Details

General

Morphemic form: {paasi}V
New orthography: paasivaa, paasinnippoq
Old orthography: pâsivâ, pâsingnigpoĸ
Sources: [MFSJLK10], [SK71], [CWSL58], [JP67], [CBBJRPIKJR97]
Combinations: View list
Constituents: {paaq}N + N{si}V
Right sandhi: Assibilation (t⇒s)
Inflection sandhi: Default/none
Stem type: Vowel stem

Description and behaviour

Form and usage:

The meaning of this stem is: 'Agent understands Patient'. According to Kleinschmidt [SK71] (and supported by the Comparative Eskimo Dictionary [MFSJLK10]), the stem is actually a combination of {paaq}N, 'entryway' and N{si}V, 'find'. Thus, the literal meaning is 'Agent finds an entryway to/w.r.t. Patient', and this is presumably used in a metaphorical sense, i.e. that to understand something is to find an entry / way into it.

Note that this combination is not regular: N{si}V is normally additive, so it should have yielded /paaqsi/. However, we still record it as a combination.

Kleinschmidt [SK71] and Schultz-Lorentzen [CWSL58] also give a different combination {paaq}N + N{-qaq}V + V{tət}V with the same meaning, but this is not recorded in the newer dictionary Oqaatsit [CBBJRPIKJR97], so it is likely not used nowadays.


Notable forms:

Meanings and examples

Tags: Knowing

  • oqaatsit paasinngilara, I did not understand what you said [SK71]

    Literally: I did not understand thy word.

  • salloriaraluartoq paasivaa, he catches him in a lie [CBBJRPIKJR97]

    Litearlly: he1 understands that he2 is actually lying.


Search the corpus for further examples.


Tags

References