Grammaticalization and Semantics of Complex Predicates in Kalmyk

Abstract

The paper describes Kalmyk complex predicates, based on the empirical data of linguistic fieldwork. The focus of this investigation is on the semantics and morphosyntactic properties of the complex predicates in Kalmyk. In Kalmyk, several auxiliaries (bää‐‘to be’, jov‐ ‘to go’, kevt‐ ‘to lie’ and suu‐ ‘to sit’) belong to the imperfective domain. Perfective semantics is the basis for complex predicates with the primary verbs ork‐ ‘to put’ and od‐ ‘to go away’, whereas the verbs av‐ ‘to take’ and ög‐ ‘to give’ express reflexive benefactive and benefactive meanings. The verb xaj‐ ‘to throw’ expresses intensivity and pluractionality. The study shows that the Kalmyk aspectual system arose as a result of grammaticalization.