Abstract
Certain Vedic Sanskrit middle-voice verbs in -ya- have long received special attention for exhibiting accent variation between root and suffix. Various accounts for their behaviour and their origin have been proposed, and according to a recent analysis these verbs are anticausatives, contrasting with passives, and that suffix accent is secondary in Vedic. This analysis involves a speculative account of how anticausatives came to differ from passives. This chapter critically reviews earlier synchronic accounts, including that of Pāṇini, argues for a syntactically based account compatible with that of Pāṇini, and offers an alternative historical perspective to the one proposed in current analyses.
Original language | English (US) |
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Title of host publication | Alignment and Alignment Change in the Indo-European Family |
Editors | Eystein Dahl |
Publisher | Oxford University Press |
Pages | 166-187 |
Number of pages | 22 |
ISBN (Electronic) | 9780191890475 |
ISBN (Print) | 9780198857907 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jan 1 2022 |
Keywords
- Vedic
- diachrony
- morphology
- syntax
- anticausative
ASJC Scopus subject areas
- General Arts and Humanities
- General Social Sciences