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Article published In:
Language and Linguistics
Vol. 26:1 (2025) ► pp.1–21

Non-past and past verb stems in Tangut

| INALCO/CRLAO | Harvard University
Over the past decade, the documentation of Gyalrongic languages has shed light on grammatical phenomena which were poorly understood in Tangut, a language of critical importance in the field of Sino-Tibetan comparative linguistics. This paper provides an explanation for the last remaining unelucidated verbal alternation in Tangut (-ɨ1 /-i2 ), which, as I will demonstrate, encodes a non-past/past distinction. By doing so, it also gives fresh arguments for placing Tangut and the Horpa languages together within one clade. Finally, methodologically speaking, it offers an example of grammatical reconstruction from above, i.e. employing sister languages to better understand the grammar of an extinct language through their common ancestor, revealing a rare example of complex distributional retention uncorrelated with regular phonetic correspondences.
Keywords: Tangut, West Gyalrongic, Verbal alternation, Tense, Non-past/past, TAME, Distributional retention
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Distribution of the alternation (internal evidence)
    • 2.1 -i2 stem (Stem 2): Absolute distributional tendencies
    • 2.2 -ɨ1 stem (Stem 1): Strong unabsolute distributional tendencies
    • 2.3Setting the variables, or homonymy as a key
  • 3.Geshiza’s non-past/past alternation (external evidence)
    • 3.1Requirement 1 (perfective prefixation for non-perfective Stem 2)
    • 3.2Requirement 2 (inferential suffixed to Stem 2, telic to Stem 1)
    • 3.3Requirement 3 (imperative-like preverbs affixed to Stem 1)
    • 3.4Requirement 4 (Stem1 producing infinitive and nominalized forms)
  • 4.The exceptions that prove the rule
    • 4.1Light-verb component stems (nominal use)
    • 4.2Prospective constructions (non-past perfective)
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • List of abbreviations
  • References
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Published online: 13 September 2024
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lali.00177.bea
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