[B-Greek] Nonindicative forms of DIDWMI
Carl W. Conrad
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
Wed Mar 24 13:28:50 EST 2004
At 12:53 PM -0500 3/24/04, Clwinbery at aol.com wrote:
>In a message dated 3/24/2004 10:38:19 AM Eastern Standard Time,
>chidical at hotmail.com writes:
>
><Can anyone explain to me why the Infinitive forms of DIDWMI <appear to be
><irreqular (e.g., DIDONAI instead of DIDOIN for the present <active, DIDOSQAI
><instead of DIDOUSQAI for the present middle, etc.)
><
><Thank you
><Chidi Alams
>
>In most instances the MI verbs are non-thematic in the present. The
>infinitive ending used in such cases is NAI and SQAI. These endings are
>added directly to the stem vowel in such instances.
To elaborate a bit further, although there are quite a few -NUMI
present-tense forms of MI verbs, there are four major ones that have
alternative forms in long-vowel and short-vowel stems: TIQHMI (stem
TIQH/TIQE; DIDWMI (stem DIDW/DIDO), hISTHMI (stem hISTH/hISTA--these were
originally ending in long-alpha and short-alpha, but the long-alpha changed
to Eta), and hIHMI (stem hIH/hIE--in the GNT this is found only in
compounds and these have assimilated to omega-type conjugation at least
partially (e.g. AFIW for older AFIHMI).
Generally speaking with regard to these four verbs, in their -MI
conjugation the long-vowel form regularly appears in the 1-2-3 SG., the
short-vowel form in 1-2-3 PL. The middle-voice conjugation generally uses
the short-vowel form (TIQEMAI, DIDOMAI, hISTAMAI, hIEMAI. Infinitives and
participles are based on the short-vowel stem: TIQENAI, TIQENT-; DIDONAI,
DIDONT-, hISTANAI, hISTANT-, hIENAI, hIENT-.
These are verbs that are generally not introduced to beginning students
until relatively late in the first year; while there is more consistency in
their conjugation than might appear at first survey of the paradigms,
learning them requires close attention and commitment of idiosyncrasies to
memory.
--
Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
1989 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu
WWW: http://www.ioa.com/~cwconrad/
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