Abstract
The paper focuses on light verbs which occur in constructions with abstract verbal nouns. It resumes Radimský's division of these verbs into basic and specific ones.
The synonymy of light verbs and its scalar desemantization were analyzed in a corpus case study of Czech light verb constructions with the noun "pokuta" (penalty). In the last part, the text deals with distinctions between full and light verbs with respect to their semantic features.