SYNTACTIC FUNCTIONS OF THE INFINITIVE IN SLAVIC LANGUAGES

The article describes the infinitive as a hybrid form that is on the border of the verbal and noun parts of speech, as it is the so-called "fossilized case form of former verbal nouns", which has lost its morphological features, but has retained its syntactic potential. Accordingly, the infinitive can perform subject, object, predicative, attributive functions, as well as the adverbial syntactic function of the determining secondary member of the sentence. From the point of view of the nature of semantic -syntactic relations and conjunctiveness in the sentence, the subject, object, and pre -substantive infinitive are distinguished. However, these functions are expressed differently in each of the Slavic languages. In the Ukrainian language, the functions of the infinitive are more developed, compared to the Polish language, which is the reason for the so-called phenomenon of idiosyncratic or patient approach to life and understanding, while the agentive one is characteristic of Western languages. In the Ukrainian language, we record a wide range of auxiliary and phase verbs that are used together with the infinitive in the predicative function, in comparison with the Polish language. The infinitive in the modal function has a wide range of meanings in Ukrainian, in Polish, for example, infinitive constructions with the particle by are rarely used, according to NKJP. In the South Slavic languages, there is a decline in the use of infinitive forms. In the modern Bulgarian language, the infinitive is used very limitedly -only in complex negative forms of the imperative mood, and in some archaic forms of the future tense, instead, the supine is common. More characteristic of the Bulgarian infinitive is the combination with the subjunctive, which is used to express doubt, uncertainty, wish, recommendation, command, or condition.