Beyond Time - Linguistics - University of California, Berkeley

-it-. . . -e. A handful of forms are simply irregular. A sampling of forms is shown in (324),
with a more complete exposition and discussion found in appendix B
(324) Some of -ite’s realizations
Stem Gloss -ite form
VHH: -zimba ‘swell’ -zimbite
-luka ‘be good’ -lukite
-penga ‘suffer’ -pengete
-yoba ‘get lost’ -yobete
-taba ‘be(come) happy’ -tabite
CM: -ikuta ‘be(come) full’ -ikusi
Imbrication: -ikala ‘stay’ -ikele
-shekela ‘sink to bottom’ -shekele
-tontola ‘be(come) cold’ -tontwele
-hupula ‘think, remember’ -hupwile
-zimana ‘stand up’ -zimene
Passive: -chiswa ‘get hurt, sick’ -chisitwe
-ile forms -fwa ‘die’ -fwiile
-suwa ‘hear, understand’ -suwile
Irregular: -iziba ‘come to know’ -izi
While verbs in main clauses with hodiernal non-past temporal reference occur with the
-la- marker in Zambian Totela (see chapter 4), verb macrostems, which include the verb root
and any pre-root object markers, are preceded by -li- in affirmative main clauses with the
-ite ending and without past or future tense marking.
(325) -li- + -ite vs. -la- + -a
a. ndìlíbwènè
ndi-li-bwene
1sg-pres.stat-see.stat
‘I see’ (stative) (cf. ungrammatical *ndi-la-bwene with -ite) (ZT2007Elic113)
b. ndìlábònà
ndi-la-bon-a
1sg-noncmpl-see-fv
‘I see’ (active) (cf. ungrammatical *ndi-li-bon-a) (ZT2007Elic113)
The -li- marker seems to be a transparent derivation from the verb -li ‘to be’ (PB *-dÌ)
and still has this meaning in some contexts in Totela, as seen in example (326), the opening
line of a story:
252