffalo from Buffalo buffalo (verb) other buffalo from Buffalo.
Buffalo buffalo (main clause subject) [that] Buffalo buffalo (subordinate clause subject) buffalo (subordinate clause verb) in turn buffalo (main clause verb) Buffalo buffalo (main clause direct object).
Buffalo from Buffalo [that] buffalo [from] Buffalo buffalo [in turn] buffalo buffalo [from] Buffalo.
A diagram explaining the sentence<br>Diagram using a comparison to explain the buffalo sentence
Usage
Thomas Tymoczko has pointed out that there is nothing special about eight "buffalos";[1] any sentence consisting solely of the word "buffalo" repeated any number of times is grammatically correct. The shortest is "Buffalo!", which can be taken as a verbal imperative instruction to bully someone ("[You,] buffalo!") with the implied subject "you" removed,[2]: 99–100, 104 or, as a noun exclamation, expressing e.g. that a buffalo has been sighted, or as an adjectival exclamation, e.g. as a response to the question, "where are you from?" Sentences longer than eight words can be constructed by adding further relative clauses. Tymoczko uses the sentence as an example illustrating rewrite rules in linguistics.[2]: 104–105
Origin
The idea that one can construct a grammatically correct sentence consisting of nothing but repetitions of "buffalo" was independently discovered several times in the 20th century. The earliest known written example, "Buffalo buffalo...