Difference between "(у)видать" and "(у)видеть"

Question

I've seen увидал used where one would use увидел. Is there any difference in meaning, or perhaps register?

Когда он увидал фото, он просто сломался.

There's also видывать. )) – Yellow Sky Jan 19 '16 at 18:40 — Yellow Sky, Jan 19 '16 at 18:40

Quassnoi · Accepted Answer · 2016-01-19T16:48:41.123

7

Perfective увидать and увидеть don't really differ.

Imperfective Ты это видел? and Ты это видал? would mean "Did you see that" and "Have you seen that?", respectively. This I think is the closest thing Russian has to English perfect and simple past distinction.

Historically, видать is an iterative for видеть (same as летать / лететь, плавать / плыть etc.)

However, this form is not productive in Russian anymore, so some of historical iteratives either have completely merged with their base forms (стелить / стлать) or acquired idiomatic meanings like those above.

edited Jan 19 '16 at 16:48

answered Jan 19 '16 at 15:58

Quassnoi

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And wha about повидать? – VCH250 Jan 19 '16 at 17:35
@VCH250: it does not have a counterpart from видеть – Quassnoi Jan 19 '16 at 17:37

score 2 · Answer 2 · answered Jan 19 '16 at 14:23

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"увидал" is just a demotic form of "увидел".

answered Jan 19 '16 at 14:23

crazyh

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Difference between "(у)видать" and "(у)видеть"

2 Answers2