Talk:Lithuanian grammar

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Contents

[edit] Different topics

The notes on various problematic topics

[edit] The tariamoji mood

The mood, called tariamoji nuosaka in Lithuanian is defined by the Lithuanian Language Encyclopedia (by the Institute of Lithuanian language, in Vilnius, 1999) as the conditional mood, and I agree with it. However, the ALKONAS Lithuanian – English dictionary gives us the subjunctive mood. For the mood functions in both meanings, it's the question only, which definition is primary. I agree with the conditional, as I've said, and after some doubts I restore the conditional mood in the text (written by myself, by the way).
Linas 15:27, 2004 Sep 3 (UTC)

[edit] Dual number

The link to "Dual number" takes to a mathematics article.

Fixed. RokasT 13:39, 20 February 2006 (UTC)


[edit] Article expansion

Okay, I've added some noun declension tables. Feel free to add improvements to them. I'll try to make a start on verb & adjective tables too. Pobbie Rarr 06:23, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

Nice job! Might I ask you if you are a native speaker? i am asking only because I noticed some small mistakes. That got me thinking that you might not be a native speaker but than I don't believe that anyone would be able to cite all those declension rules...
Speaking about declension, I believe you mixed up two things. There was an old system that declension rules were numbered I-V in Roman numbers. But then a couple years ago they decided to change it to better reflect the inflection. I believe you got both systems mixed up together. But I need some sleep to figure that out (see, even for a native speaker it's a tough nut;) ). Anyways, good job, I hope you'll keep your promise ;P Renata 07:52, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

No, I'm not native. I haven't even studied the language for that long; it just interests me so much.

Looking back, the information I obtained came from two different sources which seemed to contradict themselves slightly. That's probably why there were a few errors originally. I'm sure the declensions are in the correct order though. Cheers! Pobbie Rarr 17:43, 17 May 2006 (UTC)


Okey dokey, I've made a start on the verb and adjective tables. Feel free to edit any errors I have made. Also, someone else will have to insert '-is' adjectives into the article. Pobbie Rarr 16:20, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] The new classifying of the declensions

Thank You, Pobbie Rarr. We had to do it earlier. Now, Renata is right about the changing of the classifying. The new system of declension was introduced, because:

  1. The old system is divided into few parts, each encompassing nouns, adjectives, pronouns etc. It was very incompact.
  2. Declensions with similar patterns have different numbers in a case with nouns and in a case with adverbs in the old system.
  3. The old system was created, looking at declensions system in Latin, and it doesn't mirror structure of Lithuanian language the best way.

Currently, the new system is being introduced to school and elsewhere. In order not to confuse the old and the new systems declensions in the new system are marked not with numbers but according to the typical vowel in each pattern. There are 5 declensions: a/ia, u/iu, o, ė, and i declensions. The old 1st declension of nouns is the a now, the old 2 nd is divided to o and ė, the old 3 rd is coupled with the 5 th getting the i, but the old 4 th is the u.

On the other hand, the old system is well known and many people still use it over the World. It means, that is necessary to leave your input unchanged in the article (and, perhaps, to move it to a separate article like old classifying of Declensions in Lithuanian later in the future?).

  • I didn't noticed some essential mistakes in the tables put by You. Perhaps it's doubted thing to separate č from the stem in the words like pačio (pačio). Č in this position is always a part of the stem, not a part of the inflexion. We have a regular phonetically morphological change of the last consonant in the stem.

Now, look at the table of the new grouping. There are the main patterns only in the table, the table however encompasses all the declension system. To describe the system in detail yet 6 tables must be added (a single table for each pattern, except the pattern in the ė declension, that is the only pattern in his group). I'll put all these table in the article later, when i'll have thought over how to join the new part with the old. The table:

Singular

Declensions

(i)a

(i)u

o

ė

i

Case:

Nouns

Other

Nouns

Other



Unsuffixed

Suffixed

Nominative

-as

-us

-a

-ė

-is

-uo

Genitive

-o

-aus

-os

-ės

-ies

-ens

Dative

-ui

-am

-ui

-am

-ai

-ei

-iai

-eniui

Accusative

-ą

-ų

-ą

-ę

-į

-enį

Instrumental

-u

-umi

-iu

-a

-e

-imi

-eniu

Locative

-e

-ame

-uje

-iame

-oje

-ėje

-yje

-enyje

Illative

-an

-un

-ian

-on

-ėn

-in

-enin

Vocative

-e

-as

-au

-us

-a

-e

-ie

-enie

Plural

Declensions

(i)a

(i)u

o

ė

i

Case:

Nouns

Other

Nouns

Other



Unsuffixed

Suffixed

Nominative

-ai

-i

-ūs

-os

-ės

-ys

-enys

Genitive

-ų

-ų

-ių

-ių

-ių

-ių

-enų

Dative

-ams

-iems

-ums

-iems

-oms

-ėms

-ims

-enims

Accusative

-us

-us

-ius

-as

-es

-is

-enis

Instrumental

-ais

-umis

-iais

-omis

-ėmis

-imis

-enimis

Locative

-uose

-uose

-iuose

-ose

-ėse

-yse

-enyse

Illative

-uosna

-uosna

-iuosna

-osna

-ėsna

-ysna

-enysna

Vocative

see Nominative
--Linas Lituanus 19:33, 8 July 2006 (UTC)
I don't really know much about old/new ordering of declensions, so I'll take your word for it. However, I'm sure the illative case only exists in certain dialects (a result of Finno-Ugric influence) and Standard Lithuanian officially contains the other 7 cases only (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, instrumental, locative, vocative). Therefore, I think it would be best to introduce this as a side note.Pobbie Rarr 21:39, 9 August 2006 (UTC)
The Illative case in Lithuanian. The list of 7 cases is traditional for standard Lithuanian, You're right in this. But, although regarding conservatism of Lithuanians, we should state that the case is widely used (particularly in spoken language and in the singular form, but one can easily find it used at least once in any newspaper in Lithuanian) in Lithuania and is understood by absolute majority of speakers. I don't see a sense to ignore it, while a side note may contain a further explaining on its usage. Two other historic or dialectic locatives have different fate, being really historic. If the question is actual, we may try to make a poll for Lithuanian speakers: (1) do they understand the Illative or use it? And (2, for everybody too) do they think it's worth to put it along with other cases (I, myself, don't know how not to put, despite it's outside of the official list). How do You see it? Linas Lituanus 09:51, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Well, pretty much every available source says there are 7 noun cases in Standard Lithuanian. This needs to be reflected in the article, so I think any additional cases should be dealt with separately. How to go about this? I suggest listing these additional case suffices in a paragraph after the main table. Pobbie Rarr 11:34, 11 August 2006 (UTC)
Perhaps, and i'd thought about it, but when we do something like you suggest, other users will fell free to add other locatives and dual number to our additional tables. And there is no arguments, why they shouldn't do this (see such attempts in the history of Lithuanian language article). And it will seem no less confusing, because actually there's a big difference between usage of Illative and usage of the last. Using Illative, one will be understood and his speech will not seem specifically, while the other forms will be seen as old-fashioned, historicizms or poeticizms or, at least, marked (dual however is used normally for the number two / du dvi / and less with personal pronouns mudu / judu / jiedu / jiedvi // 'we','you', 'they' m, 'they' f- all for pairs// but allative is used normally with few words, writing this form of that words separately as adverb in vocabularies).
The other reason not to do, is that the tables above are just a very short abstract of the whole system of declension (as You know well). We'll need to put more explicit tables for each declension, so a number of tables will be enough without additional tables yet. I say, i do not ignore, what's said about Illative in Lithuanian grammars, but we don't change the grammar just adding a case to the list (inflexions of the case are true and used as inflexions – I don't know what's wrong with it?) -What concerns the standard cases, the fact, what cases are standard, is reflected in the article and it'll remain till the standard will be changed. We discuss mere a form of table here, that would be helpful for readers to find useful information, distinguishing it from secondary information.Linas Lituanus 11:54, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Past Iterative Case

Perhaps (and likely) I'm just an ignorant student, but doesn't the Latin and Spanish imperfect tense correspond pretty perfectly to this? The page says it's the only Indo-European language to use this.

Hmmm... good question. It does kind of. It basically translates as "used to" - "eidavau" means "I used to go". I think the Spanish "yo iba" is similar, but not identical. Perhaps the two are used slightly differently. Pobbie Rarr 21:00, 20 August 2006 (UTC)
the past iterative tense denotes, in fact, many consequent actions of the same kind in the past, but not a complex action similar to English to cruise, to granulate, to pace... This tense is more preferable when single actions are better distinguished in the sequence of actions. For example a sentence 'It rained many times yesterday' won't have the past iterative tense in its translation to Lithuanian (vakar daugkart lijo), because a single raining seems not a very distinguised event in a time of a day. Usage of past iterative tense is also preferred when the number of actions is big and, better, unclear. English "used to do" is a not bad approximation, but the past iterative tense doesn't mean, that the repeating of actions is't continuing presently. I don't know Spanish, so I can say nothing about a possible equivalent in Spanish. Linas Lituanus 12:34, 21 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] About the structure of tenses in general

Lithuanian hasn't the dual structure perfect vs imperfect, which is typical for many languages. Almost all verbs, taken in the four main tenses can be considered as perfect or imperfect, depending on situation. However prefixes make verbs more definite in point of perfectness. For example a prefix pa- means that the action continues for certain limited period of time, but a prefix su- means that action reaches its limit of being done (so su- perhaps is the more closest to the meaning of perfect tenses).

matyti 'to see' - pamatyti 'to see,  to sight, to notice (by looking)'
gamintas 'that was being made' - pagamintas 'made' (participles)
daužyti 'to smash' - sudaužyti 'to break completely, to smash up'

N. B. verbs with suffixe -yti have meaning of the imperfect when without a prefix.

Now, when one wants to stress the perfectness of an action, he should use not a form of the main tenses, but a form of a compound tense: a personal form of būti ('to be') + active participle. And when padariau can mean 'I've done' or 'I did', esu padaręs means exactly 'I've done' (but esu daręs, without the prefix, will approximately mean 'I've being done' or 'I've tried to do').

So, the structure of verbs in Lithuanian is quite different from the same structure in English, and it's not so easy to compare a Lithuanian tense with an English tense. Linas Lituanus

Useful examples (by an anonymous user below) , how prefixes make verbs more definite in the sense of perfectness. I doubt only the phrase: "verbs take prefixes". We just add prefixes to verbs making new verbs (that considered as different items in vocabularies), no more. It also should be added, that there aren't single pairs of perfect - imperfect in Lithuanian, as it may seem from the examples. Not only parašyti can be translated as perfect but also surašyti, perrašyti, nurašyti. At the same time, parašyti is treated as perfect mainly but not always. For example, in the sentence jis parašė porą valandų ir nuėjo ('he wrote for two hours and went away') parašyti (parašė) doesn't mean a perfect action. The same way not just nueiti but also ateiti, išeiti, pereiti can be translated as perfect, - and so on, with almost any verb. And yet, not the past tense only, but all tenses retain the possibility to be treated as perfect, when an appropriate prefix is added. (Linas Lituanus 10:58, 31 August 2006 (UTC))

Different verbs take different prefixes to add the perfective aspect to the meaning. For example,
rašiau (I wrote, I was writing, I have been writing)
parašiau (I have writen)
BUT
ėjau (I went, I was going, I have been going)
paėjau (I have taken a few steps forward)
nuėjau (I have gone) - here nu- acts instead of pa-
As you can see, it would be misleading to classify prefixes as either adding or not adding the quality of the perfecitve aspect. More examples:
eikvojau (I used, I was using, I have been using)
išeikvojau (I have depleted, I have used all and I don't have anymore) - here iš- acts instead of pa-. Actually this verb doesn't use the prefix pa- or nu- at all, perhaps su- would make some sense (sueikvojau)
skaičiau (I read, I was reading, I have been reading)
paskaičiau (I have read a little - no perfective aspect at all, just changes the meaning of the verb to indicate that little progress has been done)
nuskaičiau (I have scanned (using a scanner) - this use hasn't even made its way into the language yet as it is being used only in IT terminology)
perskaičiau (I have read) - here per- acts instead of pa-, nu-, or any other prefix. To be frank, per- is the only prefix which can add perfective aspect to the verb skaityti (to read). ////- Note by Linas- Not exactly. Verb perskaityti is a separate verb from the verb skaityti not a form of this verb. The same way verbs išskaityti, nuskaityti (a given example!), suskaityti ('to be able to read') can be translated as perfect. Linas Lituanus 10:58, 31 August 2006 (UTC)////
In conclusion, Lithuanian is not yet fully analyzed. The Past Tense bears resemblance to the Latin perfectum indicātīvī, for example one of the ways to form the perfect stem is to use the -v- suffix, as in laudā- (infect stem: laudo, laudas, laudat ...) and laudāv- (perfect stem: laudāvī, laudāvistī, laudāvit ...) and then compare važiuo- (infect?: važiuoju, važiuoji, važiuoja...), važiav- (perfect?: važiavau, važiavai, važiavo...). We don't know if the Past Tense is the ancient perfect or the imperfect but obviously Lithuanian lost the ancient imperfect vs perfect distinction but probably retained either of these (unlike English, which retained both, analytic however). Linguistic research will sooner or later reveal this. --88.118.228.85 09:58, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Na, pasakymas "verbs take prefixes" galbūt ir nelabai tinkamas, maždaug "skirtingi veiksmažodžiai reikalauja skirtingų priešdėlių perfektui sudaryti". Bet ne tai norėjau pasakyti, kažkaip dviprasmiškai išėjo. Norėjau pasakyti, kad pa- nėra universalus visais atvejais tinkantis priešdėlis bet kokiam veiksmažodžiui visada suteikiantis perfekto kokybę.

Na, išties, nesakome, kad "stalas" ir "stalams" yra du atskiri žodžiai - tai tik vieno žodžio dvi formos. Sakai, kad ir skaityti bei suskaityti yra du visiškai atskiri žodžiai (t. y. kalbiniu požiūriu susiję (giminiški), bet šiaip realiai gyvenime nesusiję). Nelabai noriu su filologu ginčytis, bet, matyt, teks. Tęsiant tavo filosofiją reikėtų sakyti, kad tada bet kurie skirtingi veiksmažodžiai (net ir turintys tą pačią šaknį) yra nepriklausomi semantiniai vienetai, o ne to paties veiksmažodžio (morfologinės) variacijos. Dariau ir padariau - tai du skirtingi veiksmažodžiai, vienas tiesiog reiškia "daryti", o kitas - "daryti ir padaryti iki galo". Ir viskas, jokio čia perfekto - tiesiog skirtingi veiksmažodžiai, turintys skirtingą reikšmę. Tai apsispręskime - arba niekur jokio perfekto, arba jis visgi yra. Kur ta riba tarp paprasčiausios žodžių darybos ir veiksmažodinės morfologijos?--88.118.217.164 15:36, 31 August 2006 (UTC)

Ne, ne. Semantiniai vienetai ne visada sutampa su leksiniais vienetais. Be abejo, kad laužti ir laužyti prasmės atžvilgiu yra vieno vieneto dariniai. Bet jie nelaikomi tuo pačiu žodžiu, nes yra panašių porų, kurių reikšmės gerokai nutolusios (pvz. teikti ir taikyti). Ir žodynininkams geriau, aiškiai poros žodius atskirti. Beje bet kuriuo atveju čia morfologijos klausimas, tik: ar darybos, ar kaitybos. Taigi ir laikoma, kad laužyti padarymas iš laužti yra darybos dalyku.

Dar dėl perfekto toks dalykas. Čia nėra tikrojo perfekto, yra tik perfektyvas; pats teisingai rašei viršuje. Buvo tik palyginimo klausimas: ar galima tai versti į anglų kabą perfektu. Toks mūsų perfektyvo vertimas išvis yra retas, bet jis įmanomas. Bet išvis reikia viršuje patikslinti: Lietuvių kalba turi perfektą (esu buves, daręs ir tt), bet čia kalba ne apie jį.

Tik dalykas tas, kad perfektyvas / įvykio veikslas lietuvių kalboje yra sąlyginis o ne žodyninis. Jis priklauso nuo žodžio reikšmės sakinyje. Tiesa tai, kad priešdėliniai veiksmažodžiai laikomi iš anksto įvykio veikslo. Bet tiesa ir tai, kad reikalui esant juos galima vartoti eigos veikslu. Su nepriešdėliniais yra viskas atvirkščiai. Jie laikomi iš anksto eigos veikslo, bet įmanoma ir kitaip. Pvz. lietuviškai visai įprastai atrodo įvykio veikslas lūžo ranka, bet rusisškai ломалась рука įvykio veiklu niekaip nesuprasime.

Ačiū už sveikas pastabas. Ar nenorėtum daugiau čia pabendradarbiauti; kad ir tokių pastabų pavidalu? Linas Lituanus 15:38, 10 September 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Adjective morphology, sequence of suffixes?

Is there a required (or at least preferred) sequence for applying suffixes to adjectives if one were to express combinations of definite, superlative, and diminutive, e.g., "the little one who is bluest". Would it be mėlynas → mėlyniausias (superlative) → mėlyniausiasis (definite) → mėlyniausiasėlis (diminutive)? Would a native speaker ever use something like this? ...in a poetic context? How about combinations of only two, e.g. laukinysėlis, "the little wild one"? Just curious... --Theodore Kloba 18:41, 2 October 2006 (UTC)

No. Diminutive is not used with adjectives. There are no such words mėliukas, mėlužis etc. Pronominal (definite) superlative adjectives are formed by adding the jis, ji to the general (non-pronominal) adjectives, i. e. geras -> geriausias -> geriausiasis.88.118.251.108 18:53, 10 October 2006 (UTC)
O kaip mažytis, gerutis? Linas Lituanus 19:02, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
Yes, some sequence You ask about exists. But one of the main grammatical principles should be reminded here, before talking about the sequence. It says, that the inflection differs by its functions from a suffix and that any suffix always precedes the inflection. I believe, You know this well, but your examples by accident don't agree with this. The definite form has not a specific suffix, but a double inflection. That's why gerasis (from geras) or geresnysis (from geresnis) or geriausiasis (from geriausias) have no suffixes, but their inflections are -asis, -ysis, -iasis respectively. These endings are also changed in declension: gerasis → gerojo → gerajam → gerąjį → geruoju → gerajame → gerajan (the illative), while true suffixes remain unchanged. I think, You see, what is wrong with your examples.
Now, i guess, that Your question is suggested by existence of forms like gerėlesnis. This compound suffix is actually made from the standard suffix of diminutive (-ėl-) and the suffix of the comparative form (-esn-is) . You can see, that the diminutive suffix precedes the comparative suffix. This order is strong here. Now, one can use the diminutive suffix before the superlative freely, the form is legal and understandable, but this form isn't very often in the language (what should it, for example, gerėliausias, mean, at least?). The positive form may take diminutive suffixes too, but it almost never uses (but in dialects) the suffixe -elis. One shold use diminutive suffixes -iuk-as / -yt-is / -ut-is instead. The ajectives with -iukas, -utis or -ytis are extremly popular in spoken Lithuanian. Its possible, that mažiukas is used more often than mažas itself. Linas Lituanus 19:02, 12 October 2006 (UTC)
The diminutive suffixes -(i)uk-as / -yt-is / -ut-is aren't alternatives for a single adjective. Or, better, only few adjectives can take all three or two of them as alternatives. The rest adjectives prefer one of the three, and -ut-is is the most used of them. -ut-is can be added to almost any ajective: baltas 'white' - baltutis, geras 'good' - gerutis, pilkas 'grey' - pilkutis,

jaunas 'young' - jaunutis. There's no formal restriction to use a diminutive suffixe ( -utis by default) for any adjective, but some adjectives aren't used as diminutives because of their meaning, like teisingas ('true', 'fair-minded'), nuosavas ('own', 'proper'). In contrary, others are used more often because of their meaning; examples are mažas 'small, little' - mažutis (and mažiukas, mažytis), jaunas 'young' - jaunutis, smulkus 'small, detailed' - smulkutis.

Yet suffixes can be groupped into compositive, which make new words, and inflectional, which make different forms of the same word. Thus, inflectional suffixes (-esn-is- or -iaus-ias, which we discuss about are inflectional) are added after compositive suffixes. So, the order in -ėl-esn-is, -ėl-iaus-ias is somewhat inherited from this rule, although the suffix -ėl- doesn't play the role of compositive suffix in this case.
There are other adjective suffixes, that are composed of few other suffixes. -utėl-is, -(i)ukėl-is, -ytėli-is are particularly interesting for our discussion. One can guess, that they are composed of -ut(-is), -(i)uk(-as), -yt(-is) respectively and a suffix -ėl-is, what is true. As I've said, the suffix -ėlis is never used for adjectives alone, but it often used as a part of composed suffixes. Words like mažutėlis, baltutėlis, sveikutėlis are not rare in spoken Lithuanian. Adjectives with this diminutive suffixe are less oficial and more poetic.
Now, few words about status of these diminutive adjectives. This group of adjectives has an interesting feature. You know, that adjectives in general differ from nouns morfologically, by having different inflections for part of cases (in masculine) and not having vocative case. But diminutive adjectives form group that can be defined as noun-like adjectives, that may apply inflections of noun instead (and they take the inflections of noun for the plural Nominative and the plural Dative regularly), may have vocative forms, and they never have definite forms. Comparative or superlative are extremly rare with these adjectives too. This can partially explain, why -ėlis can be added after -ut(-is), -(i)uk(-as), -yt(-is), when adjectives with these suffixes are more similar to nouns. (To be continued, particularly, if You ask something) Linas Lituanus 14:24, 14 October 2006 (UTC)
Thank you Linas. Could you perhaps edit your discussion into a section on diminutives in the article? Also, please check the Lithuanian section of the Diminutive article. I had previously added examples (based on an article on [1]) which may not be entirely correct.
As you suggested, I have really only encountered true diminutive adjectives in poetic context. An example that comes immediately to mind is a folk song, which has the added complication of the dual number!
Aš pasėjau du liniuku, Oj joj!
Du liniuku mėlyniuku, Oj joj joj!
My question was prompted by a not-particularly-practical want to express as one Lithuanian word "little airless one." Should this then be beorytysis, with circumflex accent on -ys-?
Thanks again. --Theodore Kloba 21:55, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
IT'S a good idea, to expand Lithuanian section of the Diminutive article. I must only think a bit how to abstract all my knowledge about it, because it concerns not adjectives only, but verbs too (verbs don't actually have "diminutives", but they apply the same suffix -el- for shorter or less intensive action). Diminutives are really interesting part of the Lithuanian grammar. --- You haven't make mistakes there. I only changed saululė, that is possible but rare, to much frequent saulelė. Yet I doubt about pakalnė → pakalnutė, because they both should be derived from an adjective, that is unused presently, pakalnis, -ė 'the one that's on a slope', but I need to check yet.
Yes, one can find adjective diminutives mostly in some poetic texts, otherwise they are part of purely spoken and unofficial language, but they aren't rare. --- little airless one? No, it's impossible: all adjectives with be- or pr- or some other prefixes depend to that noun-like declension, that has beoriai (not "beori") in the plural Nominative. They have neither definite form , nor adjective-styled diminutives. One may use noun-styled suffixe -ėlis, but not double endings of the definite form. Using -ėlis you'll get a very strange poetic word, beorėlis that's more a noun than an adjective and can't be used with a noun. You also may use -ytis (beorytis), but as a noun-styled suffix and with the same result.
Now as a general rule: all adjectival diminutives depend to the noun-like declension and they consequently don't have the definite form. Comparative or superlative is rare or, for some words, seems to be impossible at all, for these noun-like adjectives. Linas Lituanus 18:49, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Declension tables

Here, the generalized declension tables, that are tought at schools in Lithuania now, are being put. Please, copyedit them, particularly if some mistakes appear. Linas Lituanus 15:25, 3 April 2007 (UTC)

see Lithuanian declension.

[edit] The prefixes of verbs

The prefixes of verbs should be improved. A version here:

[edit] The prefixes of verbs

Meaning of verb can be modified with a prefix. Prefixes of verbs can be distinguished between simple prefixes, that make a new verb from a verb, and special prefixes, that modify meaning of the same verb.

[edit] Meaning changes

Prefix always adds different color to the primary verb's meaning. The most possible aspects added by a prefix are:

  • Prefix can stress the perfective aspect of a verb. Although an unprefixed verb may be understood both as perfective and imperfective, but a prefix can be useful, when a better distinction is necessary.
  • Prefix can be used to stress limited time of the action. Similarly to the previuos, unprefixed verbs themselves don't indicate either limited or unlimited time or amount of action. To stress these limitations a prefix is often added.
  • Prefix can be used to limit place of the action, meaning place, direction or approach of it.

A prefix can have more than one of the features above, but not every prefix has every feature.

[edit] Morphology

Most of the prefixes consist of one syllable, many of them end with a vowel, so they can easily be added to any verb's root. Prefixes ap-, at-, which have a final consonant, have variants api- and ati-, that are used before consonants p, b or t, d respectively.

As a rule, a verb can have only one simple prefix. In contrary, special prefixes can be grouped in two's, or, in very rare cases, in three's. If a special prefix (or prefixes) is added to a prefixed verb, they are added before the simple prefix.

Prefixed reflexive verbs have their reflexive form indicator clitic -si- between all prefixes and the root, in contrast to other reflexive verbs, that have the clitic -si (-is or -s in some forms) after the inflection. For example:

nusineša,  atsineša, but nešasi 
susilaikyti, pasilaikyti, but laikytis  
pasiteirauti, but teirautis
or (with special prefixes):
nesineša, nebesineša, also
nenusineša, neatsineša, but nešasi,  
nesilaikyti, also 
nesusilaikyti, nepasilaikyti, but laikytis,  
nesiteirauti, also nepasiteirauti, but teirautis

[edit] The simple prefixes

  • ap- round (direction, perfective)
  • api- is a variant of ap- before b or p
  • at- from, from somewhere (direction; place, perfective)
  • ati- is a variant of at- before d or t
  • į- in (direction, perfective), be able to (imperfective)
  • iš- out (direction, sometimes perfective)
  • nu- away (direction), from the start place (action with some direction, perfective)
  • pa- a bit, slightly, some time (time or amount, imperfective), till end (for single actions, cf su-, time or amount, perfective), under (direction, perfective)
  • par- similar to English (Latin) re- (with some differences; perfective)
  • per- through (place, perfective), thoroughly, completely (perfective)
  • pra- by (direction, perfective), starting (time, perfective rarely)
  • pri- up, to (direction or place, perfective), to the place (of the action) (place, perfective), much, many (amount, sometimes perfective)
  • su- from everywhere (direction), together (place, perfective), till end (time, perfective), completely (long or complex action, perfective)
  • už- behind (direction, perfective), in (for limited time, cf į-) (direction and time, perfective), suddenly, unexpectedly (time, perfective)
  • už- on, over (direction or place), completely (short action, cf. su-, perfective)

[edit] The special prefixes

  • ne- 'not', 'don't' is the negation prefix for verbs. It's important to note, that the Lithuanian almost not employs a negation particle as a mean to negate a verb. The negation particle (also ne) is used almost exclusively in sentences, where two actions are contrasted, for example: jis ne skaito, bet rašo 'he isn't reading, but is writing'. The using of the negation prefix results also in syntax of sentence. Thus a direct object in a sentence, where a verb has the prefix ne-, is always said in the genitive case, despite if the same verb without the negation prefix requires the genitive or the nominative, for example: Ji skaito laikraštį 'She reads (or is reading) a newspaper (in accusative)', but Ji neskaito laikraščio 'She doesn't read (or isn't reading) a newspaper (in genitive)'.
  • be- 'just' (approximately) stress a particular moment of a continued action, being used mostly in participles. This prefix isn't used as a mean to indicate continuity of action, but it means this continuity indirectly. This can be quite important in some situations, because Lithuanian language doesn't have a specific tense or mood to indicate continuity of action. For example, grįžtant lijo means 'it rained (lijo), (while we/you etc. were) returning', but begrįžtant lijo means 'it was raining (lijo), (when we/you etc. were) returning', stressing that the rain might be shorter than the returning. Note, that the prefix of the subparticiple changes (or, better, defines) the continuity of the other verb.
  • te-(1) 'let' is an indicator, along with special inflections, of the optative mood. Used in the optative mood only.
  • te-(2) 'only' means exclusivness of action. Not in the optative mood.

The most possible groups of simple prefixes:

  • nebe- 'no longer' is used to negate verbs with prefixes tebe- or be-.
  • tebe- 'still' stress, that a continued (or, sometimes, repeated) action still continues.
  • tene- 'let not' is used for negation in the optative mood.

Linas Lituanus 15:48, 17 June 2007 (UTC)