Common Slavic *-nǫ-, *-ny-, or *-nu-? A New Look at the History of the Slavic Nasal Suffix. Slovene Evidence for *-nu-

Abstract

The current consensus is that the aorist/infinitive suffix of Class II verbs in Common Slavic was either *-nǫ- (in most of the area) or *-ny- (part of the western periphery). In this study, we argue that this picture is still inadequate as it does not account for part of the dialectal Slovene evidence. A careful analysis shows that some peripheral varieties of Slovene must reflect a pre-form *-nu-, lexicalized relics of which are also found more widely in Slovene. The existence of CSl *-nu- has thus far only been conjectured based on internal reconstruction and Indo-European parallels. (An attempt at an integrated diachronic explanation of the rise of the CSl variants will be the task of a separate ensuing study.

Keywords

• Common Slavic
• Class II verbs
• Slovene dialectology
• Resian
• Carinthian