Transitive verbs with non-accusative alternation in ... - Pluto Huji Ac Il

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Rivka Halevy
an atelic reading. Compare, e.g. the canonical accusative construction of the
telic verb tsavat ‘pinch’ (26a) with the imperfective and atelic interpretation
of (26b) that contains the coreferential dative clitic le-. 13
(26) a. ziser tsavat me’at min ha-lexem, hispig ‘oto
Zisser pinched a-little from the-bread, dipped OM-3 MASC.SG
ba-šemen ... ve-hibi’a ‘et haš’arato (elicited example)
in-the-oil … and-expressed OM hypothesis-his
‘Zisser pinched off a bit of the bread, dipped it in the oil, and
expressed his hypothesis’
(26) b. ziser tsavat lo me’at min ha-lexem,
Zisser pinched to-him (DAT.CLIT) a-little from the-bread,
hispig ‘oto ba-šemen… ve-hibi’a ‘et
dipped OM– 3 MASC.SG in-the-oil … and-expressed OM
haš’arato (Beer 1987: 29)
hypothesis-his
‘Zisser pinched himself off a bite of the bread, dipped it in the oil
…and then expressed his hypothesis’
However, aspectual meaning cannot be accounted for solely by the verb
and its construal. Other clausal elements play a role, too. In (27), the
aspectual reading hinges on the secondary verbs himšix (‘continued’), and
in (28) on the presence of adjuncts in combination with an ingressive verb,
e.g. qam kedey ‘rose to/with an intention to’:
(27) ha-'ilem himšix laxbot ba-na'ar še-haya
the-mute continued to-beat in-the-boy who-was
'axšav saru'a 'al ha-'arets (Kerrett, p. 16) (class 1)
now stretched-out on the-ground
‘The mute went on beating the boy who was now stretched out on
the ground’
(28) sinen li'or ve-qam mi-mqomo kedey lingos
muttered Lior and-rose from-place-his in-order to-bite
ba-šezif (Kerrett, p. 28) (class 6)
in-the-plum
‘Muttered Lior and rose to bite the plum’
Imperfect forms, such as the present participle, e.g. maxziq ‘being in a
position of holding’ in (29) below, and mexatex ‘was cutting’ in (30),
constitute yet another grammatical device in Hebrew for portraying a vivid