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I've noticed some words ending in こ which seem to insert a っ where it is seemingly unwarranted phonetically.

Examples are 末っ子, 売れっ子, 江戸っ子, 町っ子, etc. I don't see any phonetic issues with the 'expected' 末子 (a word in itself), 売れ子, 江戸子, 町子. So what function is this っ performing in these words? Is it phonetic or could it be a morphemic usage, denoting っこ as a suffix with specific semantic content?

Also, does 慣れっこ also belong to this group of words?

kandyman
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    Partly related, perhaps? https://japanese.stackexchange.com/q/43825/9831 – Chocolate Sep 27 '20 at 15:36
  • Thanks! That's pretty much exactly what I was looking for. I should have been able to find that myself. Perhaps we should close this question as it seems redundant? – kandyman Sep 27 '20 at 15:41

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