LINGUIST List 17.490
Wed Feb 15 2006
Sum: Suppletive Comparative Adjectives
Editor for this issue: James Rider
<riderlinguistlist.org>
Directory
1. Jonathan
Bobaljik,
Suppletive Comparative Adjectives
Message 1: Suppletive Comparative Adjectives
Date: 15-Feb-2006
From: Jonathan Bobaljik <jonathan.bobaljikuconn.edu>
Subject: Suppletive Comparative Adjectives
Regarding query: http://www.linguistlist.org/issues/17/17-313.html#1
I was seeking a list of suppletive comparative adjectives such as the following:
good --> better (*gooder)
It appears there is no authoritative published list.
Such suppletion occurs in 3 of the 34 languages in the Surrey Suppletion Database (namely: Basque, Georgian and Russian - the latter is the only Indo-European language in the database). Within Indo-European, comparative suppletion occurs in many Germanic, Slavic and Romance languages, and in Welsh (Wurzel 1987). A (partial) list, corresponding to responses received thus far (and others from the literature), is given below.
Some questions of definition arise in compiling this list.
Adjectival verbs:
Fiona Mc Laughlin notes that in Wolof, (Atlantic, Niger-Congo), adjectivals (lexical items most likely to be adjectives) are all verbs, yet even in this language, there are suppletive adjectival verbs that have only a comparative meaning:
Faatu dafa njool Faatu 3s.V-focus V:be tall Faatu is tall.
Faatu dafa sut Ibu Faatu 3s.V-focus V: be taller than Ibu Faatu is taller than ibu.
See: Mc Laughlin 2004 for some discussion. I have limited the list below to adjectives, though this limitation is not for any principled reason.
Quantificational determiners / adverbs:
Another element which may be analysed as showing comparative suppletion is quantificational determiners such as:
English: many/much - more - most (a) little - less - least
I have not systematically included these in the list below.
Definition of Suppletion (1)
Marcel Erdal gives the Turkish form beter 'worse' as a potential candidate for suppletion of fena or kötü 'bad'. However, regular comparatives forms of both fena and kötü exist: daha fena, daha kötü, and beter is restricted in its distribution (M. Kelepir, S. Sener, N. Sener, pc). I have therefore excluded beter from the list on the grounds that it does not supplant the regular comparative form. Compare (perhaps?) English optimal which has a meaning similar to best, but which does not supplant the superlative best.
Defintion of Suppletion (2)
I have included in the list only those forms which have 'full' suppletion, that is, are built on a distinct root. Some authors treat other irregular (phonologically unpredictable) alternations (such as German ''hoch'' --> ''höhe'' = 'high, higher') as suppletion or ''weak suppletion'' (Wurzel). I have left these off the list.
The following is a list of suppletive comparatives culled from the responses to the Linguist query cited above. I intend to post a more complete list to my web page if I develop this further. (I have included superlatives where these were given, but have not done so consistently).
NOTE: DIACRITICS HAVE BEEN OMITTED
Basque: on - hobe 'good - better'
Finnish: hyvä - pare-mpi 'good - better'
Georgian: k'argi-i - u-k'et-es-i / u-mJob-es-i 'good - better' cud-i - u-ar-es-i 'bad - worse' cot'a - nak'l-eb-i 'few(er)' bevr-i - met'-i 'many - more'
Indo-European:
Celtic: Welsh: mawr - yn fwy na 'big' bach - yn llai na 'small' da - yn well na 'good - better' drwg - yn waeth 'bad(ly)' (adverb) uchel - yn uwch na 'high' isel - yn is 'low' agos - yn nes 'near' (adv) cynnar - yn gynt 'early' (adv)
Germanic: English: good - better - best bad - worse - worst (many/much - more - most) (a little - less - least) far - farther/further old - elder (with limited sense, e.g., siblings)
German: gut - besser 'good' gerne - lieber 'gladly' (ADV) [may or may not belong on list]
Dutch: goed - beter - best 'good' veel - meer - meest 'many/much' weinig - minder - minst 'few'
Modern West Frisian: goed - better - bêst 'good' folle - mear - meast 'much/many' [in bytsje] - minder - minst 'a little' ier - earder - earst 'early' graach (jerne) - leaver - leafst: 'adverb: gladly'
Icelandic: gamall - eldri 'old' gódur - betri 'good' lítill - minni 'small' margur - fleiri 'many' mikill - meiri 'big' vondur, illur - verri 'bad, ill'
Romance: Italian, Latin French: bon - meilleur 'good' mal/ mauvais - pire 'bad'
Slavic: Czech: dobry --> lepsí (good) spatny --> horsí (bad) maly --> mensí (small) velky --> vetsí (big) zly --> 'horsí' (meaning of very bad situation, but not meaning of 'evil', which is regular)
Polish: dobry lepszy najlepszy good, better, best zly gorszy najgorszy bad, worse, worst duzy wiekszy najwiekszy big, bigger, biggest maly mniejszy najmniejszy small, smaller, smallest
Russian: xoroshij - luchshe 'good - better' ploxoj - xuzhe 'bad - worse' malen'kii - men'she 'small - smaller' (others may be added to the list depending on the analysis of phonological irregularity) (see: Garde 1988)
Serbo-Croatian: dobar - bolji zao - gori velik - veci mali/malen - manji
Slovene: dober --> boljs^i `good --> better' majhen (definite=mali) --> manjs^i `small --> smaller' dolg --> daljs^i `long --> longer' poceni --> cenejs^i `cheap --> cheaper'
Old Church Slavonic: velii, velik 'big' bolii/bolje/bol'shij 'bigger'
To this list, Welsh (Celtic) should be added (Wurzel 1987)
Thanks to the following for their replies to my Linguist Query (and follow ups):
Elissa Flagg Greville Corbett Ljuba Veselinova Stefan Dyla Hans Broekhuis Fiona Mc Laughlin Georges Rebuschi Ivano Caponigro Susi Wurmbrand Boyan Nikolaev Jonathan Young Annabel Harrison Marijana Marelj Siebren Dyk Marcel Erdal Hana Skoumalova
References:
Mc Laughlin, F. 2004. Is there an adjective class in Wolof? In Aikhenvald & Dixon, eds. Adjective Classes. OUP: Oxford. 242-262. Surrey Suppletion database: http://www.smg.surrey.ac.uk/Suppletion/index.aspx Wurzel, W. 1987. Zur Morphologie der Dimensionsadjektive. In Bierwisch u. Lang, eds. Grammatische und konzeptuelle Aspekte von Dimensionsadjektiven. Mouton: Berlin. 459-516.
Linguistic Field(s): Morphology
|