Babak Sharif
Abstract
This investigation aims at examining the diachrony of so-called ‘compound verbs’ in Iranian languages. To this end, a number of texts were selected from the three periods of Iranian languages. From Old Iranian period, some Avestan texts as well as all Old Persian inscriptions, from MI period ...
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This investigation aims at examining the diachrony of so-called ‘compound verbs’ in Iranian languages. To this end, a number of texts were selected from the three periods of Iranian languages. From Old Iranian period, some Avestan texts as well as all Old Persian inscriptions, from MI period some Zoroastrian Middle Persian texts as well as from a Sogdian text were picked up and searched for instances of complex predicates, including prefixed verbs, incorporational verbs, combinational verbs, etc., which were then analyzed. The data show that in OI the majority of complex predicates consist in prefixed verbs, thus, maybe ‘compound verbs’ were not much needed to be formed. Nevertheless, ‘compound verb’ patterns did exist since that period. With verbal prefixes being inseparably attached to verb stems OP, the existent patterns for formation of complex predicates increased their productivity, the verb kar ‘do’ playing a major role as
the verbal element of complex predicates. In Middle Iranian, loss of productivity of some verbal prefixes as well as inseparability of many prefixed verbs increasingly led to formation of more complex predicates, with more light verbs recruited into the construction. In New Iranian, specifically in New Persian, in addition to a decrease in number of prefixed verbs, as well as an increase in number of complex predicates, two other factors prompted the formation of new ones: first, an emergent need to produce verbs out of loan elements, and second, a tendency to morphological leveling of irregular simple verbs by converting them into complex predicates.
Introduction
This article aims at examining the diachronic evolution of strings called ‘compound verb’, also referred to as ‘complex predicate’ (CP) or ‘light verb construction’, in the Iranian languages. After an introductory section 1, Section 2 reviews the most significant researches on the evolution of complex predicates in the Iranian languages. Sections 3 to 5 are dedicated to analyzing the data gathered from each of the three stages of the Iranian languages, namely, the Old, the Middle, and the New Iranian.
Literature Review
Rather than examining the processes leading to the formation of complex predicates, most of the authors investigated the occurrence of CPs in historical stages of this language family, specifically the
Persian language. Much of the literature doubt about the existence of ‘light verb constructions’ in the Old Iranian. Almost all scholars, however, agree about the existence of such strings from the Middle Iranian period onwards.
Methodology
A number of texts were selected from each period. Thus, from the OI period, a couple of Avestan texts as well as all Old Persian inscriptions, and from the MI period, some Zoroastrian Middle Persian texts as well as a Sogdian text were picked up and searched for instances or prototypes of different kinds of complex predicates including prefixed verbs, incorporating verbs, combinational verbs, etc., which were then analyzed and evaluated.
Discussion
In the Old Iranian period, the majority of complex predicates consisted of prefixed verbs, thus, maybe for this reason, ‘compound verbs’ were not much needed to be formed. According to the data from the Old Iranian, two sub-stages in this stage are recognizable: i) a stage of mobility of pre-verbs and their loose connection with the verbal stem in Avestan, and ii) a close, tight connection between pre-verbs and the verb, resulting in pre-verbs being changed into proper prefixes in Old Persian. On the one hand, the development of relatively free Avestan pre-verbs into Old Persian bound prefixes was the starting point of the emergence of complex predicates (consisting of a prefix and the verb root), and on the other hand, it initiated an increase in syntactically-based complex predicates (including predicative and incorporative
ones), whose formational patterns already existed in the language involved. Such strings consist of a transitive verb and its object, which may sometimes, as a single predicate, take another noun as their argument.
In this stage, the fixation of pre-verbs in connection with verbs, a move toward syntheticity, led to increasing production of complex predicates, which was a countermove toward analyticity, the latter counterbalancing the former phenomenon. With verbal prefixes being inseparably attached to verb stems in OP the existent patterns for the formation of complex predicates increased their productivity, a countermove toward analyticity, and the verb KAR ‘do’ played a major role as the verbal element of complex predicates.
In the Middle Iranian period, many prefixed verbs lost their analyzability. In a later development, the process of entrenchment of verbal prefixes led to their unproductivity and unanalyzability from verbal stem, resulting in a decrease in using prefixed verbs. On the other hand, as a compensatory mechanism, constructions for creating various kinds of complex predicates using different light verbs were activated. Also in this period, besides kardan, more new light verbs were recruited into the construction.
In the New Iranian period, and more specifically in New Persian, with the establishment of particular light verbs, the rate of production and proliferation of new complex predicates was increased, and, in parallel, the ratio of prefixed verb usage decreased to the point that in contemporary Persian it has reached to 1 percent. In this period, two further factors helped the formation of complex predicates. First, an emergent need to produce verbs out of loan elements borrowed from Arabic and European languages, and second, a tendency to
morphological levelling the irregular simple verbs by converting them into complex predicates.
Figure 1 illustrates the changes in the occurrence of using prefixed verbs as well as the verbal element KAR, the most frequently used verb in this slot, from Avestan to New Persian, based on the data analyzed. As we can see, the ratio of prefixed verbs had a decreasing trend throughout this time span, falling more rapidly in the Middle Iranian. As far as KAR is concerned, it had an upward trend in general, but also saw drops in two points.
Figure 1
The changes in usage of prefixed verbs (the blue line) and the verbal element kardan (the green line)
Conclusion
The path taken in the evolution of complex predicates in the Iranian languages, and more specifically the Persian language, suggests a move toward analyticity, in parallel with other developments in the same direction in the verb system, including the evolution of periphrastic constructions for passivization as well as certain tenses such as present perfect, past perfect, and future.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank Dr. Ehsan Changizi for his helpful comments on the manuscript as well as his suggestions for selecting ancient Iranian texts.
