lúub’ul
fall
lukul
l(ù)k’ul
leave, withdraw, avoid, escape
malel ~ manel
máan
pass by, move
naacal
náʔakal
rise, climb
ocól
ʔ(ò)okol
enter
puɔul
púuȼ’ul
flee, elope
talel tàal come
The data set in (1) suggests that intransitive roots could have several shapes in Colonial Yucatec: CVC,
CVhC, and CVʔVC. The Calepino de Motul specifies that, in the case of puɔul ‘flee, elope,’ the accent fell on
the first syllable (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 383r), confirming that it was heavy and implicating CVhC or CVʔVC
as its possible shape. Its Modern cognate, púuȼ’, indicates that CVhC must have been the original shape.
Similarly, the examples of ʔéem ‘go down, descend,’ hóok’ ‘come out, emerge,’ líik’ ‘arise, ascend,’ lúub’ ‘fall,’
and máan ‘pass by, move’ in Modern Yucatec must have developed from CVhC roots in Colonial Yucatec,
even though the Calepino did not mark them as heavy by doubling their vowels or specifying that they
were accented. On the other hand, the Calepino does mark the root vowel in naacal ‘rise, climb’ as heavy by
123
124
INTRANSITIVE VERBS
both doubling it and mentioning that it was accented (1600?: fol. 316r), but because the Modern cognate
of this root intransitive is náʔakal, the shape of the root must have been CVʔVC, not CVhC. And by placing
an accent on the second vowel in ocól ‘enter,’ the Calepino indicates that the root vowel must have been
short (1600?: fol. 342v), as it is in the Hocaba dialect of Modern Yucatec. That vowel is lengthened and bears
a low or falling tone when followed by a suffix other than -ol, as in h ʔòok’ih ‘he entered’ or ʔòoken ‘enter!’
in Hocaba and other western dialects (Blair and Vermont-Salas 1965:342–344). The root vowel is long and
marked by a low or falling tone with both -Vl and other suffixes in Ebtun in the eastern part of the peninsula
and is indicated parenthetically in the relevant Modern cognates of the CVC root intransitives in (1).
The Calepino de Motul cites root intransitives with their imperfective stem suffixes, -el or -Vl (V echoes
the vowel in the root). -Vl also serves as the imperfective suffix in Modern Yucatec, but -el does not. The
-el suffix echoes the root vowel in benel, the earliest form of binel, and may have been retained for that
reason, but that cannot be the explanation for the use of -el in hulel, malel/manel, and talel. It disappeared
with b’in ‘go’ and máan ‘pass by, move’ some time after the middle of the nineteenth century and seems to
have been subsumed in the root in ʔúʔul ‘come, arrive here’ and tàal ‘come’ in Modern Yucatec.
Some examples of the use of -el with these root intransitives are shown in (2) below:
(2a)
can vaɔ in benel ti ppolmal te bak=halale
‘four times I was going as a merchant to Bacalar’ (DZ587A-046A-B)
(2b)
bay v binel ti chikine
‘thus it goes to the west’ (SB596C-220)
(2c)
ma tan y ulelob v chayan talob te t u luumil castillae
‘the rest who came from the land of Castille there are not arriving here’ (KC567-026A-C)
(2d)
hauex a ba licil v malel padre
‘open a path for the priest to pass!’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 178r)
(2e)
hex na ɔul pox lae ych cah Mayapan v talel ca u heɔah lum Chichi=can
‘and this Na ɔul Pox here, he was coming from the city of Mayapan when he established the land of
Chichican’ (DZ569-026-027)
The perfective stems of these verbs (and all other root intransitives) were marked by -i (phonetic [-ih]) in
Colonial Yucatec:
(3a)
ca biniob ti cah tikal
‘then they went to the town of Tikal’ (TK590A-012)
(3b)
hek lay v kabaob al=mehenob huliob vay ti cah lae
‘here are the names of these nobles who arrived here in the town’ (MA557-017A-B)
(3c)
ca ix mani ti ma v heah v chij y et=un lae
‘and he passed by where he had been without opening his mouth’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 422v)
(3d) tali ti chikin
‘it came from the west’ (MA596-010)
INTRANSITIVE VERBS 125
The subjunctive stems of all root intransitives were consistently marked by -Vc (phonetic [-Vk]; V echoes the
vowel in the root), but the suppletive form, xijc (phonetic [šíʔik]), served as the subjunctive stem of bin ‘go’:
(4a)
ca ix t inu alah u xicin t u lacal regorsob y testigosob
‘and then I informed all the councilmen and witnesses
ca xicen yn ximbal t u pach
that I would go walking with them’ (SB596C-212A-213A)
(4b)
laacx ca huluc padre vaye
‘if only the priest would arrive here’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 258v)
(4c)
ti yan mul=tun y icnal u xetħel pak manac y ok be
‘there is a mound there next to the piece of wall that passes above the road’ (SB596C-269A-270)
(4d)
t u men num=ya bin talacob
‘because miseries will come’ (Tizimin n.d.: fol. 21v)
1.2. OTHER ROOT INTRANSITIVES. Some root intransitives that are not verbs of motion appear in (5):
(5)
Colonial
Modern
Gloss
áhal
ʔ(à)ahal
wake up
cánal
káʔanal
tire, become tired
cimil kíimil die
çihil
síihil
be born
ɔocol
ȼ’óʔokol
end, finish
elel
ʔ(è)elel
burn
helel
héʔelel
rest
hoppol
hóʔop’ol
begin
kaahal
k’áahal
remember
tuubul
túʔubul
forget
uenel
w(è)enel sleep
In this list, ȼ’óʔokol ‘end, finish,’ héʔelel ‘rest,’ hóʔop’ol ‘begin,’ káʔanal ‘tire, become tired,’ and túʔub’ul ‘for-
get’ would have had a CVʔVC shape in Colonial Yucatec; the Calepino places an acute accent on the first
syllable of one of them (cánal) (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 65r), doubles the vowel in another (tuubul) (1600?:
fol. 427v), and mentions that the first syllable of a third example is accented, without placing an accent over
the vowel (ɔocol) (1600?: fol. 131v). Only three root intransitives in this list could have had a CVhC shape:
cimil ‘die,’ çihil ‘be born, and kaahal ‘remember.’ The vowel in the first syllable of kaahal is doubled, and the
Calepino specifies that it bears an accent (1600?: fol. 233r). The other two examples are not singled out for
such marking in the Calepino.
The acute accent over the vowel in the first syllable of áhal ‘wake up’ implies that it was stressed in
Colonial times (1600?: fol. 4r). The first syllable of ʔahal is not stressed in the Western dialects of Modern
Yucatec, but it does have a long vowel and low or falling tone in the dialect of Modern Yucatec spoken in
Ebtun. áhal is one of the rare bits of evidence that t
he vowel in some CVC roots was being lengthened and
acquiring low tone after high tone appeared in Colonial Yucatec (see 2.3.2.3. in Chapter 3).
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INTRANSITIVE VERBS
2. DERIVED INTRANSITIVES
Intransitive stems are derived from several kinds of roots in Colonial and Modern Yucatec: transitive verbs,
adjectives, nouns, and particles. The ones derived from root transitives represent the passive, antipassive,
and middle voices of such verbs. The intransitive stems derived from adjectives, nouns, and particles are
known as inchoatives or versives. Other intransitives can be derived from derived transitives. There are, in
addition, a suffix, -p, that derives agentless passives from various form classes, including root transitives,
root intransitives, nouns, and adjectives, and a suffix, -k’, that converts root transitives, root intransitives,
positionals, and nouns into celeritive stems.
2.1. DERIVED INTRANSITIVES BASED ON ROOT TRANSITIVES. The passive stems of transitive roots were
marked by -b (phonetic [-b’]) in Proto-Yucatecan. The Calepino de Motul contains evidence that, by the
second half of the sixteenth century, that suffix had largely been reduced to a glottal stop and had metas-
tasized with the final consonant of the root, generating a CVʔVC passive stem that was identical to that of
CVʔVC root intransitives (cf. 2.3.2.1. in Chapter 3 and 1.1.2. in Chapter 7). The middle voice stem was produced by infixing [h] in transitive roots; the resulting CVhC stem had the same shape as CVhC root intran-
sitives (cf. 2.3.2.2. in Chapter 3 and 1.1.4. in Chapter 7). Only the antipassive stem was marked by a suffix,
-n, that did not change over time (cf. 1.1.3. in Chapter 7).
2.2. INCHOATIVES OR VERSIVES. Although the term “inchoative” has often been used to refer to the act of
becoming (as in “x becomes y”), its literal meaning is “to begin to do something,” a function handled by
the head word for inceptive aspect, hopp (phonetic [hóʔop’]), in Colonial and Modern Yucatec (cf. 2.2. in
Chapter 5). For this reason, some Mayanist linguists prefer the term “versive” to refer to acts of becoming.
However, “inchoative” is used for “becoming” as well as “beginning” in some classical languages, such as
Greek and Latin (Judith M. Maxwell, personal communication, 20 April 2009), perhaps justifying my contin-
uation of the tradition in Maya studies of using “inchoative” for what some linguists call “versive.”
Inchoative verbs were derived from several kinds of roots in Colonial Yucatec by -h, -ch-ah (phonetic
[-č-ah]), and -tal. -h was employed much more frequently than the other suffixes for this purpose in the
Calepino de Motul, but appears in only three inchoative stems in Modern Yucatec, having been replaced by
the other suffixes in other inchoative stems.
2.2.1. INCHOATIVES DERIVED WITH -H. Inchoative stems derived from adjectival, nominal, particle, and
transitive roots appear as entries in the Calepino de Motul with their imperfective stem suffix, either -al,
-il, or both, indicating that the vowel in the suffix was schwa (cf. 2.3.3. in Chapter 3 and V. Bricker and Orie
2014). Some examples of this variation in the imperfective stems of inchoatives derived from the adjectival
roots, ceel ‘cold,’ çak ‘itchy, itching,’ yij ‘ripe (fruit ready for harvesting from tree),’ netz ‘mean, vile, despic-
able, stupid,’ tam ‘deep, serious,’ tu ‘stinky, rotten,’ and utz ‘good, just, well made,’ appear in (6) below:
(6)
-h-al Variant
-h-il Variant
Gloss
ceelhal
ceelhil
feel, be cold
çakhal çakhil itch
yijhal
yijhil
ripen (fruit on tree)
netzhal
netzhil
become mean, vile, despicable, rude, uncouth
tamhal
tamhil
become deep
tuhal
tuhil
stink, rot
utzhal
utzhil
recover, improve
INTRANSITIVE VERBS 127
Adjectival roots are the source of ca. 65 percent of the inchoative verbs listed in the Calepino de Motul.
Only ca. 17 percent are derived from nouns, and particles and root transitives are each responsible for
about nine percent of the inchoative verbs in that work.
The perfective stem of -h inchoatives was marked by -i (phonetic [-ih]). The subjunctive stem suffix
that occurred with such inchoatives is not mentioned in the Calepino de Motul, nor in any document in my
database.1 The inchoative derived from the adjectival root, cet ‘equal, even; jointly, together,’ is exemplified
in context with the two aspectual stem suffixes for which I have information in (7a–b):
(7a)
chicul t u men Ds. licil u lah cethal
‘it was a sign by God while they were conjoining [referring to the conjunction of the sun and the
moon]’ (Gordon 1913:270)
(7b)
ti cethi u tħanobi
‘there their words became adjusted’ (Gordon 1913:10)
Another pair of contrastive examples is derived from the particle yan ‘there exists’:
(8a)
ti tali u yanhal y ahaulil bal=cahi
‘the kingdom of the world came into existence’ (Tizimin n.d.: fol. 17v)
(8b)
ca binob t cahtal chakan=putun ti yanhi y otochob ah ytzaob
‘then they went to settle [at] Champoton where the homes of the Itzas existed’ (Tizimin n.d.: fol.18v)
Other examples of the imperfective and perfective inflection of -h inchoatives derived from the adjectival
roots, yaab ‘much, many, often,’ koch ‘true, infallible, certain,’ and utz ‘good, just, well made,’ from the tran-
sitive root, lob ‘hurt, harm, damage,’ and from the nominal root, xak ‘mixture of many things,’ are shown
in (9a–e):
(9a)
in cechtah v yaabhal v bal in ba
‘I strongly wished that my possessions would increase’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 69r)
(9b)
ma tan v kochhal in vayak
‘my dream is not coming true’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 250r)
(9c)
lic va v lobhal t a ich v tzayomtic y otoch ku au et=vinicil
‘does it upset you that your neighbor frequents the church?’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 115r)
(9d)
vtzhi yanumal Ju.o v pectzil y icnal ahau
‘John pleased the king’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 443v)
(9e)
ti xakhi u pol
‘her hair became mussed’ (Ciudad Real 1600?: fol. 455r)
The imperfective stem in -hal did not survive into Modern Yucatec, nor, indeed, into the other daughter
languages of Colonial Yucatec: Itsaj, Mopan, and Lacandon. Mopan retained the pefective stem in -(a)hih
(Hofling 2011:16), but paired with a -tal imperfective stem, of which there were only a handful of examples
128
INTRANSITIVE VERBS
in the Calepino de Motul (see 2.2.3. below). The perfective suffix, -hi, has fared only slightly better through
time. There are still traces of its use with the particles, šàan ‘slowly’ and yàan (or ʔan) ‘there exists,’ and with
a root of unknown origin, páat ‘able,’ in Modern Yucatec:
(10a) tiʔ le b’áʔaš ʔépokáil túun porkeh šáanhih k u kaškóʔob’ letiʔ e ȼ’òonóʔob’ pàarkeh
‘for in that epoch then, because it took time for them to exchange those guns and
b�
��áʔatakil u tyáʔal beliséoʔ y éetel čikleh
bullets in Belize for chicle’ (SOT971B:17)
(10b) tiʔ e semàanáaʔ yanhih hun p’éel bàayléiʔ
‘during this week, there were some dances;
yanhih mìisah káʔah p’éeh mìisah
there were Masses, two Masses’ (PEN971:5)
(10c) t u p’atah uy atan káʔah ʔanhih u č’íʔik u yàanal kóʔoleh
‘he left his wife and took another woman’ (HOC971B:3)
(10d) páathih in t’àan
‘I could speak’ (V. Bricker et al. 1998:209)
2.2.2. INCHOATIVES DERIVED WITH -CH-AH. Many fewer -ch-ah inchoatives (N = 35) than -h inchoatives (ca.
112) appear in the Calepino de Motul. They are derived from adjectival, nominal, transitive, intransitive,
particle, and onomatopoeic roots and are listed as entries with their imperfective stems. Among them are
five sets of inchoatives that are derived from the same root (ceel ‘cold,’ çayal ‘twist, dislocate, fracture,’
yaom ‘pregnancy,’ ma ‘no, not,’ and uk ‘drink’) with both -ah and -ch-ah suffixes:
(11)
-h Inchoative
-ch-ah inchoative
Gloss
ceelhal/ceelhil
ceelchahal
feel, be cold
çayahal
çaychahal
become dislocated
yaomhal
yaomchahal
become pregnant
maachal
macchahal
cease, stop
ukahal
ukahchahal
be thirsty
The aspectual suffixes that co-occurred with -chah ((phonetic [-čah]) inchoatives in Colonial Yucatec
were -al (imperfective), -i (phonetic [-ih/-Ø], perfective), and -ac (phonetic [-ak], subjunctive). Their use is
exemplified contextually by the inchoative stems derived from the transitive root, muc ‘bury, hide, conceal,
cover up in hole’:
(12a) vac muluc vchci v mucchahal kopob t u lacal
‘on 6 Muluc was when the valleys were becoming buried, all of them’ (Gordon 1913:61)
(12b) ca mucchahiob t u yam sus t u yam kak=nab
‘then they became buried in the waves of sand, in the waves of the sea’ (Tizimin n.d.: fol. 12r)
INTRANSITIVE VERBS
129
(12c) bin mucchahac ah tubul vah ah tubul ha
‘the forgotten bread, the forgotten water will be buried’ (Tizimin n.d.: fol. 14r)
Other sentences containing inchoatives derived from the adjectival roots, ceel ‘cold’ and uij ‘hungry,’ and
A Historical Grammar of the Maya Language of Yucatan (1557-2000) Page 23
