In German and Dutch, the comparable prefix may also take adjectival bases, as for instance in Dutch aartsconservatief very conservative (< conservatief conservative) or German erzdumm very stupid (< dumm stupid). This is impossible in Frisian: *aartskonservatyf or *aartsdom. Instead, one must use an independent adverb for expressing a comparable high degree, preferably enforced with an emphatic ending -e, for example in ôfgryslike konservatyf very conservative or grouwélige dom very stupid.

With respect to the second type, the prefix aarts- [a:ts] has been pronounced as earts- [ɪ.əts] for a certain length of time, along the lines of a regular phonological change in Frisian. The prefix became confused with the ordinal and adjective earst [ɪ.əst] first. A favourable circumstance was also that the stress in the derivation resembled the pattern found in a phrase consisting of an adjective followed by a noun. As a consequence, expressions like in earste(n) dogeneat a real rogue or in earste(n) domkop a real dunce came into existence, with the inflectional suffix -e) or the emphatic suffix -en). The use of in earste(n) a real later extended to positive evaluations, for example in in earste(n) hurddraver a firstclass runner, in earste(n) leafhawwer fan klassike muzyk a serious fan of classical music, etcetera. One could possibly qualify this development as a case of degrammaticalization, where we see an affix developing into an independent word.