sources for person & number agreement

[Vardelm]

Are there any other sources for person & number inflections on verbs besides pronouns becoming bound/cliticized?

[linguoboy]

Are there any other sources for person & number inflections on verbs besides pronouns becoming bound/cliticized?

For number, you can have nominal/adjectivial forms be reinterpreted as verbal forms. (Obviously this only works if they themselves are inflected for number.) Alternatively, an iterative or distributive form can come to be routinely used for a plurality of subjects until the aspectual meaning is bleached.

For person, you can have different constructions become grammaticalised for different persons. It's not unusual to have a first/non-first split particularly with verbs of volition and perception (since you know what's going on in your head but can only speculate about others). Korean and Tibetan both have this, though Tibetan has gone much further in terms of generalising the constructions and contracting them to the point of loss of transparency.

[chris_notts]

For person, you can have different constructions become grammaticalised for different persons. It's not unusual to have a first/non-first split particularly with verbs of volition and perception (since you know what's going on in your head but can only speculate about others). Korean and Tibetan both have this, though Tibetan has gone much further in terms of generalising the constructions and contracting them to the point of loss of transparency.

That kind of split often arises more widely outside of volition and perception verbs from an old evidentiality distinction. If one of the arguments of the verb is first person then the most likely evidential is a direct evidence one, whereas if no first person is involved then only having indirect evidence is more likely. So evidential -> person agreement is one way.

I know you more or less said this, so the main thing I'm adding is the keyword 'evidentiality' for googling...

[gach]

In both Finnic and Saamic the present tense indicative is partly build on predication of nominalised verb forms. The way Saamic went is a particularly nice example of restructuring the conjugation and throwing away most of the old person material.

Sammallahti's reconstruction for the Proto-Finno-Saamic forms leading to the modern conjugation are (using the verb *tola-, "to hold")

Code: Select all

    SG       DU            PL
1   tola-m   tola-ja-n     tola-pa-t
2   tola-t   tola-pa-ti-n  tola-pa-ta-t
3   tola-ja  tola-pa-n     tola-ja-t

Only the 1st and 2nd person singular *-m and *-t represent original verbal person material here. The rest of the material was built on the participle or actor nominal forms with the suffixes *-pa and *-ja with number marking (dual *-n and plural *-t) taken from nominal morphology. The higher number 2nd persons were actually also marked with older person material, the *-ti/ta morpheme coming from original 2nd person possessive suffixes and thus already being part of the nominal predication scheme. However, the distinction between the dual and plural 1st and 3rd persons was made solely by the choice of the nominalising morpheme between *-pa and *-ja and furthermore in a way that's motivation is not at all transparent.

This system has resulted in rather asymmetric conjugation in the modern languages, for example in North Saami for the same verb doallat, "to hold"

Code: Select all

    SG      DU             PL
1   doalan  dōlle          doallat
2   doalat  doallabeahtti  doallabēhtet
3   doallá  doallaba       dōllet

The orthography used here is the standard orthography except for using additional macrons for long vowels resulting from straightened diphthongs.

[hwhatting]

@ gach: Why do you call that conjugation "asymmetric"?

[gach]

@ gach: Why do you call that conjugation "asymmetric"?

That was mostly to contrast it, maybe just for myself, with other conjugation patterns that are built using old person material and have much more transparent structures. Look for example at the conditional paradigm for the same verb

Code: Select all

    SG        DU           PL
1   doalašin  doalašeimme  doalašeimmet
2   doalašit  doalašeidde  doalašeiddet
3   doalašii  doalašeigga  doalaše(dje)

or other instances of well retained personal suffix paradigms in related languages.

As always, believe the data rather than the analysis and don't put too much weight on any single descriptive word.

[hwhatting]

Thanks for the clarification!
I was just wondering whether that was a specialised use of "asymmetrical" I didn't know of.

[Vardelm]

Thanks for the replies.

I want intransitive & transitives in my conlang to have different agreement suffixes. My plan was for intransitive agreement to be derived from pronouns. It seems that it's not a big deal to have the transitive agreement come from other sources, or even come from a much older set of pronouns. I don't think I need to work out the details on that as long as I know it's plausible.

Another question: could a nominalized verb + bound possessive pronouns be used for a reflexive voice? I've been looking at Russian reflexives as a bit of inspiration, where, IIRC, there are 2 types: one which uses an independant, reflexive pronoun, and the other which is a reflexive ending on the verb. The main difference I'm looking for is to have the reflexive endings on the verb inflect for person/number; hence the question on bound possessive pronouns. This construction would develop from a reflexive to a middle voice, and then eventually be used as the standard intransitive construction.

[R.Rusanov]

That Finnish stuff is a lot like what Russian and other Slavic languages are going through, ditching (or having recently ditched) the old perfect in favor of the imperfect, which was formed by conjungations of бъiть + the past participle. Russian lost the copula though, leaving just the participle behind.

For example

ходихъ (hodihŭ) "I went" has given way to Russian ходил, ходила, ходило (hodil, hodila, hodilo) "He/she/it went" originally "he/she/it (was) going"

[Drydic]

That Finnish stuff is a lot like what Russian and other Slavic languages are going through, ditching (or having recently ditched) the old perfect in favor of the imperfect, which was formed by conjungations of бъiть + the past participle. Russian lost the copula though, leaving just the participle behind.

For example

ходихъ (hodihŭ) "I went" has given way to Russian ходил, ходила, ходило (hodil, hodila, hodilo) "He/she/it went" originally "he/she/it (was) going"

You don't say...fascinating that languages so near each other would have similar developments...almost as if...

[R.Rusanov]

Seeing as Russian's only developed that since late medieval times, after the copula disappeared, and copula-dropping is allowed for emphatic purposes in all Slavic languages, I highly doubt it's influence from the Finnish grammatical system of 2000 BC

[Click]

[...] and copula-dropping is allowed for emphatic purposes in all Slavic languages, [...]

What?

[R.Rusanov]

Yeah, it's indicated (usually) by a dash like so:

"Този е некадърен, а онзи - още по лош!"
Tozi e nekadŭr.en, a onzi - ošte po loš
thisone is incompetent.MascSing, but thatone *dropped copula* more Comp bad.MascSing

[hwhatting]

Yeah, it's indicated (usually) by a dash like so:

"Този е некадърен, а онзи - още по лош!"
Tozi e nekadŭr.en, a onzi - ošte po loš
thisone is incompetent.MascSing, but thatone *dropped copula* more Comp bad.MascSing

That's called ellipsis, almost every Eurpean language does this. It's not done for emphasis, but to avoid repetition. It would be emphatic to insert the copula in the second clause.

[R.Rusanov]

In the example I gave there was a copula in the preceding clause, but that isn't mandatory.

"Много умен този Иван!"
Mnogo um.en tozi Ivan
very smart.MascSing *dropped copula* thisone Ivan

[hwhatting]

In the example I gave there was a copula in the preceding clause, but that isn't mandatory.

"Много умен този Иван!"
Mnogo um.en tozi Ivan
very smart.MascSing *dropped copula* thisone Ivan

Again, this is not something restricted to Slavic languages. I wouldn't know any European language where that comment construction is not possible.

[R.Rusanov]

For what it's worth I think the construction is a lot more common in the Slavic languages I read than say English and French, but you claim that it's acceptable continent-wide. As long as you consider "Slavic languages" a subset of "all European languages" I don't see what we're arguing about.

It's also this pan-slavic, "pan-european" (as you claim) trend taken to its logical extreme that has caused Russian to lose its copula entirely.

[hwhatting]

It's also this pan-slavic, "pan-european" (as you claim) trend taken to its logical extreme that has caused Russian to lose its copula entirely.

I doubt it. What I've read is that it's due to the influence of Uralic and Turkic languages, where dropping the copula in the present tense is extremely common and not restricted to that specific construction. The construction you mention is highly specialized - you front the predicate and add the subject as a comment. Russian (like many Turkic languages) drops the present tense copula in all constructions. And the historic development in most IE languages went in the opposite direction - while dropping of the copula, especially of the 3rd person forms, is quite frequent in the older IE languages, it has become less frequent in most European IE languages, including most Slavic ones. So Russian is really an outlier here, and explaining it by areal influence from Turkic (and Uralic) languages is, IMO, a better explanation than a non-existent trend in European IE languages

[Pole, the]

Again, this is not something restricted to Slavic languages. I wouldn't know any European language where that comment construction is not possible.

I doubt it. What I've read is that it's due to the influence of Uralic and Turkic languages, where dropping the copula in the present tense is extremely common and not restricted to that specific construction. The construction you mention is highly specialized - you front the predicate and add the subject as a comment. Russian (like many Turkic languages) drops the present tense copula in all constructions. And the historic development in most IE languages went in the opposite direction - while dropping of the copula, especially of the 3rd person forms, is quite frequent in the older IE languages, it has become less frequent in most European IE languages, including most Slavic ones. So Russian is really an outlier here, and explaining it by areal influence from Turkic (and Uralic) languages is, IMO, a better explanation than a non-existent trend in European IE languages

Pacefalm.

[R.Rusanov]

Yeah mate when you have two native Slavic speakers disagreeing with you maybe it's time you reconsider your viewpoint. Your Turco-finnish theory doesn't explain why that construction was first noted in modern times, long after the period of Finnish and Turkish influence on the language ended.

The present tense of the copula in Russian was in common use well into the 19th Century (as attested in the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky) but is now used only for archaic effect.

[hwhatting]

Again, this is not something restricted to Slavic languages. I wouldn't know any European language where that comment construction is not possible.

I doubt it. What I've read is that it's due to the influence of Uralic and Turkic languages, where dropping the copula in the present tense is extremely common and not restricted to that specific construction. The construction you mention is highly specialized - you front the predicate and add the subject as a comment. Russian (like many Turkic languages) drops the present tense copula in all constructions. And the historic development in most IE languages went in the opposite direction - while dropping of the copula, especially of the 3rd person forms, is quite frequent in the older IE languages, it has become less frequent in most European IE languages, including most Slavic ones. So Russian is really an outlier here, and explaining it by areal influence from Turkic (and Uralic) languages is, IMO, a better explanation than a non-existent trend in European IE languages

Pacefalm.

What's that for, care to explain? But maybe I didn't make myself clear. Rusanov claimed that a certain construction that is far-spread in Slavic languages is the source of Russian copula dropping. I'm arguing that this construction is not limited to Slavic languages, but very specialized - it's an extension of a a copula-less comment construction that diverges in constituent order from normal predicative constructions. Apart form such constructions, the trend in European IE languages has been to move away from copula-dropping, making Russian an outlier, not a trend-setter. OTOH, the Uralic / Turkic substrate explanation can be found, at least as one of the suggested explanations, in most standard histories of Russian. That doesn't make it true, but it takes a bit more than a "facepalm" for me to dismiss published science.

Yeah mate when you have two native Slavic speakers disagreeing with you maybe it's time you reconsider your viewpoint. Your Turco-finnish theory doesn't explain why that construction was first noted in modern times, long after the period of Finnish and Turkish influence on the language ended.

The present tense of the copula in Russian was in common use well into the 19th Century (as attested in the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky) but is now used only for archaic effect.

Because Russian literary writing far into the 19th century was still under the influence of Church Slavic, which didn't drop the copula. The entire 19th century was a development away from Church Slavic influence towards a literary language based on what was actually spoken by the people, which includes copula dropping. (And while I'm always ready to defer to native speakers on questions of usage, speaking the language natively doesn't give anyone an insight into language history. As I said, the Uralo-Turkic influence theory is basic 1st semester Russian linguistics stuff, not some fringe theory.)

[Astraios]

Ninja'd. What hwhat said.

[Xephyr]

Yeah mate when you have two native Slavic speakers disagreeing with you maybe it's time you reconsider your viewpoint. Your Turco-finnish theory doesn't explain why that construction was first noted in modern times, long after the period of Finnish and Turkish influence on the language ended.

The present tense of the copula in Russian was in common use well into the 19th Century (as attested in the works of Fyodor Dostoyevsky) but is now used only for archaic effect.

Why is that in a quote box? Who are you quoting?

[R.Rusanov]

Professor Wikipedia, PhD

(but you can look up some Dostoevsky yourself if you're sceptical)

[Mecislau]

Yeah mate when you have two native Slavic speakers disagreeing with you maybe it's time you reconsider your viewpoint.

Umm, just speaking a language doesn't mean your opinions on the history of the language is authoritative. But if you disagree, well, then I'm a native Slavic speaker who agrees completely with hwhatting.

Your Turco-finnish theory doesn't explain why that construction was first noted in modern times, long after the period of Finnish and Turkish influence on the language ended.

It's hardly "his theory"; it's pretty widely accepted. And it certainly is much more sensible than arguing that a fairly marginal construction (and a rather marked one at that) was generalized. And you can find plenty of examples of dropped copulas in old Russian texts; you just have to distinguish between Church-Slavonic influenced texts (like as legal and religious documents) and more pure Old East Slavic (i.e., things written by people who didn't have an education in Church Slavonic). Look at the Novgorod birchbarks, for instance, and you can find lots of быть-less forms even in the oldest layer of texts (10th-11th centuries).

"Много умен този Иван!"
Mnogo um.en tozi Ivan
very smart.MascSing *dropped copula* thisone Ivan

Dude, even English allows that. In that very same example. The sentence "Very smart, that Ivan" is grammatical.

That Finnish stuff is a lot like what Russian and other Slavic languages are going through, ditching (or having recently ditched) the old perfect in favor of the imperfect, which was formed by conjungations of бъiть + the past participle. Russian lost the copula though, leaving just the participle behind.

For example

ходихъ (hodihŭ) "I went" has given way to Russian ходил, ходила, ходило (hodil, hodila, hodilo) "He/she/it went" originally "he/she/it (was) going"

You have your history completely mixed up. The быть + l-participle forms are perfect, not imperfect. Forms like ходихъ are aorist, not perfect. And the imperfect in Proto-Slavic was a different tense entirely.

Proto-Slavic *xodixъ (aorist) would have referred to a single past action, so would mean "I went" or "I walked" (the semantics of early Russian verbs of motion are somewhat complicated, and rather different than the modern language). The form *xodilъ jesmь would have meant "I have walked", not "I was walking". To say "I was walking", you would use the imperfect tense: *xoděaxъ.