Adverbiaallausete funktsioonipõhine liigitus eesti keele põhjus- ja tingimuslause näitel
Classifi cation of adverbial clauses, based on Estonian conditional and causal clauses

Summary/Abstract: In general, Estonian adverbial clauses tend to be classifi ed according to their function (for example, conditional clauses, concessive clauses, causal clauses etc.), in this article the author introduces a classifi cation of adverbial clauses based on the function they have regarding the main clause: whether they specify its content (content adverbial clause), give reasons for the conclusion made in the main clause (epistemic adverbial clause) or make the utterance of the main clause relevant in the communicative situation (conversational adverbial clause). The paper focuses on the classifi cation of Estonian conditional and causal clauses, and examines whether it is also revealed in the language – by means of some markers – in which function the adverbial clause is used. The analysis shows that there are four types of conditional clauses in Estonian (content, epistemic, conversational conditional clauses and conditional-like formulas) and two types of causal clauses: causal (content and explanatory clauses) and reason clauses (epistemic and conversational clauses). In case of conditional clauses, one does not indicate by means of adverbial markers whether one uses content, epistemic or conversational conditionals. In causal clauses, however, the function of the clause is, to a certain extent, marked by causal conjunction (a content causal clause usually begins with et-conjunction). Various markers, such as modal verbs and particles, quotative and conditional mood, are important features of the epistemic adverbial clause.

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