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Part of
Perfects in Indo-European Languages and Beyond
Edited by Robert Crellin and Thomas Jügel
[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 352] 2020
► pp. 49–94

Chapter 3
Celtic past tenses past and present

| Studienhaus für Keltische Sprachen und Kulturen (SKSK), Königswinter

Past tense marked for perfective aspect, resultative, or other typical features of grammatical perfect forms is clearly in evidence in all of the modern Celtic languages, although not normally listed in the standard paradigms. An overview of usages in the modern languages will be given here, the major structures being of fairly recent origin. The formal structure is periphrastic throughout, divided between an older type employing the preposition ‘after’, and a newer one which shows some resemblance to the have-perfects in many other European languages. In agreement with previous authors, these major formal types will be referred to as p1 and p2 respectively. As the question of active vs. passive is crucial here, this side of the matter will be discussed to some extent, as will be the issue of syntactically reduced structures containing traces of a perfect tense. Questions of contact-induced change will not be addressed in this descriptive overview, except on some minor points. Given the grammatical and semantic complexity of this matter, with different developments over six literary languages and a multitude of dialectal varieties, the early (pre)history will not be discussed in much detail here.

Keywords: analytic [vs. synthetic], have-perfect, simple past, recent past, passive
Article outline
  • 1.Preliminaries
    • 1.1Overview
    • 1.2Typological features of Celtic verbs
  • 2.‘After’-perfect (p1)
    • 2.1General structure
    • 2.2Earlier stages
    • 2.3Function
    • 2.4Current usage
    • 2.5Incompatibility
    • 2.6Hiberno-English
    • 2.7Scottish Gaelic
    • 2.8Manx
    • 2.9Welsh
  • 3. p2: have-perfect
    • 3.1General structure
    • 3.2Possessive character
    • 3.3Related structures
    • 3.4Definiteness, relevance and proximity
    • 3.5Options and constraints
    • 3.6Paradigmatic environment
    • 3.7Evolution/Contacts
    • 3.8Combination of p1 & p2
    • 3.9 have-perfect in Eastern Gaelic
    • 3.10 have-perfect in Breton
  • 4.Voice
    • 4.1From ‘passive’ to ‘autonomous’
    • 4.2 p2 as passive
      • 4.2.1Previous views
      • 4.2.2Agentive clause
      • 4.2.3‘Have’ again
      • 4.2.4Textual features
      • 4.2.5Verbal noun versus verbal adjective
    • 4.3Passive in p1
      • 4.3.1Irish
      • 4.3.2Scottish Gaelic
      • 4.3.4Welsh
      • 4.3.5Breton
  • 5.Derived tenses: Anteriority and Posteriority
  • 6.Non-finite perfect equivalents
    • 6.1 do/i ‘to’ as agent marker
    • 6.2Small clauses with agus
    • 6.3Obsolete iar > ar
  • 7.Phrasal verbs
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 23 September 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.352.03wig
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