Abstract
When examining Periphrasis we naturally analyse the state of the contributing elements and the interplay of syntactic and morphological factors. But if periphrastic forms are part of paradigms, we should also ask how periphrasis affects the notion ‘possible lexeme’. In particular, we can look at the ways in which periphrastic forms ‘split’ lexemes. This is a relatively new area. Since periphrasis is in large part the issue of whether we are dealing with a single lexeme or more than one, it is therefore worth investigating these splits more generally, first looking at ‘easier’ splits, and only then going on to the typology of splits created by periphrasis. I shall not go over the issue of the competition between synthetic and periphrastic forms, for which see, for instance, Stump (2002) and Kiparsky (2005); rather I shall concentrate on the shape of lexemes which are split by periphrasis.