Lietuvių kalba eISSN: 1822-525X
2022, vol. 17, pp. 39–48 DOI: https://doi.org/10.15388/LK.2022.3

Verbal derived stems and semantics of prefixed verbs in the earliest Lithuanian texts

Otso Vanhala
Institut für deutsche Sprache und Linguistik, Historisch-vergleichende Sprachwissenschaft
Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Email: vanhalao@hu-berlin.de
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6649-9949

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Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) – SFB 1412, 416591334. This paper is based on a presentation at the Pranas Skardžius conference “Žodžių darybos, leksikologijos, etimologijos ir morfologijos kryžkelės” (2022 m. gegužės 26–28 d., Bistrampolio dvaras, Panevėžio raj.).

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Abstract. This article discusses the deverbal verb derivation by the means of the prefixes in the Old Lithuanian language, basing on the corpus of about 110 primary verbs and their approximately 460 derivates attested in the Evangelijos bei epistolos (Gospels and Epistles, ViE) and the Catechism (ViC) of Baltramiejus Vilentas, with additional data from other Prussian Old Lithuanian sources up to the year 1600.

By comparing the derived verbs with their bases occurring in the Old Lithuanian texts, the co-occurring morphological and semantical changes were found out. Attention is brought on the together co-occurring morphological and semantical changes used in deriving telic verbs from their often atelic bases, e. g. the loss of infinitive formants -ė- and -o-, as in giedoti ‘to sing’→ pragysti ‘to start to sing, to start to crow’, or the ablaut change in šaukti ‘to shout’ → prašukti ‘to cry out, to exclaim’. The change in telicity can be used to classify the derived verbs into aktionsart classes (e. g. ingressive/momentaneous, delimitative). The telic ingressive/momentaneous derivatives also have the nasal infix or -st- formant in the present tense.

This article shows that the non-prefixed verbs with ingressive or momentaneous meaning of the type gysti occur extremely rarely in the oldest Lithuanian texts, and are better seen as later de-prefixed derivatives of the type pragysti, i.e. pragysti → gysti. Similarly, the derived type pragiedoti is rare in Old Lithuanian as the prefixation is usually accompanied by the shortening of the infinitive stems in the derivatives of this semantic class, leading to pragysti, although the type pragiedoti also occurs. This has led to the formal patterning of the derivatives and base verbs into two new models similar to that of degti → sudegti, the two new patterns showing only a simple prefixation: gysti → pragysti and giedoti → pragiedoti.

Keywords: verbal derivation, momentaneous verbs, Vilentas, de-prefixation, prefixation, aktionsart, telicity.

Veiksmažodžių išvestiniai kamienai ir priešdėlinių veiksmažodžių semantika ankstyvuosiuose lietuviškuose tekstuose

Santrauka. Straipsnyje aptariama senojoje lietuvių kalboje vyraujanti priešdėlinė veiksmažodžių daryba, remiantis apie 110 pirminių veiksmažodžių ir apie 460 jų darinių, paliudytų Baltramiejaus Vilento Evangelijose ir epistolose (ViE) ir Katekizme (ViC), korpusu bei papildomais duomenimis iš kitų Prūsijos senųjų lietuvių kalbos šaltinių iki 1600 m.

Lyginant išvestinius veiksmažodžius su senosios lietuvių kalbos tekstuose pasitaikančiomis jų pamatinėmis formomis, nustatyti kartu vykstantys morfologiniai ir semantiniai pokyčiai. Atkreiptas dėmesys į morfologinius ir semantinius pokyčius: teliniai veiksmažodžiai išvedami iš atelinių pamatinių formų, pavyzdžiui, be infinityvinių formantų -ė- ir -o-, kaip giedoti → pragysti, arba įvyksta balsių kaita, pvz., šaukti → prašukti. Remiantis teliškumo kaita, išvestinius veiksmažodžius galima klasifikuoti į akcionalines klases (pvz., ingresyviniai / momentiniai, delimitatyviniai veiksmažodžiai). Teliškieji ingresyviniai / momentiniai dariniai taip pat turi nosinį infiksą arba -st- formantą esamajame laike.

Šiame straipsnyje parodyta, kad nepriešdėliniai ingresyvinės ar momentinės reikšmės gysti tipo veiksmažodžiai seniausiuose lietuvių kalbos tekstuose pasitaiko itin retai ir juos geriau vertinti kaip vėlesnius pragysti darinius iš priešdėlinių formų, t. y. pragysti → gysti (įvyksta deprefiksacija). Panašiai ir išvestinis tipas pragiedoti senosios lietuvių kalbos tekstuose yra retas, nes šios semantinės klasės dariniuose prefiksaciją dažniausiai lydi infinityvinių kamienų trumpinimas, dėl to susidaro forma pragysti, nors pasitaiko ir tipas pragiedoti. Tai lėmė, kad išvestiniai ir pamatiniai veiksmažodžiai formaliai suskirstyti į du naujus modelius, panašius į degti → sudegti, ir šie du nauji modeliai rodo tik paprastą prefiksaciją: gysti → pragysti ir giedoti → pragiedoti.

Raktažodžiai: veiksmažodžių daryba, momentiniai veiksmažodžiai, Vilentas, deprefiksacija, prefiksacija, akcionalinės klasės, teliškumas.

Received: 15/09/2022. Accepted: 27/12/2022
Copyright © 2022 Otso Vanhala. Published by Vilnius University Press. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Licence (CC BY), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.

1. Research problem

1.1. Deverbal verb derivation in Old Lithuanian

The object of this article are the semantical and morphological changes accompanying verbal prefixation in the Prussian Old Lithuanian texts up to the year 1600, primarily based on the texts of Baltramiejus Vilentas. Verbal prefixation, as type of derivational morphology, is a synchronic derivational means of forming new verbs into the lexicon of a language. As such, the derivatives formed by prefixation have their separate meanings that can be compared with the non-prefixed base verbs. In this way, the derivatives can be classified according to the semantic change in contrast to their base verbs.

Since the derivation is synchronic, there should be a formally and semantically transparent derivational relationship between the derivative and the base verb. The prefixed derived verbs are studied on the basis of the texts themselves with as little modern Lithuanian interpretation as possible, e. g., in terms of the productivity of the stems.

1.2. Prefixation and semantic factors

Verbal derivation by prefixation is known to affect the telicity (Ambrazas et al. 2006, 234)¹, valency (Ambrazas et al. 2006, 226) and direction in the spatial meaning of the verb (Ambrazas et al. 2006, 222). Telicity is the parameter of having an endpoint inherent in the lexical meaning. Telic verbs have such an endpoint, atelic verbs lack one. In the case of valency, the most important factor is transitivity, and additionally, the type of object or complement a verb is combined with. With direction, I mean the usage of prefixes in their adverbial sense where they modify the space related semantics, and thus the lexical meaning of a verb. Lastly, a verb can have its meaning completely changed by the prefix so that establishing a derivative relationship becomes difficult, at least from the synchronic point of view (Ambrazas et al. 1994, 402 § 1079). In Old Lithuanian, these are often loan translations from Polish or other languages, e. g., susimilti ‘to show mercy ← pol. zmilować się (LKŽ, s.v. 2. sumilti, 2.). Here are examples from the works of Vilentas, with a change in (1) telicity (at. = atelic, te. = telic), (2) valency, (3) direction and (4) base meaning:

(1) kalbėti, kalba ‘to speak’ (at.) – prakalbėti, prakalba ‘to start to speak’ (te.)

(2) gelbėti, gelbV (BrP)² ‘to help’ (a.obj.) – pagelbėti ‘to help’ (d.obj.)

(3) eiti, eit ‘to go’ – ateiti, ateit ‘to come’

(4) gulėti, guli ‘to lie’ (at.) – apgulti, apgula ‘to besiege’

A prefix can also change both the telicity and valency (5), and the determining meaning of the prefix with motion verbs also usually changes the telicity, as in the case of eiti – ateiti.

(5) degti, dega ‘to burn’ (itr., at.) – uždegti, uždega ‘to light up’ (tr., te.)

The changes in telicity and valency can be seen as aktionsart forming changes, where telicity is connected with “process related” aktionsarten and valency with “subject related” aktionsarten (Fritz, Meier-Brügger 2020, 257). In this article, I am going to focus on the telicity-changing prefixation occurring in the earliest Prussian Lithuanian texts.

2. Data and methods

The material used for this study pivots on the writings of Baltramiejus Vilentas, the Evangelijos bei epistolos (ViE, 1579) and the Catechism (ViC, 1579). Additional material was collected from all the Prussian Lithuanian texts up to the year 1600, i. e. Mažvydas’s Catechism (MžK, 1547), Hymns (MžG_I, 1566, MžG_II, 1570), Wolfenbütteler Postil (WoP, 1573), Jonas Bretkūnas’s Postil (BrP_I–II, 1591), his translation of the Gospels and the Acts (BrB_VII, 1580), Giesmės duchaunos (BrG, 1589), Kancionalas (BrK, 1589), Kolektos (BrM, 1589) and Vaišnoras’s Margarita theologica (MgT, 1600).

The verbs derived by prefixation and their derivational bases were searched for in the texts of Vilentas (ViE and ViC). Other texts were also searched through to confirm the findings for Prussian Old Lithuanian up to the year 1600 and to supply the present stems, often missing in ViE and ViC, as well as additional derivatives and base verbs of derivatives attested in ViE and ViC. Additionally, in order to quickly evaluate the general Old Lithuanian attestations of the verbs, I used the dictionaries Altlitauisches etymologisches Wörterbuch (ALEW) and Lietuvių kalbos žodynas (LKŽ) to see if either of them had Old Lithuanian attestations of the verbs in question. The derived verbs were then compared with their assumed base verbs. The two verbs, the derivative and the base verb, were regarded as being in a derivational relationship if the derivative could plausibly be based, both formally and semantically, as well as from the synchronic point of view, on the base verb (Urbutis 1978, 66).

3. Research findings

As might be expected, the most common formal pattern of prefixation is simply the addition of a prefix to the base verb with no additional changes, e. g.:

(6) kalbėti, kalba ‘to speak’ → prakalbėti, prakalba ‘to start to speak’

(7) eiti, eit ‘to go’ → ateiti, ateit ‘to come’

(8) degti, dega ‘to burn’ (itr.) → uždegti, uždega ‘to light up’ (tr.)

Thus, the rule for prefixation in Old Lithuanian would be prefix + the base verb → derived verb. Conversely, this means that generally by removing the prefix from a verb, the derivational base is left. This works usually for verbs in Old Lithuanian, and based on the data in LKŽ, apparently always in the modern language. In Old Lithuanian, the base verbs would be found out in the following way:

(9) už-degti ‘to light up’ (tr.) → degti ‘to burn’ (itr.)

(10) pa-gelbėti ‘to give some help’ → gelbėti ‘to help’

(11) už-mokėti ‘to pay’ → mokėti ‘to pay’

(12) pra-gysti ‘to begin to sing; to begin to crow; to crow’ → *gysti (id.)

In the example (12) there is *gysti with an asterisk because this verb does not occur in Old Lithuanian. The case of the pair pragysti and *gysti is by far not the only one where a derived verb has an unattested base in the early Prussian Lithuanian data. To the same group with pragysti, pragysta belong the following derivatives in the texts of Vilentas (asterisks in the list mean that the form is not attested in my data): išgirsti, išgirsta; išmokti, išmoksta; išvysti, išvysta; pabusti, pabunda; pamigti, *paminga; pažinti, pažįsta; prasidžiugti, *prasidžiunga; prašukti, prašunka; pravirkti, *pravirksta³; susimilti, susimilsta; užmigti, užminga.

The same picture is corroborated by the larger corpus of Old Lithuanian texts. Based on searches in LKŽ and ALEW, the verbs arrived at by simply removing the prefix from the verbs in the above list, such as *gysti, *žinti, and *šukti, are first attested at a much later time. I suggest that the derivational bases for these verbs are the usual primary verbs giedoti, gieda; žinoti, žino and šaukti, šaukia. This kind of derivation is semantically plausible, and morphologically there is only one additional change, i.e. (1) the zero grade / the lack of the long vowel formant in the infinitive and past stems and (2) the presence of the nasal infix / -st- formant in the present stem.

Enlarging the data from Vilentas and early Prussian Old Lithuanian by the inclusion of examples from all Old Lithuanian, it can be seen that the same tendency in prefixal derivation, based on the ALEW and LKŽ, holds well in the whole Old Lithuanian corpus. There is a large number of non-prefixed, infix / -st-type verbs with a short infinitive that are attested only outside Old Lithuanian⁴:

	Verb	Gloss: LKŽ, English	Attestation
1.	*gysti, gysta	‘imti giedoti, sugiedoti’; ‘to start to sing’	dainos, lexicography, dialects
2.	*girsti, girsta	‘imti girdėti; gauti žinią, partirti’; ‘to begin to hear; to get to now, learn’	dialects
3.	*kalbti, kalbsta	‘pradėti kalbėti’; ‘to begin to speak’	Antanas Juška’s dictionary
4.	*kilti, kyla, kilsta	‘keltis aukštyn’; ‘to rise’	all later genres (dainos, lexicography, prose, dialects etc.)
5.	*migti, minga / miega / miegsta / miegti / mienga	‘pradėti miegoti’; ‘to start to sleep’	dainos, dictionaries, dialects
6.	*milti, milsta	‘imti mylėti’; ‘to start to love’	in words collected by Feliksas Sragys
7.	*norti, norsta	‘norėti, trokšti’; ‘to want, desire’	Antanas Juška’s dictionary
8.	*stebti, stemba	‘imti stebėtis’; ‘to start to wonder’	later prose
9.	*virkti, virksta	‘imti verkti’; ‘to start to cry’	lexicography, dialects
10.	*vysti, vysta / vyda / vyma	‘pamatyti’; ‘to see’	lexicography, dialects and dainas
11.	*žasti, žanda	1. ‘pasakyti, tarti’, 2. ‘busti, peikėtis’; 1. ‘to say’, 2. ‘to rebuke’	lexicography
12.	*žinti, žįsta	‘pažinti’; ‘to recognize’	Academic sources. žinte also in later prose and dialects
13.	*žiurti, žiursta / žiūra	‘pradėti regėti’; ‘to start to see’	lexicography

The relative scantiness of the verbs of the type gysti is also noted by Jurgis Pakerys 2011, 48. In discussing the bases of pra-gýs-ti ‘begin to crow’, pa-mCOLUMNBREAKl-ti ‘fall in love’, nu-tCOLUMNBREAKl-ti ‘become silent’, he notes that “[t]hese “primary” verbs are almost never used without the prefixes and it would be unsafe to assume that gýs-ti, mCOLUMNBREAKl-ti, and tCOLUMNBREAKl-ti are possible bases of gied-ó-ti, myl--ti, and tyl--ti. In these cases, an opposite direction of derivation is at work, i. e. ‘action / state’ → ‘beginning of an action / entry into a state’” (Pakerys 2011, 48), meaning that the sequence of derivation is giedoti → gysti, as already suggested by Jakulis (2004, 16) saying that the verbs with the infinitive formant -ė- / -o- or a full grade in the stem are primary. Also, by writing that the verbs of the gysti type almost never occur without prefixes, Pakerys seems to imply the derivation giedoti → pragysti. Thus, the verbs of the type gysti came slowly⁵ into being by de-prefixation.⁶

For every verb of the types -ėti, -a; -ėti, -i; -oti, -a; -oti, -o, it seems that the present stem was the one that served as the base for the prefixal derivation. This means that the long vowel formant -ė- or -o- of the infinitive and preterit stems was effectively ignored, and new infinitive and preterit forms were formed by adding the endings to the unsuffixed stem (e. g. the inf. -mok-ti from moka, inf. mokėti). The derived present stem, for its part, got extended by either -st- or nasal infix in addition to the prefix (e. g. iš-mok-st-a from the old present mok-a).

Seeing the additional marking of the present stem forms, in addition to their rarity of attestation in the texts, it seems plausible that the preterit forms such as pragydo were the first to be formed, and the presents were formed later (Ostrowski 2019, 55).

In short, the historically correct sequence of derivation is, on the lexeme level, the following:

(13) pra + giedoti → pragysti → gysti

On the more detailed level of tense stems, it is the following:

(14) pra + giedoti → pragyd-o (prt.) → pragyd-st-a (prs.), pragyd-ti (inf.)

This means that the oppositions giedoti vs. gysti, and gysti vs. pragysti are not original, but the latter follows analogically from the oppositions like degti vs. uždegti, creating the base verb gysti. This then seemed like the synchronic base verb of pragysti, and like an ingressive/momentaneous form directly connected to giedoti.

3.1. The semantics of the prefixed verbs with the short infinitive stems

The verbs with the change in the infinitive formant in connection with prefixation invariably also have the -st- / nasal infix formant in the present stem. For this reason, in earlier studies, these derivatives have been included in and studied under the name of -st- / nasal infix verbs⁷. In the earlier studies, it has been already noted that non-prefixed verbs of the type discussed here occur rarely (e. g. Pakalniškienė 2018, 67; Pakerys 2011, 48, mentioned above), but as far as I see, the matter has not been further problematized.

The verbs sharing the morphological feature of the -st- / nasal infix have diverse semantical characteristics in Baltic. The usual functions are signaling intransitivity, or in other terms, the resultativity in the pair causativity vs. resultativity (e. g. kẽlia / kỹla, krẽčia / kriñta, (Pakalniškienė 1996, 84; 2020)), fientivity in denominal verbs (Pakalniškienė 2018, 67, with OLith. examples in 69–80), telicity, or in another terminology, terminativity in the dichotomy durativity vs. terminativity (e.g. ver̃kia / -vìrksta, šaukia, / -šunka (Pakalniškienė 1996, 84; Pakalniškienė 2021)) and the forming of imitatives (Pakalniškienė 1996, 85).

The verbs attested in the Old Lithuanian texts that nearly always have a prefix in addition to the -st- / nasal infix belong to the above-mentioned semantic class of telicity (or durativity vs. terminativity). The difference in semantics of the base verb and derivative can be seen in the following list:

(15) girdėti, girdi ‘to hear’ (at.) → išgirsti, išgirsta ‘to hear’ (te.)

(16) mokėti, moka ‘to be able to, to know how’ (at.) → išmokti, išmoksta ‘to learn’ (te.)

(17) veizdėti, veizdi ‘to see, to look at’ (at.) → išvysti, išvysta ‘to see, to notice’ (te.)

(18) budėti, budi ‘to be awake’ (at.) → pabusti, pabunda ‘to wake up’ (te.)

(19) miegoti, miega ‘to sleep’ (at.) → pamigti, *paminga ‘to fall asleep’ (te.); užmigti, užminga ‘to fall asleep’ (te.)

(20) žinoti, žino ‘to know’ (at.) → pažinti, pažįsta ‘to get to know; to know’ (te./at.)

(21) džiaugtis, džiaugiasi ‘to be happy’ (at.) → prasidžiugti, *prasidžiunga ‘to become happy’ (te.)

(22) šaukti, šaukia ‘to shout’ (at.) → prašukti, prašunka ‘to cry out, to exclaim’ (te.)

(23) verkti, verkia ‘to weep’ (at.) → pravirkti, *pravirksta ‘to burst out in tears’ (te.)

(24) mylėti, myli ‘to love’ (at.) → susimilti, susimilsta ‘to show mercy’ (te.)

As can be noted, all the verbs, except the last one (24), have only a change in semantics from atelic to telic, with some minimal changes visible in the English glosses, e.g., in the examples (22) and (23).

All of them indicate a punctual, momentaneous event, some with an implied durative event before the punctual event (išmokti ‘to learn’) and some after the punctual event (užmigti ‘to fall asleep’). Some imply no durative event, e. g. prašukti ‘to cry out, to exclaim’, išgirsti ‘to hear. In any case, the common denominator of these derived verbs is telicity, and, in comparison with their base verbs, a modification of the semantics to indicate a momentaneous event.

It can also be noted, that in the scale of transitivity (Hopper, Thompson 1980, 252), all the derivatives listed this far in this article are at most only weakly transitive, the rare object being unaffected by the verbal action. Some verbs of this class, such as the verb susimilti from mylėti fit the pattern morphologically but the semantical relationship between these two verbs is unclear due to the influence of the loaned Polish semantics of the formally similar verb pol. zmilować się ‘to have mercy’.

Prefixation is also used to form other actional derivatives in the early Prussian Lithuanian data, but these occur without changes in the infinitive and preterit stems and without the addition of the -st- / nasal infix in the present stem. These are the delimitatives, gelbėti ‘to help’ → pagelbėti ‘to give some help (‘suteikti kiek pagalbos’, LKŽ, s.v. pagelbėti)’, miegoti ‘to sleep’ → prasimiegoti ‘to sleep for a time (‘kiek pamiegoti’, LKŽ, s.v. pramiegoti, 3.)’. Some derivatives have a complete change in meaning, such as gulėti ‘to lie, to be in a lying position’→ užgulėti ‘to be proper’ and mylėti ‘to love’ → susimilti ‘to show mercy’.

3.2. Counterevidence

There is verb pair that is semantically and formally similar to the type of giedoti – pragysti: kleidėti, *kleidi ‘to err, to be astray’ – paklysti, paklysta ‘to go astray’. This verb, however, has already a non-prefixed -st- stem verb attested in Old Lithuanian, namely klysti, *klysta ‘to go astray’ in MžG_II and BrG. Both loci here are in the same hymn:

(25) Vmus muſu tawęſp gręſchk: Ieng neklis nůg tawęs (MžG_II 345,8)

(26) Humus muſu taweſp grenſchk / Ieng neklis nůg tawens. (BrG 73,19)

„Turn our minds to you, so that they will not go astray” (own translation)

In my view, this is an early case of de-prefixation possibly connected to the metric requirements of the hymn genre. These two are the only occurrences in Prussian Lithuanian up to the year 1600, which supports the view that the verb klysti was not in common usage.

Another formally similar pair is ilsėtis, ilsisi ‘to rest’ – pailsti, *pailsta ‘to become tired’. The semantics, on the other hand, are not of the usual ingressive/momentaneous model with only a change in the telicity, but there is the further change in meaning, as the telic derivative of ilsėtis, ilsisi should mean ‘to become rested’, and not ‘to become tired’. There is also the non-prefixed verb ilsti ‘to become tired’ attested in WoP 195v, 32, and outside my data, in Sirvydas’s Dictionarium Trium Linguarum. It is possible that also the verb ilsti is a secondary de-prefixed verb although its formal and semantical relationship to ilsėtis is not clear.

4. Synchronicity of the giedoti → pragysti type derivation in Old Lithuanian

Based on the evidence, the regular ingressive/momentaneous verbal derivation rule involving the prefixation accompanied with stem changes was still synchronically functioning in Prussian Lithuanian up to 1600. There were two kinds of exceptions to the rule: (1) The occurrence of de-prefixed synonymous variants in addition to the prefixed ones (kleidėti – paklysti / klysti (MžG_II, BrG)) and (2) the occurrence of synonymous prefixed derived variants with no other changes (žinoti – pažinti / pažinoti (only in BrP, BrB, WoP in my data, e.g. BrP II 075,17, WoP 291r,17)). Despite the formal similarity to the delimitatives such as prasimiegoti ‘to sleep for a time’ (← miegoti ‘to sleep’), it is clear from the rarity of texts where pažinoti occurs and from its meaning, synonymous with pažinti ‘to recognize’, that it is a new formation to žinoti, unlike the delimitatives which have no side forms (e. g. there is no more widely occurring infinitive form *pagelbti in addition to the attested pagelbėti). From the occurrence of forms such as pažinoti, it can be seen that the Old Lithuanian derivation with both prefix and additional stem changes was already beginning to lose its complexity in favour of the simple rule prefix + (unchanged) verb stem as seen in the cases of the formation of other types of derivatives where there regularly is no change, e. g., degti → sudegti, gelbėti → pagelbėti and miegoti → prasimiegoti. For the author or correctors of the Postil of Bretkūnas, the rule was still seen as correct, as it was once enforced in the errata on the page BrP_II 526, where the <paßinnoti> of the following sentence is corrected to <paßinti>:

(27) kacʒei iu akis apſchelpuſios / tatai eſti / laikomos buwa / kaip io negaleia paßinnoti. (BrP_II 22,7–8)

“and their eyes were blinded, that is, held, so that they could not recognize him”

Conclusions

Based on the evidence of the Prussian Lithuanian texts until the year 1600, infixation or the -st- formant was used in conjunction with prefixation to derive momentaneous verbs. This means that the non-prefixed derived -st- / nasal infix verbs are a result of a later de-prefixation. This is supported by the known lack of attested verbs of such type. Hence, the derivational opposition of the types šaukti ‘to shout’ vs. šukti, šunka ‘to cry out, to exclaim’ and giedoti ‘to sing’ vs. gysti, gysta ‘to start to sing, to start to crow’ is not original but formed from the earlier opposition šaukti ‘to shout’ vs. prašukti, prašunka ‘to cry out, to exclaim’ and giedoti ‘to sing’, vs. pragysti, pragysta ‘to start to sing, to start to crow’. The suffixed infinitive (e. g. gied-o-ti, bud-ė-ti) changes its stem by dropping the suffix, and the present stem has an additional formant (-st- or the nasal infix) in comparison to the other stems, possibly because of the primariness of the more usual preterit forms, which caused a requirement of a secondary distinction for the present stem.

The verbs formed by these two measures occurring together in my data are uniformly telic and momentaneous. This contrasts with the other aktionsarten such as the delimitatives which have a prefix but no additional changes in the stems. The verb prakalbėti, with ingressive meaning but still not dropping the suffix in the infinitive nor having the infix / -st- in the present tense, is an exception.

The rule of prefixation being combined with the other changes in the verbal stem is largely synchronic for Old Lithuanian, although it had already began to lose its role as the missing non-prefixed verbs started to be formed by de-prefixing the already existing derived momentaneous verbs and as the prefixation without any other changes in the stem started to occur. Ultimately, this led to similar formal regularity of the new derivational types gysti → pragysti and giedoti → pragiedoti as there existed for degti → sudegti.

Sources

BrB_VII – BIBLIA || tatai eſti || Wiſsas Schwentas Raſchtas, || Lietúwiſchkai pergŭlditas || per || Janạ Bretkŭnạ Lietúwos Ple-||bonạ Karaliacʒiúie. 1590. (BIBLIA || tatai eſti || Wiſsas Schwentas Raſchtas, || Lietúwiſchkai pergŭlditas || per || Janạ Bretkŭnạ Lietúwos Ple-||bonạ Karaliacʒiúie. 1590Aſchma dalis Bibliás || Lietuwiſchkás. || Iáno Bretkúno pergulditas.)

BrG – Gieſmes || Duchaunas / iſdch || Wokiſchka ing Lietu-||wiſchka ließuwi / per ne-||kurius Plebonus Her-||cegiſtes Pruſu/ per-||gulditas. || Iſſpauſtas Karaliaucʒu-||ie / per Jurgi Oſterbergera || 1589.

BrM – KOLLECTAS || Alba || Paſpalitas Maldas […] iſch || Wokiſchko ließuwio/ || ing Lietuwiſchka pergulditas/ ||, Per Jana Bretkuna. [Königsberg: G. Osterberger] M. D. LXXXIX.

BrP – POSTILLA || Tatai eſti || Trumpas ir || Praſtas Iſchguldimas || Euangeliu / ſakamuiu Baßnicʒoie || Krikſchcʒioniſchkoie/ nůg Aduento || ik Wæliku. || Per || Jana Bretkuna Lietuwos Plebona || Karaliaucʒiuie Pruſůſu. || Iſſpaude Karaliaucʒiuie || Jurgis Oſterbergeras. || Mæta Pono 1591.

MgT – MARGARITA || THEOLOGICA, || Collecta & conſcripta || à M. ADAMO FRAN=||ciſci, Iegerndorfenſe, Mona-||ſterij Heilsbrunnenſis Abbate. || Zemcʒ́uga Theologiſchka || […] Lituwiſchkai jra perguldita per || Simona Waiſchnora warniſchki || Plebona Ragaines || Iſchſpauſta Karaliaucʒiuie Pru=||ſu/ per Jurgi Oſterbergerą/ mæ=||tůsą/ Chriſtaus 1600.

MžG_I – Geſmes Chrik=||ſcʒoniskas gedomas Baß=||nicʒoſu per Aduenta ir Ka=||ledas ik Gram=||nicʒu. Iſch ſpauſtas Karalau=||cʒui nůg Jona Daubmana || Metu Diewa/ || M.D.LXVI.

MžG_II – GESMES || Chrikſcʒoniſkas ge=||domas baßnicʒoſu per || Welikas ir Sekmi=||nias ik Aduenta. || Iſchſpauſtas Kara=||laucʒui / nůg Jona || Daubmana. || Metu Diewa/ || M. D. LXX.

MžK – CATE=||CHISMVSA PRA=||ſty Sʒadei, Makſlas ſkai-||tima raſchta yr gieſmes || del krikſcʒianiſtes bei del || berneliu iaunu nauiey || ſugulditas || KARALIAVCZVI VIII. || dena Meneſes Sauſia, || Metu vßgimima Diewa. || M. D. XLVII.

ViC – ENCHIRIDION || Catechiſmas || maßas dæl paſpalitu || Plebonu ir Koʒnadiju / || Wokiſchku ließuviu para=||ſchits per Daktara Mar=||tina Luthera. || O iſch Wokiſchka ließuwia ant || Lietuwiſchka pilnai ir wiernai pergul=||ditas / per Baltramieju Willentha || Plebona Karalaucʒuie ant || Schteindama. || Iſchſpauſtas Karalau=||cʒui per Iurgi Oſterber=||gera / Metu Diewa || M. D. LXXIX.

ViE – Euangelias bei || Epiſtolas / Nedeliu ir ſchwen=||tuju dienoſu ſkaitomoſias / Baßnicʒo=||ſu Chrikſcʒoniſchkoſu / pilnai ir wiernai per=||gulditas ant Lietuwiſchka Sʒodʒia / per || Baltramieju Willenta / Plebo=||na Karalaucʒui ant || Schteindama. […] Iſchſpauſtas Karalaucʒui per Iurgi || Oſterbergera / Metu || M. D. LXXXIX.

WoP – ISCHGVLDIMAS || EVANGELIV PER WISVS MET=||TVS, SVRINKTAS DALIMIS ISCH || DAVGIA PASTILLṾ, TAI EST || ISCH PASTILLAS NICVLAI HE=||MINGY, ANTONY CORVINI, IO=||ANNIS SPANGENBERGI, MAR=||TINI LVTHERI, PHILIPPI || MELANTHONIS, IOANNIS || BRENTY, ARSATY, SCHO=||PER, LEONARDI KVLMĀ=||NI IODOCY WILICHI || IR ISCH KIT=||TṾ […] [o.O. 1573].

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