Re: Hungarian tense, aspect, mood...

[First of all, I'm sorry not to answer here the possible
reflections to my latest posting. I've missed the CONLANG digests
on the weekend, and I'm now trying to recover them...]

On 25 Apr 2004 Javier BF <<uaxuctum@...>> wrote:

> -lek/-lak (as in _szeretlek_ 'I love you'). This bipersonal suffix
> strikes me as very odd since it doesn't seem to fit anywhere in the
> schemes of the Hungarian conjugation. Where did it come from? Are
> there other similar bipersonal suffixes in Hungarian?
  The IE (and Semitic) languages tend the mark the definite objects
by an article. On the contrary, Finno-Ugrian (FU) languages behave
in a different manner. There are two major FU solutions (both are
related to the direct objects*):

- using different set of case suffixes on indefinite and definite
nominals (e.g. Hungarian accusative marker _-t_ was originally a
suffix for "definite accusative"**; it's usually still omitted
after possessive suffixes, because the possessive nouns are
definite yet; e.g. _la'tom a bara'tom(at)_ 'I see my friend', lit.
see-I-him/hir/it the friend-mine-(ACC));

- using different set of conjugational suffixes: and this is the
background of the quoted problem.

  Of course Hungarian has similar bipersonal suffixes: they form a
separate paradigm, called "definite conjugation". The difference
between the indefinite and definite paradigm is that the latter
refers to definite 3rd person direct object while the former not
(used without direct objects, or with indefinite direct objects),
e.g. indefinite _szeretek_ 'I love (in general)' vs. definite
_szeretem_ 'I love him/her/it'.

  It seems to very "logical" to extend this system to the 2nd
person direct objects. Thus, the Hungarian language has begun to
develop a paradigmatic series for 2nd person objects***, and the
_-lak/lek_ is the very first element of this system.

  But meanwhile Hungarians settled in the Carpathian Basin and they
met with IE languages that use definite article. Here they adopt
this IE concept and, therefore, it was no longer necessary to mark
the definite object on the verb. This is why the language gave up
to complete the series referencing the 2nd person.

  However, from a systematical point of view, the paradigm is
complete: the missing forms are borrowed from the indefinite
series; this is why we may omit the 2nd person object in phrase
_szeret_ 'he/she loves you'.

  * It seems that the indefinite/definite distinction is important
for the FU languages only in case of direct objects.

  ** A similar distinction exists in Finnish: roughly speaking,
indefinite direct objects are marked by partitive case and only the
definite direct objects are marked by the accusative.

  *** 2nd person objects are always definite, thus there's no need
for indefinite counterparts.

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