Competing Secondary Imperfectives in Cr...

Many Croatian perfective (PFV) verbs have two competing secondary imperfectives (SIs). This paper analyzes one instance of competing SIs in Croatian, illustrated by the verb raskopati and its two SIs:

raskapati (SI1) and raskopavati (SI2) ‘dig/turn up (the ground).’  

As seen in the examples, the SI1 raskapati contains the suffix -a-, as does the verb raskopati, the only difference between the PFV verb and the SI1 derivative being the qualitative ablaut o > a. In contrast, the SI2 raskopavati is derived from the PFV verb by the suffix -ava-, but with no changes to the root vowel. The former type of SIs is referred to as an A-SI (the suffix -a-, ablaut), and the latter as an AVA-SI (the suffix -ava-, no ablaut). 

The two SI suffixes employed to derive this pair of SIs are associated with two distinct derivational layers common to all Slavic languages. The  first layer, represented by the Croatian  -a-, is older and unproductive, while the other, represented by the Croatian -ava-, is more recent and productive.  The  two  layers are  generally  associated  with  different  conjugational  types  and, as a rule, do not compete in the formation of SIs of a single PFV verb, as they do in the case of raskopati. 

The two cited SIs are not the only pair of competing SIs of this type in Croatian. Competing SIs are found with nine other PFV verbs from the root KOP ‘dig’ as well as with a number of PFV verbs from two other roots, MOT ‘twist, roll’ and KOPČ ‘buckle (up).’ Overall, there are about 30 PFV verbs that derive competing SIs from these three roots. Their SIs coexist in the contemporary language: all of them are attested in dictionaries and well represented in corpora. Dictionary entries do not indicate any apparent differences in the lexical meanings between the individual pairs of SIs. 

In this study, we attempt to shed light on possible factors that govern the relationship between the competing SIs from the three roots cited above.