Himalayan Linguistics

This paper presents the verbal categories tense, aspect, modality and evidentiality of Brokpa, both from a functional and diachronic perspective. Additionally, verb stem alternations in Brokpa are briefly presented and compared with those of Classical Tibetan. Verbal categories in Brokpa are formed both morphologically through suffixes and analytically through syntactically complex constructions. The past tense marker -pi is treated in some detail, since it evinces a complex allomorphy which is no longer transparent and only explicable with reference to Classical Tibetan.