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Historical Linguistics 2022: Selected papers from the 25th International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Oxford, 1–5 August 2022
Edited by Holly Kennard, Emily Lindsay-Smith, Aditi Lahiri and Martin Maiden
[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 369] 2025
► pp. 128–149

Patterns of suppletion in inflection revisited

What the Crossover Constraint constrains

| University of Oxford
Examining the distribution of suppletive stems over inflectional paradigms, a constraint on their complexity, call it Crossover Constraint, is shown to be untenable. There are paradigms, in some languages at some stage of their development, where suppletive distributions are maximally complex — like one stem of a verb being used for 1st Person Singular and 3rd Person Plural and another stem for all other person and number forms, which in terms of paradigm geometry is a crossover distribution. Rather than unceremoniously dumping this universal it is argued that constraints on states must be distinguished from constraints on transitions. There are two main routes to suppletion, the harnessing of distinct stems for one lexeme and the phonological separation of once unitary stems; their respective results are synchronically indistinguishable. When stems are combined, they will divide up paradigms in ways that follow morphological patterns, which outlaws crossovers, while phonological differentiations are under no obligation to respect morphological groundplans.
Keywords: inflection, morphology, paradigm gaps, paradigm geometry, paradigms, suppletion
Article outline
  • 1.Unruly suppletion?
  • 2.The Crossover Constraint
  • 3.Paradigm geometry of suppletion
  • 4.What are universals supposed to be true of?
  • 5.Dual route, one destination
  • 6.Not to forget gaps
  • Notes
  • References
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References (24)
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