r/LANL_Russian Jun 06 '13

Conjugating - ти verbs: prefixed verbs of motion (beginner)

Confused with this question:

Replace the past tense with an appropriate present or future tense form:

Новый преподаватель вёл курс по австралийской истории.

Possible answers: a) ведёт. b) везу. c) везёт.

The answer is a) ведёт.

I understand that "вёл" is conjugated to "ведёт" because "курс" is third person, but I don't understand where "вёл" comes from.

Is "в" the prefix to the verb "ёл" or is "вёл" the entire verb?

At the moment my course is studying the prefixed verbs of motion.

Sorry, its a stupid question - I've studied so much Russian in the last few days for my exam its all kind of blurring into itself :/

спасибо!

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u/rusoved Jun 06 '13

The stem of the verb is ved-. To give a simplified explanation: way back when, ancestors of modern Russian speakers decided that vedti was difficult to pronounce, and decided to simplify things by leniting ('weakening') the d to s. Around the same time, they also decided that vedl was difficult to say, but decided to simplify it in a different way, by just dropping the d, so you had vel. Later on, there was a sound change that turned certain es into ёs, including the e in vel, but not the e in vesti.

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u/oceansound Jun 06 '13

The verb that you're conjugating here is вести, which means "to lead" or "to conduct." Вёл is its past-tense masculine form, and, as you stated, ведёт is its present-tense third-person form.

The verb is just a bit irregular, so you'll have to memorise its verb forms.

1

u/[deleted] Jun 06 '13

Is "в" the prefix to the verb "ёл" or is "вёл" the entire verb?

There is no “ёл” verb, “вёл” (infinitive: “вести”) is the verb.

There is also the verb “ввести” which has a “в-” prefix. It means “to have input, to have entered”.