Serial Motion Verns (was Re: Archaic A1 p- in Dakotan.)

Koontz John E John.Koontz at Colorado.EDU
Sun Apr 4 09:21:09 UTC 1999


On Fri, 2 Apr 1999, Koontz John E wrote:
> On Thu, 1 Apr 1999, Carolyn Quintero wrote:
> > What's the meaning of hiyu which Connie mentions?
>
> I believe it should be, morpheme for morpheme, thi(h)i in OP:  'arriving
> here to set out thither', but I'm not positive with this form, for several
> reasons, ...

Mainly that it looks hard to achieve in OP and I certainly don't remember
anything like it.  Bob says in a post that he never got anything like that
and Dorsey doesn't have it. In fact, it's something that occurs in Da, but
not in Dh, presumably.  The Osage do try hard to be different.

Taylor (1976) on motion verbs notes in Da that the arriving motion and
motion under way stems compound to form departing motion stems (here) hiyu
< hi + u, and (there) iyaya < i + ya (with unexplained, but delightful
reduplication).  There is also a stem that combines the arriving here form
with the motion under way there stem to produce hiyaya (more unexplained
reduplication).  This form is glossed 'tp pass by going'.  There are
corresponding vertitives glic^u < gli + ku, khigla < khi + gla, and gligla
< gli + gla (no reduplication, though the possibilities cause a slight
shiver to run down my back).

For Dhegiha he reports only the 'there' serials:  *hidha < *hi + *dha and
*khikdha < *khi + *kdha.  These are glossed 'to have gone' and 'to pass by
going homeward'.  The attestation is somewhat spotty across the branch,
though this is entirely due to the difficulty of getting Dhegiha data.

So, under the circumstances I thought I'd venture to summarize what I know
about OP serial motion verbs, some of it freshly learned today.

By way of pour parlers, the sense 'pass' is usually rendered in Dorsey
1890/1 with the preceding coverbs i'he 'to pass (by)', a'he 'to pass
over', and uhe' 'to pass toward'.  This is followed by an inflected verb
of motion, but is not inflected itself.  I think it refers to pass in the
sense of following a trail, and that these are all related to the verb
uhe' 'to follow a route', which also has a derivative udhuhe 'to follow a
route by some means (e.g., tracks, the sight of the animal, etc.)'.  The
udhu- here corresponds to Da iyo- and Wi hiro- ~ roo-.

Sometimes -he forms seem to be inflected, e.g. idha'he 'you pass in (by
the smokehole)' and udha'he 'you passed along'.  However, the first of
these may be an idha- locative (cf. Da iya-) and the second is just an
inflected form of uhe'.

Proceding now to serials proper, i.e., those that Dorsey writes as a
single word, the there-compounds a la Dakotan, as mentioned by Taylor, do
exist.  In OP they are *hidhe and khigdhe.  I have to star the first
because what one does find is the a-prefixed proximate form a'ia'dha=i,
in which the h is missing by the usual process of deletion of h in the
context V'hV, cf. maNa' 'bank', or s^aaN', or ppai' ~ ppe' 'sharp'.  The
only inflected form I know for this is the inclusive aNga'iadha=i.  This
stem is usually glossed by Dorsey as 'to have gone'.   The vertitive is
glossed 'to have gone home/again/by'.

Providing a hint at the origin of the Dakotan reduplicated forms, there is
a'ia'dhadha 'to have gone repeatedly'.

The here-compounds seem to be missing:  no trace of *thii or *gdhigi.

The cross-compounds here-arriving x there-in motion are represented by
thidhe.  I haven't found the vertitive *gdhidha.  The non-vertitive is
glossed similarly to the Dakotan form as 'to pass on/by', cf., a common
example thigdha=ga 'pass on! (male speaking)'.

Interestingly enough, there is an additional pattern of cross series
compound, involving combining the here and there motion under way verbs.
These yield:  idhe < i + dhe and gigdhe < gi + gdhe.  These are glossed
'to have gone' and 'to go and pass' (perhaps better, 'to come and pass
homeward/again/by'.  The first is inflected ibdhe, ihne (is^ne), idha=i,
??? (inclusive unknown).

Dorsey also lists:  gdhigdhiN, gdhi naNz^iN, higdhiN, hi naNz^iN,
khigdhiN, khi naNz^iN, respectively various motions and sit or stand.
This looks like only some of the possible forms.

Motion verbs have datives, cf. agi'thidha 'to pass on for one'.  The
grammar (p. 70) suggests also agihi 'he comes [arrives there] for it',
agigi, etc., but inflects these appiphi, as^kis^i, agihi, aNgagiaNgahi,
which has two problems.  First, the double inclusive is unprecedented, and
second, the texts give iNhi 'he has gone for me', which follows the
expected dative paradigm.  I would interpolate ?iNhi, dhihi, agihi, ???.
The paradigm Dorsey gives in his grammar looks wrong.  I suspect he
guessed, as he seems sometimes to do in the grammar.



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