On the 3rd Person Verbal Marker *-sV and the Definite Conjugation in Uralic Languages
On the 3rd Person Verbal Marker *-sV and the Definite Conjugation in Uralic Languages

Summary/Abstract: There may be three conjugations in Uralic languages: indefinite, definite and reflexive. The primary determinator of the choice between the indefinite or definite conjugations in Uralic was intransitivity/transitivity - intransitive verbs were used without and transitive verbs with the 3P marker. A consonant alternation of the 3P verbal marker Finno-Permic and Hungarian s ~ Ob-Ugric and Samoyedic t is usually explained in Uralistics by the change of s > t. But typologically the change s > t is a rare case. László Honti has recently considered it as possible to suppose, in case of this congruity, the descent of both of those sounds from an earlier common source - an original voiceless dental fricative. The source for the 3P verbal marker was a demonstrative (definitive) suffix, identical to the 3P possessive suffix, or possibly two different demonstrative suffixes - in Finno-Permic *-s'V and in Ob-Ugric and Samoyedic *-tV. Discussing the choise of the indefinite and definite conjugations we need to point out that there is no common set of rules valid for the whole Uralic language group. Discrimination of indefinite and definite conjugations and a concomitant reference to the number of an object (in Mordvin, Ob-Ugric and Northern Samoyedic) as well as to the person of an object (in Mordvin and partly in Hungarian) are a phenomenon that is inherent to the whole of Northern Siberia.

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