Found:
accidental gap
MORPHOLOGY: a non-existing word which is expected to exist given the hypothesized morphological rules of a particular language. In the literature, an accidental gap is usually thought of as a 'hole' in a paradigm. EXAMPLE: in English it is possible to derive nouns from verbs by adding the suffixes -al and -(a)tion to the verbal stem. However, some such derivations do not exist, although there are no grammatical reasons for their nonexistence. Compare the following examples:
(i) recite recital recitation propose proposal proposition (ii) arrive arrival *arrivation refuse refusal *refusation (iii) derive *derival derivation describe *describal description
LIT. | Allen, M.R. (1978) Bochner, H (1988) Halle, M. (1973) Scalise, S. (1984) Spencer, A. (1991) |