Date: Thu, 26 Jan 1995 00:45:52 +0100 (MET)
From: Goran Topic <topic@MATH.HR>
Subject: OOT: Croatian & Perfective (Was: Re: whiskey lovers)
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OOT = Out Of Topic :)

> Anticipative aspect is the norm for perfective tense.  I don't know the
> Croatian equivalents for  the Russian but using
>
> govorit'  for imperfective talking
> skazat'   for perfective saying
>    which is the standard Russian pair.

All very similar, and I can recognise most of the examples. Although, I
must say, there is not really such a thing as anticipative, but more
like intentional tense: that which you gave as {Ya skazhu} would in
Croatian be {Ja budem kazao}, which is called future II.
It translates into something like "I will have said". Rarely used
with perfective verbs (like {kazati}={skazat'}), mostly with
imperfective verbs (like {govoriti}={govorit'}). I can't seem to find
the exact meaning in the grammar, but in all the examples of its use I
could think of it is used to mark the intention or in relative finished
present sentences (I don't know the english terms for these, so this is
a free translation), like "Ako ikad budem zavrs^io, doc'i c'u."={If I
ever finish, I'll come.} (Caron is inverted and goes above s = lojbo cy.;
apostrophe is something like acute above c, and is palatalized alveolar
affricate.)

> Of course Croatian need not be identical to Russian in how it handles
> perfectives, but I thought I had read somewhere that the basic structure
> I described above, if not necessarily parallel ways to say it was pretty
> standard in the Slavic languages.  Feel free to correect me if I am wrong.

Quite true. Do not know any Russian, but this looks right.

> lojbab

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