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Suppletion
(redirected from Suppletive)

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Suppletion 

a means of making word forms and word bases from different roots. As a systemic phenomenon, suppletion is typical of Indo-European languages: examples are Russian ia-menia (“I”–“me”), Lithuanian aš-mane (“I”–“me”), and English “am”–“is.” Instances of suppletion also occur in languages of other genetic groups, for example, Afrikaans is-was (“are”–“was”), Turkish im-dir (“am”–“is”), and Finnish hyvä-parempi (“good”–“better”).

Suppletion in early periods of linguistic development (early suppletion) was caused by the establishment of lexical and grammatical linguistic categories. Later suppletion was caused by phonetic changes in roots and by semantic processes involving the attraction of different roots. The term “suppletion” is also used in a broader sense, to designate a means of word formation. Examples are French tomber-chute (“to fall”–“the fall”), Swedish stjäla-tjuv (“to steal”–“thief”), and English “good”–“well.”

REFERENCES

Konetskaia, V. P. Suppletivizm v germanskikh iazykakh. Moscow, 1973. (Contains bibliography.)
Osthoff, H. Vom Suppletivwesen der indogermanischen Sprachen. Heidelberg, 1899.
Benveniste, E. “Un Fait de supplétisme lexical en indoeuropéen.” In the collection Beiträge zur Indogermanistik und Keltologie. Innsbruck, 1967.

V. P. KONETSKAIA



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Concerning the morphology of personal pronouns, 1st and 2nd person pronouns are highly suppletive whereas third person pronouns are more morphologically regular as they mark plurality using one of Ket/Yugh nominal plural markers -[?
As a suppletive comparative with very high overall frequency, it might have easily undergone the loss of morphosyntactic transparency (cf.
But even in this miniscule class, the correlation does not hold with any generality, as MINEMA 'go' (which has the infinitive 'minna) has suppletive forms such as 1sg past laksin.
 
 
 
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