The paper makes the
following novel claims: (1) the semantics of noun--noun compounds which is
activated by metaphor and/or metonymy (often termed as "exocentric"
compounds in linguistics and generally regarded as semantically opaque) can be
accounted for with the help of conceptual metaphor and metonymy theory; (2)
there are regular patterns of metaphor- and metonymy-based compounds, depending
on which constituent is affected by conceptual metaphor and/or metonymy. In the
second part of the paper I look at a subtype of metaphor- and metonymy-based
noun--noun compounds, where the simultaneous activation of both metaphor and
metonymy affects the meaning, and give an account of the productive patterns
that underlie this type
