A grammar of Pite Saami, 2014

8 Verbs
Class II verbs can further be divided into two sub-classes, based on the class
marking suffix in the infinitive form: Class IIa is marked by a, while Class IIb is
marked by å. The verb bassat ‘wash’ is provided in Table 8.16 as an example for
a Class IIa verb, and bårråt ‘eat’ for a Class IIb verb in Table 8.17.
Table 8.16: The inflectional paradigm for the Class IIa verb bassat ‘wash’
sg du pl
prs 1 st bas-a-v biss-i-n bass-a-p
2 nd bas-a bass-a-bähten bass-a-bähtet
3 rd bass-a bass-a-ba biss-e
pst 1 st biss-i-v bas-a-jmen bas-a-jmä
2 nd biss-e bas-a-jden bas-a-jdä
3 rd bas-a-j bas-a-jga biss-i-n
imp 2 nd bas-a bass-e-n bess-i-t
inf bass-a-t conneg bas-a
prf bass-a-m
Table 8.17: The inflectional paradigm for the Class IIb verb bårråt ‘eat’
sg du pl
prs 1 st bår-å-v burr-e-n bårr-å-p
2 nd bår-å bårr-å-bähtin bårr-å-bähtet
3 rd bårr-a bårr-å-ba burr-e
pst 1 st burr-e-v bår-å-jmen bår-å-jme
2 nd burr-e bår-å-jden bår-å-jde
3 rd bår-å-j bår-å-jga burr-e-n
imp 2 nd bår-å bårr-e-n burr-i-t
inf bårr-å-t conneg bår-å
prf bårr-å-m
Other examples of Class IIa verbs include: juhkat ‘drink’, tjájbmat ‘write’, barrgat
‘work’, gullat ‘hear’, gähtjat ‘look’ and sávvat ‘wish’. The corpus only provides
sufficient data for the Class IIb verb bårråt; the verbs dåbbdåt ‘recognize’,
gåpptjåt ‘close’, hållåt ‘say’ and låhkåt ‘read’ are also likely candidates for Class
IIb. Verbs in Class IIb all have å as the initial stem vowel while the class marking
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