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Sesotho verbs are words in the language that signify the action or state of a substantive, and are brought into agreement with it using the subjectival concord. This definition excludes imperatives and infinitives, which are respectively interjectives and class 14 nouns. In the Bantu languages, verbs often form the centre of a complex web of regular derivational patterns, and words/roots belonging to many parts of speech may be directly or indirectly derived from them. Not only may new verbs be derived using a large number of derivational suffixes, Sesotho nouns (and, iteratively, the other parts of speech that derive from them), some imperative interjectives and, to a lesser extent, ideophones may be formed by simple morphological devices. ==Varieties== Verb stems may be divided into four varieties: #Regular stems beginning with a consonant and ending in a vowel #Monosyllabic verbs #Vowel verb stems begin with a vowel #Derived verbs constructed from other verbs, noun roots, adjectival roots, and ideophones by suffixes. Regular verbs are those beginning with a consonant and ending in the vowel ''a''. The final ''a'' may change into every vowel except the near-close near-back vowel () through inflexion or derivation. The verb root is the atomic part of the verb, which does not change (save for some ''purely phonetic changes'') and Bantu languages share numerous similar verb roots (with predictable sound changes between languages). : Stem ''-bona'' ('see') from the root ''-bon-'', also existing as isiZulu ''-bon-'', Swahili ''-on-'', Tshivenda ''-vhon-'', Chishona ''-von-'', Chilamba ''-won-'' etc. Proto-Bantu *-bon- Monosyllabic stems may be classified into several categories: * The ''i-stems'' have a typical ''i'' in derivatives, ''u'' in the passive *: ''-tla'' ('come') → Perfect ''-tlile'', Causative ''-tlisa'', Passive ''-tluwa'' *: ''-ya'' ('go') → Perfect ''-ile'', Causative ''-isa'', Passive ''-uwa'' *: ''-kga'' ('draw water') → Perfect ''-kgile'', Causative ''-kgisa'', Passive ''-kguwa'' * The ''e-stems''〔Simple phonotactic explanations may make these apparent irregularities more understandable. Almost all the non-velar e-stems are palatal or postalveolar in nature. This may be due to an original palatal glide being "absorbed" into the original consonant of the verbs (the alveolar also has similar origins). In Sesotho, the palatal (spelled may not be followed by the vowels or and these become weakened to and . The original passive suffix (still used in Setswana and many Northern Sotho languages) was ''-iwa'', and so the suffixes are weakened to ''-ele'', ''-esa'' and ''-ewa''. The velar e-stems apparently use the modern ''-uwa'' passive instead, and due to phonotactic restrictions occasionally applied on the labial approximant (similar to those on the palatal) together with the restriction that labialized consonants may not be followed by back vowels, the suffixes are weakened to ''-ele'', ''-esa'' and ''-owa''.〕 have a typical near-close near-front in their derivatives *: ''-tjha'' ('burn') → Perfect ''-tjhele'', Causative ''-tjhesa'', Passive ''-tjhewa'' *: ''-ja'' ('eat') → Perfect ''-jele'', Causative ''-jesa'', Passive ''-jewa'' * The "velar" e-stems〔 have labialized onsets, and have similar forms to other e-stems but have a near-close near-back vowel in the passive *: ''-nwa'' ('drink') → Perfect ''-nwele'', Causative ''-nwesa'', Passive ''-nowa'' * There are three defective stems, ending in a vowel other than . The first two of these verbs are very common among the Bantu languages〔The first two verbs, together with the copulative verb ''-na'' (indicating possession, with a conjunctive import), are used in many Bantu languages in generally restricted circumstances. There exists certain "defective" verbs across most Bantu languages: Proto-Bantu *-di (Sesotho participial copulative ''-le''), *-ti (Sesotho ''-re''), and *-na (Sesotho ''-na''). Additionally, a common variant of *-ti — *-tio — appears as Sesotho ''-tjho'' — an irregular palatalization (when an alveolarization would have been expected) possibly due to the verb being borrowed from some Nguni language (it does not exist in most other Sotho–Tswana languages). These are distinguished from other verbs in that they are normally not used with many of the affixes in the verbal complex. For example, though they are all transitive and are therefore used with objects, they never take objectival concords (in Sesotho and many other languages, ''-re'' may take an objectival concord when used with ideophones). Additionally, except for Sesotho ''-re'' and ''-tjho'', they may not be used as infinitives. Even though they have these peculiarities and, except for ''-na'', they do not end with the typical vowel, Bantuists consider them verbs because they may be used with subjectival concords. The highly irregular passive of ''-re'' may be due to Nguni ''-thiwa'' (most other Sotho–Tswana languages use ''-riwa'' instead).〕 *: ''-re'' ('say') → Perfect ''-itse'', No causative, Passive ''-thwe'' *: ''-le'' ('be'); very restricted in use (only used in the participial sub-mood of certain copulatives) *: ''-tjho'' ('say so') → Perfect ''-tjhelo'' / ''-tjholo'', No causative, No passive Vowel verb stems are conjugated as regular verbs but are put into a separate class due to being uncommon in Bantu languages (and, in some languages but not in Sesotho, causing changes to concords and other formatives prefixed to them).〔The specific label comes from early descriptions of isiZulu grammar, where it was discovered that, apart from simply looking different from other verbs, vowel verbs are also conjugated slightly differently from normal verbs under certain situations, and many of them have alternative (and, at least in modern popular urban isiZulu, more common) forms with the initial vowel deleted. Though isiZulu has five vowel phonemes, vowel verbs in that language may only begin with the vowels , , and (written , , and , respectively). There is no similar restriction in Sesotho.〕 Class 1 and 5 nouns derived from these verbs do not cause any velarization to the prefix. The Proto-Bantu reconstructions of many of these verbs suggests that they originally began with *g (or sometimes *j), which "protected" the vowel. : ''-ila'' ('avoid as a taboo') : ''-eta'' ('travel') : ''-utlwa'' ('hear') : ''-aha'' ('construct') : ''-otla'' ('strike') 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Sotho verbs」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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