The concept ‘build’ in East Caucasian: an intragenetic typology of verbal colexifications

Abstract

The paper presents an intragenetic typological investigation of verbal colexifications. Data from 34 languages of the East Caucasian family were collected and analyzed to detect colexifications of the concept ‘build’. By comparing the results of this intragenetic investigation with those of larger cross-linguistic investigations, I show that small-scale, manually compiled and carefully verified databases can contribute to validating and complementing information available from large-scale typological databases. In particular, investigations of under-documented languages allow detecting patterns that, although seemingly rare cross-linguistically, are relatively common at a microtypological level. The colexification patterns attested in my sample can all be explained by well-known metonymic and metaphorical shifts, but only one of them is reported to be cross-linguistically common. While some of the shared patterns could be attributed to a common origin of the verbs in questions, others are likely to have spread by language contact.