Fabrizio Ulivieri - TrendSetter

  Lithuanian has quite an "overgrown" participial system in comparison with the other Indo-European languages, like Latin, Greek and Sanskrit. In most of the Indo-European languages the inherited participial systems were reduced but Lithuanian not only kept all the inherited Indo-European participles, but it expanded their system. In this short note we focus on the comparability of the past active participle in -ęs with some participial forms of Latin and Greek. The Latin ablative absolute finds its counterpart in Lithuanian in the past participle in  -ęs (singular masculine nominative) -ę (plural masculine nominative) -usi (singular feminine nominative) -usios (plural feminine nominative): Dux, caesis hostibus, liberavit exercitum = vadas , priešą nužudęs, išlaisvino kariuomenę = The commander after slaughtering the enemy freed the army Caesar, oratione habita, in Italiam profectus est = Cezaris , pasak ęs kalbą, išvyko į Italiją = Caesar, having made a speech, set o...

by Fabrizio Ulivieri Lithuanian is the most archaic among all the Indo-European languages spoken today, and as a result it is very useful, indeed, indispensable in the study of Indo-European linguistics. The most important fact is that Lithuanian is not only very archaic, but still very much alive, i. e., it is spoken by about three and a half million people. It has a rich tradition in folklore, in literature, and it is used very successfully in all walks of modern life, including the most advanced scientific research. Forced by our interest for this piece of living archaism, we go deeper in our linguistic survey. One of the most noticeable similarities is the future (- sigmatic future -). Lithuanian has preserved a future tense from prehistoric times: it has one single form, e.g. kalbė-siu 'I will speak', etc. kalbė-si kalbė-s kalbė-sime kalbė-site kalbė-s This form kalbėsiu is made from the stem kalbė-(ti) 'to speak', plus the ancient stem-end...