Evidentiality in Uzbek and Kazakh

4.3 
Ekan/Eken and Verbal Categories 
Perhaps the most contentious issue in the study of evidentiality is the status of evidentiality as an 
independent verbal category. A variety of morphemes in Uzbek and Kazakh have been ascribed 
evidential status, and most of these either express past tense or are derived from morphemes 
bearing past tense. What follows is a review of the meanings of these morphemes and their 
relationship to tense, confirmativity, and evidentiality. 
The simple past tense morpheme -di/-DI is often described as the görülen geçmiş zaman 
‘witnessed past tense’ in grammars written in Turkish, although as we have seen its use does not 
necessarily mean that the speaker actually witnessed the event in question, as in (52), which is 
repeated here in (179): 
(179) Huddi shu serial o'tgan oy-lar-da Turkiya kanal-i-da ham ber-il-di, lekin
ko'r-ma-di-m. (Uz) 
just that serial past month-
PL
-
LOC
Turkey station-3-
LOC
also give-
PASS
-
PST
, but
see-
NEG
-
PST
-1
SG
‘That serial was also shown on the Turkish station, but I didn’t see it.’ 
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Johanson (2003) considers this form to be unmarked for evidential meaning and Friedman’s 
(1978) assessment of the simple past’s Turkish congnate as 
CONFIRMATIVE
is applicable to this 
morpheme in Uzbek and Kazakh. 
The perfect -gan/-GAn is often described as the duyulan geçmiş zaman ‘heard or 
perceived past tense’ in Turkish-language grammars (as opposed to the ‘witnessed’ simple past) 
but this too is an incorrect assessment. The perfect -gan/-GAn is best analyzed as a past tense 
form that is unmarked for confirmativity (Friedman 1978), as it is able to express events that the 
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speaker is willing to confirm (such as well known historical facts or events that the speaker 
participated in) or events that the speaker may not be willing to confirm (such as events that have 
been previously marked as non-confirmative or which the speaker has explicitly not witnessed).
Johanson treats the perfect as “a postterminal of the type 
PPAST
, displaying perfect-like meanings 
with occasional indirective readings” (2003, 279). 
The converbial past -(i)b/-(I)p is also often referred to as a second duyulan geçmiş zaman 
in Turkish grammars, and Johanson calls this form a “stable indirectivity marker of the type 
IPAST
-1: ‘has evidently done, evidently did’” (2003, 279). The meanings of this form are broader 
than mere indirectivity, however. Johanson employs the term 
INDIRECTIVITY
to refer to “the 
presentation of an event by reference to its reception by a conscious subject” and states that “the 
notion of indirectivity is in accordance with the crosslinguistic definition of evidentiality as 
‘stating the existence of a soure of evidence for some information’” (2003, 274). Although 
-(i)b/-(I)p may express indirectivity or indicate non-firsthand information, its primary function is 
to express non-confirmativity. As a non-confirmative morpheme, it bears meanings of doubt and 
non-volitionality, as well as the indirective or evidential meanings of hearsay or inference. 
The morphemes that have been glossed here as 
EVID
- ekan/eken - are often referred to as 
bearing rivâyet ‘hearsay, gossip’ mood in Turkish-language materials and are ascribed inferential 
meaning by Johanson (2003). These assessments are generally correct, in as much as the 
presence of ekan/eken signals that the information conveyed was obtained from non-firsthand 
sources, although when these morphemes are used in their admirative or emotive sense, it is 
assumed that the speaker has direct evidence for the information expressed. 
The final morphemes that have been said to participate in the expression of evidential 
meaning are the modern reflexes of older *er-miš, Uzbek emish and Kazakh -mIs. These 

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morphemes are only rarely discussed in grammars of Uzbek and Kazakh, in part due to their 
rarity. Johanson (2003) ascribes these morphemes reportative meaning, and the analysis here 
supports that conclusion. 
The analysis so far groups these morphemes into two classes: the past tense morphemes 
and the copular morphemes. The primary purpose of the past tense morphemes is to express 
anteriority, and speakers have the option of choosing between these morphemes on the basis of 
confirmativity: