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A recent thread touched on the question of whether Slavic aspectual pairs should be considered part of the same lexeme or not.

I wonder if the same logic can be applied to the principal parts of Latin or (especially) Greek verbs. For example, take the following array of verbs from Greek:

peítho: (present active) "I persuade", pépoitha "I trust, rely on" (perfect active), pépeismai "I believe, trust" (perfect passive)

Is it really clear that these forms constitute the same lexeme, any more than a Slavic aspectual pair like Slovenian postavljati / postaviti ("to place") are the "same" lexeme?

Can "lexematicity" be viewed as a measure of the degree of linkage between forms, rather than a matter of "either-or" connection?

Sir Cornflakes
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user8017
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    Yes. In general -- not just Slavic -- "principal parts" means the variety of stem types that a given word might have. In English there are three principal parts: infinitive, past, perfect participle (be, was, been; go, went, gone). In Latin there are four, which includes a present tense form. Greek and Sanskrit had more, though few verbs had all of the parts. In general, even when the allomorph is totally suppletive (like went for go), it's the same lexeme. Here's a diagram. – john lawler in exile Mar 16 '15 at 03:52
  • Actually most Greek verbs do have all 6 of the principal parts in attested usage, I believe. – TKR Mar 16 '15 at 03:54
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    What reason would there be not to treat these as forms of the same lexeme? – TKR Mar 16 '15 at 03:55
  • @johnlawlerinexile Why? I.e., why is the "co-lexematicity" of so-called principal parts a self-evident fact? The term "principal part" may have been invented to describe forms that were conceived of as belonging to the same lexeme, but that does not mean that such a conception is/was entirely accurate. – user8017 Mar 16 '15 at 04:08
  • @TKR One reason is that the above Greek forms do not seem any closer, formally or semantically, than Slavic words that are labelled different lexemes. – user8017 Mar 16 '15 at 04:18
  • Both your Greek and Slavic words look like they're part of the same lexeme. I don't understand what the point of the question is. – curiousdannii Mar 16 '15 at 07:27
  • @curiousdannii The answers to this recent thread seemed to imply that Slavic pairs like the one above are not considered the same lexeme (at least not by everyone). Regardless of whether this is correct, it seems that the "lexeme" status of Greek principal parts tends to be evaluated in a different way than that of Slavic aspectual pairs, and I'm trying to understand why. – user8017 Mar 16 '15 at 08:42
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    @user8017 I think ultimately the answer will probably come down to the Lexicalist Hypthothesis. It's a fairly major divide within linguistics, and one which cannot be definitively answered. – curiousdannii Mar 16 '15 at 08:49
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    @user8017 One reason is that when in a dialogue you "pick up" a word or phrase the other has used and change its aspect and tempus, you end up using the suppletive form regularly and without even thinking about it, which wouldn't be expected in cases of mere synonimity. –  Mar 16 '15 at 10:17
  • @johnlawlerinexile Is there a specific reason to answer in the comments? That just makes it so we have unanswered questions sitting around which it doesn't make any sense to answer, because it has been done in the comments already. –  Mar 16 '15 at 10:18
  • @MaxP For reasons I don't understand, he prefers not to answer questions properly. The mods here don't seem to care, or else they'd tell him off I guess. – curiousdannii Mar 16 '15 at 13:27
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    I already have an ID here that doesn't work and in this ID I have just enough to comment. I prefer not to go to the trouble of a formal "answer" because comments are easier and work just as well. Nobody ever searches anyway, because everybody always uses their own terminology, and it's always different from what others use. The Q/A model does not work well for linguistics, and still less well for ElU. – john lawler in exile Mar 16 '15 at 19:51
  • @johnlawlerinexile Then why waste your time on this page anyways? And why not just answer, it is just as much effort as a comment? And why not edit question titles so they are more searchable? –  Mar 16 '15 at 21:16
  • @MaxP If a user refuses to post something you consider to be a good answer, you can post it yourself and you have two options: if you repost it as is with minimal effort, you can consider marking it as CW. But if you repost it and add also material of your own so you're expanding on it, you can post a regular answer. Maybe even add a small note at the bottom attributing the original user. See this question for more details. – Alenanno Mar 16 '15 at 22:05
  • Comments are much easier. And they're limited to 500-some characters, which is useful. I answer because I like answering questions about language and linguistics; it's what I did for a living until I retired, and I enjoyed it. – john lawler in exile Mar 16 '15 at 22:27
  • @MaxP That may be true, but I don't understand why the alternation between aspect pairs like postavljati/postaviti would be any less unconscious or automatic. Yet postavljati/postaviti are generally two separate entries in Slovene dictionaries, and seem to be considered separate lexemes (at least by some). – user8017 Mar 16 '15 at 23:21
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    @user8017 As far as I'm aware there isn't any consensus as to whether there are lexemes at all, and thus no failsafe way to know if you have suppletive forms or just somewhat specialised near synonyms, so it's as much a lexicographer's convention as anything else. –  Mar 16 '15 at 23:38

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