no Greville G. Corbett
(17) Vy videl-i
2.PL Saw-PL
'you saw'
(18) Vy bol'n-y
2.PLill-(sp)pL
'you are ill'
In terms of agreement with honorific vy there is no reason for separating the verb
and the participle in -/. In contrast, the long form adjective, like the noun, usually
shows semantic agreement:
(19) Vy molcaliv-aja
2.PL silent-(Lp)pEM.SG
'you are silent' (addressed to a woman)
(20) Vy genij
2.PL genius.sc
'you are a genius'
It is unusual for predicate nouns to agree, and they normally 'escape' from agree-
ment to have their number determined by semantics. But syntactic agreement is
possible, as in some types of nineteenth-century Russian (see Corbett 1983: 55). If
one wished to split the predicates into two the most likely place would be between
the short form and the long form. But here too there is overlap: in Suksin's short
story Cerednicenko i cirk (1980: 234), we find the following example:
(21) ... nikomu vy bol'sene nuzn-y
... no one.DAT 2.PL more NEC necessary-(sp)pL
'no one needs you any more'
As expected, we find the short form in the plural. But on the same page we find,
again in honorific use:
(22) Komu vy potom bud-ete nuzn-a?
who.DAT 2.PL then will.be-2.PL necessary-(sp)pEM.SG
'Who will need you then?'
The data may be summarized as follows, taking statistical data from four sources
(Corbett 1983: 53).
(23) Predicate agreement with honorific vy in Russian
Non-past verb Past participle SF adjective LF adjective Noun
PL PL pi [97%] SG [89%] SG
N = 145 N=37