On Defective Verbs and Mood Marking in Hungarian
On Defective Verbs and Mood Marking in Hungarian

Summary/Abstract: In this paper irregular inflection of Hungarian defective verb forms of the type csuklik ’hiccough’, hámlik ’peel’, etc. is discussed. The final shape of the phonological representation of irregular forms in question tends to be subject to rules of segmental sequence organisation, i.e. optimality requirements of the syllable structure. However, parallel normative variants like hajolna and hajlana ’would bend’ with similar optimality values in view of their syllabic structure show that their undoubtedly systematic distribution should be accounted for along the lines of criteria beyond morphophonology. Our ­analysis suggests that the choice between the members of the pairs lies on the argument structure of the verb, that is to say, whether the argument is an agent or a patient, cf. hajolsz and hajlasz ’bend [Indicative, 2sg]’ with the subject agent and patient, respectively.

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