grammaticalization query: 'see' to 'VERIFY'

[Michael Daniel]

Dear all,

in two Lezgic (East Caucasian) languages, Archi and Agul, there is a(n
apparently rare) morphological category of verificative, or verificational.
Its meaning is 'check whether P is true', where P is the lexical verb with
its dependents. Here is an Archi example, with VERIF in the infinitive:

qalal-a          jašul      adam       i-r-k:u-s
palace-IN     inside   person     4.be-INTRG-VERIF-INF
'(He went inside) in order to see whether there was anyone inside the
palace. (4 is the agreement class)'

The following Agul example with VERIF in the past tense shows that VERIF
introduces its own argument ('one who checks'):

gadaji           ruš    qušunaj-čuk’-une.
boy(ERG)    girl    go_away.PF.RES-VERIF-AOR
'The boy checked, whether the girl has gone away.'

(See also this handout for further details:
http://lingvarium.org/maisak/publ/Maisak_Leipzig2009.pdf)

In both languages, the construction seems to result from grammaticalization
of the verb 'see' (Archi ak:u- and its Agul cognate). The development seems
to be historically and areally independent.

Although there is a number of grammaticalization paths in which this verbal
meaning is involved (see Heine and Kuteva 2004: 269-270; and other
developments, including evidential-like meanings), we are unaware of the
verb 'see' grammaticalizing into categories similar to Archi/Agul
verificative. We would be happy to learn of any comparable, in functional
semantics terms, evidence from other languages.

Michael Daniel and Timur Maisak

(if convenient, copy both of us when replying to this message)
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