Aspectual triplets in Estonian
Aspectual triplets in Estonian

Summary/Abstract: Estonian has lexical perfective-imperfective ‘doublets’, as inmõõtma ‘measure’, välja mõõtma ‘measure (out)’. The ‘doublets’ render theEstonian lexical aspect similar to that of Germanic, e.g. Dutch meten ‘measure’and uitmeten ‘measure out’. Finnish uses object case alternation forthe expression of the opposition, e.g. mitata/mitoittaa ‘measure’. However,Estonian also has regular morphological means to express aspectual ‘triplets’,like Slavic, as in the Russian imperfective simplex merit’ ‘measure’, theperfective izmerit’ ‘measure (out)’ and the secondary imperfective izmerjat’,approximately ‘be measuring out’. The third member of the Estonian tripletemerges via combining the particle and the partitive object case.

• Details
• Contents