76 Carol Ge.ne.ttl and Kristine Hildebrandt
contexts. 'Verb-like adjectives' share morphological properties with verbs, but we
will argue in §4 that they have sufficiently distinct syntactic behaviour to argue
that they are a separate lexical class.
2.1. SIZE OF CLASSES
Simple adjectives and verb-like adjectives differ noticeably in class size. There are
thirty simple adjectives that we know of. This class appears to be closed, although
there are a few Nepali borrowings which fit into this class.^4 Verb-like adjectives,
by contrast, are an open class, and productively incorporate new members. We
list fifty-seven monomorphemic verb-like adjectives in the tables that follow, and
we expect that there maybe considerably more. In addition, one can productively
form phrasal verb-like adjectives through the process of compounding.
2.2. PHRASAL VERB-LIKE ADJECTIVES
Verbs and verb-like adjectives may combine with other elements to productive-
ly form phrasal compounds which constitute members of this class. Most phrasal
verb-like adjectives are composed of a noun which is followed by either a verb-like
adjective or a verb. A partial list of phrasal verb-like adjectives is given in (i):
(i) 2mwi 2kAtti 'furry' (fur + many)
4hlo ithyApA 'brave' (wind/spirit + big)
iti ithyApA 'brave, alternate form' (heart + big)
iti icampA 'cowardly/fearful/worrisome' (heart + small)
3le ikpA 'easy' (?? + do)
4kole ikhApA 'difficult' (slow + come)
3tuk itApA 'difficult, arduous' (Nepali duk 'pain + become)
3ta 3rurjpA 'far' (what + long)
lara imrempA 'drunk' (alcohol + full)
3ini ithypA 'famous' (person + big)
3sup ithyApA 'healthy, strong' (body + big)
2shitarj ikhApA 'angry' (anger + come)
2churj 2rjipA 'charming' (?? + laugh)
Most commonly, phrasal adjectives are members of the HUMAN PROPENSITY or
PHYSICAL PROPERTY classes, although 4/co/e ikhApA 'difficult' and 3/6 lUpA. easy' is a
member of the class DIFFICULTY, and 3ta ^ruypA. 'far' is a POSITION term.
2.3. REDUPLICATION
Only a small number of adjectives undergo reduplication, either whole or partial.
Those we know of are given in (2).
(^4) It is possible that as more and more speakers of the language become bilingual in Nepali, and
the intensification of pressure due to contact increases, more Nepali adjectives will be incorporated
into this lexical class.