The Past Tenses of the Mongolian Verb

In the Modern Mongolian language there are four verb forms which have traditionally been labelled as past tense markers, differing primarily in aspect. In the last two decades scholars have suspected that the past tenses endings may actually differ by marking evidentiality and inferentiality. The present study not only confirms this, but, using 350 glossed and analyzed examples drawn from a variety of sources, shows distinctions of degrees of remoteness as well, and details significant differences between the spoken and written languages.