# Slovenian: aspectual verb pairs – where to know them from?



## MrsMiller

There is one question concerning Slovene for which I still search an answer although I have dealt with the language already for some months. Maybe I can find an answer here in the Slavic forum. 

Well, I learnt that most Slovenian verbs exist as pairs (imperfective verb / perfective verb).

But how can I find out the perfective verb form when I only know the imperfective verb form and the other way round? My search in bilingual dictionaries is not always efficient.

Are there any special dictionaries (and maybe also any sources available online) that contain all the aspectual verb pairs of the Slovenian language? 

I hope for any help here to complete my knowledge about the topic of aspect! Thanks a lot in advance!


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Uf, tough topic. 

I couldn't find anything on the web. I hope there's a kind person who has time and patience to copy-paste all rules from the grammar books... manually.

But I've found a book: xxx


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## MrsMiller

Hello Tolovaj_Mataj,

first let me say many thanks for the recommendation of a book which seems to be perfect for my special needs.  (And also thanks to Jana for the link via PM. ) I think I will buy it the near future. 

My question was mainly targeted on learning whether such a book (or an other source) does exist for foreign learners and I am really happy to learn it does.  

But one further question: Is it possible to find out the perfective form of an imperfective verb and the other way round by one of the monolingual online-dictionaries on "bos.zrc-sazu.si/"? (Sorry I am not allowed to place a direct link due to my small number of posts here.) I sometimes use these monolingual dictionaries but I couldn´t find out myself whether this is possible. I guess it isn´t. 

Thanks for any help in advance.


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

SSKJ doesn't give any links from a perfertive verb to its imperfective v verb.  Each verb is only marked by _dov_. for perfective or _nedov. _for imperfective.
Hm, I would say that finding pairs is not difficult for any educated native speaker as far as I can hear every day. I hear people making wrong aspect mistakes quite rarely.

Jana will be mad on me once again... so the key words are Herrity and Slovene. There you can find rules on derivation...


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## MrsMiller

Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> SSKJ doesn't give any links from a perfertive verb to its imperfective v verb.


What a shame! 



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Each verb is only marked by _dov_. for perfective or _nedov. _for imperfective.


Yes, I know. And some verbs (mainly foreign words) are marked both dov. and nedov. what means that the perfective verb form is equivalent to the imperfective verb form. (e.g. telefonirati, analizirati, eksplodirati, fotografirati, oksidirati, polarizirati) I read about that. 



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Hm, I would say that finding pairs is not difficult for any educated *native speaker* as far as I can hear every day. I hear people *making* wrong *aspect mistakes quite rarely*.


Somehow I am not surprised about that fact. 
Is it possible that for a non-native speaker the topic "usage of aspect" is very much easier than knowing the aspectual verb pairs? At least I got that impression in the meantime.... (...although it´s told that for learners without any Slavic background the topic "usage of aspect" is very, very hard to understand.)



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Jana will be mad on me once again... so the key words are Herrity and Slovene. There you can find rules on derivation...


Thanks.


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## zigaramsak

MrsMiller said:


> Is it possible that for a non-native speaker the topic "usage of aspect" is very much easier than to know the aspectual verb pairs? At least I got that impression in the meantime.... (...although it´s told that for learners without any Slavic background the topic "usage of aspect" is very, very hard to understand.)


 
I'm not sure if you mean how a foreign speaker should know whether it's more appropriate to use the perfective or the imperfective verb in some situation. I have been thinking about this too.

I think it can't be too hard for an English speaker, as the past simple and the past continuous are similar to our perfective/imperfective aspect. But what about German speakers? I speak some German and sometimes I would like to use this concept, but it's not there. Sometimes I say something and the next moment it sounds so strange to me, as if something was missing. Of course, my German is not perfect and I'm sure that native speakers find their way to express everything just the way they want, but I imagine it must be even stranger, when it's the other way around.

On the other hand, I often hear Germans (German speaking people) using simple and continuous tenses in English correctly, so that shouldn't be a very big problem with Slovenian either...


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## MrsMiller

MrsMiller said:


> Is it possible that for a non-native speaker the topic "usage of aspect" is very much easier than to know the aspectual verb pairs? At least I got that impression in the meantime.... (...although it´s told that for learners without any Slavic background the topic "usage of aspect" is very, very hard to understand.)
> 
> 
> 
> zigaramsak said:
> 
> 
> 
> I'm not sure if you mean how a foreign speaker should know whether it's more appropriate to use the perfective or the imperfective verb in some situation. I have been thinking about this too.
> 
> I think it can't be too hard for an English speaker, as the past simple and the past continuous are similar to our perfective/imperfective aspect. But what about German speakers? I speak some German and sometimes I would like to use this concept, but it's not there. Sometimes I say something and the next moment it sounds so strange to me, as if something was missing. Of course, my German is not perfect and I'm sure that native speakers find their way to express everything just the way they want, but I imagine it must be even stranger, when it's the other way around.
> 
> On the other hand, I often hear Germans (German speaking people) using simple and continuous tenses in English correctly, so that shouldn't be a very big problem with Slovenian either...
Click to expand...

 
Yes, I agree to. I think that neither English nor German learners of the Slovenian language do have huge problems to understand when to use the perfective / imperfective verb. Of course, for German students it is for sure an advantage to know this concept from the English grammar. 

By the way, to express the continous form in German you only have to add the word "gerade" (=trenutno / prav takrat?) to the phrase in simple form.
Only a little comparison (English -> German)
Simple: (etwas tun)
I clean the bathroom on Wednesdays. -> Ich putze das Bad mittwochs.
I cleaned the bathroom last week. -> Ich putzte das Bad letzte Woche.
Continous: (gerade etwas tun) or: (gerade dabei sein, etwas zu tun)
I am cleaning the bathroom. -> Ich putze *gerade* das Bad. or Ich bin *gerade *dabei, das Bad zu putzen. 
I was cleaning the bathroom. -> Ich putzte *gerade* das Bad. or Ich war *gerade* dabei, das Bad zu putzen ....-> when something else happened
Those words I wrote red-coloured must be conjugated.

But back to Slovene - I see my problem elsewhere. Teaching material about the topic "glagolski vid" should be built up the following way:

1st.: tell the fact that verb pairs exist and that they are composed of an imperfective verb form and a perfective verb form.

2nd.: tell the rules of aspectual derivation or give a hint whether there are any sources learners can find out the verb pairs from.

3rd.: tell the rules when to use which verb form.

I am an autodidactic learner of the Slovene language and in the teaching material I own step 2 has been either omitted completely or reduced to a very insufficient (and not helpful) minimum. 

Learning process became frustrating as I should do step 3 without knowing anything / enough about step 2.  I asked myself what to do when I want to use the imperfective verb form but don´t know the corresponding verb at all (but only the perfective verb form) and any sources to find out this word.  (In my view step 2 (=knowing the rules of of aspectual derivation resp. knowing all the verb pairs) is the most difficult one for non-native speakers.)

So the hints I got here are very helpful to solve my problem.


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## Duya

I'm not a Slovenian speaker, but I hope you will find my post helpful nonetheless. While I will give some examples from my native Serbo-Croatian, very similar principles are applied in Slovenian (and in all other Slavic languages). I hope a native Slovenian will provide more straightforward examples from Slovenian.

There are several "schemes" for forming the aspectual pairs. I'm not sure I will enumerate them all below (I don't have any relevant literature at hand), but here we go with a few common ones:

1) 
"Base" verb imperfective:  _čekati _(wait) 
prefix + base verb perfective: _*sa*čekati _(to have waited)
prefix + base + "infix"(1) imprefective (frequentative): _*sa*ček*iva*ti _(to wait for someone frequently, e.g. your kid from school)

the most used "infixes" used are _-va-_ and _-ja-_, but they should be memorized by heart, in most cases, as some are quite unexpected: prepl*es*ti <-> prepl*ita*ti.

More examples of this type:
_znati _(know) -> _saznati_ (to become aware of) -> _saznavati_
_ići _(to go) -> _doći _(to come) -> _dolaziti_ (to be coming)(2)
Note that in this scheme, bare base+infix doesn't exist, e.g. _čekivati _or _znavati ._

2) 
A "pair" of imperfective and perfective base, each with its own "subfamily" made using prefixes:

_videti _(to see), perf. <->  _viđati _(to see [someone] frequently), imp.
_prevideti _(to oversee), perf. <->  pre_viđati _(to oversee [something] frequently)
_uvideti _(to realize), perf. <-> u_viđati_ (to be realizing), imp.
Here, _viđati _is made by "infix" -ja- from "base" _videti
_Note that, in this particular case, the "real" *semantic *pair of _videti_ is _gledati, _which is entirely another root (but compare identical situation in English with "see" and "look"/"watch").

Other examples of this scheme:
_stajati _(to stand, imp.)_ <-> stati _(to stop, perf.) (nastajati<->nastati, nestajati<->nestati)
_pomagati _(to help, imp.) <-> _pomoći _(to help, perf.) 
_padati _(to be falling, imp.) <-> _pasti _(to fall, perf.) (upadati<->upasti, propadati<->propasti)

Occasionally, the imperfective from this scheme can get a perfective "descendant" by scheme 1. For example _padati_ has _napadati _(to fall a plenty, e.g. snow).

(1) Take my notion of "infix" loosely. In many cases, the difference comes from different reflexes of the suffix, but the transformation happened long time ago. 
(2) The whole "ići" family of verbs is fairly huge; it's arguable whether perfective _doći, poći, naći,  _etc. are "base" verbs of its own or derivatives of _ići. _Whatever the case, the scheme is identical throughout: _dolaziti, polaziti, nalaziti _etc.


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## MrsMiller

Duya said:


> I'm not a Slovenian speaker, but I hope you will find my post helpful nonetheless.


 
Oh, yes I do - at least your scheme N° 1.  Your second scheme is still a bit inscrutable for me.  I have to take some more time to think over....



Duya said:


> While I will give some examples from my native Serbo-Croatian, very similar principles are applied in Slovenian (and in all other Slavic languages). I hope a native Slovenian will provide more straightforward examples from Slovenian.


 
I think I could find two examples concerning scheme N° 1 myself. After all I know a lot of vocabularies (learnt without knowing any schemes!)...

brati -> prebrati -> prebirati

pisati -> podpisati -> podpisovati

Is that correct? I am not 100% sure....

Amendment: One example from the second scheme could be: skakati <-> skočiti ?

I am curious whether native speakers can agree to.


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Duya, this is an interesting theory. I've never digged so deeply into this issue. Prefixes and infixes differ from SC, of course, but the logic is the same.

Your examples give me some thoughts:
- pomagati (to help) has no pair any more, it has both functions nowadays.
- stati (to stand) is imperfective; obstati, ostati, nastati, postati, zastati are perfective

This has remembered me to the third grade when we learned this and we got a homework, where we had to find as many perfective verbs from an imperfective as possible using prefixation. The verb iti has them a lot.

MrsMiller, these are correct.


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## Outsider

This previous thread may be of interest.


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## MrsMiller

Outsider, thanks for the interesting thread.  To be honest - I didn´t search for this topic outside the Slavic forum. 



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> MrsMiller, these are correct.


Great! 



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Your examples give me some thoughts:
> - pomagati (to help) has no pair any more, it has both functions nowadays.
> - stati (to stand) is imperfective; obstati, ostati, nastati, postati, zastati are perfective


 
OK. Could you (or any other native speaker) give a statement concerning the following verbs:
biti (imperf.)
imeti (imperf.)
morati (imperf.)
hoteti (imperf.)
Are there any perfective forms of those?
And what about the verbs moči and naj?

I guess that I asked two very silly questions now....


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## Duya

None of the verbs you wrote has a perfective pair, or even (as far as I know) a perfective "derivative". _Biti_ is a strange beast, being simultaneously perfective and imperfective, but it is highly irregular in all IE languages (see Indo-European copula) and is best omitted from any general analysis.

In Serbo-Croatian, I can only find "uzmoći" (endure, withstand) as a perfective derivative of "moći", but it's fairly obscure and slightly archaic.

"Naj" is not a verb in Slovenian (you probably drew a false parallel with English "Let"); rather, it's a particle (at least I hope so ) used to form (certain persons of) imperative.


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Biti (when meaning _to be_) is imperf. form, its perfective form is prebiti (when meaning _to spend some time_) - http://bos.zrc-sazu.si/cgi/a03.exe?name=sskj_testa&expression=ge=prebiti&hs=1


Biti (when meaning _to beat ..._ we don't used y anymore; some other Slavic languages still distinguish between i and y) is imperf., its perf. family contains: odbiti, izbiti, zabiti, zbiti, nabiti, pobiti, prebiti (when meaning to break sth through), pribiti, ubiti, ...

Imeti bears both aspects: http://bos.zrc-sazu.si/cgi/a03.exe?name=sskj_testa&expression=ge=imeti&hs=1

Modal verbs like hoteti, morati, moči... have only imperf. forms.

Naj is not a verb but particle (http://bos.zrc-sazu.si/cgi/a03.exe?name=sskj_testa&expression=ge=naj&hs=1), therefore we cannot talk about its aspect.

Unfortunately I have previously mentioned grammar book at home, so I cannot copy these ideas from it, but they are well described there.


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## sokol

MrsMiller, some comments from me as I am a German native speaker with some knowledge of Slovenian (and by the way, it was and still is difficult for me to use verbs correctly - with time you get the hang of it, somehow, but you easily make mistakes here).

What helped me was the advice of my teacher to accept that basically the same verb in perfective and imperfective form have _different meanings _which you express with _different means in your native tongue_ (this certainly is true for German, but for English too even though English has its progressive tenses).

You say *'berem knjigo'* - 'ich lese ein Buch' - 'I read a book', and this is _nedovršni_, which means that I just make no statement wether I have read the book or wether I am reading at the moment (which would be English progressive: I am reading a book): none of these meanings is expressed with the Slovenian sentence, if I have understood the basics of this grammatical chapter of Slavic languages correctly.

And you say *'prebral(a) sem knjigo' *(it would be more logical to use past tense here; present tense 'preberem knjigo' would sound strange, like if you just had finished the book at this moment, and even then probably wrong, idiomatically) - 'ich habe das Buch ausgelesen' or even 'ich bin mit dem Buch fertig' (= 'fertig mit lesen') - 'I have read the book to the end' or better 'I have finished the book' - (with all those meaning: you have read it, you know its content); this of course being _dovršni_.

Both meanings differ.
It may cause *more *errors rather than less if you learn to transform _ned_. into _dov_. (and vice versa) and think that you can change the aspect in doing so (well, you _do _change the aspect, but _not only_ ...). Especially as many perfective verbs have rather 'special' meaning when used in present tense.
(I have to confess that I myself haven't quite managed yet when to use perfective, especially in present tense, and probably I never will.)

Nevertheless I agree with you that it is of great help if you *do *know the rules of conversion; for once it is easier for you to learn vocabulary, and then it also help with understanding of meaning.

Duya already has given some good advice even though Slovenian pre- and infixes differ slightly. And you have always to keep in mind that these are only guidelines, and that there are exceptions.

But basically, yes, a prefix like 'po' or 'do' makes a perfective verb out of an imperfective, and an infix like 'aja' or 'ova' makes an iterative = imperfective verb out of a perfective verb.

Aspect is one of the major difficulties for learning Slovene (or any Slavic language, for that matter), and I wouldn't expect to ever achieve mastery in this field really ... best thing of course would be to live in the community to really learn using aspect correctly with almost no faults made.


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## Outsider

zigaramsak said:


> I think it can't be too hard for an English speaker, as the past simple and the past continuous are similar to our perfective/imperfective aspect. But what about German speakers? I speak some German and sometimes I would like to use this concept, but it's not there. Sometimes I say something and the next moment it sounds so strange to me, as if something was missing. Of course, my German is not perfect and I'm sure that native speakers find their way to express everything just the way they want, but I imagine it must be even stranger, when it's the other way around.
> 
> On the other hand, I often hear Germans (German speaking people) using simple and continuous tenses in English correctly, so that shouldn't be a very big problem with Slovenian either...


I would like to comment on this. I don't entirely agree that English continuous verbs should be easy for German speakers or for speakers of Slavic languages. On the contrary, I have often noticed that people with that linguistic background tend to misapply the continuous in English, for example using a continuous verb when they should use a simple verb. 

Where Zigaramsak wrote "Sometimes I *say* something and the next moment it *sounds* so strange to me, as if something was missing", they would have some tendency to say something like "*Sometimes I *am saying* something and the next moment it *is sounding* so strange to me, as if something was missing". This may point to important differences between English and those languages that tend to be overlooked...

P.S. I found the idea that applying imperfectivity to a perfective verb produces an *iteration* fascinating! How standard would you say this is in the grammatical and linguistic literature?


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## sokol

Outsider said:


> P.S. I found the idea that applying imperfectivity to a perfective verb produces an *iteration* fascinating! How standard would you say this is in the grammatical and linguistic literature?



Of other languages? I've got no idea. There is an iterative infix or prefix (I'm not sure any more, was a long time ago that I studied this) in Old Hittite, an Indoeuropean language.
But overall my guess would be that this were not so common.

It is however a standard feature of Slavic languages.

(And I agree on your sidenote that many times learners of English make mistakes with progressive form - I should know, because I am sure that I'm making plenty of my own. )


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## jazyk

> On the contrary, I have often noticed that people with that linguistic background tend to misapply the continuous in English, for example using a continuous verb when they should use a simple verb.
> 
> Where Zigaramsak wrote "Sometimes I *say* something and the next moment it *sounds* so strange to me, as if something was missing", they would have some tendency to say something like "*Sometimes I *am saying* something and the next moment it *is sounding* so strange to me, as if something was missing". This may point to important differences between English and those languages that tend to be overlooked...


I've noticed the same thing here, Outsider, and I've even sent some people a few PMs.


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## Athaulf

sokol said:


> But basically, yes, a prefix like 'po' or 'do' makes a perfective verb out of an imperfective, and an infix like 'aja' or 'ova' makes an iterative = imperfective verb out of a perfective verb.





Outsider said:


> P.S. I found the idea that applying imperfectivity to a perfective verb produces an *iteration* fascinating! How standard would you say this is in the grammatical and linguistic literature?



I think there might be some confusion over what exactly "iterativity" means here. I'm not even sure if this notion has a standard, universally accepted definition in linguistics. If you have in mind its "plain English" meaning -- as used, for example, by the authors of this paper, according to whom_ "iterativity is the repeated, multiple, and/or habitual performance or occurrence of an action (act or event)" _-- then I'd say that iterativity is in fact more or less orthogonal to the Slavic aspect. 

In Croatian, iterative actions can be expressed by either perfective or imperfective verbs. The rules about which to use in each particular context are complicated as always, but for just about any verb denoting an action that it would be logically possible to repeat, I can imagine it used with an iterative meaning. Now, it is true that in this particular matter, there are significant differences in the use of aspect in different Slavic languages (see, for example, post #8 and the replies to it in this thread). However, from the examples of Slovenian I've seen, it definitely seems to me like Slovenian is similar to Croatian in this regard. For many relevant examples, it's enough to google for the Slovenian phrase _"vsaki dan"_ ("every day") or something similar.


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## Tolovaj_Mataj

Sokol,
you've really made a nice explanation. I totally agree.
And specially with that part that understanding English concept of tenses are not helping in understanding concept of aspect we discuss here.


--

When I mentioned I heard foreigners making mistakes in aspect, I didn't add those were actually English people. 
And vice versa: Slovenes learning English usually struggle with usage of English tenses. ... or should I write "they are struggling". 


And btw... Athaulf... it's indefinite adjective... "vsak dan".


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## Athaulf

Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> And btw... Athaulf... it's indefinite adjective... "vsak dan".



Oops... sorry, it was a typo. I wasn't sure which one it was (in Croatian the same phrase uses the definite form), and I tried both, the indefinite obviously giving far more results, but at the end, I ended up writing the wrong one here.


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## MrsMiller

So many new answers in this thread.... Thanks. 

Let me give some comments



Duya said:


> "Naj" is not a verb in Slovenian (you probably drew a false parallel with English "Let")


I see. I drew a false parallel with the German modal verb "sollen" (shall).



Tolovaj_Mataj said:


> Biti (when meaning _to be_) is imperf. form, its perfective form is prebiti (when meaning _to spend some time_).... Imeti bears both aspects..... Modal verbs like hoteti, morati, moči... have only imperf. forms.


OK. Great to know (finally!) - as this question kept me busy all the time. 

Sokol,
your explanation caused a kind of light bulb moment with me.  Thanks.  I will try to write a bit more about the very next time but before I still want to think over some days. There is no time limit as learning Slovene is my private pleasure (and I can assure that it´s still a pleasure despite the aspect. )

Wish you all a nice weekend.


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## sokol

Athaulf said:


> However, from the examples of Slovenian I've seen, it definitely seems to me like Slovenian is similar to Croatian in this regard.



Yes, it is, as far as I can tell from my knowledge of both languages. And the use of aspect differs significantly between South Slavic languages (or at least the western branch of them as I know next to nothing about Bulgarian and Macedonian) and West plus East Slavic languages.
And of course you don't need to infix a perfective verb to get an iterative one, you also could express iterative meanings with 'naturally' imperfective verbs.

(And thanks, Tolovaj, for confirming that I've at least understood _something _about aspect in Slovenian & Slavic languages. )


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## zigaramsak

This is all very interesting, but unfortunately I did not have enough time to reply earlier.



MrsMiller said:


> By the way, to express the continous form in German you only have to add the word "gerade" (=trenutno / prav takrat?) to the phrase in simple form.


 
Ok, but what about this one:
Hast du das Bad geputzt?

1.) Ja, das habe ich schon gestern gemacht. / Yes, I did that yesterday already.
2.) Ja, das habe ich gestern den ganzen Tag gemacht (machen müssen). / Yes, I was doing that the whole day yesterday.

I hope these 2 sentences are correct (at least grammatically). The verb machen in Slovenian would be perfective in (1) and imperfective in (2):
1.) Ja, to sem naredil že včeraj.
2.) Ja, to sem delal včeraj cel dan.



Outsider said:


> I would like to comment on this. I don't entirely agree that English continuous verbs should be easy for German speakers or for speakers of Slavic languages. On the contrary, I have often noticed that people with that linguistic background tend to misapply the continuous in English, for example using a continuous verb when they should use a simple verb.


 
Yes, now with your example I also think you are right that we and Germans make these mistakes.

Although I think that the concept of English past simple and continuous is much more similar to the Slavic aspect than present simple/continuous. English present tenses really are a lot different.

Verbs in Slavic languages have their aspect even when they are in the infinitive. Every verb can be put in any tense and it will always retain the aspect. Just as sokol already explained:

brati (imperfective - to read), prebrati (perfective - to read and finish)

past - imperfective: včeraj sem bral knjigo (I was reading a book yesterday) 
past - perfective: včeraj sem prebral knjigo (I read a book yesterday and I finished it)

present - imperfective: kadar mi je dolgčas, berem knjigo (when I'm bored, I read a book) 
present - perfective: kadar mi je dolgčas, preberem knjigo (when I'm bored, I read a book - and I finish it)

future - imperfective: jutri bom bral knjigo (I will be reading a book tomorrow)
future - perfective: jutri bom prebral knjigo (I will read a book tomorrow and I will finish it)

It's also clear that there is no connection between Slovenian aspect and English present simple/continuous.



Athaulf said:


> I think there might be some confusion over what exactly "iterativity" means here.


 
Slovenian has some verbs that can only be used for iterative actions:
videvati (imp.) - to see something many times (videti - perf., gledati - imp., uniterative)
pozdravljati (imp.) - to greet somebody many times (pozdraviti - perf., I think no other imp. form)
srečevati (imp.) - to meet somebody many times (srečati - perf., I think no other imp. form)

I'm sure there are more, I just can't remember them.

All three forms can be used to express iterativity, but only the (1) is really iterative, I think:
1.) Vsak dan jo videvam. - I keep seeing her every day. (repeated perfective action)
2.) Vsak dan jo vidim. - I see her every day.
3.) Vsak dan jo gledam. - I look at her every day (for longer than a moment).


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## Athaulf

zigaramsak said:


> Slovenian has some verbs that can only be used for iterative actions:
> videvati (imp.) - to see something many times (videti - perf., gledati - imp., uniterative)
> pozdravljati (imp.) - to greet somebody many times (pozdraviti - perf., I think no other imp. form)
> srečevati (imp.) - to meet somebody many times (srečati - perf., I think no other imp. form)
> 
> I'm sure there are more, I just can't remember them.



Um... isn't the phrase _"lepo vas pozdravljam"_ a fairly common formal greeting in Slovenian? The meaning of the verb _pozdravljati_ isn't really iterative there.  But as for the other two verbs (which are, if I'm not mistaken, equivalent to Croatian _viđati_ and _sretati_), your point does hold for them. 

By the way, is the verb _videti_ purely perfective in Slovenian? In Croatian, this verb is biaspectual. You can say, for example, _"vidim ga"_ with the imperfective meaning (i.e. "I see him, here and now"). 



> All three forms can be used to express iterativity, but only the (1) is really iterative, I think:
> 1.) Vsak dan jo videvam. - I keep seeing her every day.
> 2.) Vsak dan jo vidim. - I see her every day.
> 3.) Vsak dan jo gledam. - I look at her every day (for longer than a moment).


Well, that depends on the definition of "iterative". I've certainly seen this term used in ways that would encompass all these examples.


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## zigaramsak

Athaulf said:


> Um... isn't the phrase _"lepo vas pozdravljam"_ a fairly common formal greeting in Slovenian? The meaning of the verb _pozdravljati_ isn't really iterative there.  But as for the other two verbs (which are, if I'm not mistaken, equivalent to Croatian _viđati_ and _sretati_), your point does hold for them.
> 
> By the way, is the verb _videti_ purely perfective in Slovenian? In Croatian, this verb is biaspectual. You can say, for example, _"vidim ga"_ with the imperfective meaning (i.e. "I see him, here and now").


 
Hm, yes you are right, I forgot about this. It's very normal to say "lepo vas pozdravljam". But somehow this verb cannot be used for past or future actions in this way (it would get the described iterative meaning).

Oops, yes, you are also right about "videti", it's the same as in Croatian. I've just checked in my dictionary and it also says that this verb can be perfective or imperfective.


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## MrsMiller

zigaramsak said:


> I hope these 2 sentences are correct (at least grammatically).



Let´s see:



zigaramsak said:


> 1.) Ja, das habe ich schon gestern gemacht. / Yes, I did that yesterday already.


For me it sounds even a bit better with a changed word order: instead of "schon gestern" I would have written "gestern schon".



zigaramsak said:


> 2.) Ja, das habe ich gestern den ganzen Tag *lang* gemacht (machen müssen). / Yes, I was doing that the whole day yesterday.


Alternatively you could say:
Ja, damit war ich gestern den ganzen Tag (lang) beschäftigt / zugange.
Ja, damit habe ich gestern den ganzen Tag zugebracht / verbracht.

By the way, yesterday I found a grammar book (online on "seelrc.org/projects/grammars.ptml") in which I want to read through this topic now. It seems to contain some new interesting facts I haven´t been aware of up to now.


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## Duya

Athaulf said:


> I'd say that iterativity is in fact more or less orthogonal to the Slavic aspect.





zigaramsak said:


> Hm, yes you are right, I forgot about this. It's very normal to say "lepo vas pozdravljam". But somehow this verb cannot be used for past or future actions in this way (it would get the described iterative meaning).



Well, I'd say you're both right... 

A Slavic verb is seldom iterative as such; depending on its meaning and usage/context it may denote an iterative (repeating, habitual) action or not. As Athaulf said, it is not identical to the aspect, but iterative meaning does have a strong correlation with imperfective aspect. That is especially so for actions which don't have a "natural" continuous form -- their imperfective form _tends to _denote a repetitive action (but it's not necessarily so).

Or, let me put it this way: iterative action [most often; South Slavic exceptions mentioned by Athaulf duly noted] requires an imperfective verb, but an imperfective verbs do not necessarily denote an iterative action.


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## janecito

I guess the number of posts in this topics speaks for itself (about how interesting/difficult/intriguing, etc. the (Slavic) aspect is/can be). Let me just add some of my observations.
The problems start already at a very beginning if we want to determine what an aspectual pair actually is. Theoretical, “ideal” aspectual pair consists of two verbs that differ in nothing but the aspect – i.e. no change of meaning. Of course, there are very few cases like that as most of them at least at some extra meaning to it, such as ending and action, starting to do something, repeating something, etc. For instance, if we take the verb *pisati*, the perfective form would be *napisati*, or maybe even *zapisati*, while verbs such as *prepisati*, *podpisati*, *odpisati*, *dopisati*, *opisati *could hardly be called perfective forms of *pisati *despite the fact that they are formed using the same word formative procedure – adding a prefix. Agrell (the father of the concept of Slavic aspect) gave the following criteria for determining whether two verbs form an aspectual pair or not: if you can form another imperfective verb from the perfective (that was already formed from the imperfective one), then the two verb in question are not aspectual pair. His theory is 100 years old, but might come in handy with our 'pisati':

*pisati *[imperf] > *zapisati *[perf] > — (> aspectual pair)
*pisati *[imperf] > *prepisati *[perf] > *prepisovati *[imperf] (> 'pisati' – 'prepisati' are not aspectual pair, while 'prepisati' – 'prepisovati' are)

Well, might work in this case, but that of course doesn't mean it can apply to any verb pair, let alone any Slavic language. In some other languages (e.g. Russian) these 3rd forms (sometimes called 'secondary imperfective') are much more frequent than in Slovene, e.g. пить > выпить > выпивать (in Slovene we only use 'piti' in 'popiti'). Using this criteria 'zapisati' of course fails as a perfective form of 'pisati' ('pisati' > 'zapisati' > 'zapisovati').

Another criteria (which might be more useful for someone learning a language) is checking if the pair translates into a foreign language with the same word or not.

*Pisal *sem pismo. > I *was writing* a letter.
*Napisal *sem pismo. > I *wrote *a letter.
*Podpisal *sem pismo. > I *signed *a letter.
*Prepisal *sem pismo. > I *copied *a letter.

Another point that should be considered is the fact that apart from this 'grammatical aspect' (which in Slavic languages translates into imperfective and perfective verbs) there is also the 'lexical aspect' – i.e. the aspect that is already contained in the meaning of the verb. Some verbs express activities or states (which are imperfective), others express events (which are perfective), e.g.:

*brati *(to read) > activity (imperfective nature)
*skočiti *(to jump) > event (perfective nature)

A proof for this could be the translations that small, pocket dictionary give us. For instance, my small English-Slovenian Dictionary gives the following translations:

*to read* > *brati *(only imperfective form)
*to jump* > *skočiti*, *poskočiti*, *preskočiti *(three forms, but all perfective)

... even though 'to read' means both 'brati' and 'prebrati' and 'to jump' also expresses the idea of 'skakati'.

Lexical aspect can also help up predict what the aspectual pair formed from certain verb will express. If you form an imperfective form of a verb expressing an event, practically the only meaning it can have is the iterativity, hence 'skakati' means 'to be jumping, i.e. to jumps over and over again, to jump several times). On the other hand, forming perfective form from a verb that expresses activities or states, usually gives us the idea of 'start to do sth.', 'finish to do sth.', etc. 

*brati *(to read) > *prebrati *(to finish (reading) the book)
*poznati *(to know) > *spoznati *(to get to know)

As to forming aspectual pairs, Slovenian pretty much follows the patterns that are know also in other Slavic languages (see Duya's post (#8)), but of course, the same prefix can have different meanings in different languages. Plus there are the three groups of verbs that only have one form:
— imperfectiva tantum (only imperfective): znati, biti, moči, etc.
— perfectiva tantum (only perfective): izvedeti, etc.
— biaspectual verbs (one form for both aspect): telefonirati, videti, etc.

If learning a language, I guess the best thing to do would be to simply try to memorize both forms as you're learning the verbs, although finding them sometimes seems to be a problem.  None of the Slovenian books/dictionaries that I have give those forms, while it is completely natural for my Polish-English dictionary to provide the aspectual pair (+ sometimes the 3rd form) of every verb (that has one).

Then there is the question of Slovenian perfective present, non-existing in (many?) Western and Eastern Slavic languages (*preberem *(present), but rus. *прочитаю* (future) or pol. *przeczytam* (also future)) and it's use(s)... Let's compare, for instance, the performative expressions, such as:
*
I promisе!* > slo. *Obljubim!* [perf], but rus. *Обещаю!* [imperf] or pol. *Obiecuję!* [imperf]

or repetitive actions:

I *drink *a cup of coffee *every morning*. > slo. Vsako jutro *spijem *[perf] skodelico kave., but rus. Каждое утро я *выпиваю *[imperf] чашку кофе.  [imperf] or pol. Każdego ranka *wypijam *[imperf] filiżankę kawy.

Etc.


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## sokol

Excellent summary, janecito, and as for Agrell's theory (I didn't know that till now), yes, that sounds quite reasonable!

Still, a question to your post:


janecito said:


> *Pisal *sem pismo. > I *was writing* a letter.
> *Napisal *sem pismo. > I *wrote *a letter.


I am unsure if really there is no change of meaning involved here: doesn't mean 'napisati' that you have finished writing the letter PLUS that you've sent it?
And further I am not quite sure if 'pisal sem pismo' really should be 'I was _writing _a letter': in the Slovene sentence you only state that a letter has been written. (Imperfective verbs don't necessarily correspond to progressive tense forms in English, even though they might in some cases both progressive form and imperfective are different concepts, grammatically.) For that I would propose 'I wrote a letter'.
And for 'napisal sem pismo' rather 'I sent a letter' - as I feel that in this case the letter also has been *sent*. 'I wrote a letter' also _can _mean that the letter is sent already, but the sentence as such lets it open if the letter is sent or not (or context may make this clear). But please correct me if this is wrong.



janecito said:


> Then there is the question of Slovenian perfective present, non-existing in (many?) Western and Eastern Slavic languages (*preberem *(present), but rus. *прочитаю* (future) or pol. *przeczytam* (also future)) and it's use(s)... Let's compare, for instance, the performative expressions, such as:
> *
> I promisе!* > slo. *Obljubim!* [perf], but rus. *Обещаю!* [imperf] or pol. *Obiecuję!* [imperf]



To my knowledge, in all Western and Eastern Slavic languages future tense is either imperfective verbs in future tense or perfective verbs in present tense, while in all Southern Slavic languages it is like in Slovenian, that is perfective verbs in present tense actually mean present tense.

My teacher always warned me to be careful with perfective verbs in present tense (in Slovenian) as their meaning is rather special - like your example of promising. Overusing of perfective verbs in present tense is a very common mistake foreign learners make (me included).


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## Athaulf

sokol said:


> To my knowledge, in all Western and Eastern Slavic languages future tense is either imperfective verbs in future tense or perfective verbs in present tense, while in all Southern Slavic languages it is like in Slovenian, that is perfective verbs in present tense actually mean present tense.



Not exactly. In Croatian et al., there are actually two different futures, which are used in different syntactic contexts. The first one is formed using the short form of auxiliary _htjeti_ + infinitive for all verbs, but the second one is compound (a particular form of _biti_ + L-participle) only for perfective verbs and equal to the present tense for imperfective ones. Using the compound form for the second future of perfective verbs also sounds OK, but it's not that common. 

Futhermore, unlike the standard language, Kajkavian dialects have only one future, which has the same form as the second future from the standard language. Thus, in these dialects, present tense of perfective verbs can be used to express future much like in East Slavic languages. I'm not closely familiar with these dialects, so I don't know if their speakers use the compound or present future form for perfective verbs more often, and what exact criteria they use to choose between those, but the latter possibility definitely exists. I'd be surprised if it doesn't exist in Slovenian too, at least for some verbs.

There is of course also the issue of using present tense to express future, which is sometimes possible even with imperfective verbs, and which makes the whole question even more murky.


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## sokol

Athaulf said:


> I'd be surprised if it doesn't exist in Slovenian too, at least for some verbs.



In Slovenian, as far as I know, it _is _possible to express the (near) future with present tense, both with imperfective and perfective verbs, but 'real' future tense is always the compound future tense (= like your second one: the finite form of the copula _biti _with L-participle, both with perfective and imperfective).
It is, with Slovenian, definitely *not *like in Czech and Russian where present tense of perfective verbs _is _future tense. But I cannot claim to being able to explain the finer nuances (there might be some) of use of both present and future tense in Slovenian, so I leave it at that.
It might be that Kajkavian use is close to Slovenian use, but it might be different too - of that I can't be sure.


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## janecito

sokol said:


> I am unsure if really there is no change of meaning involved here: doesn't mean 'napisati' that you have finished writing the letter PLUS that you've sent it?


Yes, that is true, but on the other hand, perfective aspect concludes the action/activity somehow - either by focusing on it's beginning, on terminating it or by limiting it to a certain (usually short) period of time (this effect is produced quite often in Russian with the prefix по-: ходить : походить* - I'm sure we could find something similar in Slovene, I just cannot thing of anything right now). So, maybe instead of saying that the meaning changes, we should say that the thing that changes is the perspective from which we see the activity in from which we focus it, but the activity both verbs describe is the same - writing a letter.

*This is a bit off topic, but it's a perfect example how using the same prefix with the same verb can give very different results in different languages: hoditi : pohoditi in Slovene are of course far from being aspectual pair, but rather two completely different lexical units, the first one meaning 'to walk' and the second one 'to step on'.


sokol said:


> And further I am not quite sure if 'pisal sem pismo' really should be 'I was _writing _a letter': in the Slovene sentence you only state that a letter has been written. (Imperfective verbs don't necessarily correspond to progressive tense forms in English, even though they might in some cases both progressive form and imperfective are different concepts, grammatically.) For that I would propose 'I wrote a letter'.
> And for 'napisal sem pismo' rather 'I sent a letter' - as I feel that in this case the letter also has been *sent*. 'I wrote a letter' also _can _mean that the letter is sent already, but the sentence as such lets it open if the letter is sent or not (or context may make this clear). But please correct me if this is wrong.


'Napisal sem pismo.' doesn't really say anything about sending (or not) the letter. If sending it would be included in the perfective verbal form, than sentences like this wouldn't make much sense (but are completely acceptable):

Napisal sem pismo, poslal pa ga bom naslednji teden. (I wrote a letter, but I'll send it next week.)

As to whether it should be translated 'wrote' or 'was writing' ... my theoretical knowledge of English is just not strong enough to make that judgement.  But if past tenses in English function anything like in Spanish, than it is definitely possible.


sokol said:


> To my knowledge, in all Western and Eastern Slavic languages future tense is either imperfective verbs in future tense or perfective verbs in present tense, while in all Southern Slavic languages it is like in Slovenian, that is perfective verbs in present tense actually mean present tense.


I'm not really familiar with other South Slavic languages, but as far as Slovene goes, I agree. Someone might complain about your terminology though, cause although the future forms of perfective verbs (in E and W Slavic languages) look like present (morphologically) they are still referred to as future and not as present.
Still, the question remains, what do we understand by 'present'. Also in Slovene it is impossible to express 'actual present' using perfective forms. By actual present I mean describing something that is happening right now (e.g. *Sedim *[imperf ]za računalnikom in *razpravljam *[imperf] o glagolskem vidu v slovenščini. - I'm sitting behind a computer and I'm discussing verbal aspect in Slovene.). Perfective present is used for repetitive actions, e.g. something that happens every day, week, etc.

*Vsak dan* se *zbudim *ob sedmih, *vstanem*, *pozajtrkujem*, *se stuširam* in *se odpravim* v službo.
_Every day I wake up at 7am, I get up, I eat breakfast, I take a shower and I go to work._

Let's say in Russian, using adverbs of time/frequency such as every day/week/year etc. automatically calls for imperfective forms.

And another use of perfective present would be the performative expressions (see the 'I promise' example). Although, I should add that using imperfective form for this isn't at all strange in Slovene, let alone agrammatical. Though I think it cannot stand as a separate expression then (there should be a continuation):

*Obljubljam *[imperf], da bom spoštoval zakone.
I promise to obey the laws.

I don't know what the difference is. To me, using the imperfective form adds more formality and solemnity to the 'promise'. Maybe someone else could comment on this. Here is another (famous ) example:

Danes, ko postajam pionir, *dajem *[imperf] častno pionirsko besedo: da se bom pridno učil in delal, spoštoval starše in učitelje, da bom zvest in iskren tovariš, ki drži svojo obljubo; da se bom ravnal po zgledu najboljših pionirjev, da bom spoštoval slavna dejanja partizanov in napredne ljudi sveta, ki žele svobodo in mir; da bom ljubil svojo samoupravno domovino, Socialistično Federativno Republiko Jugoslavijo, njene bratske narode in narodnosti in gradil novo življenje, polno sreče in radosti.

Looks like it works the same in some other 'Yugoslav' languages.



sokol said:


> Overusing of perfective verbs in present tense is a very common mistake foreign learners make (me included).


This is a surprise for me. I would expect it to be the other way around - overusing imperfective present (also when the perfective one should be used). But I guess this depends on the language background of the person learning the language - I mostly have contact with E/W Slavic speakers and for them the concept of 'perfective present' is just too unusual to be overused.



Athaulf said:


> There is of course also the issue of using present tense to express future, which is sometimes possible even with imperfective verbs, and which makes the whole question even more murky.


Exactly.  Anyway, I thing that when using perfective  verbs in present tense there must be some sort of marker (usually an adverb) that places the action in time as an habitual action (*običajno*, *vsak dan*, *vedno *- usually, every day, always) or as a future action (*jutri*, *naslednji teden* - tomorrow, next week):

*Običajno *te pokličem po kosilu. _Usually I call you after lunch._
*Jutri *te pokličem takoj, ko se zbudim. _Tomorrow I'll call you as soon as I wake up._

Of course this 'placer in time' can also be implicit (understood from the context etc.). The only expressions that don't have to be placed in time are the performatives as they are performed in the moment of pronouncing the words and by pronouncing them, i.e. now.


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## janecito

Is the number of times you're allowed to edit your post limited to 1? If so, is that something new?

Anyway, I've discovered a nonsense in one of my previous posts. Here is the correction ...



janecito said:


> His theory is 100 years old, but might come in handy with our 'pisati':
> 
> *pisati *[imperf] > *napisati *[perf] > — (> aspectual pair)
> *pisati *[imperf] > *prepisati *[perf] > *prepisovati *[imperf] (> 'pisati' – 'prepisati' are not aspectual pair, while 'prepisati' – 'prepisovati' are)
> 
> [...] Using this criteria 'zapisati' of course fails as a perfective form of 'pisati' ('pisati' > 'zapisati' > 'zapisovati').



'Zapisati' of course has the 3rd form ('zapisovati') as I also stated in continuation.

Sorry for this.


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## sokol

janecito said:


> But if past tenses in English function anything like in Spanish (...)


Not _quite _really, but that's another problem. Thing is, the progressive past tense does not necessarily correspond to imperfecto, as progressive tenses not necessarily correspond to Slavic imperfective verb constructions. Similarities exist sometimes when comparing grammar this way, but they also are common causes for errors as we oversimplify.



janecito said:


> Someone might complain about your terminology though, cause although the future forms of perfective verbs (in E and W Slavic languages) look like present (morphologically) they are still referred to as future and not as present.


Yes, I know that; I described it like that to make clear in what way they are different from Slovene, and the use of aspect there.

And yes, it is completely clear to me that usually present tense of perfective verbs don't actualy mean *this *moment, the actual present tense, not even in Slovene - except in very special contexts like your example of promising (where the proposition of the sentence is in fact the performance of the promise, and therefore really happening just right now).

And of course I never really quite learned how to use perfective verbs in present tense correctly - I just keep trying to.
(Of course for learners with another Slavic language as mother tongue it would be different, but as in German there is not even a near correlate to the Slavic perfective/imperfective category this is especially difficult for me.)
(And thanks for mentioning that often in Slovene perfective present tense is used for habitual actions: I didn't know this till now.)

The point however still is that in Slovene there's a future tense for both aspect forms, and a present tense for both aspect forms, whereas in Western and Eastern Slavic the future tense formally is divided into the 'imperfective (grammatically future tense)' forms and the 'perfective (grammatically present tense)' forms.
And in Croatian et al., as I now have learned, a future tense with 'htjeti + INF' and both aspect forms and one with 'biti + PP' only with perfective verbs and used at the same level as present tense - which (the latter) seems to correspond approximately to the use of Slovene perfective verbs in present tense [even though possibly also used for future II], if I got this right from Athaulf's post.

(PS: You can't edit your posts any more after some time has expired; this seems to be a new feature, I too thought this was possible some months ago.)


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## Athaulf

sokol said:


> The point however still is that in Slovene there's a future tense for both aspect forms, and a present tense for both aspect forms, whereas in Western and Eastern Slavic the future tense formally is divided into the 'imperfective (grammatically future tense)' forms and the 'perfective (grammatically present tense)' forms.



I'm not sure about formal classification, but it seems like something similar to the South Slavic iterative use of perfective verbs exists in Czech. 

I'd say that the whole confusion stems from the fact that Slavic languages -- just like, say, English, and unlike, say, Latin -- in reality have _no_ future tense, period. Instead, they express future using various present tense constructs*. For grammarians, it's of course convenient and customary to take some of these forms and name them "future tense" in order to get nice and neat comparison tables between different languages, all modeled on Latin for historical reasons, and this is what they do. But in the end, this creates total confusion for those who are trying to really understand  how things work in-depth. Due to such artificial classifications, the line between present and "future" tense in Slavic languages is hopelessly blurred. Many ways of expressing future end up being classified as present tense, and the "future" tense, however they choose to define it, ends up having decidedly non-future roles in many cases. 


* Admittedly, some of these present tense constructs are in the process of grammaticalization, like e.g. the contraction of _raditi ću_ into _radiću_ in Serbian (pronounced the same, but spelled as the intermediate form _radit ću_ in Croatian). But this is still far from a real future tense; the suffix is still felt as a separate verb and gets detached and moved around the sentence in many situations.


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## janecito

sokol said:


> (And thanks for mentioning that often in Slovene perfective present tense is used for habitual actions: I didn't know this till now.)


That is (in my opinion) the main difference between Slovene and Russian, for instance - in the latter imperfective forms are used to express repetitiveness and duration, while in Slovene they only expresses duration. So, the difference is in point III:

*I. One time action *(I drank the whole cup, I finished it)

*Spil sem* [perf] kavo.
Я *выпил *[perf] кофе.
_I drank coffee._

*II. One time activity (duration*) (the activity was going on for a certain period of time and we know nothing about whether it was concluded or not - it doesn't say anything about whether I finished my coffee or not):

*Pil sem* [imperf] kavo.
Я *пил *[imperf] кофе.
_I drank/was drinking coffee.

_ *III. Repeated action* (Every morning I drank the whole cup, every morning I finished my coffee)

Vsako jutro *sem spil *[perf] kavo.
Каждое утро я *выпивал/пил* [imperf] кофе.
I drank coffee every morning.

*IV. Repeated activity (duration)* (I was drinking it every morning, but again we know nothing about whether I finished it or not.)

Vsako jutro *sem pil* [imperf] kavo (medtem, ko sem bral časopis).
Каждое утро я *пил *[imperf] кофе (читая газету).
_I was drinking coffee every morning (while reading the newspaper.)_


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## sokol

Athaulf said:


> I'm not sure about formal classification, but it seems like something similar to the South Slavic iterative use of perfective verbs exists in Czech.


Nice example, yes - this basically seems to be the same as in Slovenian.

As for "real" future tense, well - future is a slightly strange concept in many languages, German being one of them (where too there has formed a new compound future form, no "old" Indoeuropean future tense like the one in Latin has survived); German future tense really can have all sorts of meaning (besides actual future), and present tense often _is _used as future tense.

Whatever, to stay on topic: my Slovenian Grammar (Celovec 2000: p. 60) explicitly states that a perfective present tense may, if context fits, express future tense, like the following example (both correct according to this grammar, all verbs used here are perfective - or so I think, unfortunately neither of my Slovene dictionaries adds the aspect of verbs, so I have to guess with 'stemniti'; the remarks in red are mine, my grammar does not comment on the sentenses):
- Ko se bo stemnilo [future tense pf. meaning future], bomo odšli [future tense pf. meaning future II, event happens after 'se stemniti'] v hišo.
- Ko se stemni [present tense pf. meaning (near) future], bomo odšli [future tense pf. meaning future II] v hišo.
I guess here in Czech only one possibility would exist, and that this one would be (formal) present tense with perfective verbs, in both main and subordinate clause.


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## zigaramsak

sokol said:


> Whatever, to stay on topic: my Slovenian Grammar (Celovec 2000: p. 60) explicitly states that a perfective present tense may, if context fits, express future tense, like the following example (both correct according to this grammar, all verbs used here are perfective - or so I think, unfortunately neither of my Slovene dictionaries adds the aspect of verbs, so I have to guess with 'stemniti'; the remarks in red are mine, my grammar does not comment on the sentenses):
> - Ko se bo stemnilo [future tense pf. meaning future], bomo odšli [future tense pf. meaning future II, event happens after 'se stemniti'] v hišo.
> - Ko se stemni [present tense pf. meaning (near) future], bomo odšli [future tense pf. meaning future II] v hišo.


 
You are right, future can be expressed this way in Slovenian! And yes, the verb in present tense has to be perfective. I'm just not sure if the future in the second example is any closer. I think there is almost no difference. Maybe definiteness (i.e. there is no doubt that it will get dark sooner or later), or maybe it just sounds better (and shorter) in some cases. I really can't say what the difference could be, I hope someone else can comment on this...

Thank you, janecito, for your nice analysis!

And thank you, MrsMiller, for your explanation and correcting my German.


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## DaniL

Hey all,

I haven't read the whole thread, but at I have noticed that you are looking for perfective forms of verbs biti, imeti, morati, hoteti.

I just came up with one for hoteti, if you are still interested: zahoteti se (to get a wish for something).


Zahotelo se mu je kave. He wished for a coffee.

This verb is used impersonally.

I should come to this part of the Wordreference forum more often, it's interesting to be in the role of the one giving the explanation for a change. 

DL


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