Preverbs are a way in which some languages specify various aspects of a verb, e.g. the direction of the action and where it is taking place. The defining characteristic of a preverb is that it precedes the verb it alters, which means that preverbs are usually verbal prefixes. The term preverb is not used for all languages though, but similar constructions are found in many languages and language families across the world. Preverbs can convey quite a wide array of meanings and functions, as they can e.g. indicate the location, direction, tense, aspect (i.e. if an action is completed or ongoing) and negation. It is therefore common for preverbs to convey meanings that are expressed by prepositions and auxiliary verbs in other languages, such as English ‘I’m going in’, ‘I’m going out’ and ‘I will go’. Certain languages have evolved highly sophisticated manners of using preverbs to more or less attach all this information on to the verb. Since I’m working with languages in the Caucasus, I will give some examples from some of the region’s many fascinating languages as preverbs are found in all its three indigenous language families.
Georgian, Megrelian, Laz and Svan belong to the Kartvelian or South Caucasian language family, and they are rather notorious for their preverbs, as they convey a complex combination of direction, tense and aspect (Rostovtsev-Popiel 2016). The original function of preverbs in these languages was to convey the direction and orientation of various actions (Hewitt 1995: 148), e.g. as with the Georgian preverbs mi– ‘thither, there’ and mo– ‘hither, here’.
mi-di-s
there-go-3rd person singular
‘He/she is going there/thither’.
mo-di-s
here-go-3rd person singular
‘He/she is coming here/hither’.
You can even combine these two preverbs to create ‘mi-mo-di-s’, which literally means ‘he/she thither-hither-goes’ and means that someone is coming and going (Hewitt 1995). These can also be combined with at least seven other preverbs in Georgian, which convey meanings such as ‘up’, ‘down’, ‘in’, ‘out’, across’, ‘away’ and ‘down into’ (Hewitt 2005: 29). This means that Georgian can easily construct complex verbs like:
a-mo-di-s
up-here-go-3rd person singular
‘He/she is coming up here/hither’
ga-mo-di-s
out-here-go-3rd person singular
‘He/she is coming out here/hither’.
še-mo-di-s
in-here-go-3rd person singular
‘He/she is coming in here/hither’.
Georgian also uses the same preverbs to differentiate tenses, c.f. these unfortunate examples (Hewitt 1995: 128):
Present tense: v-i-kʼvl-eb-i – ‘I am being killed’.
Future tense: mo–v-i-kʼvl-eb-i – ’I shall be killed’.
Past tense (Aorist): mo–v-i-kʼal-i – ‘I was killed’.
As we can see above, these preverbs do not always express direction, but we will not delve deeper into the somewhat confusing preverbs of Georgian. The neighbouring Northwest Caucasian languages have even more complex preverbs, e.g. Kabardian that is spoken in the Russian autonomous republics of Kabardino-Balkaria (which is home to Europe’s highest mountain, i.e. Mount Elbrus) and Karachay-Cherkessia.
Kabardian preverbs distinguishes de– ‘in’ from xe– ‘in a mass (like water)’ and numerous other further specified orientations like perə– ‘in front of’, ɕʼe– ‘under’, fʼe– ‘in front of, on something vertical (like a wall)’, qʼʷe– ‘behind’, gʷe– ‘next to’, čʼʷecʼə– ‘inside’, ʔʷə– ‘near’, ɕħeɕə– ‘at the tip, above’ and bʁurə– ‘on the side’ (Kumaxov 2013: 201-206). If we use some of these preverbs with the verb t- ‘to stand’ we find how Kabardian express the following meanings (translated from Russian):
de-t-ən – ‘to stand in (something, e.g. a courtyard)’.
perə-t-ən – ‘to stand in front of (something)’.
qʼʷe-t-ən – ‘to stand behind (something)’.
gʷe-t-ən – ‘to stand next to (something)’
ʔʷ–t-ən – ‘to stand near or close to (something)’.
čʼʷecʼə-t-ən – ‘to stand inside (something)’
bʁurə–t-ən – ‘to stand on the side (of something)’
(Kumaxov 2013)
Kabardian also has something that is common in all Northwest Caucasian languages, as they have preverbs that relate to body parts such as ʔepə– ‘to/in/from the hand(s)’, ɕħerə– ‘to/on/from the head’ and ɬə– ‘to/on/from the foot/feet’ (Kumaxov 2013), and the related language Abkhaz has even more preverbs of this type, e.g. çʼa– ‘to/from/in the mouth’, gʷala– ‘to/from/in the heart’ and curiously cʷə– ‘to/from the sun’ (Hewitt 2010: 116-119). This is not as strange as it might seem however, as some Indo-European languages have similar verbal constructions like Swedish handleda ‘supervise (literally ‘to hand-lead’) and munhuggas ‘argue (literally ‘to mouth-stab’ reciprocally) and Latin manufactus ‘hand-made’. This also holds true for direction and location, as there are numerous Indo-European examples such as German ausgehen ‘out-go’, Swedish pågå ‘on-go’, Latin intrōdūco ‘into-lead’ and Russian входить ‘in-go’. Even if these forms are similar to but not conventional preverbs, they clearly appear to be less complicated than the examples given above from Georgian and Kabardian. This ends the introduction and insight into the fascinating world of Caucasian preverbs and I hope that you have not lost neither your direction nor orientation after reading this!
Filip Larsson
References
Hewitt, B. G. (1995). Georgian: A Structural Reference Grammar. London Oriental and African Language Library, volume 2. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Kumaxov, M. A. (2013). Кабардино-черкесский язык. Moskva: Inst. Jazykoznanija, RAN.
Rostovtsev-Popiel, Alexander (2016). ‘Kartvelian Preverbs in Cross-Linguistic Perspective’, VII International Symposium on Kartvelian Studies.