Suppletion in Imperatives and Hortatives
Verbs: tense, mood, evidence · one world map for each value
WALS codes 193 languages for this feature. The most frequent value, “None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material)”, covers 153 of them (79%); the least frequent, “Imperative and Hortative”, is recorded for a single language.
That value is most frequent in Papunesia (100% of the 26 languages coded there) and least frequent in Africa (54% of 35).
All 12 Austronesian languages coded have “None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material)”.
Afro-Asiatic is the most divided, its largest group reaching only 6 of 13.
A regular and a suppletive form alternate8 languages · 4%
Imperative29 languages · 15%
Hortative2 languages · 1%
Imperative and Hortative1 language · 1%
None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material)153 languages · 79%
One map per value; each dot is a language WALS codes with that value.
By macro-area
| Value | Africa | Eurasia | Papunesia | Australia | North America | South America |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| A regular and a suppletive form alternate | 2 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
| Imperative | 12 | 11 | 0 | 0 | 4 | 2 |
| Hortative | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 |
| Imperative and Hortative | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 19 | 47 | 26 | 11 | 28 | 22 |
| All values | 35 | 62 | 26 | 11 | 34 | 25 |
Inside the largest families
| Family | Coded | Most frequent value | Share |
|---|---|---|---|
| Indo-European | 25 | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 68% |
| Afro-Asiatic | 13 | Imperative | 46% |
| Austronesian | 12 | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 100% |
| Niger-Congo | 11 | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 82% |
| Uto-Aztecan | 8 | None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material) | 75% |
Languages to explore
The most fully coded languages with each value.
- A regular and a suppletive form alternate: Hungarian, Guaraní, Berber (Middle Atlas), Iraqw, Nahuatl (Tetelcingo), Bulgarian
- Imperative: Russian, Finnish, Spanish, Georgian, Lezgian, Greek (Modern)
- Hortative: Krongo, Acoma
- None (= no suppletive imperatives reported in the reference material): English, French, Turkish, Indonesian, Mandarin, Japanese
From the same chapter
- Suppletion According to Tense and Aspect 193 languages