ON THE PARADIGM OF DIRECT EVIDENCE FORMS IN MODERN BULGARIAN LANGUAGE

Abstract

The paper presents the full paradigm of direct evidence forms in the Modern Bulgarian language. The thesis being defended is that grammaticalized direct evidentiality is an example of a higher linguistic abstraction. It is argued that the set of direct evidence grammatical formations should encompass not solely the indicative forms containing the morpheme -h-/-she-, but also the relative imperative forms of the type da pisheh, neka (da) pisheh, dano (da) pisheh, da byah pisal, neka (da) byah pisal, dano (da) byah pisal, da byah pisan, neka (da) byah pisan, dano da byah pisan among others, in addition to forms expressing an hypothetical condition (bih pisal among others).