THE VERB Gl. 431 



in a verbified shape; and, having assumed tlie verbal form, it came to signify 

 to be here, to he at this or that place, to he at this time or at such a time. 



Thus the original verbal signification of gi is that of accidental exist- 

 ence — to exist, not by nature, but hy chance: to happen to be. In this function 

 it is comparable to the Spanish verb estar, to he accidcntallij ; but it soon 

 assumed also the function of designating real, essential existence, like the 

 Spanish verb ser: to he by nature, to he essentially, in reality, and not by chance 

 or accident. Outside of these, the verb gi has taken other significations — 

 to become, to have, possess, to do and to say — all of which will be treated in 

 their respective order Gi is often abbreviated into -g, -k, and its shorter 

 forms are used enclitically. 



I have elsewhere discussed this verb at length,* and have here extracted 

 some of the examples given there. More examples will be found in the 

 Dictionary, pages 44. 45. 



Presented in their order of grammatic evolution, the six different func- 

 tions of gi are as follows: 



(a) To he here, to he at this or that place, to be at such a time, then. In 

 this function, gi points to casual or accidental existence, occurrence by 

 chance, and, like the pronoun ge, generally implies close proximity to the 

 grammatic or logical subject of the sentence. It comes nearest to our verb 

 to exist. Examples: 



kani gi he, she, it is outside, outdoors. 



lapi gi there are tivo (of them). 



tidsh gi to feel well; ku-i gi to feel unwell. 



kiimmetat giank staying in the rocks. 



giti shuye'akeks gi-uapka here shall be a leaping-place, 142, 3. 



To this definition must be traced the gi composing some of the attrib- 

 utive and impei'sonal verbs above mentioned, as kii'gi, laki, lushlushgi, 

 p'laiki, sha'tki, etc. 



(b) To become, to begin to he. This definition appears, e. g., in the fol- 

 lowing example: ksi-i ni a kukamtchish gi-uapk / would never become old, 

 64, 13. 



*"0n tlie Substantive Verb in some North American Langnages;"Proceeding8of the XVIth Annual 

 Session of the American Philological Association, July, 1884, pages "^G-SS. 



