Details
General
| Morphemic form: | V{nəkuu}V (Combinations) |
| New orthography: | +nikuuvoq |
| Proto-eskimoic root: | |
| Constituents: | V{nəq}N + N{-kuq}N + N{-u}V |
| Morpheme type: | Verbal modifier |
| Left sandhi: | ə-eliding (additive) |
| Right sandhi: | None |
Description
Form and usage:
This affix is a straightforward combination of abstract participle V{nəq}N, N{-kuq}N and N{-u}V. As the left-most morpheme is V{nəq}N, this combination inherits its left-sandhi behaviour, so it may (optionally) elide a stem-final /ə/, although this is probably rare in productive usage.
The affix is used to describe a perfective state/tense, similar to one of the meanings of V{sima}V, but only for events the speaker himself has experienced. It may be less ambiguous than V{sima}V and hence be preferred, especially by younger speakers and in newer texts, whereas older speakers may tend to prefer V{sima}V (some claim to dislike -nikuu-, because it contains N{-kuq}N, which has connotations of something old/broken/discarded). It is seemingly also a fairly new construction: For example, it is not explicitly mentioned in the dictionary by Schultz-Lorentzen (1958).
Verb stem
| Right sandhi: | Regular |
| Valency: | Valency-preserving |
| Diathesis: | Unaltered (same as the stem) |
Meaning(s)
| Meaning | Notes | |
|---|---|---|
| has already Vb'ed | Used to express (experiential) perfect tense, probably most commonly in combination with V{-riiq}V. | |
| has once Vb'ed | Examples | |
| has never Vb'ed | When used in combination with the negation affix V{ŋŋit}V. | Examples |