Morphological remodelling

[Max Wheeler]

It sounds as if an example of what you're looking for can be seen in the
remodelling of the preterite (past perfective indicative) in Occitan and
Catalan. In both of these languages an /-r-/ element, original to the 3pl
suffix (Lat. -erunt) appears in the 2sg, 1pl and 2pl, and, in Occitan, in
the 1sg as well. Representative preterite paradigms are, for <cantar>
'sing':

Occitan:
cantèri
cantères
cantèt
cantèrem
cantèretz
cantèren < *cant+ederunt

Catalan:
cantí
cantares
cantà
cantàrem
cantàreu
cantaren < Lat. canta(ve)runt

In both languages the spread of the /r/ element from the 3pl to the other
persons, replacing PN affixes inherested from the Latin preterite, is a
post-medieval development (as far as one can judge from texts, of course).

Major source with discussion of the Occitan development in
Ronjat, J. 1937. Grammaire istorique [sic] des parlers provençaux modernes.
Montpellier: Société des Language Romanes. Vol III, §575 ff.

I hope this is the kind of thing you're looking for.

Max Wheeler

--On Tuesday, March 20, 2001 15:13 +0000 "M.O.McCullagh"
<mom20 at hermes.cam.ac.uk> wrote:

>  Can anyone on the list think of examples of morphological remodelling
> within a verbal paradigm based on a single ending? The only secure example
> I have been able to come up with is the creation of new middle imperative
> endings in Greek from the basis of the second plural ending -sthe. That
> example seems to me particularly interesting because second plural forms
> are statistically the least frequent of all the personal endings
> (according to Bybee's Morphology). I'd be very interested to hear of
> similar remodellings, inside or outside IE.

>  Matthew McCullagh,
>  Cambridge University

____________________________________________________________
Max W. Wheeler
School of Cognitive & Computing Sciences
University of Sussex
Falmer
BRIGHTON BN1 9QH, G.B.

Tel: +44 (0)1273 678975 Fax: +44 (0)1273 671320 Email:
maxw at cogs.susx.ac.uk
____________________________________________________________