The grown-up siblings: history and functions of Western Uralic *kse
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.33339/fuf.86081Abstract
In this paper, it is claimed that the case suffix *kse, known as translative, dates back to the Finnic-Mordvin proto language, where it functioned as a functive. It is illustrated using synchronic data from Finnic-Mordvin languages that the functions of *kse do not display an inherent feature of directionality ‘into’, or in other terms, lative. It is even possible that the suffix was neutral with respect to time stability, as it is in contemporary Erzya. Further, it is assumed that since the Northern Finnic languages have acquired a new stative case, the functive labelled essive *nA, formerly applied as an intralocal case, the functions of *kse have changed in these languages: *kse has become mainly the marker of a transformative, with an inherent feature of dynamicity.