It seems intuitive to me that a language would have both regular and irregular verbs. But I have always wondered why it is that Spanish, for example, developed 3 regular conjugations ( -ar, -er, -ir). The quick answer is that these were inherited from Latin, but how did Latin come to have four conjugations?For that matter, why did Latin have 5 different regular noun declensions?
It's hard for me to imagine this being a natural course of evolution for a language. Multiple forms of irregularity strike me as something to be expected. But it seems almost an oxymoron to say we have multiple ways to do things "regularly" :)
Does this reflect a merging of different ancient indoeuropean languages? Or is there an explanation which parallels biological evolution, in terms of "mutations"? Or is this a question that's "out there" in the realm of pure speculation?
2007-12-04
02:55:35
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1 answers
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asked by
Michael M
7
in
Languages