Category:Macedonian iterative verbs

Macedonian verbs that express the repetition of an event.

Morphologically, they are imperfective verbs derived from perfective verbs which are themselves derived from a primary imperfective verb, for example гори (gori) ("to burn", primary imperfective) > изгори (izgori) (perfective) > изгорува (izgoruva) (iterative). Although they are imperfective, they retain the telicity of the perfective verb. Thus, they are used in contexts where the meaning is telic, but an imperfective form is grammatically required, including iterative (or habitual or gnomic) contexts, where there is a series of sub-events which are individually perfective in that they attain their telos, but which comprise a global event which is not itself perfective.

Additionally, they are used in narrative and descriptive utterances, where perfective actions are being recounted, possibly ones which were actually completed in the past, but expressed as imperfective forms so as to create an impression that they are ongoing, possibly with a dramatic effect, and so to involve the reader or hearer to a greater extent. Finally, these secondary imperfective verbs are used in irrealis contexts, be they iterative or not, where the telos is conceptualized, excluding the primary imperfective, but cannot be asserted, excluding the perfective.

Unlike primary imperfective verbs, iterative verbs cannot be used in contexts where the time of the event overlaps with the temporal reference point, i.e. where a progressive tense would be used in English.

It should be noted that not all secondary imperfective verbs are iterative. Sometimes, they are functionally equivalent to the primary imperfectives, e.g. in the case of храбри (hrabri) ("to encourage") > охрабри (ohrabri) > охрабрува (ohrabruva). In other cases, the meaning changes along the derivational chain, such that the secondary imperfective is the main aspectual pair of the perfective verb and is semantically distinct from the primary imperfective, e.g. in the case of копа (kopa) ("to dig", imperfective) > откопа (otkopa) ("to unearth", perfective) > откопува (otkopuva) ("to unearth", imperfective). Here, откопа (otkopa) and откопува (otkopuva) are a genuine aspectual pair with the meaning "to unearth", whereas the underlying копа (kopa) has a distinct meaning and is therefore not aspectually related to either of them. Consequently, откопува (otkopuva) is neither equivalent to копа (kopa) nor its iterative counterpart.

Macedonian iterative verbs should not be confused with Macedonian frequentative verbs.