issues on Bulgarian verbal morphology

[Kjetil Rå Hauge]

At 10:57 +0100 26-11-01, Sitzmann wrote:
>1. The -m ending can only be found in the a-conjugation, where it probably
>is an analogy to the athematic verbs like jesm* < esmi (with primary PIE
>ending) or jam* < êdmi.
>In 3rd pl. -at/-jat you find the old ending -oNt-, as in Bulgarian oN > #
>(e.g. #g#l < oNg#l# < PS angulu "angle"), where <#> analogicaly was replaced
>by <a>, the rule seems to be "no jer in the end of a word" (e.g. also in
>zhenoNtoN > zhen#t# > zhenata); for e- and i-conjugation you have also 1st
>sg. nesoN > nesa etc. [Here Paul B. Gallagher is right]

The <a> of the 1st sg/3rd pl verbal endings (and of the masc. "short"
definite article) is a feature of Bulgarian orthography only and
represents /#/ (the mid central unrounded vowel otherwise represented
by "er goljam"). In the pre-1945 orthography the ending was still
written with the "nosovka". If there was a rule "no jer in the end of
a word", it must have been in the minds of the members of the
orthography commission, who had decided to do away with the nosovka
and word-final er goljam, but probably thought that the spelling
<nes#> would be too confusing to introduce overnight, as it would be
read /nes/ by a population accustomed to spelling <grad#>  for /grad/.
--
-- Kjetil Rå Hauge, U. of Oslo. Phone +47/22856710, fax +47/22854140
-- (this msg sent from home, +47/67148424, fax +1/5084372444)

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