40 лет Санкт-Петербургской типологической школе
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(5) S inelite bjaxa tanki i iznoseni, kepetata
coats.the were light.PL and wom.out.PF.PPP.PL kepi.the izpomackani…
wrink.PF.PPP.PL
«The coats were thin and worn, the kepis (were) wrinkled…».
Removed from any context, one may consider iznoseni «worn-out» and izpomackani «wrinkled» as resultative participles, since they may be associated with transitive verbs and allow the characterisation of the objects «coats» and «kepis» as affected and changed by a preceding event, but the coordination of the adjective tanki«light» leads to the elimination of the resultative interpretation in favour of an adjectival interpretation. Therefore (5) denotes a state. Syntactically, the construction is predicative for the two following reasons: 1.
(6a) Njakoi ot lozjata bjaxa vece obrani i
some of vines be.IMPF.3PL already pick.PF.PPP.PL and pusti
empty.PL
Lit.«Some vineyards were already harvested and deserted».
If one admits that the form bjaxa obrani «were harvested» is resultative because it is formally derived from the verb obiram/obera «harvest, pick fruit» and because it implies a resulting state evidenced by the adverb vece «already», it would be difficult to explain the occurrence of the coordinated adjective pusti «empty». Just as in example (5), the participle is part of the paradigm of adjectives and the utterance denotes a state. As a result, it is impossible to give it either a corresponding active counterpart (6b) or to introduce an agent (6c):
(6b) *Xorata bjaxa vece obrali lozjata i
people.the be.IMPF.3PL already pick.PF.APP.PL vines and pustiempty.PL
Lit.«The people had already picked the grapes and deserted».
(6c) Njakoi ot lozjata bjaxa vece obrani i pusti
some of vines.the were already pick.PF.PPP.PL and empty.PL
*(ot studentite)
*(by the students)
«Some vines were already stripped and deserted».
This analysis shows that the double interpretation which may be assigned to a construction depends on the discursive context. Let us compare the following utterances:
(7a) Kolata e scup-en-a / poprav-en-a
cart.the is break.PF-PPP-SG.F repair.PF-PPP-SG.F
«The cart is broken/repaired».
(7b) Toj vidja kolata i razbra, ce e
he saw cart.the and understand.PF.AOR that is
scup-en-a
break.PF-PPP-SG.F (7c) Toj vidja kolata i razbra, ce e
He saw cart.the and understand.PF.AOR that is
scup-en-ai posle poprav-en-a
break.PF-PPP.SG.F and later repair.PF-PPP-SG.F
«He saw the cart and understood that it had been broken and later repaired».
From the preceding examples, it is clear that the aspectual properties of the participle can change according to the construction. Examples (7a) and (7b) are of the descriptive type and code the state of the entity. As in (6a), the participle behaves like an adjective, but of verbal nature, and which with the auxiliary constitutes a syntactic predicate. Thus, it seems difficult to speak of the «orientation» of a participle. On the other hand, (7c) belongs to the domain of passivisation, even though the agent is not specified: the participle is oriented toward the patient of the basic transitive verb. The comparison between examples (7b) et (7c) merits special attention as it shows how the adjunction of a coordinated participle (popravena «(is) repaired») leads to the transformation, as noted by Maslov [1988: 77], of the stative meaning of the completive ce e scupena that we identified in (5a) as «an actional passive perfect» («had been broken and repaired»). Thus, the auxiliary transforms the resultative participle into a verbal unit (a passive verb) which functions as a one-place predicate [Descl'es & Guentc'eva 1993: 91].
If this type of syntactic condition is not limited to Russian, as Maslov [19] affirmed, the data show that the interpretation of a given construction with — n/ – tis always context dependant. This can be illustrated with two Russian examples borrowed from [Knjazev 1988:344]:
(8a) My dvazdyj prosli mimo levogo basennogo kryla zamka….
Vpervyj raz okna byli zakry-t-y.
windows were close.PF-PPP-PL
«We passed twice by the left tower wing of the castle. The first time the windows were shut».
(8b) Rita noc'ju zatejala ssoru: trebovala zakryt' okno….
Takprepiralis' dolgo, i Rita, razumeetsja, vzjala verx:
okno bylo zakry-t-o.
window was close.PF-PPP-SG.NEUTER
«At night Rita began a quarrel insisting that the window should be shut. They carried on for a long time and it was Rita who had the upper hand: the window was shut».
19
In Bulgarian, unlike Russian, the corresponding form also occurs in cases where the state, a direct outcome of an action, is obliterated by a subsequent action [Maslov 1988: 77].
According to Knjazev, in (8a) the construction okna byli zakryty «the windows were shut» is an objective resultative, whereas in (8b) the construction okno bylo zakryto «the window was shut» is an actional passive. In other words, the construction in (8a) has the meaning of a state and implies: a) on the semantic level, one participant only about which a contingent property is predicated through the past passive participle; b) on the syntactic level, the structure is of the predicative type where the predicate, even though it has the form of a past passive participle, has the status of an adjectival determiner. On the other hand, the construction in (8b) has the meaning of a resultative state having, on the semantic level, three characteristics [DesclSs & GuentcMva 1993: 91]: 1. it implies a preceding event and the existence of an agent (specified or not); 2. it determines a property of the patient; 3. the property is not necessarily contingent upon the implied preceding event. On the syntactic level, the auxiliary operates on the past passive participle, associated with an abstract passive predicate which includes the notion of an unspecified agent, in view of its transformation into a verbal unit [ibid].
The resultative state, which I have just defined, must not be confused with the resultant state. Indeed, in languages such as Bulgarian, where there is an overt expression of the perfect (9b) and of a periphrastic passive (9a), these two notions are clearly distinguished:
(9a) Otvori cekmedzeto i razbra: parite
open.PF.AOR drawer.the and understand.PF-AOR money.PL bjaxa otkradnati.
was steal.PF.PPP
«He opened the drawer and understood: the money had been stolen».
(9b) Otvori cekmedzeto i razbra: bjaxa
open.PF-AOR drawer.the and understand.PF.AOR were
otkradnali parite
steal.PF.APP.PL money.PL
«He opened the drawer and understood: someone had stolen the money».
Although these two forms may appear in the same context, each has its own meaning: (9a) denotes a resultative state as defined above; it permits therefore to draw attention to the patient and to the characteristic which is attributed to it by the passive predicate; if the verbal form is a reminder of the implied event, it is in order to signify that at its origin is an agent. On the contrary, (9b) is an overt expression of the perfect; it denotes a resultant state: that is, a state which is brought about by an event and which is contiguous to this event.
It has often been pointed out that the periphrastic passive tends to be constructed with a perfective past participle, whereas the reflexive passive tends to use the imperfective form. On this subject Siewierska [1988: 247] notes that in Slavic languages, with the exception of Polish, the periphrastic passive including an imperfective participle rarely appears, and quotes Czech and Serbo-Croatian where the constructions are said to be used mainly in scientific texts. This affirmation is not wholly justified. In Russian, the contrast is not any clearer: the constructions with an imperfective past passive participle are sporadically attested [Maslov 1988; Poupynin 1996: 131] and are subject to strong lexical, syntactic and contextual constraints; they are allowed in varying degrees in Czech, Serbo-Croatian, Polish, and above all Bulgarian.