Changes and Verbs. The morphemes in a verb phrase encode the components of a Subject's change in the Cognitive Image. At the heart of a verb phrase is the verbal root (e.g., `via- 'hit; beat'), which depicts the prototype of the change. The prototype may be augmented

• through the suffix -ov that depicts remote agency (e.g., ^vi·ov- 'hit [through an intermediary]'), or
• with words that specify
  • an incorporated object in the prototype (e.g., `Co via- 'shout', literally, "hit a shout") or
  • an incorporated direction of the prototype (e.g., ^bâra via- 'beat [heart]', literally, "hit out").

Modal and aspectual suffixes may be added to the Prototypical form

• to indicate a command (-u for singular addressees with -a-stem verbs; e.g., ^kânu 'laugh!', < ^kâna-u),
• to view a change retrospectively, focussing on the Patient (or the Actor for intransitive verbs) at the end of the change (-i, -Ra, -na, -ña, or -ta; e.g., ^vina 'beaten, hit'), or
• to depict an Actor as it progresses through the change (-na; e.g., `viana '[he/she/it] is hitting'),
• to depict a changing Actor in Conceptual Mode (-la; e.g., `viala '[a hypothetical] hitter').

The Retrospective and Conceptual forms may occur directly before their subject noun, where they function as participles; e.g.,

These participial forms may follow, and the Command, Progressive, and Prototypical forms must follow, the specification of objects in a predication, where they function as simple finite verbs. In such case these forms are followed by a subject pointer, unless the subject is 3rd person singular; e.g., with 1st person singular subject pointer -m:

Retrospective and Conceptual finite verbs may show a Affirmational Mode, marked by -o, which places the change of a non-feminine subject in the forefront of the speaker's cognition, out of Prototypical Mode; e.g.,

Affirmational Mode forms of ^âsa- 'is' (^âso-, etc.) may occur alone or in compound verb forms indicating tense, in which case they typically occur with the word ^nâmo 'nevertheless'; e.g.,

Because feminine singular subjects do not appear in Affirmational Mode, feminine speakers do not refer to themselves in Affirmational Mode. Rather, they use compound forms with ^âsa- 'is' ;e.g.,

In addition to the Retrospective and Conceptual Participles, other nonfinite verbal forms are formed with suffixes to the Prototypical form:

• a precedential participle, marked with -ti, indicating a change in an actor that precedes or leads up to the change represented by a second verb; e.g., `viati 'having hit';
• a gerund, marked with -˜, indicating the completed state of a change as a goal of action. Derivatives of gerunds are:
  • a precedential adverb, marked with -o˜ added to the Retrospective stem, indicating the time preceding the completion of a change, expressed negatively (with `nâ 'not') as the time during which the change did not occur; and
  • a destination noun, marked with -ñ, indicating a change as a goal of motion;
• a location noun, marked with -to˜ 'place', indicating the location at which a change occurs;
• an impulse noun, marked with -ik, indicating an uncontrollable internal impulse;
• an adverb of motion, marked with -m, indicating a change concomitant with motion.

Compound verbs are formed with a participle followed by one of the verbs ^âsa- ‘is' and `bu- ‘become', which respectively add dimensions of tense and Suppositional Mode to the depiction of the change.

Compounds formed with ^âsa- ‘is' may be closely compounded, as in `ielâsi ‘he would have gone' (< `ie-la=âsa-i), or phrasally compounded, as in `iela_âsi 'he was going to go' (< `ie-la ^âsa-i).

Various types of adverbs may appear with a verb to indicate spatial and temporal location, direction, manner, negation, and speaker-hearer status.