development of a copula from the verb 'to come'

[Hannu Tommola]

Just some examples of copula/Aux < (be)come:

Finnish:
tulla 1. 'come' 2. 'become' 3. future auxiliary

Estonian:
saama 1. 'get' 2. 'become' 3.  future auxiliary

Swedish:
komma 1. 'come' 2.  future auxiliary
bli 1. 'become' 2. future of 'be'

Russian:
bud-u, -eš', -et etc. 1. 'become' / future of 'be' 2. future auxiliary

and so on,

Merry Christmas to all,

Hannu


Quoting Wolfgang Schulze <W.Schulze at LRZ.UNI-MUENCHEN.DE>:

> well, it depends from what you define as being a true copula.  
> Nevertheless, think of English /become/ (that is /be-come/), or  
> German /bekommen/ used as a process verb (or, in German, as an  
> auxiliary to encode the passive diathesis when foregrounding an  
> 'indirect object').

> I guess that there are many more examples in the languages of the world
-- 
Hannu Tommola, Professor of Russian Language (Translation Theory and Practice)
School of Modern Languages and Translation Studies
FIN-33014 University of Tampere, Finland
Phone: +358-(0)3-3551 6102
www.uta.fi/~trhato