Historical English Syntax 9783110863314, 9783110124316

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Historical English Syntax

Topics in English Linguistics 2 Editors

Jan Svartvik Herman Wekker

Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York

Historical English Syntax

Edited by

Dieter Kastovsky

Mouton de Gruyter Berlin · New York

1991

Mouton de Gruyter (formerly Mouton, The Hague) is a Division of Walter de Gruyter & Co., Berlin.

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Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data

Historical English syntax / edited by Dieter Kastovsky. p. cm. — (Topics in English linguistics : 2) Proceedings of the Kellner-Festival, held in 1988 at Schloss Liechtenstein. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-89925-683-X (U.S. : acid-free paper) 1. English language —Syntax —Congresses. 2. English language—Grammar, Historical —Congresses. I. Kastovsky, Dieter. 1 9 4 0 - . II. Kellner-Festival (1988 : Schloss Liechtenstein). III. Series. PE1361.H57 1991 425—dc20 90-27043 CIP

Deutsche Bibliothek Cataloging in Publication Data Historical English syntax / ed. by Dieter Kastovsky. — Berlin ; New York : Mouton de Gruyter, 1991 (Topics in English linguistics ; 2) ISBN 3-11-012431-9 NE: Kastovsky, Dieter [Hrsg.]; GT

© Copyright 1991 by Walter de Gruyter & Co., D-1000 Berlin 30. All rights reserved, including those of translation into foreign languages. N o part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher. Typesetting and printing: Arthur Collignon GmbH, Berlin. Binding: Lüderitz & Bauer, Berlin. Printed in Germany.

In Memoriam Leon Kellner

Contents

Introduction Dieter Kastovsky

1

Bibliography of Leon Kellner's writings

9

Should John Anderson

11

On the typological status of Old English Leiv Egil Breivik

31

What positions fit in? Fran Colman

51

Language change typology and some aspects of the SVO development in English Andrei Danchev

103

Pronoun and reference in Old English poetry Hans-Jürgen Diller

125

The rise of the passive infinitive in English Olga Fischer

141

Question-answer sequences in Old English Udo Fries

189

Between hypotaxis and parataxis. Clauses of reason in Ancrene Wisse Andreas H. Jucker

203

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time from Late Old English to Early Middle English Veronika Kniezsa

221

Can (could) vs. may (might): regional variation in Early Modern English? Merja Kytö

233

Locative valency of the English verb: a historical approach Anatoli] M. Mukhin — Natalya M. Yulikova

291

viii

Contents

Motivated archaism: the use of affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose Terttu Nevalainen

303

Spoken language and the history of i/o-periphrasis Matti Rissanen

321

The be/have variation with intransitives in its crucial phases Mats Ryden

343

Semantic aspects of syntactic change Dieter Stein

355

Subordination and word order change in the history of English Robert P. Stockwell—Donka Minkova

367

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English Toril Swan

409

Lexical diffusion in syntactic change: frequency as a determinant of linguistic conservatism in the development of negation in English Gunnel Tottie

439

On the stylistic basis of syntactic change Susan M. Wright

469

Index of technical terms and topics

493

Index of names

501

Introduction Dieter

Kastovsky

Compared to historical English phonology and morphology, historical English syntax is still a relatively underresearched field. English shares this fate with the other philologies, where many a historical grammar or the grammar of an earlier period never got beyond phonology, or at best phonology and morphology, as was the case, for example, with Luick's Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache (1921 — 1940), or Jordan's Handbuch der mittelenglischen Grammatik (1925). Thus, it is not surprising that almost all the papers presented at the Luick-Symposium 1985 on the occasion of the fiftieth anniversary of Luick's death were on phonology (cf. Kastovsky — Bauer 1988). When I was planning another conference on historical English linguistics for 1988, it seemed only natural, therefore, to devote it to historical English syntax, in order to help fill this gap, at least to some extent. Thus, CHES — Conference on Historical English Syntax — was born. But, as in 1985, an even more specific occasion for such a conference presented itself, not surprisingly, one might say in view of the fact that the Department of English of the University of Vienna is one of the oldest in central Europe (founded in 1872 as "Seminar für englische und französische Sprache", and in 1891 established as "Englisches Seminar", separate from the Romance Department). It so happened that in 1888 Leon Kellner, author of the widely used Historical outlines of English syntax (1892), had applied for his habilitation on the basis of his Caxton's syntax and style (published in 1890); the habilitation was granted in 1890, and certainly was one of the first habilitations with an emphasis on historical English syntax. Thus, CHES was renamed Kellner-Festival, and it is to the memory of Leon Kellner that the following papers are dedicated. They also serve as a late tribute to a great scholar who already during and after World War I had become a victim of those sentiments that were to cost Germany and Austria their scholarly elite in the 1930s. Leon Kellner 1 was born on April 17th, 1859 in Tarnow, a small German-Jewish community east of Krakow, which in those days was still part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. At the age of three, he entered the local Jewish school, which he left when he was thirteen, and from

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then on he received private tuition. After a brief stay at the Jewish seminary in Breslau (Wroclaw) from 1874—1876, he was sent near the Galician border to Bielitz in Slovakia, where he obtained his Abitur in 1880. In the same year he enrolled at the University of Vienna, studying classical languages, French, German, English and Indo-European comparative grammar with, among others, Lotheissen, Heinzel, Minor, Schipper, Brandl, Härtel and Friedrich Müller. In 1883 he finished his dissertation "Zur Syntax des englischen Verbums mit besonderer Berücksichtigung Shakespeares" and received his Dr. phil. "per vota unanima cum applausu". In the following year he worked as a substitute teacher at the Franz-Josef Gymnasium in Vienna, and published his first article "Schopenhauer als Sprachforscher" in the Deutsche Wochenschrift. In summer 1885 he went to London for the first time (the first of many, and longer, visits), where he became acquainted with Dr. Furnivall, President of the Early English Text Society, who soon became his patron and personal friend, introducing him to the cultural and scholarly scene in London. In 1886 Kellner passed his teacher's examination for English and French, and continued his work as a substitute teacher, now at the Oberrealschule in the III. district in Vienna. In 1887/88 he was able to spend the year in London, thanks to a travel grant from the ministry. There, he not only worked on the edition of Caxton's Blanchardyn and Eglantine, which led to his Habilitationsschrift on Caxton's syntax and style, but he also became interested in contemporaneous English literature, having met a number of young English writers like William Morris, Robert Buchanan, George Meredith, Sir Edwin Arnold, etc. He wrote a number of essays on them for the Münchener Allgemeine Zeitung, which was published as a collection in 1899 under the title Englische Epigonenpoesie. In 1890 he received his habilitation (incidentally in the same year as Karl Luick), and from 1890 until the autumn of 1891 he lectured at Vienna University on topics such as "Historical English syntax", "Introduction to Middle English", "Nineteenth-century English literature", "Shakespeare", "English phonology ('Lautlehre') and morphology (Formenlehre')", "English word-formation". In 1891 he had to interrupt his academic teaching, because he was finally awarded a permanent teaching position as Gymnasialprofessor at the Staatsoberrealschule in Troppau (Opava) in Bohemia. There he introduced the idea of having pen-friends in England and France, which he also propagated at the Philologenkongreß in Vienna; this idea turned out to be immensely successful, was institutionalised and eventually even resulted in a large-scale exchange programme. In 1894, having been offered a position at the Währinger Oberrealschule,

Introduction

3

he returned to Vienna, which enabled him to resume his academic teaching at the university. In 1896, Theodor Herzl invited him to participate in the Zionist movement, which he gladly did, and from then on, Kellner remained a very active member of this movement. During the following years, he spent a great deal of time in England, publishing widely on linguistics, literature, and also working on an English-German/GermanEnglish dictionary. In 1902 he was offered the Chair of English Philology at the University of Czernowitz (Ukraine, at the time still part of Austria), which he held until 1915. In 1905 he founded the lexicographical journal Bausteine: Zeitschrift für Neuenglische Sprachforschung, which he edited for Langenscheidt in Berlin until 1914, when it was discontinued because of the war. During his stay in Czernowitz he also wrote two important works on literary history, Die englische Literatur im Zeitalter der Königin Victoria (1909) and Geschichte der Nordamerikanischen Literatur (1913). In 1915, the Russians occupied Czernowitz, and Kellner had to leave, taking refuge in Vienna. But while his Czernowitz colleagues managed to get positions at other Austrian universities like Graz, Innsbruck or Prague, Kellner was not as lucky — a foreshadowing of what was to happen to Jewish intellectuals some twenty years later. Kellner's disappointment was all the greater because at the time the second chair at the English Department in Vienna was vacant — and remained so. In 1919 he became personal adviser on Anglo-American affairs to the Austrian Federal Presidents, first serving under Seitz, and then under Dr. Michael Hainisch, who, like Kellner, was a Fabian, and became a close personal friend. In 1924, Leon Kellner was pensioned off against his will, but he continued to work as a private scholar, concentrating on Shakespeare during the last years of his life. In 1928, Kellner died of a heart-attack. Leon Kellner was the prototype of the late nineteenth century allround philologist — interested both in literature and linguistics, practical language teaching (he wrote an English coursebook), and English culture and civilisation (cf. his sketches of life in England in his Ein Jahr in England [1900]). It is gratifying, therefore, that the following papers include at least three contributions which transcend the strictly syntacticlinguistic domain and venture into the area of textlinguistics, stylistics and literature. Thus, Fries' "Question-answer sequences in Old English" is an attempt to apply principles of transphrastic textlinguistics and discourse analysis to a description of the few Old English manuscripts containing dialogues (^Elfric's Colloquy, and the prose dialogues of Solomon and Saturn, and of Adrian and Ritheus). Diller's "Pronouns and reference in Old English poetry" shows that referent/reference identifi-

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cation in Old English poetry depends more on rhetoric, metre, generic conventions and extralinguistic knowledge than on explicit syntactic information. And Wright's paper "On the stylistic basis of syntactic change" investigates the use of "dummy" auxiliary do in Malory's Morte Darture, arriving at the conclusion that the origin of the auxiliary do is linked with anaphoric do and determined by two notions of style — a structural one related to the textual level, and a rhetorical one related to the local level; in both cases, do functions as a kind of intensity marker, but the effect differs depending on the level — textual cohesion on the one hand, and the focussing of characters on the other. Kellner's interest in verb syntax is echoed by Mukhin — Yulikova's paper on "Locative valency of the English verb: a historical approach", applying a valency-oriented framework to the subclassification of Modern and Old English verbs. Another area dealt with in the following is Adverbials/Adverbs. Colman's "What positions fit in?" investigates formatives which function simultaneously as prepositions and adverbs, e. g. cefter, fram, etc. She argues that such adverbs should be treated as elliptical prepositional phrases with an unspecified argument of the preposition, in which case the hybrid category of "prepositional adverbs" is no longer needed; she further argues that forms occurring as prefixes should be analysed as lexicalised cliticised elliptical prepositional phrases rather than as separable or inseparable prefixes. Thus, the so-called postpositions in Old English are not really postpositions, but elliptical PPs, i. e. Old English is less postpositional than normally thought. Jucker's paper "Between hypotaxis and parataxis. Clauses of reason in Ancrene Wisse" investigates the conjunction for and some related connectors. For right from the beginning is a connector halfway between parataxis and hypotaxis; contrary to expectation it has developed in the direction of higher paratactic force, and now shows signs of beginning obsolescence. And Kniezsa's "Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time from Late Old English to Early Middle English" examines the relationship between prepositions governing a case, case-marked nouns and adverbs as circumstantials of verbs in the Peterborough Chronicle. Just as historical English phonology has its favourite topics, e. g. the Great Vowel Shift, historical English syntax has its favourite areas, especially in the last twenty or thirty years, viz. auxiliaries, above all do, and word-order. It is not surprising, therefore, that more than fifty percent of the following papers deal with these two areas.

Introduction

5

Danchev's "Language change typology and some aspects of the SVO development in English" attributes the SOV-^SVO shift primarily to language contact in connection with an interactive bidirectional model of language change; he views Old English as a period of relative structural complexity, Middle English as a period of prevailing structural simplification (as a result of language contact) and Modern English as a period of increasing elaboration. Stockwell —Minkova in their paper "Subordination and word-order change in the history of English" deal with the implementation of the change itself and challenge the traditional view that the SOV-+SVO change took place independently in main and subordinate clauses. According to them, the original verb-second order of main clauses was reanalysed as SV in analogy to the surface structure of subordinate clauses. And Fischer's paper "The rise of the passive infinitive in English", resulting in the change from Ic seah turf tredan to I saw turf being trod argues that the reason for this syntactic change can be found in the following word order change: in Old English verbal complements could freely precede the verbal nucleus, which followed from the Old English SOV order; but the change SOV-»SVO made a change from the active to passive infinitive necessary, because preverbal elements at this later stage would generally be interpreted only as subjects and no longer as objects. Finally, Breivik's "On the typological status of Old English" discusses the various syntactic patterns of Old English existential sentences arguing that the existing variation can be explained within a framework which assumes that dummy subjects use a property of languages which have or have had a verb-second constraint, and that in Old English dummy subjects already begin to appear optionally in positions where they are no longer motivated by this constraint, an indication of the beginning of a typological word order change. The papers on auxiliaries fall into two groups, one dealing with an auxiliary ("dummy") do, the other dealing with modals and be/have. The rise of the periphrastic do has attracted the attention of anglicists for a long time, and with the development of the variationist framework this interest has increased, since the implementation of the periphrasis lends itself extremely well to a variationist approach. This is amply documented in the papers by Nevalainen, "Motivated archaism: the use of affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose", Rissanen, "Spoken language and the history of Jo-periphrasis", and Stein, "Semantic aspects of syntactic change". Nevalainen shows that the retention or even reintroduction of affirmative periphrastic do in liturgical prose after the mid-sixteen hundreds,

6

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Kastovsky

i. e. at a time when this use of do is becoming obsolete, is a "change from above", i. e. a conscious selection based on established religious usage, especially in collects. Rissanen corroborates the assumption that the origin and implementation of the do-periphrasis is closely linked to spoken discourse and the emphatic role it has in the latter. Similarly, Stein argues that the grammaticalisation of do in questions is partly due to semantic factors, viz. contrastivity, manifested as intensity and discourse prominence. In fact, Wright's paper mentioned above also belongs in this group. A side effect of the rise of periphrastic do, viz. the replacement of the older negation V nothing ("wo-negation") by do not V anything ("notnegation"), is investigated by Tottie in "Lexical diffusion in syntactic change: frequency as a determinant of linguistic conservativism in the development of negation in English". Obviously, the older construction is retained with high-frequency verbs and constructions in Modern English, while it is generally replaced by the periphrastic construction in collocations with items of lower frequency. Anderson's paper on "Should" returns to the categorial status of modal auxiliaries in Old and Modern English arguing that in Old English scealj sceolde did not have auxiliary status, and that the ensuing change did not result in a major category AUX, but only in the establishment of a syntactic sub-class of verbs, the auxiliaries; the modals, on the other hand, have to be regarded as a morphological subclass of verbs, most of them — but not all — also being auxiliaries. Kytö's "Cara ( could) jvs. may (might): regional variation in Early Modern English" again demonstrates the value of variationist techniques for tracing the implementation of a change, in this case the increase of can j could and the decrease of may /might in their 'root possibility' function between 1570 and 1720: the data clearly show colonial lag, i. e. the change is more advanced in British English than in American English; but there is also a difference in terms of medium, i. e. the written medium is more conservative. Finally, another rather underresearched area, i. e. "The be/have variation with intransitives in its crucial phases", (more precisely in the 18th and 19th centuries) is dealt with in Ryden's paper, again in a variationist framework. For the cause of the change one must look at the functional diversity of be as copula, passive and perfect auxiliary, which might lead to systemic and/or functional ambiguity. The change proceeds gradually, first affecting iterative and durative verbs, and is enhanced by certain modal contexts.

Introduction

7

If a conference of this kind is a representative reflection of the state of the art — and at least to a certain extent it must be — then some general conclusion might be permitted. First of all, there are some areas that apparently attract more attention than others, e. g. word order, auxiliaries. Secondly, both in terms of methodology and grammatical frameworks there is variety rather than uniformity: traditional philological studies, typological studies or variationist studies exist side by side, just as traditional grammar, case and valency grammar and government and binding have their adherents. What is less obvious in the papers, but was much more obvious during the conference itself, is the readiness of the adherents of different schools or frameworks to accept alternative approaches, or at least to discuss them on their own terms, a very healthy development indeed. A conference of this kind cannot be organised without help, and the present one was no exception. First and foremost I would like to thank the Minister für Wissenschaft und Forschung, Herrn Universitätsprofessor Dr. Hans Tuppy, for accepting the patronage of this conference, and for subsidising it substantially. I am also grateful to the Town Council of Vienna and the Landeshauptmann of Niederösterreich, Herrn Siegfried Ludwig, for their generous financial support, and in particular to the latter for also providing the conferees with a unique opportunity to experience that Austrian wine and Austrian hospitality compare favourably with any others. Thanks also go to the staff of Hotel Schloß Liechtenstein, which provided the right kind of "ambiente" and to the British Council, who helped with travel and also more fluid grants. Last, but by no means least, I would like to thank my staff for their help in the organisation of the conference, in particular the conference secretary, Frau Christine Klein, who again performed organisational miracles, and Mag. Ardith Jean Meier, Dr. Elke Schartmann and Mag. Iris Schwaner for their help with the editing of the manuscript and the proofreading. Without conferees there would be no conferences. My final thanks therefore go to the participants for coming, producing stimulating papers and being so convivial: they were the ones who made the conference such a success. Note 1. A detailed biography is found in Anna Kellner (1936), Leon Kellner. Sein Leben und sein Werk. Vienna: Carl Gerold's Sohn. For detailed bibliographical references to Kellner's works, cf. the bibliography of his writings in this volume.

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References Jordan, Richard 1925 Handbuch der mittelenglischen Grammatik. Vol. 1. Lautlehre. Heidelberg: Winter. Kastovsky, Dieter —Gero Bauer (eds.) 1988 Luick revisited. Papers read at the Luick Symposium at Schloß Liechtenstein. 15.-18. 9. 1985. Tübingen: Narr. Kellner, Anna 1936 Leon Kellner. Sein Leben und sein Werk. Vienna: Carl Gerold's Sohn. Luick, Karl 1921 — 1940 Historische Grammatik der englischen Sprache. 2 vols. Leipzig: Tauchnitz.

Bibliography of Leon Kellner's writings

1885

Zur Syntax des englischen Verbums, mit besonderer Berücksichtigung Shakespeares. Wien: Holder. 1889 Englische Epigonenpoesie. Stuttgart: Cotta. 1890a Caxton's Blanchardyn and Eglantine. (Early English Text Society e. s. 58) London: Trübner. 1890b Caxton's syntax and style. London: Philological Society. 1892 a Rev. ed. of Richard Morris, Historical outlines of English accidence. London: Macmillan. 1892 b Historical outlines of English syntax. London —New York: Macmillan. 1895 a Three kings' sons. (Early English Text Society) London: Trübner. 1895 b Sonnenburgs Grammatik der englischen Sprache. Wien: Gerold. 1897 Altenglische Spruchweisheiten. [Brochure, no indication of publisher]. 1899 Englische Märchen (mit Anna Kellner). Wien: Graphische Industrie. 1900 a Ein Jahr in England. Stuttgart: Cotta. 1900 b Shakespeare. (Dichter und Darsteller) Leipzig —Berlin —Wien: Seemann und Gesellschaft für Graphische Industrie. 1902—1905 Deutsch-englisches und englisch-deutsches Handwörterbuch. Braunschweig: Vieweg. 1903 Lehrbuch der englischen Sprache für Mädchenlyzeen. Berlin: Springer. [1910] [2nd edition] 1905—1914 Bausteine. Zeitschrift für Neuenglische Sprachforschung. Unter Mitwirkung des Neuphilologischen Vereins in Wien und Oberlehrer Dr. Krüger, Berlin, edited by Leon Kellner. Berlin-Schöneberg: Langenscheidt. 1908 Zionistische Schriften von Theodor Herzl. Berlin: Jüdischer Verlag. 1909 Die englische Literatur im Zeitalter der Königin Victoria. Leipzig: Tauchnitz. 1913 Geschichte der nordamerikanischen Literatur. Berlin —Leipzig: Göschen. [1927] [2nd edition] [1915] [Translated by Julie Franklin as American literature. (American Books) New York: Doubleday.] 1914 "Jüdische Weihestunden", Emunah. Czernowitz [brochure, no indication of publisher], 1917 English fairy tales. Leipzig: Tauchnitz. 1919 a "Shakespeare-Bacon als Essayist", Neue Freie Presse. Wien. 1919 b The essays or counsels civil and moral by Francis Bacon. Leipzig: Tauchnitz. 1919c Von Dickens bis Shaw. (2nd edition of Die englische Literatur im Zeitalter der Königin Victoria) Leipzig: Tauchnitz. [1928] [Translated by Jan Krejci as Anglickä literatura doby nejnovejsi, od Dickense az k Shawovi. Praha: Laichter.] 1920 Theodor Herzls Lehrjahre. Wien: Löwitz. 1922a Shakespeare-Wörterbuch. Leipzig: Tauchnitz. 1922 b "Neue Wege zu Shakespeare", Neue Freie Presse. Wien.

10

Bibliography of Leon Kellner's writings 1925

Restoring Shakespeare. (Englische Bibliothek) Leipzig: Tauchnitz; London: Allen & Unwin. 1930 a Meine Schüler. Geschichten und Skizzen aus meiner Klasse. Berlin —Wien: Zsolnay. 1931 Erläuterungen und Textverbesserungen zu 14 Dramen Shakespeare's. (Sächsische Forschungsinstitute IV) Leipzig: Tauchnitz. 1933/1934 "Shakespeare's Sonette", Englische Studien 68: 5 7 - 8 0 .

Should John Anderson

"Should" with Infinitive

instead of the Subjunctive

Preterite

0. § 358. This use, too, may be traced back to Old English, where it is found side by side with the subjunctive. "And hi J)a eft sendon aerendwracan to Rome and waependre stefne him fultumes baedon, J?aet jsaet earme eöel mid ealle ne fordiligad ne ware, ne se nama öaere Romaniscan {jeode, se öe mid him swa lange sceän and bryhte, fram fremdra öeoda ungeöwaernesse fornumen and fordilgad beon sceolde" (and they again sent messengers to Rome and with weeping voice asked for aid, that the poor country were not utterly destroyed, and that the name of the Roman people, which was so long bright and shining among them, should not be overcast and obscured by the violence of foreign nations). - BEDA, i. 12 ... (Kellner 1892: 223).'

What follows is, in a way, an attempt to make clear to myself how best to interpret, or to go about interpreting, the phenomena illustrated here by Kellner (1892: 223), particularly how we should interpret "instead o f ' . And it reflects a dissatisfaction with certain aspects of what writers on the history of syntax (including myself) have to say about them. Let me begin with a look at a recent controversy that focusses my unease. Lightfoot (1974, 1979: ch. 3) erected an elegant narrative called "The diachronic analysis of the English modals". I did not at that time (cf. Anderson 1976: ch. 2; 1978), and I do not now (cf. Anderson in press a, b), agree with his suggested denouement: the innovation of a major word class, "Modal". This conclusion is not warranted by the data he surveyed; and such a strategy (of split of a major word class by introduction of a new class label) is excluded by an appropriately restrictive theory of the parts of speech. However, it is not my intention here, to once more question the shape or colour of this cornerstone of Lightfoot's construction. My concern starts rather with the damp patches, cracks, fungal growths, evidence of subsidence and the like, that have since been discerned in the fabric by some onlookers, at least. As a result of their efforts, the elegance of the structure is now much less easy to perceive. Some of this apparent decay was built-in, perhaps, involving particular design faults: it is clear, for instance, that the historical materials that

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Anderson

form the foundations for the construction are less stable and regular than one might wish. And some delapidation has proceeded from the failure to provide the structure with certain fundamental, load-bearing supports, such as a precise and testable formulation of the "Transparency Principle". (All of this is familiar from the trade journals: for some discussion of these and other problems, see e. g. Warner 1983; Plank 1984; Allan 1985.) But some alleged faults appear to involve simply tricks of light or perspective. And attempts to amend or extend the edifice have themselves, moreover, sometimes incorporated structural and functional elements whose role in this construction and whose place in the theoretical architecture as a whole remain unclear. The status of some of these (such as "grammaticalisation" or "desemanticisation") has puzzled me for some time, and not merely with respect to the characterisation of the English modals and their history; I'd like to try to find out whether my puzzlement is misplaced or, despite the paucity of public acknowledgments of this, others share my uncertainties. Take, for instance, "grammaticalisation", and consider: "The grammaticalization of the English modals (and hence auxiliarization) is already a fact in Old English" (Goossens 1987: 141). Goossens provides an account of grammaticalisation in terms of Functional Grammar (e. g. Dik 1981), but the motivations for describing the phenomena he cites as involving grammaticalisation remain obscure. And, generally, again with few exceptions, the status of such a concept in a linguistic description is left unclear; specifically, the principled (rather than merely stipulated) designation of what counts as an instance of grammaticalisation, and how it is to be characterised in general. Meillet (1912 [1948]: 148) related the term to the process whereby a mot autonome developed into a mot accessoire and eventually an ilement grammatical. His description of the "process" seems to involve progressive desemanticisation. But not only, in Meillet's discussion, does the distinction between mot and element grammatical remain unclear (it does not seem to accord with, for instance, the syntax/morphology boundary), but also that between mot autonome and accessoire is not precisely delineated: what characterises a mot accessoire? Not much is clarified in this respect by subsequent discussions, despite the welcome elaboration by a number of scholars (such as Lehmann 1985) of factors allegedly contributing to grammaticalisation. This process interpretation of grammaticalisation seems to be related to a further, non-processual sense: certain semantic distinctions in particular languages are said to be "grammaticalised" rather than "lexicalised". Again, though perhaps in principle clear, this notion often remains vague

Should

13

in application. Palmer (1986: 3 — 4), for instance, introduces grammaticalisation as "the idea that semantic features that are common to many languages may be expressed by the grammatical forms and systems of individual languages", without any indication at that point in the discussion of what it takes to be a "grammatical form" or "system". The signalling of certain universally defined notions is not a sufficient condition for grammaticalisation or auxiliarihood, though it may be a necessary one, and the syntactic or other defining conditions remain unspecified. In what follows I shall be concentrating on the process interpretation of grammaticalisation, while acknowledging the interrelatedness of the senses. On further enquiry into this general area of usage, it then transpires, in Palmer's account (p. 5) and others, that grammaticalisation is "a matter of degree", where "degree" in his case is apparently measured in terms of the extent to which a certain group diverges morphologically and/or distributionally from some larger class to which it belongs, synchronically or historically (e. g. Palmer 1986: § 1.5.1). And the same is true of Meillet's process notion of grammaticalisation: "Et il y a tous les degres intermediaires entre les mots principaux et les mots accessoires" (1912 [1948]: 135), though it is unclear how precisely degree is to be measured. Now, it may be, to focus once more on the history of the modals, that we should look upon such verbs as displaying from the beginning indications of grammaticalisation, indications which are increasingly blatant over time (cf. again Warner 1983; Plank 1984; Goossens 1987). But what are the consequences for our linguistic description of attributing to different periods of the language different degrees of grammaticalisation with respect to certain groups of forms? How is this represented formally, given that frameworks typically allow only for the traditional strictly binary distinction grammatical/lexical, or open/closed? Goossens (1987: 139) concedes that even the "three-point scale" allowed for by Functional Grammar is "not refined enough". Is this another indication that we've reached "Endstation Hauptwort" (Ross 1972)? Anderson (in press a, b) argues that Ross' evidence (e. g. 1972, 1973) for a scalar relation between categories does not necessitate the abandonment of categoriality. But in the present case, it is not even clear what the scale, or the points on it, might be, or whether (despite Lehmann 1985) more than one scale is involved; nor do we have any measure of the relative weights of different kinds of evidence for grammaticalisation. What I want to offer here are some terminological, perhaps even conceptual, suggestions that hopefully

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will eventually lead to a resolution of such questions and to the imposition of some structure on this conceptual domain. The nature of part of the problem is well illustrated by Brinton's (1988: 3.2.) reaction to Lightfoot's suggestion that innovation of the Modal category was also associated with the introduction of an AUX constituent: "I believe there is ample evidence to reconstruct for common Germanic a category AUX, which probably includes independent auxiliaries in addition to verbal affixes" (Brinton 1988: 107). But her suggestion that AUX contained auxiliaries in Old English is based "primarily on semantic and functional grounds" (Brinton 1988: 105). Certainly, various of the ancestors of the present-day auxiliaries already display in Old English notional and morphological idiosyncrasies (see below, for instance). But the massive evidence for a central syntactic role for an element AUX, or a subcategory auxiliary (as I'd prefer — Anderson 1976, in press a), in the form of the "nice" properties and others (cf. e. g. Huddleston 1979), is quite absent from Old English. But if on those grounds Old English is said to lack AUX, or a subcategory auxiliary, how do we characterise the extent to which the Old English ancestor of a modal like should can be said to be grammaticalised, given the morphosyntactic as well as semantic idiosyncrasies that we shall be looking at here? Does grammaticalisation of a verb necessarily involve auxiliarisation, and vice versa? And, either way, how do we characterise either phenomenon? 1. Present-day English should belongs to a syntactically identifiable set of forms: let us, for the moment, refer to these, the traditional "auxiliaries", as the "nice forms", to avoid prejudicing their status, even as verbs. Is this class of forms grammaticalised? Certainly, the class is referred to by syntactic generalisations. But, then, so too are the classes we call noun and adjective, for example. Both nouns and "nices" are also notionally identifiable, in terms which are potentially of universal applicability: the set of nouns contains those forms used to denote a "person, place or thing"; the "nice forms" include items denoting "modality, tense and aspect". The distributional behaviour of the "nices" is largely idiosyncratic; their identification as auxiliaries (which I take to be a universally available subclass of verb) is principally notionally based. But both nouns and "nices" constitute syntactically motivated (sub)classes. (Can we also say that the "nice forms" are in addition the syntactically most "active" verbs?) However, grammaticalisation, as commonly used, does not seem to have to involve such syntactic saliency.

Should

15

We can perhaps at this point distinguish the "nice forms" from nouns as being closed class: (in one sense, at least) grammatical rather than lexical — cf. the non-processual use of "grammaticalised" noted above. And, I suggest, as subcategorial rather categorial (cf. again Anderson in press a, b): the "nice forms" are verbs. It has also been claimed that there is "a cline of grammaticality such that adverbs are more "grammatical" than adjectives" (Traugott 1988: 129). Degree of grammaticality, in this respect, may, if operationally valid, coincide with the internal complexity of the representations for different word classes (cf. Anderson in press b). In that case, the "nice forms", given a representation as a subclass of verbs, should certainly be considered, in terms of this complexity, as more grammatical than items that belong simply to major word classes. But, again, attribution of grammaticalisation does not seem to be limited to classes that are syntactically well-defined. Among the "nices" we can distinguish, again on the basis of shared morphosyntactic behaviour (as discussed e. g. by Lightfoot), a subset which includes items denoting modality: let us call these the "modal nice forms". Should also belongs to this subset. Much of the shared morphosyntactic behaviour of the modals is arguably morphological rather than syntactic: absence of non-finite forms, absence of a third person suffix in the present, opacity of the tense variation itself. Modals would then be only a minor syntactic (sub)category, basically showing the distribution of finite verbs. We can at least say that in Present-day English should belongs to a distinctive subset of the syntactically relevant class or subclass of "nice forms". But, as I have observed, the term grammaticalisation, or even auxiliarisation, as commonly used, does not seem to be necessarily associated with syntactic saliency such as displayed by the "nice" forms. And should also displays other properties which have sometimes been associated with auxiliarihood. It is relatively desemanticised. But even if we can make such a notion precise in synchronic terms, it is not limited (synchronically or diachronically) to the items usually termed grammaticalised or auxiliary, even by the most liberal espousals of the term: consider, for example, the familiar history and present use of the adjective nice. Many "nice forms" have undergone relative desemanticisation, but even where this is present, it cannot in itself betoken syntactic saliency of some sort. It has also been suggested that auxiliaries do not impose an argument structure independently of the lexical verb that they accompany: they are transparent to selectional restrictions. To the extent that this might be true, it once more does not uniquely characterise the "nice forms". Such

16

John Anderson

transparency is associated not only with "aspectual" form like begin (Anderson 1968) but also with seem and other raising-to-subject verbs which (pace Newmeyer 1969: 196, 1975: 30) are not obviously aspectual. Brinton (1988: 65) suggests on the basis of this shared transparency that "aspectualizers [such as begin] are semantically similar to auxiliaries, functioning not as full verbs, but as operators on the next lower, or complement, verb"; and subsequently (Brinton 1988: 75) that "whether one adopts a semantic and universal definition of auxiliary or a functional definition, one seems compelled to include aspectualizers within the class of English auxiliaries". Whatever the semantic appropriateness (or otherwise) of such a proposal, it does not seem to me to constitute an argument for the inclusion of aspectualisers in a syntactic element AUX or a syntactic subclass of auxiliary. Moreover, transparency is not limited to "nice words" or to any other well-defined semantic or syntactic class, except raising-to-subject verbs, if the "nice forms" are included therein. And we already have a way of characterising this class syntactically, as raising-to-subject verbs: recourse to AUX, in these circumstances, is unnecessary, as well as undesirable. In so far as transparency might also be attributed to weather verbs like rain, we can associate it more generally with predicates that lack a nominal (semantic) argument. Such transparency is also one of the "two general indications" adduced by Goossens (1987: § 5.3.6.) of the grammaticalisation of sceolde in late Old English: "it combines as a rule with an infinitive (phrase) which imposes its argument structure on the resulting combination sculan + infinitive". But, as I have suggested, this form will share such a property with a number of other forms; and there is no syntactic motivation for distinguishing them further than as verbs which lack nominal arguments. Why, and with what consequence, should we term this grammaticalisation? Neither desemanticisation nor transparency necessitate grammaticalisation or auxiliarihood, particularly in so far as these latter terms have any syntactic relevance. Warner (1990) too suggests that scealjsceolde might have belonged to a class of auxiliaries in Old English. Part of his evidence is the transparency phenomena we have just been discussing; and I shall return to it briefly below, in discussing the particular characteristics of should. But already at this point we can say that this is in general, as I have suggested, a property of raising-to-subject verbs (even though such appear to be rather less numerous in Old English). So too with the ellipsis phenomena he adduces as in common between Present-day English "nice forms" and

Should

17

putative Old English auxiliaries: this is associated with verbs that take infinitive complements, rather than with putative auxiliaries as such. Goossens' second "indication" looks to be more directly relevant: the absence of non-finite forms corresponding to scealjsceolde. This is a major morphosyntactic property of the Present-day English modals. But in Present-day English this property and others characterise the entire core subset of "nice forms" that are traditionally called the modals, and even so these are marginal as a syntactic class. In Old English a number of verbs, particularly the other preterite-presents, show defective paradigms of various sorts; but only mot, as far as I am aware, parallels sceal/ sceolde in this respect (Warner 1990). Surely (pace Warner) what we have here is a verb, or two, with defective morphology, not a one- or twomember syntactic class or subclass? Similarly, with respect to Present-day English, one is not tempted to set up a syntactic (sub)class to accommodate the fact that beware occurs only as an imperative or an infinitive or an (uninflected) subjunctive. Sporadic morphological defectiveness is not a criterion for the establishment of syntactic classes. If whatever is meant by grammaticalisation can include the accretion or possession of idiosyncratic morphological properties, then Old English scealjsceolde was grammaticalised. But then the use of morphological idiosyncrasies, "grammaticalisation" on this understanding, to suggest auxiliarisation in any sense comparable to that in which the "nice forms" can be said to be auxiliarised in Present-day English is to obscure rather than illuminate history. It is at best unhelpful to suggest that Old English sceolde is an auxiliary in the sense that it is appropriate to apply such a term to the "nice forms" of Present-day English; i. e. if we interpret auxiliary as having any syntactic significance. Nevertheless, there are other aspects of the behaviour of the "nice forms", specifically, in addition to those we have already noted, their place in the semantic system of the language, that can be said to be already present with their Old English ancestors. These are included in the "semantic and functional" motivations adduced by Brinton (1988) in claiming early auxiliary status for even aspectualisers. However, the relevant "semantic and functional" properties are not unique to syntactic auxiliaries, like the "nice forms". It may well be that their presence promotes the development of (syntactic) auxiliarihood (as is suggested by Warner's (1990) scenario); but clarification of the history of this is not promoted by the expropriation of the word class label for the designation of a wider semantic set, or the suggestion, for example, that on "semantic and functional" grounds aspectualisers in English

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belong to a constituent AUX. Similarly, if possession of these "semantic and functional" properties indicates grammaticalisation, then grammaticalisation in this sense is not directly involved in the syntactic status, and the acquisition of syntactic status, by particular sets of forms. But let us now look rather more carefully at the systematic semantic status of the semantic sets of forms that include the "nice forms", and in particular at that of should; and at the relationship of this to syntactic categorisation and recategorisation. 2. The "nice forms" form a syntactic class with a core meeting a putatively universal notional definition and with members which are relatively desemanticised. But, further, at least some of the members either are semantically in complementary or free variation with the simple form or enter into a simplex privative opposition with it. Thus, do + verb in Present-day English is in complementary distribution with the simple form: (1)

a. b. c. d.

Charlie left for China. Charlie didn't leave for China. Did Charlie leave for China? Charlie did leave for China.

The simple form is excluded from the environments in (b — d) (associated with negation, interrogation, emphasis, however we characterise them); the do sequence is excluded from (a). At an earlier period, the two possibilities were in free variation in at least some of these environments, whatever other factors of complementarity might have been involved (cf. e. g. Stein 1986, this volume; Wright this volume). On the other hand, the two verbal sequences in (2) (2)

a. Charlie left for China. b. Charlie was leaving for China.

are in contrast: (2 a) cannot be interpreted as involving the 'in progress' interpretation associated with (2 b), but (2 b) adds to the potentialities of the simple form only this semantic property and its consequences: (2 b) is in minimal contrast with (2 a). As such, it contains a transparent verb be. We should note too as distinctive the possibility associated with the pair in (3):

Should

(3)

19

a. Charlie left for China every Tuesday. b. Charlie used to leave for China every Tuesday.

The used sequence is in free variation with the simple form in (3 a). But notice too that a used sequence is in free variation only with a particular reading of the simple form and thus only in certain semantic contexts: (4)

a. Charlie left for China last Tuesday. b. * Charlie used to leave for China last Tuesday.

It serves as it were a deneutralising function with respect to the simple form, in forcing one reading. The semantic contrast between (2 a) and (2 b) is minimal, given the desemanticisation and transparency of be, its rejection of a following have, and the (expected) absence of tense variation on the following nonfinite form. It is perhaps not surprising that the minimally distinctive item in such a construction, or in one like ( l b —d), should develop distributional properties warranting a syntactic re- or sub-classification of some sort. But minimal semantic contrast or complementarity should not be equated with syntactic distinctiveness: we should not allow terms like grammaticalisation to obscure the syntactic status that should be attributed to forms at different periods. To this end, let me now begin to make some terminological suggestions. Let us refer to the semantic relationship between the more complex and the simpler form in (1—3) as "periphrasis". Those who are wedded to the term could refer to the status of e. g. be in (2 b) as involving "semantic auxiliarihood", and we can also compare here Ryden's notion of a "syntactic paradigm" (this volume; cf. too Ryden — Brorström 1987). (I return below to the significance of this term.) The periphrasis may be non-contrastive — involving complementary or free variation; it may be contrastive; it may be deneutralising. In terms of the above discussion, the contrast between (2 a) and (2 b) is minimal: the periphrastic form is transparent and radically desemanticised. It might, however, be appropriate to think here in terms of a "cline of periphrasticness". Compare (3 b) with (5), for instance: (5)

Charlie was in the habit of leaving for China every Tuesday.

which is also deneutralising with respect to (3 a). But be in the habit of introduces a further restriction; it is not transparent:

20

(6)

John

Anderson

a. The rain used to fall for hours. b. IThe rain was in the habit of falling for hours.

(6 b) requires a metaphorical interpretation, since be in the habit of normally imposes a restriction on its subject, one which is violated by (6 b). But even fully periphrastic constructions — minimal periphrases — are not necessarily syntactically distinctive: it is in this respect that I have suggested that the term "grammaticalisation" may be misleading here. Perhaps one might talk of "pregrammaticalisation" in relation to the presence of semantic factors favouring (syntactic) grammaticalisation; and, indeed, of "weight" of pregrammaticalisation (in the light of the preceding discussion). Or, perhaps "paradigmaticisation" captures more accurately the status of periphrases vis-ä-vis the simple form: we seem to be dealing with paradigmatic relations — though (pace Ryden — Brorström 1987) the term "syntactic" is again perhaps misleading. The characterisation of paradigmaticisation and of items that are paradigmaticised but not morphological remains problematical (on such issues cf. Vincent 1987; Anderson 1989); but, I am suggesting, it should not be equated with (a change in) syntactic status. A set of periphrases may indeed acquire word class status: let us call such a class (syntactically) "auxiliary" if we have to do with a subset of verbal periphrases including some expressing tense, aspect and/or mood which display distinctive syntactic behaviour. Present-day English possesses a class of auxiliaries, the "nice forms", to which should belongs. We should note that as well as the class including members that are not necessarily notionally appropriate, not all auxiliaries need be minimal periphrases. Both points are rather well illustrated by the use of dare in Present-day English, part of whose distribution is auxiliary, but which is notionally aberrant and is not transparent: (7)

The postman/*rain daren't return tomorrow.

The class of auxiliaries is closed, but, as with other word classes, individual members may display exceptional properties, such as the various restrictions on mayn't. The use of the term grammaticalisation for the development of such word classes involves a rather more restrictive view of what is encompassed in the process. Perhaps, to be quite unambiguous, one should talk of syntacticisation. However that may be, I want now to

Should

21

consider should and its Old English ancestor in the light of these suggested distinctions. Before proceeding, we should note finally here that it has been pointed out to me that the term operator is also available as a label for the "nice forms" (cf. e. g. Huddleston 1984: 4.4.). Use of this would perhaps underline the language-particular character of the grouping and its associated properties (but then so too — if somewhat less prettily — does the label "nice forms", as employed above). But it seems to me that this is an unfortunate and inappropriate usage, given the use of the term otherwise. And, more importantly, the deployment of the term auxiliary embodies a claim that, whatever the particularness of the distinctive syntactic properties concerned, syntactic auxiliarihood, the establishment of a subclass of verbs with a notionally defined core and distinctive distribution, is universally available. It is also of no consequence, in this respect, that auxiliaries are not always associated syntactically with another verb (cf. e. g. He is cold), particularly since auxiliaries should not be regarded in any use as constituting (syntactically) verb-modifiers (Anderson 1976: ch. 1, in press a, b). 3. Should is a "nice form" and so an auxiliary in Present-day English. It also belongs to a subset of verbs which lack a non-finite paradigm, most of whom also display the syntactic peculiarity of rejecting a dependent ίο-infinitive in favour of the ίο-less: we should note, however, the well-known exceptions of be to and (for many speakers) ought to (though the latter item seems to be recessive — see e. g. Harris 1987). Not all of these verbs are also auxiliaries: in traditional terms, not all modals are auxiliaries. For many speakers, this is true of used, which shows the morphological limitations of the forms (e. g. as in (8 a), but is not syntactically an auxiliary, in taking Jo-support (cf. (8 b)): (8)

a. * Charlie seems to use to go there. * Charlie could use to go there. b. Charlie didn't use to go there. Did Charlie use to go there?

Should is both modal and auxiliary. And unlike dare and need, it does not also show a main verb distribution: (9)

The postman doesn't dare to return tomorrow.

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Further, a case can be made for it as a minimal periphrasis, as paradigmaticised. Should is relatively desemanticised, and, at least on an epistemic reading, also transparent: (10) The ruin should be over by tomorrow. Moreover, in certain circumstances it seems to function as a non-contrastive periphrasis in free variation with the "uninflected subjunctive": (11) a. Mirabelle demanded that Charlie leave. b. Mirabelle demanded that Charlie should leave. Here, should is an equivalent for the mandative subjunctive. Any residual contrast (Nagucka 1984) is minimal. I've termed the relevant form in (11 a) the "uninflected subjunctive" in contrast with the inflected form in the protasis of (12): (12) If Charlie left, Mirabelle would take a lodger. which is identical with the past tense form (except in parts of the paradigm of be). We find in British English a similar form in (13): (13) Mirabelle demanded that Charlie left. but here it is the result of tense concord rather than subjunctive marking - cf. (14): (14) a. Mirabelle demands that Charlie leave. b. Mirabelle demands that Charlie should leave. c. *Mirabelle demands that Charlie left. A should-sequence is also arguably in free variation with the subjunctive of the protasis in (12), as illustrated by (15 a), (15) a. If Charlie should leave, Mirabelle would take a lodger. b. If Charlie were to leave, Mirabelle would take a lodger. though some speakers see (15 a), and the other alternative in (15 b), as 'more tentative', and so in minimal contrast. Notice too that, unlike the subjunctive, should can co-occur with 'indicative' apodoses, as in (16 a),

Should

23

(16) a. If Charlie * left/should leave, Mirabelle immediately lets me know. b. If Charlie leaves, Mirabelle immediately lets me know. this being a 'more tentative' periphrasis for (16 b). On the other hand, the failure of ought to provide an equivalent to should in (17 b — c), compared with (17 a), (17) a. The rain ought to be over by tomorrow. b. Mirabelle demandsjdemanded that Charlie ought to leave. c. If Charlie ought to leave, Mirabelle would take a lodger. suggests that at most should provides a minimal contrast to the subjunctive in ( l i b ) , (14b) and (15a). Let us also observe, incidentally, that the periphrastic would of the apodosis in (12), (15) and (16) has ousted the simple morphological subjunctive. Compare the example from Thackeray's Henry Esmond in (18), (18) Had she been a Whig, he had been one; ... which is followed immediately by (19), (19) had she followed Mr. Fox, no doubt he would have abjured ruffles and a periwig, ... revealing the co-availability for that writer of the periphrasis and the simple form. In Present-day English in this environment the periphrastic subjunctive would complements the inflectional found elsewhere. Without investigating Present-day English should further, we can at least conclude that it is a modal auxiliary that can be minimally periphrastic, contrastively or in free variation. In contrast, in Old English there is, as far as I am aware, no evidence that sceolde belongs with a set of other forms to a syntactic class which we can legitimately label auxiliary; i. e. that it has been syntacticised. Sceal shows the exceptional paradigmatic realisations associated with preterite presents. Through Old English and Middle English it also shares with mot the morphological deficiency of lacking non-finite forms, a defect that eventually spreads to the other forms that we now label "modal". Further, as is familiar, its capacity to take direct objects, as in (20),

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(20) An him sceolde tyn frusend punda. One he-DAT owed ten thousand pounds-GEN (Visser 1963: § 549), and the sense associated with that, is on the wane already in the Old English period; but this is one aspect of desemanticisation, not necessarily a reflex of (syntactic) auxiliarihood. The transparency of sceolde etc. to the arguments of their complement verbs is a property of raising-to-subject verbs rather than a stigma of auxiliarihood. This is true even of the examples with impersonal verbs and passives noted by Warner (1990), as (21), which show transparency to rection as well as to argument structure, (21) Da cwced ic: Hwi ne sceolde me swa pyncan. then said I: Why not should me-DAT/ACC so seem 'Why should it not seem so to me'. wherein, in this example, the first person pronoun bears the case inflexion assigned by the infinitive — rather than, say, nominative, as the subject of sceolde. Again, however this is characterised, it is a property of raisingto-subject verbs (cf. e. g. Anderson 1986: n. 6, 1988: § 5); consider e. g. (22):

(22) £>a ongan hyne hyngrian. then began he-ACC hunger None of this warrants, then, (syntactic) auxiliary status, as I've attempted to characterise it. On the other hand, there does seem to be evidence of periphrastic use, or paradigmaticisation (or semantic auxiliarisation, if you prefer). Perhaps most distinctive in this regard are examples anticipating the Present-day English non-past obligational use of (23 a), as (23 b) (quoted by Goossens 1987: 131), cf. (23) a. Mirabelle should show more concern for Charlie. b. after godes gesetnysse ealle crystene men sceoldon beon swa 'according to God's decree all Christian men should be so gepwcere, swilce hit an man ware, ... united, as if it one man were, ...'

Should

25

wherein sceoldon cannot be regarded as the past equivalent of sceal or its subjunctive. Contrast (24) (again from Goossens 1987: 131), (24) Gyf hit ponne mcedencild wcere: ponne sceolde heo hi forheebban fram 'If it a female child were: then should she herself restrain from ingange godes huses ... entry to God's house' wherein sceolde occupies a position in an 'unreal' conditional, available to preterite subjunctives in general. But even in (23 b), sceoldon does not constitute a minimally contrastive periphrasis: the 'obligationaP sense imposes restrictions on its subject. Also striking — and in this case transparent — is the dicitur use, now obsolete, whereby the speaker fails to vouch for the truth of some report (Kellner 1892: § 358; Mitchell 1985: §2037): (25) a. Pees Apollines dohtor sceolde bion gydene. 'The aforementioned Apollo's daughter was said to be a goddess.' b. Da scedon hi pees hearperes wif sceolde acwelan ... 'Then said they that the harper's wife died ...' The use of the subjunctive after verbs of 'communication' might seem sometimes to permit a similar kind of interpretation: (26) a. ... pe mon seegd peet on an scip meege an pusend manna '(of) which people say that in one ship can-sw6y (be) a thousand men' b. ... para he seede pat he syxa sum ofsloge syxtig 'of which he said that he and five others killed-sw6/' sixty on twam dagum in two days' But, as Mitchell (1985: e. g. §§ 8 7 5 - 8 ) has illustrated in some detail, the motivations dictating choice of subjunctive vs. indicative in these and other circumstances are complex and varying: it apparently does not always indicate a failure by the speaker to vouch for the statement being reported. Perhaps one might say that in examples like (25 b) sceolde is a deneutralising periphrasis with respect to the subjunctive, to the extent that it is not contrastive. In any case, it seems in (25) to constitute a near-minimal periphrasis.

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Anderson

Other possible periphrastic uses are more difficult to evaluate. Examples like that in my initial quotation, or the adjacent mandatives from jElfric (cf. Mitchell 1985: § 2009) in (27) (27) Eft Crist bebead pcet gehwa sceolde agildan dam Casere pat 'Afterwards Christ bade that everyone should pay to Cesar what to him gebyrep ... him belongs' and (28) (28) 7Petrus se apostel bead eac ... pcet hi wceron heora hlaforde getreowe 'and Peter the apostle bade also ... that they be to their lord true

suggest a periphrastic status for sceolde, perhaps in free variation with the subjunctive. (Cf. too Tellier (1962: 108) on Alfredian prose.) But in many examples it is difficult to determine the degree of desemanticisation involved: consider here Mitchell's (1985: §2081) discussion of modals in subordinate questions and exclamations. This should make us cautious in evaluating e. g. Goossens' (1987) attribution of grammaticalisation to occurrences of sceolde in final clauses ("clauses of consequence/purpose") such as: (29) Symon ... getigde cenne ormcetne ryddan innon pam gete par petrus 'Simon ... tied up an immense dog inside the gate in which he Peter in hcefde pcet he fcerlice hine abitan sceolde kept so that it fiercely him bite should' Moreover, in final clauses sceolde is not that common (Mitchell 1985: § 2972), and is in apparent contrast with other modals. Goossens' assertion (1987:134) that "Clearly sceold- is used to mark this type of adverbial clause" is scarcely justified on the basis of the restricted set of data he considers. Undoubtedly, we witness in Old English the partial desemanticisation of sceolde, and an increase in periphrasticness, with possibly its use as a minimal periphrasis — e. g. in the dicitur construction of (25). And certainly, in confirmation of this, the modal periphrases become more

Should

ΤΙ

common in prose in the course of the Old English period, apparently at the expense of the subjunctive (Gorrell 1895: 4 5 7 - 8 ; Mitchell 1985: § 3950). But I am suggesting that this should not lead us to heap (syntactic) auxiliarihood on sceolde, if we are to make sense of its subsequent history. The major change in the syntactic status of the modals belongs to a later period, with the differentiation of verbs into auxiliary and non-auxiliaries. Whatever the precise character of that change, whatever its profile with respect to individual verbs and individual syntactic properties, whatever its dependence on earlier semantic and morphological changes, these earlier changes cannot be said to exhibit grammaticalisation in anything like the same sense, i. e. syntacticisation. Our understanding of this complex history is not enhanced by a failure to draw whatever systematic distinctions are appropriate. I should, perhaps, reiterate that I am not here advocating the view that English has innovated a major category AUX: on the available evidence (pace Steele et al. 1981), such a major category has no place in syntactic theory. Rather, English has established a syntactic subclass of verbs, the auxiliaries. Still less do I subscribe to the view that English has innovated a major word class modal: the modals are essentially a morphological subclass of verb, most of them also auxiliary. The major characteristic of this subclass (lack of non-finite forms) is already to be attributed to sceal and mot in Old English. Its spread to the other modals is regularised as a consequence of the reanalysis of them all as auxiliaries. This latter is the major syntactic change in their history, not the introduction of a word class modal (cf. Warner in press), which, in my view, is not syntactically motivated (cf. again Anderson in press a). Let me note finally, as a short coda, that while there are signs in the Old English period of a dissolution of the past/non-past relationship between sceolde and sceal — as witness (23 b) above — it would not do to exaggerate this, particularly for early Old English. Even the restriction of the usage of (25) to sceolde is controversial, though admittedly the number of putative examples with sceal is small (cf. Standop 1957:101—2; Mitchell 1985: § 2038). And, even apart from the continued, though recessive, past tense use of sceolde in (20) or (30) (30) £>a sceolde he deer bidan ryhtnorpanwindes. 'There had he to wait for a wind from due north', (cf. e. g. Standop 1957: ch. Ill), we continue to find non-past analogues with sceal to both the mandative of (27) and in final clauses parallel to (29)

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John Anderson

(31) /Elc bisceop and celc lareow is to hyrde gesett Godes 'Each bishop and each preacher is as pastor appointed to God's folce post hi sceolon pcet folc wid done wulf gescyldan people that they shall that people against the wolf shield' (Mitchell 1985: §2820). Crucial would be examples with a sceolde in a clause dependent on a mandative non-past verb, parallel to (12 b) in Present-day English. Note 1. From Kellner (1892), who also, in inspiring a conference at which this paper could be presented (though there was some doubt that it would be — cf. Colman this volume: note 1), has enabled me to owe gratitude, in addition, to a number of other participants, particularly Fran Colman and David Denison, for their comments thereon, thereat and thereafter. Thanks too to my colleagues in the Department of English Language at the University of Edinburgh for the helpful discussions which accompanied and followed my presentation of some of this material at a seminar on 9 Nov 1988.

References Allan, W. Scott 1985 The role of the lexicon in syntactic change. [Ph. D. thesis, University of Edinburgh.] Anderson, John M. 1976 On serialisation in English syntax. (Ludwigsburg Studies in Language and Linguistics 1) Ludwigsburg [no indication of publisher] 1978 Deep structure change? The history of the modals. [unpublished MS., presented to the English Department, University of Lund] 1986 "A note on Old English impersonals", Journal of Linguistics 22: 167 — 77. 1988 "The type of Old English impersonals", in: John M. Anderson —Norman Macleod (eds.), Edinburgh studies in the English language, Edinburgh: John Donald, 1 - 3 2 . 1989 "Periphrases and paradigms" in: Bengt Odenstedt—Gunnar Person (eds.), Instead of flowers. Papers in honour of Mats Ryden. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1 - 1 0 . in press a "Grammaticalisation and the English modals". [Preliminary version to be made available by LAUD.] in press b "The localist basis of syntactic categories", in: A. Kakouriotis (ed.) Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on English and Greek. [Preliminary version available from LAUD, December 1988.] Anderson, Tommy R. 1968 "On the transparency of begin: some uses of semantic theory", Foundations of Language 4: 394—421. Brinton, Laurel 1988 The development of English aspectual systems. (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 49) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Should

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Dik, Simon C. 1981 Functional grammar. Dordrecht: Foris. Goossens, Louis 1987 "The auxiliarization of the English modals: a functional grammar view", in: Martin Harris —Paolo Ramat (eds.), Historical development of auxiliaries. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1 1 1 - 4 3 . Gorreil, J. Hendren 1895 "Indirect discourse in Anglo-Saxon", Publications of the Modern Language Association 10: 342—485. Harris, Martin 1987 "English ought (to)", in: Dieter Kastovsky — Aleksander Szwedek (eds.), Linguistics across historical and geographical boundaries, 1: Linguistic theory and historical linguistics. (Trends in linguistics: studies and monographs 32) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 347 — 58. Huddleston, Rodney D. 1979 "Criteria for auxiliaries and modals", in: Sidney Greenbaum —Geoffrey Leech — Jan Svartvik (eds.), Studies in English linguistics. London: Longman, 65-78. 1984 Introduction to the grammar of English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Kellner, Leon 1892 Historical outlines of English syntax. London: Macmillan. Lehmann, Christian 1985 "Grammaticalisation: synchronic variation and diachronic change", Lingua e stile 20: 3 0 3 - 1 8 . Lightfoot, David W. 1974 "The diachronic analysis of the English modals", in: John M. Anderson — Charles Jones (eds.), Historical linguistics, I: syntax, morphology, internal and comparative reconstruction. Amsterdam: North-Holland, 219 — 50. 1979 Principles of diachronic syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Meillet, Antoine 1912 "L'evolution des formes grammaticales", Scientia 12. [1948] [Reprinted in: Linguistique historique et linguistique generale. Paris: Champion 1948, 130-148], Mitchell, Bruce 1985 Old English syntax. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Nagucka, Ruta 1984 An integrated analysis of syntax and semantics of obsolete English constructions. Wroclaw: Ossolineum. Newmeyer, Frederick J. 1969 "The underlying structure of begin-class verbs", in: Robert I. Binnick — Alice Davison — Georgia M. Green —Jerry L. Morgan (eds.), Papers from the fifth regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society. Chicago, 195 — 204. 1975 English aspectual verbs. The Hague: Mouton. Palmer, Frank Robert 1986 Mood and modality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Plank, Frans 1984 "The modals story retold", Studies in Language 8: 305 — 64.

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Ross, John Robert 1972 "The category squish: Endstation Hauptwort", in: Paul M. Peranteau et al. (eds.), Papers from the eighth regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society, Chicago, 3 1 6 - 2 8 . 1973 "Nouniness", in: Osamu Fujimura (ed.), Three dimensions of linguistic theory. Tokyo: TEC, 137-257. Ryden, Mats —Sverker Brorström 1987 The be/have variation with intransitives in English. Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell. Standop, Ewald 1957 Syntax und Semantik der modalen Hilfsverben im Altenglischen. BochumLangendreer: Heinrich Pöppinghaus. Steele, Susan —Adrian Akmajian — Richard Demers — Eloise Jelinek — Chisato Kitagawa — Richard Oehrle —Thomas Wasow 1981 An encyclopedia of AUX: a study in cross-linguistic equivalence. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT press. Tellier, Andre 1962 Les verbes perfecto-presents et les auxiliaires de mode en anglais ancien. Paris: Klincksieck. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1988 "Is internal semantic-pragmatic reconstruction possible?", in: Caroline Duncan Rose—Theo Vennemann (eds.), On language: rhetorica, phonologica et syntactica (A festschrift for Robert P. Stockwell from his friends and colleagues). London: Routledge, 128 — 44. Vincent, Nigel 1987 "The interaction of periphrasis and inflection: some Romance examples", in: Martin Harris —Paolo Ramat (eds.), Historical development of auxiliaries. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 237 — 56. Visser, Frans Theodor 1963 An historical syntax of the English language. Vol. I, Leiden: Brill. Warner, Anthony 1983 Review of Lightfoot 1979. Journal of Linguistics 19: 187 - 209. 1990 "Reworking the history of English auxiliaries", in: Sylvia Adamson et al. (eds.), Papers from the 5th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 65) Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 537 — 558.

On the typological status of Old English Leiv Egil Breivik

This paper is meant as a contribution to historical linguistics and word order typology. My primary concern will be with the various types of syntactic patterns displayed by existential sentences in the Old English period. It will be argued that the diachronic data can be accounted for by a modified version of Haiman's (1974) theory concerning the verbsecond constraint. In my attempt to come to grips with the welter of existentials in Old English, I shall draw on a wider background and look in some detail at their counterparts in other Germanic languages. 1 The term "existential sentence" is often applied with a certain vagueness in the literature. Here, the term will be reserved to designate all and only sentences which contain a form of existential/locative be or an intransitive verb which has included in it the meaning 'be in existence' or 'come into existence'. By this definition all the sentences in (1) are existential sentences. (1)

a. b. c. d. e. f.

There are lions in Africa. Lions exist in Africa. There are no ghosts. Ghosts do not exist. There is a book on the table. On the table is a book. g- On the table there is a book.

The kind of there which occurs in such sentences is often called existential there, and should be distinguished from locative there, as in Look! There's a chair. Note that the morpheme there is not taken to be a defining property of existential sentences. There is also found in constructions which do not qualify as existential sentences, as in (2) where we have a transitive verb in the passive voice: (2)

Since 1970 there have been published a number of articles on existential sentences.

32

Leiv Egil Breivik

There is no doubt that existential there and locative there are ultimately derived from the same word. It is equally clear that the two are syntactically and semantically differentiated in Old English. The hypothesis that there can function as a non-referring expression in earlier English receives support, inter alia, from the fact that it is interchangeable with the classic dummy form it. As is well known, it is widely used as an empty "slotfiller" in certain types of non-existential sentence in Old and Middle English (e. g. in weather statements). Consider the following examples of existential it: 2 (3)

for port hit wees an geleafa & an hiht on pa halgan prynesse cer Cristes tocyme 'because there was one belief and one hope in the Holy Trinity before Christ's advent' (Bückling 81: 2 6 - 2 7 )

(4)

Pa weard hit swa mycel cege fram pam here, pet man ne mihte gepeoncean ne asmcegian hu man of earde hi gebringon sceolde ... 'Then there was so great terror inspired by the host that everybody was incapable of devising or drawing up a plan to get them out of the country' (Chronicles, Laud 1006: 3 2 - 3 4 )

The alternation of there, it and zero is amply illustrated by Old and Middle English texts, e. g. by the various MSS of Cursor Mundi (Morris 1873). Thus, in line 2210, all three possibilities are represented: (5)

a. Pat tim it was bot a langageJHebru pe first pat adam spac; (Cotton) b. Pat time was bot an langagejhebreu pe first at adam spac. (Fairfax) c. Pat time it was bot a langage,)Ebru pe first pat adam spack. (Göttingen) d. Pat tyme was }?er but ο langage/Ebrew pe furste pat Adam spak. (Trinity)

Before taking a closer look at the historical data, it is necessary to outline some of the major tendencies of Old English word order (for a full discussion, cf. Mitchell 1985: chapter IX and Traugott 1972: 106—109). Three basic types of serial order can be distinguished: A.

S(v)V(0)(...) (S = subject; ν = auxiliary verb; V = lexical (main) verb; Ο = object/verb complements. Parentheses indicate that the element is optional.)

On the typological status of Old English

B. C.

33

S(0)(...)V(v) i. (X)(v)VS(...) ii. (X)vSV(...) (X is a cover term for various elements, some of which will be specified below.)

This classification is of course not exhaustive: only such patterns are listed as are relevant to my discussion of existentials. Type A word order is the same as the usual Modern English order (verb-medial). It is used in most non-dependent clauses containing an affirmative proposition: (6)

Ic eom sodlice cristen Ί am truly a Christian' (yElfric 1 XXII: 208)

In (6) the adverb sodlice is placed after the verb. However, as in Modern English, an adverbial element can intervene between subject and verb. Type Β is the dominant order in subordinate clauses: (7)

Gif ic godes man eom. forbcerne eow godes fyr if I God's man am consume you God's fire 'If I am a man of God, let God's fire consume you' (jdfric I XVIII: 248)

This order — sometimes referred to as "subordinate order" — is also found in main clauses. Type C is employed by yes/wo-questions, in which case the X position is empty: (8)

willap ge astigan on eordan & min peer onbidan 'Will you go ashore and wait for me there?' (Bückling 233: 30)

The X position may be empty in declarative main clauses, too: (9)

Hcefde he bisceopsedl in pare stowe, pe geceged is Had he episcopal seat at the place which called is Liccedfeld Lichfield 'He had an episcopal seat at the place which is called Lichfield' (Bede 262: 11)

34

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Breivik

If the X position is filled, the elements that occur are, most typically, the negative particle ne and adverbials of place and time: (10) Ne synd ge na wyrde. pat wundor to geseonne 'You are not worthy to see that wonder' (^Blfric 1 VII: 196) (11) Daer wareI East Engla folces seo yld ofslagen 'There [locative] were slain the chief men of East Anglia' (Chronicles, Laud 1004: 16 — 17) (12) Nu mag sod hit sylf gecypan 'Now the truth itself may be told' (Bückling 187: 1 5 - 1 6 ) Other constituents found at X include subject complement, direct object and indirect object. Stockwell (1977, 1984) claims that Late Old English prose is characterised by a word order norm that is best described by the verb-second constraint, i. e. the constraint whereby the finite verb must be the second constituent in a declarative main clause. Or, as Stockwell himself puts it: "In declarative main clauses of late OE prose, represented e. g. by the Homilies and Saints' Lives of iClfric, the V-2 rule characterizes a wordorder norm that is not fully grammaticized. By that, I mean that it is very common but not obligatory or fully categorical" (1984: 576). Stockwell's hypothesis is supported by Bean's (1983) study of the development of word order patterns in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. Her data show that the verb-second rule characterises 70% to 80% of all main clauses after the earliest period. According to Bean, XSVO (which is the Modern English order) is never higher than 10% in prose after the earliest period. Further evidence for the claim that verb-second order is grammaticised in Old English main clauses to a considerable extent can be found in Canale (1978), Gerritsen (1984), Haider (1986), van Kemenade (1987), Vennemann (1974). In what follows, I shall discuss my own data from the point of view of word order typology. The present investigation is based on a total of 1,653 clauses drawn from Old English, Middle English and Early Modern English texts. 820 of these clauses contain existential there/it. My Old English corpus consists of 94 there/it-clauses and 468 clauses without the existential particle. Frequency counts reveal that existential there vastly outnumbers existential it in earlier English. The ratios are: 81/2 (Old English), 281/15 (Middle English), 367/4 (Early Modern English). It may be mentioned that existential it lingers on after Early Modern English in archaic ballad style, as in It is an ancient mariner, And he stoppeth one of

On the typological status of Old English

35

three (Coleridge). Since existential it is extremely rare in my Old English material, we shall disregard it in the remainder of the paper. In the subsequent discussion, reference will be made to the examples in (13) — (30). A distinction has been made between existential sentences in which there is absent and sentences in which it is present. Examples (13) — (20) do not contain the dummy form. The first three have the pattern notional subject plus verb. Types A and Β have been collapsed into one category on the grounds that there are no unambiguous sentences of Type Β in my material. The sentences in question are either unambiguously Type A (SvV ..., SV ...) or indeterminate between A and Β (SV). Examples (16) — (20) exhibit Type C order, i. e. the verb precedes the notional subject. Note that the X element may be empty in existential sentences of Type C. Thus example (19) has verb-initial order. Existentials in which there is present will be referred to as Type D. We have already seen that there can co-occur with a passive verb phrase in Present-day English. This is the case in earlier English, too. Such sentences will be referred to as Type E. It should be pointed out that serial order is not used as a criterion to establish classes D and E. However, the dummy subject occurs in preverbal position in the vast majority of cases. Type A/B (13) Micel yfelnyss wees on iudeiscum mannum 'There was great evilness in Jewish men' (iElfric 1 XI: 317) (14) 7 gyt ma wees pe pat don ne wolde 'but there were yet more who would not do so' (Bede 48: 21) (15) Manige men beod pe beforan οfirum mannum hwcet hugu god begangap, & rape hie hit anforlcetap 'There are many men who, before other men, begin to do a little good and quickly abandon it' (Bückling 57: 1 - 3 ) Type C (16) On dam ylcan dcege com sum bisceop helenus gehaten 'On that same day came a bishop who was called Helenus' (^Elfric 1 II: 57 — 58) (17) Νis nan leahter swa healic pat man ne mceg gebetan 'There is no sin so great that a man may not atone for it' (/Elfric 1 XII: 157 — 158)

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Leiv Egil Breivik

(18) Nu synd dreo heah-mcegnu. de menn sceolan habban 'Now there are three chief virtues which men must have' (yElfric 1 XVI: 246) (19) Wees sum Godes peow of pam brodrum pare cirican at Agostaldes ea, pas noma was Bothelm 'There was a servant of God among the brethren of the church at Hexham, whose name was Bothelm' (Bede 156: 1 5 - 1 6 ) (20) Pa waron ~iv ciningas on Cent. Wihtred. 7 Wabheard 'There were then two kings in Kent, Wihtred and Waebheard' (Chronicles, Laud 692: 3 - 4 ) Type D (21) Gif Öaer beoö fiftig wera wunigende on pam earde 'If there are fifty men living in the place' (yElfric 1 XIII: 196) (22) J)aer was an cyrce of scinendum golde. and of gymstanum standende on pam felda 'there was a church of shining gold and of precious stones standing in the field' (^Elfric 1 XXI: 352-353) (23) pa onget he pat öaer nas fyrod genoh ongen heora fynd 'he then perceived that there was not a sufficient army to meet their enemies' (iElfric 2 XXX: 295-296) (24) E>aer waron bisceopas of gehwilcum burgum to pare ge-corennysse 'There were bishops from every city at the election' (idfric 2 XXXI: 267-268) (25) Forpon prym gearum ar his cyme in pa magde pat J)aer nanig regn in pam stowum cwom 'For three years before his coming to that province, no rain had fallen in those localities' (Bede 302: 25 — 27) (26) Donne is J^aer on neaweste sum swipe mare burh 'Then there is a very famous city in the neighbourhood' (Bückling 197: 18) (27) nis Jjaer on pam londe lad-genidla 'there is no enemy in the country' (Exeter IV: 50) (28) i»aer bid swyde mycel gewinn betweonan him 'There is very much strife among them' (Orosius 20: 17 — 18)

On the typological status of Old English

37

Type Ε (29) t>asr wurdon gehalede cet dcere halgan byrgene eahta untrume menn ... wundorlice purh god 'At the holy tomb there were healed eight sick men, miraculously, by the power of God' (.^lfric 1 XXI: 132-134) (30) ne bid öaer ncenig ealo gebrowen mid Estum, ac peer bid medo genoh 'no ale is brewed among Estonians, but there is enough mead' (Orosius 20: 1 8 - 1 9 ) 7=

°ι

π

m

D?

Figure 1. Percentage changes in the various types of existential sentence in earlier English (I = Old English, II = Early Middle English, III = Late Middle English, IV = Early Modern English).

Let us now look at the data in more detail. Consider first example (22). In this sentence there occurs in first position and the verb in second position. My hypothesis is that in Old English constructions like (22) there is inserted as an empty topic to move the verb into second position. Sentences like (13) and (16) satisfy this constraint without there. Figure 1 shows that C is the dominant pattern in my Old English material. The proportion of this type is especially high in non-embedded contexts. Verbinitial sentences like (19) do occur, but the vast majority have verb-second order. As already stated, English is now a verb-medial language. I would claim that the morpheme there (an empty topic) is syntactically reanalysed as a subject-NP when English develops from a verb-second into a verbmedial language. The quantitative data (cf. Figure 1) show that existential

38

Leiv Egil

Breivik

sentences of Type C are increasingly being ousted by sentences with a pre-verbal there under the pressure of the SVO syntax. TTzere-sentences represent a compromise in the conflict between pragmatic and syntactic structure: the initial subject slot is filled by a dummy subject, while the logical subject, the communicative core, is shifted to post-verbal position. As the presentative construction with there becomes established, there is also a decrease in the proportion of A/B-sentences. The sentences in (13) — (15) violate the principle of end-focus, which states that the new information tends to come towards the end of sentences and clauses. In view of the gradual nature of syntactic change, it is not surprising that we should find survivals of the verb-second stage in Present-day English; cf. (1 i). A similar comment applies to the use of post-verbal there in declarative main clauses, which persists into Early Modern English. Cases like (31) and (32) are, however, exceedingly rare after the Middle English period: (31) In that tyme was ther a Baron a good man and a right good knyghtj whiche went vnto an Heremytage/where as was an hooly heremyte moche relygious/ (Caxton 83: 16 — 18) (32) Of these sorte was there one not very longe a go, whiche wente aboute to make a good bargayne ... (More 85: 11 — 12) Between 1150 and 1450, English word order assignment rules undergo an extensive reanalysis. It is significant that the most dramatic syntactic changes in existential sentences take place precisely in this period. By 1550, the use or non-use of there is governed by virtually the same syntactic factors as those operative today. It is not surprising that existential there is much more common in nonembedded than in embedded contexts in the Old English period (cf. Figure 2). Recall in this connection that Old English subordinate clauses are mainly verb-final. After Early Middle English, however, we witness a marked increase in the proportion of subordinate there-clauses. This is what one would expect in view of the fact that verb-finality was lost in subordinate clauses in Early Middle English (cf. van Kemenade 1987, Kohonen 1978, Lightfoot 1979, Mitchell 1964). It would appear, then, that the use of the dummy form there originates in main clauses and later percolates into subordinate clauses. The trend shown in Figure 2 is perfectly compatible with Stockwell — Minkova's hypothesis (this volume) that the complementiser-subject-verb order in subordinate clauses is a

On the typological status of Old English

39

%

Figure 2. Percentage changes in the distribution of main and subordinate z/iere-clauses in earlier English (I = Old English, II = Early Middle English, III = Late Middle English, IV = Early Modern English).

major factor in the later reanalysis of main clause order as subject-verb. The traditional view is of course that the word order of main clauses changes independently of developments within subordinate clauses (cf. e. g. Canale 1978 and Vennemann 1984). Mention of the occurrence of there in subordinate clauses brings us to my next point. Not explained by the analysis developed above is the fact that Old English there occurs post-verbally in such cases as (26), (27) and (30). The existential dummy particle also appears in other contexts where the verb-second constraint does not obtain. Thus it can show up in embedded structures, as in (21) and (23). Sometimes it even occurs in subordinate clauses where the finite verb stands at the end of the clause. (25) is a case in point. In an attempt to solve the problems presented by there, we shall take a look at its counterparts in other languages, and at Haiman's (1974) theory of syntactic change. In his seminal book on syntactic change Haiman discusses the use of dummy subjects in various languages. Following Perlmutter (1971), he makes a typological distinction between Type A and Type Β languages. According to Haiman (1974: 91), a Type A language must have all the the following features: (i) Allow no deletion of unstressed personal pronoun subjects. (ii) Must have subjects for impersonal verbs. (iii) Have special indefinite pronoun subjects like on and man.

40

(iv) (v)

Leiv Egil Breivik

Have dummy subjects to replace extraposed sentences. Have a dummy pronoun there (or some equivalent) to stand in the place of logical subjects that have been displaced from sentenceinitial position.

Type Β languages may dispense with superficial subjects. The class of Type A languages is co-extensive with the Germanic languages, plus French and Romansh. Most of the other languages of the world are Type Β languages. Haiman hypothesises that while the Germanic languages are Type A languages by heredity, French and Romansh are Type A languages by borrowing from Germanic dialects. We thus see that languages which are genetically closely related to English have a dummy element which is inserted in subject position in existential sentences. Equally important, Type Β languages do not have a rule corresponding to //zere-insertion in English or ^-insertion in German. Note also that some Type A languages (e. g. French, German and Norwegian) employ the same morpheme both in existential sentences and in other constructions which require a dummy element in subject position. Consider the following Norwegian examples: (33) Det er mange folk her. 'There are many people here'. (34) Det sner. 'It is snowing'. (35) Det vart sunge. it was sung 'There was singing'. (36) Det er usannsynleg at han vil gjere det. 'It is unlikely that he will do it'. In many varieties of Norwegian, der can replace det in sentences like (33) and (34). Haiman contends that dummy subjects are properties of languages which either are or have been subject to the verb-second constraint. His hypothesis is that we begin with a language having the underlying order VSO. In order to satisfy the verb-second constraint, various constituents of the sentence can be fronted. If nothing can be fronted, as in impersonal passives like (35), a dummy pronoun is inserted to move the verb into second position. From this stage, the language eventually develops oblig-

On the typological status of Old English

41

atory subject pronouns and SVO order. Haiman posits (1974: 127 ff.) four stages in the historical development of dummy pronouns. (37) Stage 0: VSO base order a. fronting b. # V # pronoun, V Note that pronoun insertion is ordered after fronting. This means that either the first or the second rule may apply, but not both. This stage is exemplified by Modern Icelandic, where all cases of /»ad-insertion follow the application of the fronting rule: (38) a. E>aö voru blöd, blek og pennar ä bordinnu. 'There were papers, ink and pens on the table'. b. A bordinnu voru (*J>aÖ) blöd, blek og pennar. 'On the table there were papers, ink and pens'. c. Voru (*J)aö) blöd, blek og pennar ά bordinnu? 'Were there papers, ink and pens on the table?' A similar situation obtains in Faroese, where only weather statements can have the dummy subject in post-verbal position. In Modern German, fronting always precedes ^-insertion in existential sentences and impersonal passives. (39) Stage 1: SVO base order a. # V -»• # pronoun, V b. fronting c. subject-verb inversion d. V pronoun -* V 0 (obligatory) The underlying order VSO of Stage 0 has been reinterpreted as SVO. Furthermore, pronoun insertion now precedes the fronting rule. This means that both (a) and (b) may apply in the same derivation. Observe, however, that the pronoun is obligatorily deleted by rule (d). Attestation of Stage 1 is provided by Romansh. (40) Stage 2: SVO base order a. # V -> # pronoun, V

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b. fronting c. subject-verb inversion d. V pronoun V 0 (optional) As appears from (40), rule (d) is optional at Stage 2: dummy subjects begin to appear optionally in positions where they are not motivated by the verb-second constraint. According to Haiman, the rule which deletes post-verbal dummy subjects becomes more and more restricted and finally ceases to operate at all: (41) Stage 3: SVO base order a. # V -»· # pronoun, V b. fronting c. subject-verb inversion d (the rule is dropped) We have now reached the stage in the historical development where the presence of a dummy subject is completely independent of the surface verb-second constraint: when rule (d) is dropped from the grammar, dummy subjects begin to appear obligatorily in positions where the verbsecond constraint does not require them. Both Stage 2 and Stage 3 are well attested in Type A languages. Consider the Dutch data in (42) and (43): I (42) a. b. c. d.

Er is hier veel sneeuw. 'There is much snow here'. Is (er) hier veel sneeuw? 'Is there much snow here?' Hier is (er) veel sneeuw. 'Here there is much snow'. ... dat (er) hier veel sneeuw is. '... that there is much snow here'.

(43) a. b. c. d.

Er wordt gezongen. 'There is singing'. Hier wordt (er) gezongen. 'Here there is singing'. Wordt (er) hier gezongen? 'Is there singing here?' ... dat (er) hier gezongen wordt. '... that there is singing here'.

In Modern Danish, Norwegian and Swedish, hardly any traces remain of an original interdependence between the verb-second constraint and the presence of dummy subjects in sentences. Thus det cannot be left out in the Norwegian examples in (44) and (45):

On the typological status of Old English

43

(44) a. b. c. d.

Det er lever i Afrika. 'There are lions in Africa'. I Afrika er det lever. 'In Africa there are lions'. Er det lever i Afrika? 'Are there lions in Africa?' ... at det er lover i Afrika. '... that there are lions in Africa'.

(45) a. b. c. d.

Det regnar i Bergen i dag. 'It is raining in Bergen today'. I Bergen regnar det i dag. 'In Bergen it is raining today'. Regnar det i Bergen i dag? 'Is it raining in Bergen today?' ...at det regnar i Bergen i dag. '... that it is raining in Bergen today'.

For English and French, both of which have lost the verb-second constraint, Haiman postulates the stages in (46) and (47) with respect to word order: (46) Stage 2: SVO base order a. fronting b. subject-verb inversion (optional) (47) Stage 3: SVO base order a. fronting b. (the rule is dropped) Stage 2 is claimed to describe Middle English and Middle French, while Stage 3 is claimed to describe the modern languages. According to Haiman (1974), the loss of rule (b) (subject-verb inversion) is the only factor which prevents English and French from being verb-second languages. Throughout Haiman's four stages, the verb-second constraint is a target, that is, it is an outcome of a number of rules that conspire to keep the verb in second position. Haiman points out (1974: 50) that targets must be distinguished from surface structure constraints: targets motivate rules, while surface structure constraints screen the output of rules, filtering out ill-formed sentences. The changes outlined above are hypothesised to be the result of satisfying the verb-second target at earlier and earlier stages in the derivation. We shall now reconsider the English data in the light of Haiman's theory. Haiman's own examination of the diachrony of English dummy subjects is very cursory. As far as there is concerned, he contents himself with the following statement (1974: 125-126):

44

Lei ν Egil Breivik

... modern English requires a more or less obligatory (and relatively early — i. e. cyclical) rule of //jere-insertion in existential sentences where the subject noun has been moved from the head of the sentence. Again, in Old English, this rule does not seem to have existed, or at least, not to have been obligatory, provided always that no violation of the V/2 constraint should arise through the failure of its application. This statement is not accurate with respect to the situation that obtains in Old English. First, the evidence is overwhelming that the rule of thereinsertion exists in this period. Secondly, from examples like (19) it is clear that the non-use of there can violate the verb-second constraint in Old English. Verb-initial existentials also occur in my Middle English material: (48) Stod an hali mon of feor, biheold al pis ilke Ά holy man stood at a distance and watched the whole affair' (Ancrene 13: 11 — 12) Nor is Haiman's claim about the dummy subject hit 'it' correct. According to him, /zz'Mnsertion follows the application of the fronting rule in Old English; that is, /^-insertion is claimed to be sensitive to word order in the same way as / ^ - i n s e r t i o n in the Modern Icelandic examples in (38). As shown by examples (49) — (50), the dummy subject hit can show up in post-verbal position, where fronting has occurred. Sentences like (49) and (50), which both contain an extraposed clausal subject, are by no means rare in my Old English material: (49) da gelamp hit amang pam pat sume hlosniende menn deer betweonan eodon. and pisra seofona georne heddon 'Then it befell them that some spying men went amidst them and carefully observed these seven' (jElfric 1 XXIII: 1 3 6 - 1 3 7 ) (50) Da gelamp hit pet se cyng AZdelred fordferde cer da scipu comon 'Then it happened that king yEthelred passed away before the ships arrived' (Chronicles, Laud 1016: 35 — 36) These sentences should be compared with that in (51): (51) Hit gelamp pa sona. swa hi ofslagene wceron. pcet my eel liget com. ofer pa manfullan hadenan 'It happened then, as soon as they were slain, that a great flash of lightning fell upon the wicked heathens' OElfric 1 IV: 4 2 2 - 4 2 3 )

On the typological status of Old English

45

Although there are difficulties with Haiman's analysis in the form presented, it has certain appealing aspects. As we have seen, he contends that Stage 2, at which dummy subjects appear optionally in positions where the verb-second constraint does not require them, describes the situation in Middle English. However, if we assume that Old English has reached Stage 2, then we can account not only for sentences in which there occurs pre-verbally but also for such residual cases as (21), (23), (25), (26), (27) and (30). Observe that all the Old English fAere-sentences we failed to come to grips with earlier have parallels in other Type A languages. Compare the examples in (21), (23), (26), (27) and (30) with those in (42), (43), (44) and (45). As appears from (43 d), even the serial order of (25) is attested. Needless to say, the hypothesis proposed above also accounts for the distribution of the dummy subject it in Old English. There has been much discussion about the rationale for Old English constructions like (9) and (19). Quirk —Wrenn (1958: 94) state that such constructions are used "in some cases for special declarative effect (Wees hit pa on alee wisan hefig tyma 'It was then in every way a grievous time', Gegrette pa guma operne 'Then the one man saluted the other'), in other cases apparently because individual writers were fond of this style (it is especially common, for instance, in the iElfredian Bede and in some of the poetry)". Bacquet (1962: 588) also regards this order as primarily conveying emphasis. This view is not shared by Mitchell, who says that Snegireva (1962) "has some valuable comments and suggestions about VS, including the following: it is used to contrast with the other orders; to link sentences, especially in oral narratives; to introduce new facts or a new train of thought; to change the emphasis; or to narrate a dynamic sequence of events by developing the narrative from stage to stage" (Mitchell 1985: § 3936). Whatever the effects of placing the verb before the subject in declarative clauses, there is little doubt that this construction is a relic from the VSO stage. (9) and (19) resemble the Modern English example in (1 f) in that they represent the specialisation of a once more general rule. Stockwell (1977) posits a sequence of five transitional stages between Proto-Germanic (SOV) and Modern English. In the first stage, verb-initial variants arise by a rule of comment focussing. Using Stockwell's notation, we can state the rule as follows: SO(V) vSO(V). Stockwell writes: "The rule may have been inherited from IE, since VSO variants must have existed (they are the early norm in Celtic and, to a lesser extent, in Slavic); or in Gmc. it may have been extended from a narrower function such as the imperative or presentative. This rule would code some semantic content

46

Lei ν Egil

Breivik

such as 'vividness' of action: i. e., the action, not the participants, would be primary in the expression" (1977: 291—292). We may also note that Heusler (1931:168) speaks of VSO order in Old Icelandic as the "moving" order. McKnight (1897: 138) refers to it as "dramatic" or "pathetic". Givon (1977) assumes YSO as intermediate between SOV and SVO for Hebrew, Spanish and several Bantu languages. In this connection, one important point needs to be emphasised. The existence of verb-initial sentences like (9) and (19) is not the only reason why Old English is not a consistent verb-second language. As shown by Bean (1983), XSV (or verb-third) order is an important pattern in main clauses, especially in the earliest period. In XSV constructions, the subject is preceded by an adverbial element, as in the following examples (from Bean 1983: 62):3 (52) Her Cyneheard ofslog Cynewulf cyning. 'In this year Cyneheard slew King Cynewulf. (53) & py ilcan geare Tatwine was gehalgod to arcebisc. 'and the same year Tatwine was consecrated as archbishop'. The fact that subject-verb inversion is not obligatory in declaratives which have undergone fronting is yet another argument in favour of my hypothesis that Old English has reached Stage 2. Bean (1983: 62) also claims that (54) exhibits verb-third order: (54) & on Pasches he weas on Northamtune 'and at Easter he was at Northampton' However, if we accept van Kemenade's (1987) analysis of Old English personal pronouns as syntactic clitics, then he in (54) does not disrupt verb-second order. 4 My data show there is no reason to disagree with Haiman's (1974) claim that the following changes take place subsequent to Stage 2: (i) the rule of subject-verb inversion is dropped from the grammar; (ii) the rule of dummy subject insertion begins to operate within the cycle. Equally important, my data show that English becomes verb-medial (verb-third) before dummy subjects begin to appear obligatorily in positions where they are not required by the verb-second constraint. Haiman (1974: 143) cites the following examples to illustrate the interaction between the cyclical rules of dummy pronoun insertion and subject raising:

On the typological status of Old English

47

(55) I expect it to rain. (56) I expect there to be no trouble. It may be noted that examples where existential there has undergone subject raising do not crop up until the fifteenth century: (57) ... ther is like to be troble in the maner off Oxenhed Letters 312: 1 0 - 1 1 ) (58)

... (Paston

... ther wer leek to be do gret harme on bothe ouyr pertyes ... (Paston Letters: 324: 18)

In the foregoing pages, I have argued that the seemingly bewildering multitude of existential sentences in Old English can be accommodated within a modified version of Haiman's (1974) theory that dummy subjects are the property of languages which either have or have had the verbsecond constraint (Type A languages). 5 My hypothesis is that Old English has reached the stage where dummy subjects begin to appear optionally in positions where they are not motivated by the verb-second constraint. This hypothesis is supported by data from languages which are typologically and genetically closely related to English. Notes 1. The present paper draws heavily on Breivik (1983: chapter 4). Some of the hypotheses concerning the diachrony of existential there are also presented in Breivik (1989). 2. In this connection, one point needs to be made explicit. It is sometimes difficult to decide whether a given there in earlier English is an instance of existential there or locative there. However, my statistics cannot possibly be so crude as to indicate a development that is not rooted in fact. For a full discussion of the differentiation of the two there's in earlier English, cf. Breivik (1977, 1983: chapter 4). 3. It is arguable that (52) exhibits verb-second order. According to Robert Stockwell (personal communication), her is peripheral in clause structure when it occurs as the beginning of an entry in the Chronicle. 4. Van Kemenade (1987) argues persuasively that all personal pronouns are clitics. A topicalised personal pronoun in first position counts as a separate constituent only if it occurs alone; if some other element has been topicalised, the pre-verbal personal pronoun must be clitisised, and hence it does not disrupt verb-second order. According to van Kemenade (1987: 111), there is only one exception to this: "when the first constituent [in a main clause] is ... fa 'then/when' or the negative particle ne 'not', we always find 'subject-verb inversion', even when the subject is a pronoun". Example (54) should be compared with the /^-constructions in (49) — (51). 5. Although my data are consistent with the sequence of changes Haiman (1974) hypothesises for verb-second languages, they do not necessarily bear out his central hypothesis

48

Leiv Egil Breivik that this sequence should be explained in terms of one basic principle — a target-moving process which seeks to eliminate disparities between surface forms and underlying forms. Whether or not this is a diachronic principle which has explanatory force with regard to verb-second languages is a question we cannot go into here. Targets are of course an artefact of the theoretical framework in which Haiman works. The notion of target presupposes that surface structures and underlying structures differ substantially, and it would be unnecessary in syntactic theories like the Extended Standard Theory or the Revised Extended Standard Theory.

Primary

texts

yElfric 1 = AZlfric's Lives of saints. 1881 Vol. I. i. Edited by Walter W. Skeat. (Early English Text Society o. s. 76) London: Trübner. 1885 Vol. I. ii. Edited by Walter W. Skeat. (Early English Text Society o. s. 82) London: Trübner. [1966] [Reprinted as one volume. London: Kraus Reprints.] jElfric 2 = jElfric's Lives of saints. Vol. II. i. Edited by Walter W. Skeat. (Early English Text Society o. s. 94) 1890 London: Trübner. Vol. II. ii. Edited by Walter W. Skeat. (Early English Text Society o. s. 114) 1890 London: Trübner. [1966] [Reprinted as one volume.] Ancrene = Ancrene wisse. 1972 Vol. VI —VII. Edited by Geoffrey Shepherd. Manchester: Manchester University Press. Bede = The Old English version of Bede's Ecclesiastical history of the English people. 1890 Vol. I. i. Edited by Thomas Miller. (Early English Text Society o. s. 95) London: Trübner. 1891 Vol. I. ii. Edited by Thomas Miller. (Early English Text Society o. s. 96) London: Trübner. Bückling = The Bückling homilies. 1874 Vol. I. Edited by Richard Morris. (Early English Text Society o. s. 58) London: Trübner. 1876 Vol.11. Edited by Richard Morris. (Early English Text Society o. s. 63) London: Trübner. 1880 Vol. III. Edited by Richard Morris. (Early English Text Society o. s. 73) London: Trübner. [1967] [Reprinted as one volume.] Caxton = The book of the knight of the tower. 1971 Translated by William Caxton. Edited by M.Y. OfTord. (Early English Text Society s. s. 2) London: Oxford University Press. Chronicles = Two of the Saxon Chronicles parallel. 1892 Vol. I. Edited by Charles P l u m m e r - J o h n Earle. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Exeter = The Exeter book. 1895 Vol.1. Edited by Israel Gollancz. (Early English Text Society o. s. 104) London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trübner.

On the typological status of Old English

49

More = The apology of Syr Thomas More, knyght. 1930 Edited by Arthur Irving Taft. (Early English Text Society o. s. 180) London: Oxford University Press. Orosius = King Alfred's Orosius. 1883 Vol. I. Edited by Henry Sweet. (Early English Text Society o. s. 79) London: Trübner. Paston Letters = Paston letters and papers of the fifteenth century. 1971 Vol. I. Edited by Norman Davis. London: Oxford University Press.

References Bacquet, Paul 1962 La structure de la phrase verbale a I'epoque Alfredienne. Paris: Les Belles Lettres. Bean, Marian C. 1983 The development of word order patterns in Old English. London: Croom Helm. Breivik, Leiv Egil 1977 "A note on the genesis of existential there", English Studies 58: 334—348. 1983 Existential there: A synchronic and diachronic study. Bergen: Department of English, University of Bergen. 1989 "On the causes of syntactic change in English", in: Leiv Egil Breivik — Ernst Häkon Jahr (eds.), Language change: Contributions to the studies of its causes. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 29 — 70. Canale, William Michael 1978 Word order change in Old English: Base reanalysis in generative grammar. [Unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, University of Toronto]. Fisiak, Jacek (ed.) 1984 Historical syntax. Berlin: Mouton. Gerritsen, Marinel 1984 "Divergent word order developments in Germanic languages: A description and a tentative explanation", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.) 1984, 107 — 135. Givön, Talmy 1977 "The drift from VSO to SVO in Biblical Hebrew: The pragmatics of tenseaspect", in: Charles N. Li (ed.) 1977, 1 8 1 - 2 5 4 . Haider, Hubert 1986 "V-second in German", in: Hubert Haider — Martin Prinzhorn (eds.), Verb second phenomena in Germanic languages. Dordrecht: Foris, 49 — 76. Haiman, John 1974 Targets and syntactic change. The Hague: Mouton. Heusler, Andreas 1931 Altisländisch. Heidelberg: Winter. Kohonen, Viljo 1978 On the development of English word order in religious prose around 1000 and 1200 A. D.: A quantitative study of word order in context. Abo: Research Institute of the Äbo Akademi Foundation. Li, Charles N. (ed.) 1977 Mechanisms of syntactic change. Austin: University of Texas Press.

50

Leiv Egil Breivik

Lightfoot, David 1979 Principles of diachronic syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. McKnight, George 1897 "The primitive Teutonic order of words", Journal of English and Germanic Philology 1: 136-219. Mitchell, Bruce 1964 "Syntax and word-order in The Peterborough Chronicle 1122—1154", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 65: 113 — 144. 1985 Old English syntax. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Morris, Richard (ed.) 1873 Cursor Mundi I. (Early English Text Society o. s. 57) London: Trübner. Perlmutter, David Μ. 1971 Deep and surface structure constraints in syntax. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Quirk, Randolph — Charles Leslie Wrenn 1958 An Old English grammar. (2nd ed.) London: Methuen. Snegireva, T. A. 1962 "Porjadok slov kak sredstvo svjazi mezdu samostojateF nymi predlozenijami ν drevne-anglijskij period", Ucenye zapiski Xabarovskogo pedagogiceskogo instituta 8: 139-201. Stockwell, Robert P. 1977 "Motivations for exbraciation in Old English", in: Charles N. Li (ed.) 1977: 291-314. 1984 "On the history of the verb-second rule in English", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.) 1984: 575-592. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1972 A history of English syntax: A transformational approach to the history of English sentence structure. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. van Kemenade, Ans 1987 Syntactic case and morphological case in the history of English. Dordrecht: Foris. Vennemann, Theo 1974 "Topics, subjects, and word order: From SXV to SVX via TVX", in: John M. Anderson — Charles Jones (eds.), Historical linguistics. Proceedings of the First International Conference on Historical Linguistics, Vol. I, Amsterdam: NorthHolland, 3 3 9 - 3 7 6 . 1984 "Verb-second, verb late, and the brace construction: Comments on some papers", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.) 1984: 627 — 636.

What positions fit in?1 Fran Colman

A. The position The "positions" of the title anticipates a notion I will be pursuing in the course of this paper, in that it is elliptical — for "adposition". I am interested here in a subclass of adpositions, namely, prepositions, in Old English; and in questions raised by the possible postpositional occurrence of forms which also represent prepositions. I take a preposition to be a word belonging to neither conjugation-class nor declension-class words, but which governs case on N(oun) P(hrase)s (words of both conjugation and declension classes can, of course, govern case on NPs in Old English: most familiarly, verbs govern non-nominative cases — e. g. slean + accusative, giernan + genitive; but case can also be governed by, for instance, numerals and certain quantifiers — e. g. fela + genitive, or adjectives — e. g. gelic + dative). Prepositions, as uninflectable, fall in with adverbs, but, at first sight, differ from the latter in that they govern case: prepositions are transitive particles, adverbs may be thought of as intransitive particles (cf. further Vennemann (1974: 81), Denison (1981: 11). Note that Denison (1981: 14) appropriately extends the core category of prepositions to include, for instance, "particles which govern something other than a NP headed by a (pro)noun, for example an adverb (from now), a prepositional phrase (from under the bed), a finite clause (from where I was sitting) ..."; and that Pasicki (1987: 307) remarks: "A major finding about OE prepositions is that they do not take sentential objects"). I say "at first sight", because the relationship between prepositions and adverbs is one that has attracted much scholarly attention. And while one may start off thinking of focussing on prepositions, and the positions they may occupy in Old English, the question of distinctions between word-classes, and of establishing criteria for identifying them — particularly in a language no longer spoken, but more generally as well — is unavoidable (and cf. further Fujiwara 1987). To begin with, though, let me illustrate some Old English prepositions which govern case-marked NPs (pace the argument against an operand — operator relation between adpositions and NPs in Limburg (1983)).

52

Fran Colman

At the same time I will indicate something of the dependency case framework in terms of which the analyses here are formulated: a framework in which semantic Case Relations are taken as basic to the syntax, head-modifier relations may pertain between components, and the verb is head of the sentence. Arguments of the verb may be "participant" or "circumstantial". This distinction is associated with the lexical semantics of the verb in question: a "direct object" NP will be a participant, but an adverbial (including P(repositional) P(hrase)s functioning adverbially) will be a participant only if it subcategorises the verb as, for instance, directional, as in This goes beyond the pale. The same adverbial will be a circumstantial if it does not subcategorise the verb, as in Things thrive beyond the pale. A circumstantial adverb originates as a predicate in a higher sentence, rather than "modifying" the sentence (Anderson 1976: chapter 3). We will see representations of this type of adverbial below (e. g. in (2)). I adopt the four case system of Anderson's case grammar: ergative, absolutive, locative, ablative (corresponding roughly to agent, patient, location/goal and source, respectively) and combinations thereof. Case Relations may be expressed by an adposition (plus inflection), or by nominal inflection alone (cf., e. g., Colman 1988: 49). Grammatical Relations are assigned on the basis of a hierarchy of these cases: subject assignment will look first for an ergative, and failing its presence, search the hierarchy for ergative + case, then absolutive + case, then absolutive (cf., for instance, Anderson 1984: 54). The one-case-per-clause constraint bans cooccurrence of two realisations of the same Case Relation in one clause, except absolutive, which is also the only obligatory case (for the most recent presentation of this claim, see Anderson in press: Chapter 3.3); where a single finite verb is accompanied by more than one instance of the same Case Relation, only one of these may be a participant; any other will originate in a superordinate clause, as a circumstantial argument. The "strong" Case Grammar hypothesis therefore differs from other verb-central theories (e. g. Functional Grammar, cf. e. g. Dik (1987); Lexicase, cf. e. g. Starosta (1987, 1988)) in its claim that Case Relations are basic, and Grammatical Relations derived.

What positions fit in?

(1)

53

shows a clause consisting simply of a PP and finite verb:

and

wiö

fone

here

gefuhton

Here, the accusative NP is taken as governed by wid; within the NP I adopt the analysis of D(eterminer) as head, following e. g. Anderson (1976: chapter 4), Hudson (1987); and the principle of concord and rection determination formulated in Anderson (1986) as a) determination of concord is counter-dependency and b) determination of rection is the reverse. The PP realises the Case Relation locative. This PP is analysed as a participant argument of the verb, on the assumption that it subcategorises feohtan (past plural form gefuhton) as a directional verb. (2) illustrates a clause with more than one PP (see p. 54). The nominative NP, in which M(odifier) is the head, realises the complex Case Relation ergative/absolutive, and functions as subject argument of the finite verb. Each of the two dative NPs here is governed by a preposition, but notice that only one of the PPs is a participant argument of the verb: to Readingum subcategorises cuman (past singular form com) as a directional verb. The temporal PP after pissum gefeohte imposes no restrictions on the verbal lexical semantics, and functions as a circumstantial, represented as argument of a "higher" verb. Now these examples (taken from The C-Text of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, AD 868 and 872: Rositzke 1940) illustrate prepositions in Old English; but, as is well-known, formatives which in Old English function as prepositions occur following case-marked NPs. In (3) I summarise some of the observations available in grammars:

54

Fran Colman

V

(2)

loc

\

Ν

erg/abs

D

Ν

loc

\

Ν

Μ

Ν

Ν and

(3)

aefter

Jjissum

gefeohte

com

micel

sumerlida

to

Readingum

Quirk-Wrenn (1957: § 141): — generally prepositions come in front of "items with which they are grammatically and notionally connected"; — pronouns may precede prepositions, especially those of more than one syllable: e. g. him betweoh; — a preposition may come after a noun "when it enables the preposition to stand before a verb form": e. g. pa gatu him to belocen hcefde; — prepositions follow verbs "less commonly": e. g. Oswoldhim com to (this construction is very fully dealt with in Wende 1915 and Mitchell 1978). Mitchell and Robinson (1982: § 123): — "Prepositions often follow the word they govern ...". Mitchell (1985: § 1062): — "Most of the words usually called prepositions can be used in both [pre-position and post-position]"; — "pre-position before nouns and demonstratives ..., and the relatives se and 'sepe ...";

What positions fit in?

55

— "post-position after adverbs like her and par ... and the relatives pa and se'pe"·, — "both pre-position before and post-position after personal pronouns used alone ...". Allen (1980: 54) refers to an optional process of inversion of preposition and object in Old English, quite common with pronouns, but quite rare with full noun phrases. The extent to which Old English might be a postpositional language relates to wider generalisations about word order. Consider Greenberg Universal number 4 (Greenberg 1963): "With overwhelmingly greater than chance frequency languages with normal SOV order are postpositional". Whatever analyses might be proposed about underlying, or basic, word order, Old English offers plenty of evidence of surface verb-final clauses, notably in subordinate clauses (e. g. pas pe he rice hafde, Rositzke 1940: AD 875), and in clauses with pronoun objects (e. g. and he hyne to cinge gehalgode, Rositzke 1940: AD 854, which also illustrates the verbfinal tendency for coordinated main clauses), but even in main clauses (with no initial conjunction), as illustrated in (4):

He

lytle

werode

unedel ice

aefter wudum

for

Notice here the interruption of subject and clause-final verb by two circumstantials (one of which is an A(dverb)), and by a participant, not

56

Fran Colman

normally possible in a non-verb-final language such as Present-day English (the word-order patterns for the various types of Old English clauses are, of course, well documented, cf., e. g., Traugott (1972), Bean (1983), Mitchell (1985), and literature on changes in English word-order, e. g. Vennemann (1975), Colman (1988). On types of adverbial interruptions of arguments possible in an SVO language, such as Present-day English, cf. e. g. Anderson (1976: chapter 3), Colman (1988: 33)). Expectations, in the light of the Greenberg Universal cited above, of postpositions in Old English, might therefore seem to be gratified by the sorts of observations noted under (3) above. But two further observations — neither of them new — immediately offer themselves: a) several formatives which function as prepositions function also as adverbs and/or verb prefixes; and b) not all Old English prepositions are recorded in postposition. These observations are not unrelated, and raise questions about the function of formatives which appear to function as adpositions in postposition; and so about the extent to which Old English is a postpositional language. "That there are in OE prepositions and adverbs and that some words can be used in both functions is an acknowledged commonplace", remarks Mitchell (1985: § 1061) in the section headed "Prepositions, Adverbs, Prepositional Adverbs, Postpositions, Separable Prefixes, or Inseparable Prefixes?" (also part of the title of Mitchell 1978). What may, at least at first, be taken as decisive for distinguishing between prepositions and adverbs is the presence or absence of a governed case-marked NP: so, to functions as a preposition in hu he to mannum com (Mitchell 1985: § 1061), but as an adverb in cume to and drince (Mitchell 1985: § 1063). Identifying a verb prefix is a little more tricky (and we know not to look to manuscript word-division as a reliable clue). With respect to separable prefixes, I agree with Denison's disclaimer of their relevance for Old English, and his suggestion that "the most economical and informative description of a particle + verb string in OE will be that it is either a compound verb (i. e., inseparable) or a particular arrangement of preposition or adverb and verb" (Denison 1981: 57). But what of inseparable ones? Is the casemarked NP governed by the formative or by the verb, for instance? Mitchell (1985: § 1065) takes, for example, the accusative NP in (5) (5)

ofereode pa cepelinga beam steap stanhlido (Beow)

as governed by the prefix ofer (which is therefore taken as prepositional), because gan is an intransitive verb. On the other hand, one would agree

What positions fit in?

57

with Mitchell (1978: 257) that prefixation can produce "a new morphosemantic unit", allowing interpretation of ofergan as a different lexical item from gan: a transitive, rather than an intransitive verb. This is also in accord with Denison's conclusion with respect to two (generally) transitive verbs, slean and ofslean: "But since ofslean is syntactically a single and (normally) indivisible item, it is not helpful to give a separate syntactic description of the prefix" (Denison 1981: 52). But I will return later to possible lexicalisation of prefixed word-forms. In summary, we can start from the hypothesis that a formative functions as an adverb in the absence of an overt governed case. In the presence of a non-nominative case-marked NP, we have to ask whether this case is governed or not, and if governed, whether by the formative or not. As I have suggested, the ambiguity of formatives with respect to their function is not unconnected to the claim that not all adpositions are recorded in postposition. Wende (1915) lists several recorded only in preposition (though of course he acknowledges the incompleteness of his data): e. g. cer, andlang, begeondan, onforan, op, purh, toeacan, under, upp. (A question raised by Olga Fischer at the Symposium would be worth pursuing further, i. e. whether any adpositions occur only in postposition when collocated with a particular verb: for instance, does ongean always occur in postposition with cuman, as it does in e. g. (12) and (14) below? I don't yet know the answer to this; but certainly, other directional verbs collocate with ongean in preposition, as in e. g. and da woldon ferian nordweardes ... ongen pa scipu (Rositzke 1940: A D 894); and the same adposition occurs in postposition with non-directional verbs, as in e. g. (13) and (15) below). Let us look further at purh, for instance. Now, Bosworth — Toller: 1077 cite in Duru, de ic wees purh hider onsended, where the "preposition follows the governed word"; but this, of course, is simply an instance of postposition after a relative (cf. again Mitchell 1985: § 1062). But wa dam de hig purh cumap (Lk., Skt., 17.1, glossing uoe illi per quem veniunt, Bosworth — Toller: 1077) has non-nominative hig followed by purh (despite the order of the Latin). Is this an instance of purh as a postposition? We are drawn back to the ambiguity of the formatives. purh is cited as a verb prefix by Bosworth — Toller: 1080 in Swylce hit seaxes ecg purhwode (cf. purhwadan, 'to penetrate'); why must it be regarded as a postposition in the former example? (Note that both cuman and wadan may be subcategorised as directional verbs.)

58

Fran Colman

Β.

Postpositional analysis of data

To address the question of the extent of postpositions in Old English, I begin by analysing as postpositional a sample of clauses with a sample of formatives which appear, by virtue of the presence of a potentially governed non-nominative case, to function as postpositions. The morphological case governed by the formative in preposition is given here alongside the citation form. The analyses are presented without comment in this section (in trees representing dependency case analyses), and form the basis for discussion in the subsequent section. Fram ( + dative as preposition):

(6)

Ν

Ν

Ν

He

hine

forwraec mancynne fram

(Bosworth- Toller: 330,

Beow)

What positions fit in?

(Bosworth-Toller: 340)

(gewitene is analysed as an adjective derived from a verb)

(Wende 1915: 112)

59

60

Fran Colman

(9)

\)a.

Jje

(Wende 1915: 112)

(Wende 1915: 112)

him

from

noldon

What positions fit in?

(11)

Da

fordwan

se

deofol ... him

fram

(Wende 1915: 112)

Ongean ( + dative or accusative as preposition) (12)

V

erg/abs

Donne

storm

(Bosworth-Toller: 751)

cyme

minum

gaeste

ongegn

61

62

(13)

Fran Colman

V

( B o s w o r t h - Toller: 751)

(Rositzke 1940: AD 879)

What positions fit in?

(15)

Him

bij}

ongean

(Bosworth-Toller: 751)

Aifter ( + dative as preposition

(16)

less usually accusative) V

and Rositzke 1940: A D 879)

63

64

Fran Colman

(Wende 1915: 108)

(19)

(Wende 1915: 108)

V

What positions fit in?

65

To ( + dative, genitive, accusative as preposition: dative most common, Mitchell 1985: § 1178)

(20)

erg/abs

Ν

and

ι

Cantware

(Rositzke 1940: A D 832)

(Rositzke 1940: A D 901)

him

to

cierdon

66

Fran Colman

(22)

erg/abs

and

him

com

(Rositzke 1940: A D 894)

(23)

(Rositzke 1940: A D 887)

micel

eaca

What positions fit in?

(Wende 1915: 121)

(25)

erg/abs

sua

us

(Wende 1915: 121)

unnytte geöohtas

to

cumaö

67

68

(26)

Fran Colman

V

(Rositzke 1940: AD 897)

What positions fit in?

Wid ( + dative, genitive or accusative as preposition)

(27)

gefeaht

and (Rositzke 1940: A D 835)

(28)

erg/abs

and

J)a

Francan

(Rositzke 1940: A D 882)

him

wiö gefuhton

69

70

Fran Colman

(30)

and

him

(Rositzke 1940: A D 872)

wiö

gefeaht

What positions fit in? (31)

and

hie

him

wiö

namon

(Rositzke 1940: AD 867) (32)

öaet

aht

wiö

haefdest

( B o s w o r t h - Toller: 1248)

Ymb ( 4 - a c c u s a t i v e , o c c a s i o n a l l y d a t i v e , a s p r e p o s i t i o n ) (33)

V

D a weorod

öe

(Bosworth-Toller: 1294)

him

ferdon

and

stodon

72

Fran Colman

(34)

V

(Bosworth-Toller: 1294)

(35)

V

(Bosworth-Toller: 1294)

What positions fit in?

C.

73

Alternative analyses

The analyses presented above take the non-nominative case as governed by the formative, which is therefore interpreted as a postposition. One thing we might note about these analyses is the extent to which tangling (crossing of dependency and association lines) occurs in the tree-representations (cf. (8), (14), (15), (19), (22), (23), (24), (25), (26), (29), (30), (31), (32), and (35) above). Now, tangling illustrates the interruption of arguments within a constituent. Various types of interruption may be acceptable to a particular language or not. Arguments within a clause in Present-day English, for instance, may be interrupted only under certain circumstances: by a circumstantial argument, provided the verb is not final, as in, for instance, Fred furtively ran to the woods (where furtively constitutes an "interruption" under analyses which exclude VP adverbs); but not in *Fredfurtively ran, where nothing follows the verb, or in *Fred to the woods ran (furtively), with a participant argument interrupting subject and verb phrase (cf. again, Anderson (1976: chapter 3); Colman (1988: 33), cited in section A above. The account I give here is, superficially at least, probably too restrictive. In e. g. Fran slowly drank, grammatically, if not otherwise, plausible, a circumstantial interrupts the subject and clause-final verb. Here, however, elliptical omission of postverbal arguments may be invoked). But interpolation bans on V(erb) P(hrase)s and PPs in Present-day English prevent interruption of verb and NP in the former, and preposition and NP in the latter (in other words, the constituents VP and PP are continuous, with immediate linear association of governor with governee); so, I take the following as unacceptable: * Miranda smashed maliciously Erica's machine, *Su fled to silently the stables. In the representations in section Β of each of the Old English examples cited, tangling reflects interruption of adposition and putative governee — sometimes by more than one argument. But in a language which overtly marks surface case relations, the governee may be separated from its governor while the association between the two is unambiguously marked by the inflectional morphology. In itself, then, tangling as represented in the formulations in section Β above may not give rise to concern. But one could argue that this type of interruption, along with reduction of inflectional case marking, contributes to word-order change

74

Fran Colman

(cf. e. g. Colman 1988); and that in the Old English period the degree of syncretism in expression of inflectional case renders less plausible analyses involving so much invocation of tangling. The observation that most of the NPs followed by a formative in the examples in section Β are pronouns raises the issue of analysis of Old English pronoun objects of verbs as clitics — specifically proclitics, to account for their frequent occurrence in pre-verbal position. A generalisation that a pronoun governed by another word-form will be procliticised to its governor would allow application of this analysis to the relative positions of prepositions and their objects: preposition — noun, but pronoun — preposition. But I remain unconvinced by a clitic analysis of pronouns in relation to the data under discussion here for two main reasons. The first has to do with problems of defining "clitic", specifically in relation to pronoun objects of verbs; and the second derives from the morphological forms of the pronouns which are followed by ambiguously adpositional formatives. It is clear that Old English pronouns do not conform to criteria for characterising genuine clitics, as in Italian:. (i) if pre-governor position is supposed to identify clitic pronouns in Old English, then putative clitic forms correspond to referentially identical non-clitic forms; and apropos of this, there is no evidence for Old English of whether or not a form with supposed clitic function is prohibited from prosodic emphasis through stress: for instance, the preverbal pronoun (accusative) in and hine geflymde (Rositzke 1940: AD 1016) has the same (orthographic) form as the post-verbal one in and sloh hine (Rositzke 1940: AD 1012); (ii) forms identical with putative clitic forms occur in isolation, after a preposition, or separated from a verb form; for instance, the dativemarked pronoun in pcet he him hold hlaford beon wolde (Rositzke 1940: AD 1014); (iii) the same form is found not consistently to the left or right of the supposed host, but on either side indifferently (as illustrated in (i) above). I have here mapped observations about Old English pronouns onto characterisations of "special" clitics in Italian in Wanner (1987: 28 — 31), inviting the objection that, while forms of Old English pronouns may not fit these criteria, they may yet be "simple" clitics, whose central property is prosodic subordination "in intimate contact with a contiguous item of higher stress level, the host element" (Wanner 1987: 36). But aside from exemplification such as that in (ii) above, of a preverbal pronoun surely not in "intimate contact" with the verb, it would be impossible to

What positions fit in?

75

show which pronoun forms represent prosodically subordinated items. (However tentatively, I am tempted to cite data from Old English verse, while recognising both the potentially vicious circularity of basing reconstructions of phonology on reconstructions of metre based to a large extent on reconstructions of phonology ..., and a distinction to be drawn between metrical and prosodic patterns; but a line such as Ac wende hit him to wyrsan pinge (Sweet — Whitelock 1967: XXII 1.14), with alliteration identifying the stem syllables of the finite verb and the adjective as metrically prominent, might suggest at least metrical subordination of the adjacent pronouns, even though they follow the verb, that is, in nonproclitic position.) Moreover, if "simple" clitics reproduce the normal constituent arrangement pattern of a given language, as do prosodically subordinated Present-day English pronouns, then why is it "cliticness" of Old English pronouns which places them in pre-governor position (even in clause types where SVO might be expected)? In other words, if Old English pronouns are "simple" clitics, why do they sometimes (but not always) contravene the normal patterns of the language? Finally, it might be argued that given the variety of verbal object positions (for nouns) in Old English, corresponding largely with clause-type, the occurrence of pronouns both pre- and post-verbal simply reflects the normal constituent arrangement patterns. But in this case, there is no need, or evidence, for invoking the notion of clitic to account for serialisation of Old English pronouns. I will suggest below that the prevalence of pronominal forms (rather than nominal) in pre-formative position is significant for a different analysis. The most-cited proponent of clitic analysis for Old English pronouns has been van Kemenade (1984), who, while acknowledging that the wellknown properties of Romance clitics do not carry over to Old English personal pronouns, nevertheless argues that the latter have "some characteristics typical of clitics" (p. 105). And, given the influence of this claim, I want to spend a bit of time here considering some aspects of the arguments and analyses of data intended to support it. The general idea is that object pronouns occur on the left of their governing head (van Kemenade 1984: 106), although the occurrence of prepositions governing following pronouns is overtly omitted from the discussion. Van Kemenade (1984: 105 — 6) claims PP as an island in Old English, from which a personal pronoun can be extracted, as in pa wendon hi me heora bcec to, perhaps begging the question of government of me by to). Now although it seems plausible that light-weight arguments tend to be preposed (cf. further Colman 1988), this alone does not seem convincing enough to

76

Fran

Colman

classify such arguments as clitics, and further, I am not won over by putative evidence for significant pronoun-governor serialisation. The claims about Old English in the description of how clitics on COMP interact with the position of the finite verb in verb second languages (including Old English) seem to me not entirely supported by Old English data. Van Kemenade (1984: 102) says that embedded clauses with no complementiser have the finite verb in second position, as in, e. g., Eala pu min leofa man ic pe mid lufe secge ic hazbbe Godes engel ..., and formulates the following as a crucial question (p. 103): "Why does the verb move to second position in sentences that have no base-generated complementizer; alternatively why does a base-generated complementizer block verb movement?" Now this question, crucial as it would be if we could be sure about the validity of the claim about ordering of finite verbs in accordance with presence or absence of complementisers, seems to me to lack force in the face of the following observations. For one thing, I am not sure of any evidence that the clause ic hcebbe Godes engel ... (cited above) is an embedded clause, rather than a main clause in direct speech. Moreover, examples of Old English embedded clauses with verb second (or rather, following the subject) in the presence of a complementiser are not far to seek. A cursory search in Sweet —Whitelock (1967) throws up examples such as the following: XIII 1.3: Se Hcelend cwced pcet heofenan rice ware gelic sumum hiredes ealdre. XIII 1.37: gelome ic eow scede pcet heofenan rice getacnad pas andwerdan geladunge III.Ε 1.9: £)a scedon hi pcet dees hearperes wif sceolde acwelan III.Ε 1.18: da dohte he dcet he wolde gesecan helle godu and so on. I suspect that the claim for relationship in Old English between presence of a complementiser and verb-final order comes from forcing a nonexistent similarity between that language and Present-day German (where such a relationship indeed pertains. Consider, too, that the latter language does not have the ordering of pronoun object preceding the verb, common in the former). Also, some of the "clitic" properties claimed for Old English pronouns are not entirely convincing either as distinguishing them from Presentday English ones (presumably not to be analysed as clitics), or as borne out by the data. That Old English personal pronouns cannot be modified identifies them as clitics no more than does the same property of Present-

What positions fit in?

77

day personal pronouns (and cf. also Colman 1988: §2.4). That Old English pronouns cannot bear contrastive stress is evidenced only from their non-occurrence in alliterating positions in Old English verse. But I wonder about clauses such as Ond hiene pa Cynewulf in Andred adrcefde (Sweet — Whitelock 1967: I 1.4), where an object pronoun is placed in what by van Kemenade's, and others', account is interpretable as topic, or focus, position — and therefore plausibly associated with stress. I wonder, too, about the observation that "inversion" in main clauses fails if the subject is a pronoun: i. e. it remains in pre-verbal position even where the clause does not begin with the subject (van Kemenade 1984: 105). This failure of "inversion" is common after adverbial phrases, but not after pa and ne (and also, though not cited by van Kemenade, ponne). These clause-openers are regarded as somehow special. But, again, there are instances of adverbial phrases followed by pronoun subjects in main clauses, and, although these seem to be infrequent, it is also less common for (full) nominals to "invert" after complex adverbial phrases than after the simplex adverbs. Furthermore, pronoun subjects commonly follow verbs in the absence of any clause-initial adverb, e. g. Wees he se mon ... (Sweet-Whitelock 1967: X 11.22-3). Van Kemenade cites as the minimal property of clitics their absorption of the case feature of their head (1984: 107). Now, I'm not sure if I am on the right track here, but I suspect that the following observation runs counter to a clitic analysis of Old English pronouns. Most striking, and this is my second main reason for questioning clitic status for the pronouns, is the uniformity with which supposed postpositions co-occur with the dative case — even where the same formative functioning as a preposition normally governs another case. To borrow Greenberg's phrase (1963: cf. section A above), "with overwhelmingly greater than chance frequency", supposed postpositions occur with a dative-marked NP (and this is so not only for the very limited data presented here, but is confirmed by the Toronto Concordance, cf. Venezky — Healey 1980), even if the same formative in pre-position may govern, or even more commonly governs, accusative or genitive case. This suggests to me that the dative case in such instances may not reflect rectional government by the formative. In sum, van Kemenade's calling certain pronouns clitics (i. e. those in particular which occur in putative pre-position order) identifies a problem, but without resolving it. In the absence of independent evidence for cliticisation, and in the face of persistent dative marking in pronouns preceding formatives, the next step is to examine possible functions of the dative case in Old English.

78

Fran Colman

(a)

The dative case governed

Aside from being governed by prepositions, the dative case can be lexically governed by a verb, as an "indirect object" (cf. e. g. Mitchell 1985: § 1350). Verbs which govern the dative are typically verbs of 'giving' and of 'taking away', as exemplified in Mitchell (1985: § 1350): Agif me minne sunu, Hwcet la, cetbrced ic de pinne sune. To these we can add e. g.fultumian, and the verbs with 'dative of interest' cited in Mitchell (1985: § 1350), e. g. and him lac offrodon. The dative in him hearde oflireow (Mitchell 1985: § 1349) is also governed by the verb. Such governed datives are, naturally, participant arguments of the verb. The dative case can also be governed by declension-class words: nouns or adjectives. In, for instance, peah de heo mannum undancwurde sy, or and het poet hi xvceron to tacne dagum and gearum (Mitchell 1985: § 1355), the dative is governed by a noun. In is nu hellegeat belocen rihtwisum mannum (Mitchell 1985: § 1355), the dative NP is governed by an adjective, and all instances of the adjective gelic govern the dative. In such instances the dative functions as a constituent of noun or adjective phrases, the latter functioning as (members of) participant arguments of the verb.

(b)

The dative case ungoverned

Ungoverned dative-marked NPs in Old English can function adverbially, expressing accompaniment, manner, instrument, etc., as in ond he for don fcegre cende his lif betynde 7 geendade (Mitchell 1985: §1408). As such they would usually be circumstantial arguments of the verb. There is, though, another possible function of a circumstantial ungoverned dative, and that is what has been called the "ethic" dative. Whether or not Old English can be said to have an "ethic" function for the dative is questionable: indeed, Mitchell (1985: §§ 1352 — 3) denies any such thing for Old English. From what I can tell, the term "ethic" has been used rather variously in literature about structures in English and other languages. In general, though, some sort of "interest" is associated with ethic datives. Kellner (1892: §§ 191 - 2 ) cites as ethic datives (a) datives that "look like" reflexive pronouns, but are "always connected with intransitive verbs", as in e. g. xvceron him on Cent; and (b) datives which do not refer to the subjects of transitive verbs, as in e. g. Middle English Hure sinne du him forgiue. Mitchell (1985: § 1352) quotes the rather vague definition in

What positions fit in?

79

OED, s. v. ethical a. 3: "the dative when used to imply that a person, other than the subject or object, has an indirect interest in the fact stated". And the same work (§ 1353) mentions writers who "have described as 'ethic' those datives which refer to the subject or object of the sentence", but sees "little point in extending the definition to include persons directly involved in the action". This disclaimer appears in accord with the stipulation for ethic datives in German in Abraham (1973: 16), that the person categories of subject and "object" (predicative) must be different: so, for instance, *Ich bin mir ein Lehrer (Abraham 1973: 15) is unacceptable. Nevertheless, the dative pronoun in, for instance (40) below (gewat him ham sidian), co-referential with ergative, seems best analysed as an ethic. Perhaps non-co-referentiality may be a language-specific restriction, not applicable to Old English. For Abraham (1973: 11), only pronouns express ethic dative, e. g. in Das war dir ein Hauptspaß, as claimed also for Latin, in, for instance, Gildersleeve — Lodge (1968: §351). Abraham (1973: 12) further identifies ethic datives as optional for the sentence, in the sense of a logical proposition: the amount of information lost is its marking as a dialogue situation. This would fit with an analysis confined to syntax, of ethic datives as circumstantial arguments of verbs. A tightened definition might be extrapolated for ethic dative, such as: "a circumstantial realising the Case Relation locative (that is, the Case Relation associated with location of the "interest"), whose head is a verb indifferent as to whether or not its nucleus is agentive (requiring ergative)". But however "ethic" is defined, I would like to keep open the possibility of interpreting some instances of dative case as (ungoverned) circumstantial locatives, and suggest that, whatever name we are to give them, some instances of dative NPs in Old English are best interpreted in this way. This discursus on possible functions of dative-marked NPs arose because of the consistent dative inflections on NPs which precede formatives which may be adpositions. Let me now try to tie in the remarks about the functions of dative case with the occurrence of dative NPs in the selected data analysed in section Β above. Given that the dative in Old English can be governed by something other than an adposition, we can ask whether each dative NP is governed by the formative, or by something else. And given the presence of ungoverned datives in Old English, we can ask of each dative N P whether it is indeed governed at all, or possibly ungoverned. The observation that an N P preceding a formative is always dative has (silently) presupposed interpretation of some instances of formatives as

80

Fran Colman

verb-prefixes; and this returns us to the ambiguity of formatives with respect to function as prefixes or adverbs, cited in section A above. It is true that the formatives I am examining here occur after NPs marked for accusative, as, for instance, in the following: — — — — — —

sona heo done fefer framadep (Bosworth — Toller: 330) Hie heora here on tu todceldon (Bosworth —Toller: 995) He done hlaf tobrcec on twa (Bosworth — Toller: 993) ... done hit wind toblcewp (Bosworth — Toller: 993) His broder grip eall ceftercwcep (Bosworth — Toller: 11) Hi da sona afterridon idelum fcerelde (secuti sunt eos per viam (Bosworth - Toller: 11)) — Gif ge hit willap afterspyrian (Bosworth —Toller: 11) — He da discas ymbcerde (Bosworth — Toller: 1295) — Swa swa lyft and lagu land ymbclyppap (Bosworth —Toller: 1295) But nonsense would result from analyses taking the accusative NPs as governed by at least some of the formatives just cited: e. g. done fefer as governed by fram in a PP. The accusative would seem to be governed by the complex (prefixed) verb; the formative does not, in these instances, function as a preposition governing an overt case in the clause. This finds support, too, in the following observations. As far as I can tell, accusative NPs followed by ambiguous formatives occur commonly when the formative is followed immediately by the verb; and they are nominal as well as pronominal (compare the mainly pronominal dative-marked NPs preceding the formatives in section B). Moreover, sequences of formative + verb are followed, as well as preceded, by accusative NPs (which may be pronominal: see again the discussion of pronouns as "clitics", above), as in, for instance: — Donne he framatihp hine (Bosworth — Toller: 330) — Fromcerr iorre din from us (averte iram tuam a nobis) (Bosworth — Toller: 340) — Hi tocurfon done lichaman on manugu sticceo (Bosworth — Toller: 994) — Du tobradest heorte mine (Bosworth — Toller: 993) — Saturnus hcefd ymb pritig wintergerimes weoruld ymbcyrred (Bosworth - Toller: 1295) — Se rodor alee dag uton ymbhwyrfd ealne disne middangeard (Bosworth - Toller: 1296) — Engel ymbcerde diet water (Bosworth — Toller: 1295).

What positions fit in?

81

The formative wid, which can govern accusative or genitive, as well as dative, as a preposition, immediately precedes verbs in constructions with dative NPs, as in: — Da wipcwcep him se engel (Bosworth — Toller: 1250) — He begann to wipcwedene dam geleafan (Bosworth — Toller: 1250), as well as in constructions containing no (participant) non-nominative case, e. g.: — As Harold his brodor widcwceö ( + i hure ouer hure. (0531) The sentence connector appears between the verb and the object in a clause with an ellipsis of the subject. This is a position which neither coordinators nor subordinators but only conjuncts can occupy. We can only assume that the other clause connectors do not appear in this position, but, of course, there is no firm evidence for this. The second criterion concerns the respective positions of the two linked clauses. Clauses linked by coordinators and conjuncts are fixed in their respective positions. The clause containing the coordinator or conjunct cannot precede the other clause. Prototypical subordinators, on the other hand, allow this. Modern English for, as I have shown above, behaves in this respect as a coordinator. In Ancrene Wisse a complex picture emerges. In the vast majority of cases the /or-clause follows the clause with which it is linked, with one or two exceptions. (27) Me cnut his gurdel to habben poht of a ping; ah ure lauerd, for he nalde neauer for^eο ten us, dude mearke of purlunge in ure munegunge i ba twa his honden. (2425) (28) pis dude ure lauerd us pe weren se seke of sunne & swa isulet perwid pet na ping ne mahte healen us ne cleansin us bute his blod ane; for swa he hit walde: his luue maked us bead prof — iblescet beo he eaure! (2407) In excerpt (27), the /or-clause is embedded in the clause with which it is linked, immediately after the subject. As far as the content of excerpt (28) is concerned, the /or-clause can plausibly provide a reason both for

Clauses of reason in

Ancrene fVisse 215

the preceding and the following clause. The punctuation supplied by Shepherd (1985) suggests that he takes it to refer to the preceding clause. In Tolkien's (1962) edition all the clauses are separated by periods. Tolkien thus avoids having to disambiguate the construction. I have to leave this problem unresolved, but example (27) suffices as evidence that/or-clauses are not immovable. Even though the position following the superordinate clause is strongly preferred, other positions also occur. Both the Oxford English Dictionary and the Middle English Dictionary list several examples in which /or-clauses precede their superordinate clauses or are embedded within them. Example (1) quoted above also falls into this category and is therefore repeated here. (1)

pe knihtes, for ha spec pus, charden euchan a^ein. Marg.(l)8/12; quoted after MED)

(1225, St

(29) And for he was a straunger, somewhat she Likede hym the bet. (cl 386, Chaucer LGW 1075; quoted after MED) (30) And for the time shall not seeme tedious He tell thee what [etc.], (1593, Shaks. 3 Hen. VI. Ill i.9; quoted after OED) All the for /«'-clauses follow the clauses they are linked with. This conforms with the analysis of this clause connector as a conjunct. The three purh />e/-clauses also follow the clauses they are linked with, but this figure is so small that no predictions can be made about how likely or unlikely the position in front of the matrix clause would have been. The for pi /»^/-clauses, finally, in four cases precede and in one case follow the clauses they are linked with. The following two examples may suffice: (31) Ah for f}i J>et sum mahte, purh to muche bitternesse, fallen in to unhope, Magdaleine, pe spealed tures hehnesse, is to Marie ifeiet, purh hwet is bitacnet hope of heh mearci & of heouene blisse. (1417) (32) Deuleset, jet he weped to me wid euene sarest, & seid Godd forget him for J)et he ne sent him na muchel secnesse. (1818) In (31) the linked clause precedes and in (32) it follows the clause it is linked with. Clauses introduced by the more prototypical subordinator pah are likewise not sequentially fixed in relation to their superordinate clause. 12 out of 21 instances appear in front of their superordinate, three are embedded within them, and six follow them. These patterns are illustrated by examples (33) to (35).

216

Andreas Η. Jucker

(33) t>ah he seo oder here idele gomenes & wundres bi pe weie, he ne edstont nawt, as foles dod, ah ... (0330) (34) & swa longe ha mähte forhorin hire wid opre men pet, J?ah ha walde a^ein cumen, he ne kepte hire nawt. (2320) (35) hit leaued in his secnesse & nis per bute forkeoruen hit, J)ah hit punche sar Godd; (0908) Table 4 gives the results for all clause connectors under investigation in Ancrene Wisse in tabulated form. Table 4. Relative position of linked clause position of linked clause for pi for purh pet for pi pet Pah

preceding

medial

(I)9

1

4 12

3

following 9 55 3 1 6

The third test establishing the degree of subordinating force of a clause connector establishes whether it can be immediately preceded by a conjunction. There are three relevant examples. One is exemplified by excerpt (36). Here for pi is preceded by ant. In (31) above and in (37) for pi pet is preceded by ah. (36) pe deade nis namare of scheome pen of menske, of heard pen of nesche, for he ne feled nowder; & for ]?i ne ofearned he nowder wa ne wunne (0529) (37) Ich walde, he seid to his leofmon, pet tu were i mi luue oder allunge cald, oder hat mid alle; ah for J)i Jjet tu art ase wlech bitweone twa, nowder hat ne cald, pu makest me to wleatien & ich wulle speowe pe ut, bute pu wurde hattre. (2625) The subordinator pah is also regularly preceded by a coordinator as in example (38). (38) ah J>ah ha were iweddet him, ha mahte iwurden se unwreast (2318) In parts 6 and 7 of Ancrene Wisse, the conjunction for is never preceded by a coordinator, but examples (29) and (30) above, in which for is

Clauses of reason in Ancrene Wisse

217

preceded by and, suggest that this is merely a coincidence. In this corpus, however, there is no firm evidence as to how likely or unlikely the author of Ancrene Wisse would have been to use for with a coordinator. The next test considers whether a particular clause connector can link other elements apart from clauses, such as verb phrases, prepositional phrases or simple nouns. None of the four clause connectors I am concerned with at the moment is used in such a way, even though both for and for pi are used not only as clause connectors but also in their original function as preposition and prepositional phrase. In these cases, as exemplified in (39), the demonstrative pronoun pi of for pi does not refer to the preceding clause, and the phrase cannot be glossed as 'therefore'. Instead it has to be glossed as 'on this account'. (39) Mi feader, j e f hit mei beon, speare me ed tis time; pi wil pah & nawt min eauer beo iuordet. His deorewurde feader for £>i ne forber him nawt, ah ... (1108) The last test likewise does not apply to our examples because they do not link subordinate clauses. Table 5 summarises the above findings on the basis of Table 3 above, indicating the gradient from conjunct to subordinator including the two features word order and verb modality that are specific to Old English. The following seven criteria are marked in the table: (a) (b) (c) (d) (e) (f) (g)

It is fixed to clause initial position. It does not require subjunctive mood. It does not occur with subordinate word order. Its clause must follow the clause it is linked with. It cannot be preceded by a conjunction. It can link elements other than clauses. It can link subordinate clauses.

Table 5: Conjunct-subordination gradients in Ancrene Wisse a conjunct subordinators

for jji for for pi pet pah

b

c

d

e

f

g

—

+

_

_

_

+ +

+ +

+

+ +

-

-

-

+

-

_

_

+

-

+

-

-

-

-

_ -

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Andreas Η. Jucker

(Table 5 does not include purh pet, for which too little evidence is available.) Criteria (a) and (d) offer a convenient distinction between conjuncts and subordinators. Only conjuncts but not subordinators can appear in non-clause initial position, and only subordinate clauses but not conjunct clauses can precede the clause they are linked with. The conjunction pah is more clearly marked as a subordinator than either for or for pi pet because it always requires a verb in the subjunctive mood. The word order facts, criterion (c), do not offer very strong evidence. Verb-last word orders, which are now obsolete, were disappearing fast at the time of Ancrene Wisse. In parts 6 and 7, there are no clear cases of verb-last word orders either in /or-clauses or in for pi />e/-clauses. The two instances of pah-clauses with the verb in final position consist of intransitive verbs with a clitic adverb preceding the finite verb. These cases cannot be regarded as evidence for subordinate word order because the verb happens to be in second position as well if the clitic is disregarded (see above examples (10) and (11)). Apart from the word order facts and the possibility of marking subordination by the subjunctive, the overall picture is largely that which obtains in Modern English. For pi is categorised exactly as Quirk et al. have categorised therefore, and for pi pet corresponds to because. The one difference lies in the categorisation of for. Quirk et al. put for into the category of subordinator while pointing out that it is not as obviously a subordinator as because or if As it is used in Ancrene Wisse, it is more clearly subordinate because of its greater movability within its subordinate clause, and because there is evidence, albeit not in Ancrene Wisse itself (cf. examples (29) and (30) above), that it could occur with a preceding coordinator. Thus, the syntactic facts that can be used to characterise subordination do not apply to all subordinators to the same extent, as can easily be seen in Table 5. They all share their movability within their subordinate clause, they are fixed to clause initial position, and they can be preceded by a coordinator. They differ in that pah requires subjunctive mood. The interesting point emerging from these findings is the fact that the clause connectors introducing clauses of reason are subordinators to different degrees in Ancrene Wisse. The conjunction for, which had only just emerged as a conjunction at the time of Ancrene Wisse, shared then, as it does now, several features with coordinators and conjuncts. In spite of what one might expect of a clause connector occupying an intermediate

Clauses of reason in Ancrene Wisse

219

stage between parataxis and hypotaxis right from the beginning of its existence, it has not moved in the direction of greater hypotaxis. On the contrary, it has moved in the direction of greater parataxis. According to Quirk et al.'s table of the coordination-conjunct-subordination gradients reproduced above as Table 3, it has lost its movability and its possibility of being preceded by a coordinator, both of which are characteristics of conjuncts and coordinators. And it has done all this at a time when there are signs that it is slowly becoming obsolete itself, being largely restricted to formal and written contexts. Notes 1. David Denison, U d o Fries, Tom Lundskaer-Nielsen, Robert P. Stockwell and Susan Wright read earlier drafts of this paper and provided very helpful comments. They should not, of course, be held responsible for its contents. 2. Cf., for instance, Bruce Mitchell (1978: 393, 1984: 271) and references there. 3. Parataxis and hypotaxis are often taken to be synonymous to coordination and subordination, but I take the latter terms to be special cases of the former. Parataxis includes both syndetic (or linked) and asyndetic (or unlinked) coordination, but it also includes other cases of the juxtaposition of units of equal status, such as appositions or tag questions. The last two types of constructions are distinguished from asyndetic coordination by the fact that they could not be overtly linked by a coordinator without a change of meaning. In the same way hypotaxis includes both syndetic and asyndetic subordination as well as other cases of hypotactic relations, such as the embedding of one phrase in another, which are not and could not be overtly marked as hypotactic (cf. Quirk et al. 1985: 918 f.). 4. My analysis is based on parts six and seven of Ancrene Wisse (the Anchoresses' Rule). References are to Geoffrey Shepherd's edition [1985], which uses the MS Corpus Christi College Cambridge 402 (MS C C C C 402). 5. Cf. in particular Dobson (1962, 1966, 1976). 6. Cf. Mitchell (1985: 694, 7 1 0 - 1 3 , passim.). 7. For pi not in clause initial position. 8. Cf. e.g. Quirk et al. (1985: 9 2 1 - 9 2 8 ) . 9. Ambiguous case. Cf. example (28) above.

References Dobson, Eric John 1962 "The affiliations of the manuscripts of the Ancrene Wisse", in: Norman Davis — Charles Leslie Wrenn (eds.), English and medieval studies presented to J.R.R. Tolkien. London: Allen & Unwin 1 2 8 - 1 6 3 . 1966 "The date and composition of Ancrene Wisse", Proceedings of the British Academy 52: 1 8 1 - 2 0 8 . 1976 The origins of Ancrene Wisse. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Kubouchi, Tadao 1975 "Word-order in the Ancrene Wisse". Hitotsubashi Journal of Arts and Sciences 16: 1 1 - 2 8 .

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MED = Middle English Dictionary. 1952— Edited by Hans Kurath and Sherman M. Kuhn. Michigan: University of Michigan Press. Mitchell, Bruce 1964 "Syntax and word-order in The Peterborough Chronicle 1122 — 1154", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 65: 113 — 144. 1978 "Old English od pat adverb?" Notes and Queries 223: 3 9 0 - 3 9 4 . 1984 "The origin of Old English conjunctions: Some problems", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.), Historical syntax. Berlin: Mouton, 271—299. 1985 Old English syntax. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press. OED = Oxford English Dictionary. 1888 — 1933 Edited by James Murray et al. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Quirk, Randolph — Sidney Greenbaum — Geoffrey Leech — Jan Svartvik 1985 A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman. Shepherd, Geoffrey (ed.) 1959 Ancrene Wisse. Parts six and seven. London — Edinburgh: Nelson & Sons. [1985] [Revised ed. Exeter: University of Exeter Press]. Tolkien, J. R. R. (ed.) 1962 The English text of the Ancrene Riwle. Ancrene Wisse (Early English Text Society 249) London: Oxford University Press. van Kemenade, Ans 1987 Syntactic case and morphological case in the history of English. Dordrecht: Foris.

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time from Late Old English to Early Middle English Veronika Kniezsa

In a previous paper (Kniezsa 1986) I already tried to discuss adverbs of time expressed by cases. The examples were taken from four texts of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, and since there were about five thousand examples of interest, heeding Prof. Enkvist's warning that this would prove unmanageable, I have restricted the analysis to the expression py(s) (ylcan) geare which appeared both as a simple case form and as a prepositional phrase with on. The result suggested that the relationship between case and prepositional phrase is not a simple replacement but — at least in the case of the above-mentioned phrases especially in the Second Continuation of the Peterborough Chronicle (1132 — 1154) — a special syntactic complementation. Since the publication of my paper Prof. Mitchell's Old English Syntax has been available, helping me to find a suitable framework for the treatment of the vast and interesting material offered by the texts of the Chronicle. Prof. Mitchell (1985) has defined the problems concerning the prepositions in three questions: a) How often is it impossible to tell which case an Old English preposition governs because the form of the noun or pronoun is ambiguous? b) Are there Old English prepositions which begin by taking one case and end by taking more than one? c) Can any increase in the use of prepositions be detected in the Old English period? I shall arrange my material according to these questions with a slight change in their sequence. Looking at Tables 1 and 2 representing the data it seems logical to try to answer first the question whether there can be observed any increase of prepositional phrases which — one would assume — should be accompanied by a decrease of the synthetic forms. Comparing the relevant figures in Table 1, we see that where adverbs of time are concerned there is an absolute increase in the number of adverbs expressed by cases, maybe against usual expectations. If we take the count of Text A as 100%, this being the earliest of the versions, it should have contained the most examples for simple cases. However,

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Table 1. Adverb of time expressed by cases Case

A

C

D

Ε

PCh

Accusative Instrumental Dative Genitive Mixed form

94:21% 83:19 7: 1 74:17

75:13% 97:16 7: 1 93:16 2: 0

100:17% 79:14 10: 2 78:14 5: 1

88:15% 73:12 14: 3 82:14 5: 1

50:10% 12: 2 7: 1 82:17 15: 3

258:58%

274:47%

273:48%

262:44%

167:33%

Total

Table 2. Adverb of time expressed by prepositional phrases Case 63:14% 25: 6 94:21 3: 1

Accusative Instrumental Dative Genitive Mixed form Total

185:42%

92:16% 26: 4 186:32 4: 1 2: 0

89:15% 3: 1 209:36 2: 0 1: 0

73:12% 58:10 187:31 6: 1 11: 2

66:13% 42: 9 167:33

310:53%

304:52%

335:56%

332:67%

57:12

Table 3. Accusative case/prepositional phrase Construction

A

C

D

Ε

PCh

1. Prep + N. 2. Adj. + N. 3. Num. + N. 4. Prep. + Pron. 5. Pron. + N. 6. Pron. + Adj. + N.

-/24 5/ 1 59/20 -/12 30/ 2 / 4

—/29 6/11 47/27 -/ 6 15/15 7/ 4

—/33 4/ 7 64/21 -/ll 27/15 5/ 2

—/32 7/ 2 64/19 -/12 9/ 6 8/ 2

—/40 5/ 3 19/ 2

Total

94/63

75/92

100/89

88/73

50/64

1/

-/ 6 11/11 13/22

Table 4. Genitive case/prepositional phrase Construction 1. Adj.,N,numb 2. Adj. + N. 3. Num. + N. 4. Pron. 5. Pron. + N. 6. Pron.Adj.N.

7/ 1/ 30/3 28/ 8/

Total

74/3

-

/

-

-

- / -

/ -

4/ 4 2/ 5/ 8/ 70/ 5 9/10

93/4

79/2

82/6

98/19

8/ 2/ 29/4 37/ 17/ -

/

10/ 3/ 28/2 16/ 122

- /

50/6 22/ 9/

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time

223

Table 5. Instrumental case/prepositional phrase Construction 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.

Adj.,N. Prep. + Pron. Adj. + N. Num. + N. Pron. + . Pron. + Adj. + .

Total

— /

—

-n 3 2/3/17/ 9 61/83/22

— /

—

-/12

21-

i/-/45

5/5/10/10 77/ —

-n 3/3/13/2 58/-

6117/ 7 45/-

97/22

79/3

73/52

4/-

1/—/32 4/2/4/10 V 12/42

Table 6. Dative case/prepositional phrase Construction 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

N. Adj. + N. Num. + N. Prep. + Pron. Pron. + N. Pron. + IndPr + N Pron. + Adj. + N

Total

1/31 -/15 6/ 5 —/19 —/16

35 18 7/ 8 - / 26 - / 65

- /

- /

- /

2/ 34 8 4 5/ - / 16 1/ 72 " /

39

1/ 1/ 39

4/ 2/ 32

7/185

10/205

10/186

- / -

- / -

-/10

- /

7/94

43 7 8/ 7 - / 28 _ / 81

- /

47 1 2/ 1 - / 23 4/ 77

- /

_/ /

- /

-

- /

18

6/167

both Texts C and D (and the latter has a considerable portion written in the 11th century) show a 6% increase, Text Ε though a mere 1.5%, still more than Text A; i. e. the increase in the length of the texts, even if added later, still show a productive use of the synthetic forms. It is only the 11 — 12th century part of the Peterborough Chronicle where we find a dramatic drop in the number of adverbial case forms, having only 65% compared to the 100% of Text A. However, if we compare the proportions of cases and prepositional phrases, we notice a steady increase of the latter. In Text A cases represent more than 50% of all adverbs of time. In Texts C, D, and Ε it is already somewhat less than half, while in the portion marked as PCh only one third. The analysis of the cases shows that to express temporal relationships all the oblique cases were involved: accusative: duration of time ('timein-which'), instrumental: point of time ('time-at-which') together with dative for those items without special instrumental marker. These two (acc.-instr./dat.) represented the contrasting meanings inherited from Indo-European. The genitive had a variety of meanings due to the

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manifold functions of the case itself on the one hand and to its composite character on the other, (e. g., because of the early syncretism of some of the Indo-European case endings it had absorbed some other cases both in forms and meaning, e. g. the Indo-European ablative, etc.). The examples of the earlier texts (A, C, D, E) show that the accusative and instrumental dative were the important temporal markers. There is a slight increase in the proportion of the dative especially in Texts D and E, which would only be expectable, by analogy to or generalising a more productive case, the instrumental counting as a preserved archaism. The genitive seems to be a marginal form, leading Traugott (1972) to say that it actually was an archaic form in Old English, restricted to set phrases. However, PCh shows a surprising increase in the genitive, and even more surprising to the expense of the instrumental/dative (in earlier portions the genitive appears as a synonym or modification of the accusative, "defining the time within which something happens" (Mitchell 1985: § 1400)); pas (ylcan) geares became a standard phrase in all three parts of the latest portions, "perhaps the Gen. stresses the implication of 'sometime in that year'" (Mitchell 1985: § 1400), appearing side by side with py (ylcan) geare, commonly used in the earlier texts, pisses geares is added to the new genitive phrases. In the earlier texts pis occurred only in prepositional phrases: on pys (ylcan) geare; the appropriate form of pcet was used in synthetic constructions. The productivity of the genitive seems to be greatest in the early 12th century, the copied part of PCh (1070 — 1121) providing adverbial genitives not used earlier in Old English. Mustanoja (1960) described this as a growing tendency for Middle English. Probably it can be explained by the syncretism of the remnants of Old English case markers. The classical Old English dative can be described as a well marked case, in opposition with the accusative as a less marked one. When late Old English nouns developed towards common case, this opposition was replaced by the genitive (well marked) as opposed to the rising common case (less marked). The genitive plural is the norm with numerals from twenty upwards. As Campbell (1959) explains, the numerals from 20 to 120 can be treated syntactically both as adjectives and nouns. The genitive plural markers refer to the noun function. Similar phenomena can be observed in the Slavic languages (in Polish numerals 1—4 are adjectival, from 5 nominal with genitive plural, whereas in Russian it seems the adjectival function was given up with the exception of 1, and numerals 2 — 4 require the genitive singular of the noun).

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time

225

In the corpus numeral + genitive plural phrases are the equivalent of the accusative expressing duration of time: heold xli daga A 50.2 vs. and rixode xvii winter A 8.21. In prepositional phrases the genitive plural overrules the usual case governed by the prepositions. There are 16 examples of genitive plural required by the numeral preceded by the preposition ymb(e) (A 3, C 4, D 2, Ε 7), originally governing the accusative: ymb xxii wintra pcespe he rice hafde. In the last portion, the genitive plural in such contexts is in the decrease, the common case plural form is extended disregarding the numeral, i. e. the noun function was given up, and all numerals were treated as adjectives. The second question concerning Old English prepositions was: How often is it impossible to tell which case an Old English preposition governs, because the form of the noun is ambiguous? Prof. Mitchell rightly points out that the native Old English speaker might have decided differently from us when it came to syncretic case forms and could find forms far more straightforward which a presentday reader would find ambiguous. I classified my examples according to strict rules, with the result that poet gear, or on poet gear is analysed as an accusative, on the principle that in Indo-European the nominative usually was not an adverbial case; pys geare and on pys geare are classified as instrumental; and those forms which do not conform to the ideal Old English morphological patterns exemplified by 9th century forms were summed up as mixed forms, e. g. pis geare, pys gear, even if a syntactic analysis would prove all four forms to represent the same syntactic phrase, the difference being only in their respective stage of their development towards Middle English common case. There is a tendency towards a greater increase of such mixed forms in Text E, and especially in PCh, of prepositional phrases than were among the simple cases (cf. Kniezsa 1986): Case: Prep:

A 0(0%) 0(0%)

C 2(0.7%) 2(0.6%)

D 5(1.8%) 1(0.3%)

Ε 5(1.9%) 11(3%)

PCh 16 (9.6%) 57(17.2%)

It has to be remarked that those forms of PCh were treated as regular which featured all the traditional endings and/or forms (cf. Kniezsa 1985). Syntactically, however, a closer analysis would be necessary to sort out all the accusative and instrumental/dative forms, because these do not

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always show the classical duration of time/point of time opposition, as was already noticed by Wülfing (1894/1901). As I had remarked in my 1986 paper, accusative and instrumental/dative forms seem to show a tendency for cases to be attached to certain lexical items rather than signal traditional syntactic oppositions (e. g. pone dag — accusative, pys geare — instrumental, thus pis gear mentioned above could represent rather an Early Middle English common case instead of a classical accusative). The mixed forms can be divided into two groups. a) The first group consists of late Old English forms, where the grammatical markers (gender, number, case) show a certain confusion, e. g.: on pare Sceternesdceg {pare fem. gen./dat., dceg masc. acc.); on pa ilea tima {pa fem. acc.; ilea uninfected weak adj., lima masc., thus it should be timan); fram pa undern dceies (fram usually governs dat., pa is again fem. acc., undern is masc. acc.); cf. pa ilean geare (pron. sg. fem.? or rather acc. pi.? But the noun is a long stem neuter, therefore it should be without a marker), pa ylcan sumer (pron. = fem. acc.?, noun masc.). In these examples pa stands instead of the regular masc./neutr. instrumental py of the earlier portions as a characteristic form of Text D. The question is: should this form be analysed as a reduced form of the instrumental singular of the demonstrative pronoun pon, or could it be regarded as a forerunner of pe of the later portions, a representative of the single definite article form of PCh, pel b) The other great group of phrases shows the tendency towards Middle English common case: 1. The demonstrative pronoun is generalised as pis and pat, as a single singular form not any more marking gender and case, i. e. on pat dcei, on pis gear (or should this be analysed as accusative), cf. poet lengten, pat oper dai with simple case forms in Kniezsa (1986). 2. The definite article appears in its single Middle English form as pe, especially in the two Peterborough Continuations of the Peterborough Chronicle. The adjective also shows its Middle English "paradigm" where -e represents all the earlier number, gender and case markers: on pe fyrste sunnon dai. c) There is a new group of phrases where the preposition precedes the new adverbial gen., e. g. on pas ilean geares, on pas dages, on pas ilean tima (with an imperfect «-stem noun form). This -es genitive will be extended to original feminine nouns too, cf. on nihtes, be daies and be nihtes (with the much quoted analogical genitive -es of an original feminine noun, usually explained as a generalisation from the phrase dages

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time

227

and nihtes). Both prepositional constructions appear in the Second Peterborough Continuation. Are these already foreshadowing the later Standard English prepositional phrases, where the original adverbial genitive will be analysed as plural as in on Sundays, in contrast to Presentday Scottish and American English Sundays, which in grammars are often described as plural forms instead of the original genitive (cf. Jespersen 1909-1949)? Otherwise the overwhelming majority of the cases show the appropriate suffixes, and this is true even in the latest portions of the texts. Where due to suffix syncretism the noun forms could have been ambiguous, there is an increase in the constructions with a demonstrative pronoun/ definite article. This way the ambiguity of the noun and adjective forms were surmounted by the directness of the pronoun, which always was most clearly marked for gender, number and case, and thus the case marking was taken over by the pronoun from the noun, and there is little doubt left for what case a noun represented in prepositional phrases in the sentences. The third question raised by Prof. Mitchell was whether there were prepositions which took up additional cases to be governed during the Old English period. The increase of the cases governed by a preposition seems to be a general tendency in the various Indo-European languages. Since the prepositions were originally adverbs, their prepositional use developed in the languages independently. Thus there can be great variation concerning which preposition governs which case, always depending on how the languages expressed the various adverbial functions, and what kind of oppositions were required: thus, cf. on: in, which traditionally could express oppositions represented by the accusative and instrumental/dative in the Germanic languages; however, in Greek en and and were followed by the dative only; and while ymbe and of, which all through the Old English period as well as in the other Germanic languages governed one case only viz., accusative and dative respectively, Greek amfi and upo governed accusative, genitive and dative. There are prepositions which govern only one case in all the texts of the Chronicle (mixed forms included): Accusative:

ofer, op, utan, ymbe (genitive because of numerals); oppe, oppet, sippan;

Dative:

ά, after, be, for an to,fram,

of, ongemang, togeanes, under.

Only mixed forms occur with: abuton, onbuton, betweonan,

wipinnan.

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Veronika

Kniezsa

Others govern accusative and dative: a) in all texts: cer, in, on; b) with the exception of Text A: cet, innan, to, uppon, butan, cetforan, beforen, onforan, toforan, binnon, ongean, betwux. The suggestion is that those instances where the other texts differ from A represent extension of cases with a preposition, usually occurring in annals which are later additions, and therefore could represent later developments. Examples: cet, butan (in A dative), binnon (in A accusative). However, there is onforan with accusative in the first four texts and dative in PCh. There are examples where there is accusative besides the usual dative; if these occur in PCh, it is difficult to decide whether these should be analysed as an extension of cases or whether they represent another instance of an Early Middle English common case. Another point is the appearance of the genitive with prepositions which originally did not appear with this case. There are the examples with ymb(e) followed by a numeral higher than 20. Should this construction be analysed as an additional case governed by ymb? These examples are usually neglected in the Old English grammars. Another problem which has not been mentioned so far are the phrases with on followed by a genitive instead of the earlier instrumental/dative in PCh.: on pisses geares, and the examples of be dceies and be nihtes. Thus, should on nihtes etc. be regarded as genitives, or already as common case plural forms, or should we explain them as a late Old English extension of the cases governed by on and be? In my previous paper (Kniezsa 1986) I suggested that in their first appearance prepositional phrases represented an attributive composition similar to compounded nouns and adjectival phrases; it is the noun in the syntactically required case which decides the adverbial function of the phrase and the preposition simply modifies the meaning of the phrase. This would then modify the function of the preposition: thus it is not the preposition which "governs" the case, it is the noun in the case form required by the adverbial function which may take a preposition in order to make its meaning more explicit. Thus it can be explained why in late Old English on and by could be followed by a phrase in the genitive. In late Old English the genitive became a marked adverbial case, which then could be complemented by any one of the prepositions which usually appeared in phrases expressing temporal relationships. Conclusions. The analysis of the Chronicle corpus of adverbs of time gives the following answers to Prof. Mitchell's questions:

Prepositional phrases expressing adverbs of time

229

a) As to the ambiguity of forms, when morphological noun markers cease to serve as clear indicators of gender, number and case, the definite article/demonstrative pronoun takes over this function, making the morphological forms unambiguous (cf. Modern German). It was only in the latest portions of the Peterborough Chronicle that the case indication was partially disguised by the syncretism of the case markers, and the forms already represented Middle English common case. The necessary contrasts were retained with the help of existing strongly marked case forms: common case vs. genitive. b) It indeed seems that a preposition which originally had taken one case can take another one; the process seems to be connected with the development of the meaning of the various cases; the preposition has only an attributive function in Old English; the syntactic function, i. e. the use of the preposition as adverbial marker, is a later, Middle English feature. c) There seems to be a relative increase of prepositional phrases, but it depends on the construction whether they become the only marker or occur side by side with synthetic forms, e. g. adverbs of time and place, where up to our days there is a complementary contrast between the simple case forms and the prepositional phrases. Primary

texts

Text D = An Anglo-Saxon Chronicle from British Museum Cotton MS Tib. Β IV. 1926 Edited by Ernest Classen — Florence E. Harner. Manchester: Nelson and Sons. Text C = The C text of the Old English Chronicles. 1940 Edited by Harry A. Rositzke. Bochum — Langendreer: Heinrich Pöppinghaus. Text PCh = The Peterborough Chronicle 1071-1154. 1958 Edited by Cecily Clark. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Texts A and Ε = Two of the Saxon Chronicles parallel. 1892 Vol. 1 Edited by Charles Plummer. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

References Anderson, John 1971

The grammar of case: Towards a localistic theory. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Campbell, Alistair 1959 Old English grammar. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Danchev, Andrei 1969 "The parallel use of the synthetic dative instrumental and periphrastic prepositional constructions in Old English", Annuaire de l'Universite de Sofia 63: 39-99.

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Einenkel, Eugen 1887 Streifzüge durch die mittelenglische Syntax. Münster: Schöningh. 1916 Geschichte der englischen Sprache. Historische Syntax. Strassburg: Trübner. Fisiak, Jacek (ed.) 1978 Recent developments in historical phonology. (Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs 4) The Hague: Mouton. Gordon, Malcolm (ed.) ALlfric's Catholic Homilies Vol. II. (Early English Text Society) Gottweis, Reinhard 1905 "Die Syntax der Präpositionen 'at', 'be', 'ymb' in den Aelfric Homilien und anderen Homiliensammlungen unter Hinweis auf romanischen Sprachgebrauch", Anglia 28: 3 0 5 - 3 9 3 . Jacobsen, Johannes 1908 Der syntaktische Gebrauch der Präpositionen for, geond, of und ymb in der ae. Poesie. Kiel: Fiencke. Jespersen, Otto 1909—1949 Α Modern English grammar on historical principles. 7 vols. London: Allen and Unwin. Johnson, Olaf 1914—15 "On some OE adverbs and conjunctions of time", Anglia 38: 83 — 100; 101-120. 1916 "More notes on OE adverbs and conjunctions of time", Anglia 39: 101 —120. Kastovsky, Dieter —Aleksander Szwedek (eds.) 1986 Linguistics across historical and geographical boundaries. Vol. 1: Linguistic theory and historical linguistics. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Kniezsa, Veronika 1986 "The progress of the expression of temporal relationships from OE to eME", in: Dieter Kastovsky—Aleksander Szwedek (eds.) 1986. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 4 2 3 - 4 3 6 . Krohmer, Wilhelm 1904 Altenglisch in und on. Berlin: Mayer und Müller. Lindkvist, Karl-Gunnar 1978 AT versus ON, IN, BY: on the early history of spatial AT. Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. Mitchell, Bruce 1978 a "Prepositions, adverbs, prepositional adverbs, postpositions, separable prefixes, or inseparable prefixes in Old English", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 80: 3 9 - 4 5 . 1978 b "Old English 'oö }>ast' adverb?", Notes and Queries 223: 2 3 0 - 2 3 4 . 1985 Old English syntax. 2 Vols. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mosse, Fernand 1952 A handbook of Middle English. Baltimore;: John Hopkins Press. Mustanoja, Tauno F. 1960 A Middle English syntax. Helsinki: Societe Neophilologique. Pilch, Herbert 1970 Altenglische Grammatik. München: Hueber. Quirk, Randolph — Charles Leslie Wrenn 1952 An Old English grammar. (2nd edition) London: Methuen.

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Shores, David L. 1971 A descriptive syntax of the Peterborough Chronicle from 1122 to 1154. (Janua Linguarum Series Practica 103) The Hague: Mouton. Strang, Barbara Μ. H. 1970 A history of English. London: Methuen. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1972 The history of English syntax. New York: Holt, Reinhart & Winston. Weinstock, Horst 1968 Mittelenglisches Elementarbuch. (Sammlung Göschen) Berlin: de Gruyter. Wülfing, J. Emst 1894/1901 Die Syntax in den Werken Alfreds des Großen I. —II. Bonn: Hanstein.

Can (could) vs. may (might): regional variation in Early Modern English? Merja

1.

Kytö

Introduction

The transfer of a culture from one continent to another is an event with dramatic potentialities for the development of language in the new environment. In this paper I shall compare the language of one migrant group, the early New England colonists, to that of their contemporaries who remained in the mother country. My main aim is to observe and interpret some of the possible convergent or divergent developments, by way of examining the interplay of various linguistic and extralinguistic factors. 1 The linguistic item I shall look into is the variation and development of the modal auxiliaries indicating "root possibility" in English, i. e., the use of the verbs can (could) and may (might) in instances such as those illustrated by examples (1) and (2) (for further identification, see section 4.2.6.). (1)

Its best to send a thousand or two of board, shingle, & clabord nayles, so many of each sort; here will be need enough of them; they may be paid for after a while, if you can not do otherwise. (Wait Winthrop, AmC/Private letter, 1892: VI/V,235)2

(2)

To see all, would require a Month's time; but that we might see as much as could be in our allotted time, we got upon the highest part of the Mountain - (John Fryer, BrC/Travel, 1909: 1,187).

This study forms a continuation to the previous body of corpus-based research I have carried out on the use of the modal auxiliaries in early American English.3 My approach is that of socio-historical variation analysis, a method particularly suited to documenting, witnessing and interpreting the process of linguistic change in the past. 4

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Variational study of modals in Early Modern English, British vs. American

Α common denominator, the syntactico-semantic function that the variant forms of the pairs of modals such as can (could) vs. may (might) and shall (should) vs. will (would) share, provides a starting point for the study. Evidence on the rivalry of these variant forms and on the push and drag chain type of semantic and (morpho-)syntactic changes have been presented in works on the history of English (Mustanoja 1960, Visser 1963-1973, Kisbye 1971-1972, Traugott 1972, Lightfoot 1979). If by variation is meant, as is the case in recent socio-historical research, 5 that the relationship between what is expressed and how it is expressed is subject to variation patterned with greater or lesser regularity under the influence of linguistic and extralinguistic factors, the system of modal auxiliaries should present a study case par excellence suited to testing the power of the method. A study of variation, making systematic and quantitative use of empirical evidence retrieved from a motivated and structured selection of texts, should offer fresh insights to elucidate the problem of actuation and the different aspects and stages of the process of change. 6 The system of modal auxiliaries has generally been viewed as one of the major fields affected by the systematic changes that took place in the turmoil of the early Modern English period. 7 Moreover, the same period witnessed the emergence of the first major regional variety of English, the colonists' idiom in the New World, and the first signs of its gradual divergence from the linguistic habits (the southern standard and the local dialects) practised in the mother country. As to regional variation, what makes the period to be of particular interest are the differences that can be observed in the use of the modals in Present-day British and American English (Quirk et al. 1985: 220; Coates-Leech 1980: 30-33). Despite the fact that some of the regional differences are most probably of relatively late origin, 8 a study of the early tendencies characteristic of the "transitional period" should reveal not only the development of American English vis-ä-vis British English but also the development of "extraterritorial" varieties in general. The mother country once behind, the colonists are confronted with new challenges and forums set by the new socio-cultural conditions. After the initial settler period, when variant forms of all types intermingle to create an undifferentiated mixture, the variant selection begins and certain variant forms start gaining ground at the expense of the others. 9 The

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language goes through an accommodation process characterised by, broadly speaking, two seemingly opposite tendencies, one (speaker innovation) accelerating and the other (conservatism and traditionalism) retarding the process of change (Partridge — Clark 1951: 206 ff.). Granted that the conditions of the new environment are not very similar to those of the mother country, the new communicative needs force the new variety to change. At the same time, in so far as is consistent with the developing external conditions, conservatism helps to maintain what has already proved useful in linguistic practice (Bryant 1907: 279 — 281). Conservatism and innovation, moreover, contribute to promoting two tendencies of equally fundamental nature, one towards a greater (geographical, social, occupational) uniformity and the other towards a further disintegration, by leading the new and the mother varieties to alter in divergent directions. The initial stages of a new variety may show signs of an evolutionary phenomenon known as the "arrest of development", or, in milder terms, the "colonial lag": while the settlers cling to the fixed form of language they transport, the language which has been left behind develops independently leaving the new variety in an archaic and stationary state. 10 Moreover, the developments that take place in the mother country can be attested only later in the new colonial offshoot areas, where the prestige of the old mother country usage is held high even at the cost of hypercorrectness or where other geographical factors (lack of communications, or natural obstacles isolating communities) or socio-cultural forces (religious extremism, educational aims) slow down the rate of change. This kind of development should, of course, be seen from a relative perspective: with the mingling of new combinations of language users, periods of migration tend to bring about times of rapid, numerous and extensive cultural modifications. As to American English, isolation, which (rather than migration) is the ultimate factor contributing to archaic usages, never resulted in a complete loss of contact with the Mainland variety (Krapp 1925 [I960]: I, 50; 1926-1927: 296-297). The consequences of preserving and innovating tendencies can be seen in the fact that extraterritorial Englishes show, characteristically, both archaic and advanced features which stem from different layers of the Mainland evolutionary stages (Bryant 1907: 281, 289-290; Lass 1990, forthcoming; L a s s Wright 1986). Comparing early American English with contemporary British English should, from a more general point of view, throw light on the origins and ontogeny of the extraterritorial varieties of English, a field of study still largely neglected in the mainstream of historical Anglistics.11

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Textual evidence for studying regional variation in Early Modern English Aspects of early American English writing

Despite the restrictions set by diachrony and medium, empirical evidence on language development comes down to us in various documents illustrating past usage. I shall discuss a number of the characteristics of New England writing and point out some of the factors causing intra- and intertextual variation, within and between texts or types of text representative of the two varieties studied. I shall also deal with the selectional criteria adopted for compiling the sub-corpora. Though the colonisation of Virginia antedates that of the New England area by a couple of decades, the language of the northern colonists presents a more rewarding starting point for a study of early American English. The North offers a richer variety of texts (much early Southern material was destroyed in the hot climate, frequent fires, wars and rebellions) and better possibilities for tracing back the socio-educational background of the authors (the New Englanders arrived in families, aiming at establishing organised forms of settlement and cultural institutions; the plantation culture in the early South drew mainly single males interested in quick riches, cf. Morgan (1971: 170 — 171)). The writings left by early New Englanders and their second and third generation descendants represent types of text such as history writing, travel accounts, diaries, religious and scientific treatises, narratives on witchcraft cases or other matters of public concern, sermons, legal documents, town records and private and official correspondence (Piercy 1939). These documents may also offer rare glimpses of spontaneous spoken language in the form of witness depositions or notes taken down during trial proceedings, and town or church meetings. The town meetings presented an institution of uniquely New England character, which opened a common forum to people of varied walks of life to meet and talk (Winslow 1952 [1972]). The speech-based documents are of particular interest as they offer an opportunity to approach the spoken language of the past, an obvious field for the study of linguistic change. The writers include representatives from among the more educated social strata and, judging by both the socio-historical information available on the informants and by naive spellings and other instances of non-cultivated usage, from among the more or less self-tutored common folk.

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When seen as forerunners of an embryonic and rising literary culture, early colonial documents were largely produced to serve a practical purpose or to give expression to the uniquely colonial experience of the author. The individual nature of the texts requires us to pay attention to possible idiolectal influences when interpreting the overall results obtained for the data. At the same time colonial writers, many of whom saw themselves as builders of "a Citty vpon a Hill", 12 shared a great aim in common, the need to testify to God's word and will in the New World. Consequently, there can be considerable intra-textual variation within a work, or inter-textual variation between works representative of a text type. Moreover, certain texts can be hard to place in categories of a very rigid and clear-cut nature (the term "text type" is taken as a more or less practical working definition for a preliminary classification of the material). 13 The Puritan history writing, for instance, was not only aimed at recording the flow of events on a factual basis but also sought to interpret the meaning of fires, thunderstorms, earthquakes and other "remarkable providences" as signs of God's will amongst his sinners (Morison 1936 [1977]: 177 ff.). Similarly, a Puritan diarist or letter-writer could pen his inner struggles, with obvious consequences in terms of style and language. There were, of course, Puritan and non-Puritan diarists and letter-writers in Britain as well, but the Puritan bias and the colony-bound perspective of New England writing should be kept in mind when comparing the results obtained for the two varieties. 14 Differences in the religious and ideological background of the New England and British writers exclude a number of fruitful sources from the sub-corpora intended for purposes of comparative analysis. Moreover, the harsh conditions of settlement, which gave greater emphasis to generally utilitarian and epideictic aspects of literary culture, meant that the quantity and coverage of colonial texts now available remain more limited and restricted when compared with contemporary British English writing (for instance, fictional writing had no advocates among Puritans, and drama was allowed in New England only from the early 1700s on (Rankin 1960 [1965]: 11 ff.)). It is not always possible to find counterparts in American English for the early representatives of certain types of text; such a difficulty restricts the choice of texts. 15 A further problem is that no counterparts can be found to all characteristically colonial documents (especially those produced by representatives of common folk) in Britain, where the spread of standard English and the dominance of educated writers prevailed.

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The special character of colonial writing had to be taken into consideration when compiling the corpus of early American English. This consisted of 926,000 words of running text produced in the New England area from 1620 to 1720.16 The works included in this corpus cover, all in all, thirteen types of text (history writing; diaries; travel journals; narratives; essays; wills; appeals and answers; private letters; official letters; town records; trial and meeting proceedings; witness depositions; sermons). The texts are classified as "non-speech-based" and "speech-based" with respect to their relationship to spoken language, and as "formal" or "informal" with respect to the setting of composition (determined by the nature of the communication situation, the purpose of the text, the participant relationship, and the educational background of the language user). The gallery of informants (speakers and writers) include firstgeneration settlers and subsequent colony-born men and women of varying educational backgrounds and representative of a range of social statuses from high to low. In view of the planned comparisons between the two varieties, the selection of American English texts available had to be re-tailored by exluding part of the material and by adding a number of new texts mainly to fill in for the gaps in the diachronic coverage (for the present selection of texts, see section 3.3.).

3.2. The Helsinki Corpus of English Texts The principles of compilation adopted for the above-described American English corpus share close affinities with a body of computerised texts, the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts: Diachronic and Dialectal, the target of a project currently under work at the Department of English, University of Helsinki, under the supervision of Professor Matti Rissanen. 17 The Helsinki Corpus aims at cutting through the history of English by offering a choice of texts representative of the main periods of English. For the purposes of the present study, the British English material is drawn from among that included in the Helsinki Corpus. The general guidelines for including a text in the Helsinki Corpus have been representativeness (mostly in terms of a text type or genre defined on the basis of extralinguistic criteria) and comparability (to ensure the possibility for diachronic and synchronic studies through the different sub-periods distinguished). The Early Modern British English part of the Helsinki Corpus consists of 529,400 words at present (cf. Old English 395,600 words and Middle English 596,900 words; the figures exclude passages

Can {could) vs. may (might)

239

in foreign languages, and our own and the editor's comments). 18 It is intended for world-wide distribution on floppy disks and magnetic tapes. The Early Modern British English part, compiled mainly by Terttu Nevalainen and Helena Raumolin-Brunberg, 19 offers a handy access to linguistic data on the use of the modals in British English. 20 The source text of each example retrieved can easily be traced back with the help of the textual codes, which identify and describe the text by giving information on the name and author of the text, period of compilation, relationship of the text to possible foreign sources, type of the text, relationship of the text to spoken language, various author-related socioeducational parameters (sex, age, rank) and characteristics of the communication situation (setting, participant relationship and interaction). It is hoped that the present study will help measure the scope of the Early Modern British English part of the Helsinki Corpus in view of the future development of the project. In addition to a selection of early American English texts, texts representative of another geographical variety, that of Middle Scots compiled by Anneli Meurman-Solin will be integrated with the basic part of the Corpus. From the Modern Era on, the explosive increase of English non-literary texts opens wider horizons for the student of diachronic variation. As local dialects in Early Modern British English were less and less often recorded in systematic form, the Early Modern British English sub-corpus of the Helsinki Corpus focusses on the rising and evolving national standard language (with special emphasis on the London area). 21 Extralinguistic criteria, mainly the social rank and educational background of the informants, have been used as the primary criteria for distinguishing between dialectal and standard English texts. In terms of diachronic continuity, fifteen types of texts are represented, and sampled systematically to cover the three sub-periods distinguished (law texts; history writing; diaries; educational, scientific and philosophic treatises; (auto)biographies; handbooks; travel books; private and official correspondence; the Bible; sermons; trial proceedings; comedies; for periodisation, cf. below). In terms of social stratification, the gallery of writers includes men from the gentry, the professions and middle ranks, and women mostly from the gentry and, to a lesser extent, from other ranks (for details, cf. section 3.3.).

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3.3.

The sub-corpora studied

Classifying the material according to types of text and dates of composition will help us organise the data for statistical purposes. These extralinguistic factors have been the two main axes guiding the selection of the texts for the sub-corpora compiled for the present study. Other extralinguistic factors (e. g. the relationship of the text to spoken language, the level of formality of the texts, and the informant characteristics) will be taken into consideration as far as the material sampled allows. To offer a consistent basis for diachronic comparisons, the types of text of major interest available in the early American English corpus and in the Early Modern British English part of the Helsinki Corpus are history writing, diaries, travel accounts, private and official correspondence, sermons, and trial and meeting proceedings. These texts offer material from successive periods of time, quite consistently for British English, and relatively for American English (for the gaps in the data, cf. below). Owing to the history of settlement, the sub-periodisation adopted for the two varieties differs slightly. For socio-historical reasons the two centuries of British English (1500 — 1710) are divided into three sub-periods covering a span of 70 years each, reflecting the stabilisation of socio-demographic conditions from the 1650s on after a period of social turmoil (Stone 1966: 40 — 55). The time spans will be referred to as sub-periods Br A (1500-1570), BrB (1570-1640) and BrC (1640 — 1710). Similarly, various factors related to the history of settlement argue in favour of contrasting the settler generations of the pre1670s period (launched by the arrival of the Pilgrim Fathers to the Plymouth Colony in 1620) to the descendant generations of the post16708 period (henceforth referred to as sub-periods AmB and AmC): from the 1670s on, the gradual decline of Puritan faith and the explosive rate of population growth led to the disintegration of the old social order, to economic diversification and to a greater institutional complexity (Kytö 1988: 30 — 32). The two final periods of British English run, roughly speaking, parallel to the two fifty-year periods of American English: 1500 BrA Time

1570

BrB -Θ— 1620

1640 —I AmB

BrC θ— 1670

1710 AmC

1720

The time gaps must, of course, be kept in mind when analysing the results obtained. Juxtaposing the different sub-periods for comparison is nev-

Table 7. The British English texts studied; BrA = 1500-1570, BrC = 1640-1710 Words

Text type

Period

Author/Text

History

BrA

Sir Thomas More Robert Fabyan John Stow Sir John Hayward Guilbert Burnet John Milton

5,700 5,400 4,700 5,300 5,800 5,800

John Leland Richard Torkington John Taylor Robert Coverte Celia Fiennes John Fryer

6,900 7,200 8,800 5,900 5,100 5,300

King Edward VI Henry Machyn Richard Madox Margaret Hoby John Evelyn Samuel Pepys

6,300 6,400 6,500 6,000 6,000 5,100

BrB BrC

Travel

BrA BrB BrC

Diaries

BrA BrB BrC

Private letters

Official letters

Total

Total

11,100 10,000 11,600

32,700

14,100 14,700 10,400

39,200

12,700 12,500 11,100

36,300

BrA BrB BrC

Various writers idem idem

10,600 11,400 13,000

35,000

BrA BrB BrC

Various writers idem idem

6,200 5,600 5,800

17,600

Total

Non-speech-based

Sermons

BrA BrB BrC

Trials

BrB = 1570-1640,

John Fisher Hugh Latimer Richard Hooker Henry Smith John Tillotson Jeremy Taylor

160,800 4,500 5,000 5,100 5,200 6,600 5,900

BrA

Sir Nicholas Throckmorton 16,000

BrB

Earl of Essex Sir Walter Raleigh Titus Oates Lady Alice Lisle

Total

Speech-based

Total

Non-speech-based and speech-based

10,300 12,500

32,300

16,000

—

BrC

9,500

6,000 8,200 7,700 6,000

14,200 13,700

43,900 76,200 237,000

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ertheless justified in that the language of the first settler generation should reflect that of the Jacobines rather than that of their successors. The list of British English texts included in this study is given in Table l. 22 Each sub-period is represented by samples taken from two texts, except for correspondence, represented by various writers in each sub-period, and trials, represented by one text in the BrA period. The majority of the texts have been written by men, most of whom are representatives of the gentry or the professions. The only texts produced by women (apart from Lady Alice Lisle's trial and letters written by women) are Lady Margaret Hoby's Diary and Celia Fiennes' Journeys. Except for one letter writer (Jane Pinney from the BrC-period, of professional background), women writers represent the higher ranks of society. In the early American English sub-corpus tailored for this study each type of text is represented by one work taken in its entirety wherever possible. In the case of correspondence, a number of letters are sampled for each author. This policy was preferred to random sampling within a work, taken the individual and pioneering nature of colonial writing referred to above. A suitable counterpart to John Cotton's sermons for the later sub-period has not been found, 23 and this is also the case with Madam Knight's Journal, a travel account of an exceptionally entertaining and colloquial nature from the early 1700s (see note 15). The list of the texts is given in Table 2 (the word counts are based on estimates carried out manually). In view of the regional comparisons planned, a number of texts require some commentary. Among the "non-speech-based" texts, Michael Wigglesworth's Diary leans more towards the characteristically Puritan tradition of inner meditation than Sewall's work (though passages of meticulous self-analysis occur in the latter as well), while the diaries included in the British English part rather follow the non-Puritan tradition of factual reporting. The collections of letters included in the two subcorpora also differ in size and structure. Both private and official letters by one and the same writer (all men and family members representative of different generations) could be found for the early American English part. Letters by women have neither been preserved nor edited as extensively and consistently. Though women's letters of a private nature have been of main interest to most editors, a number of official letters by colonial women, seeking help in distress from the leading authorities, were included in the material as well. With the exception of Sir Thomas More, whose letters to his wife and daughter have been included along

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243

Table 2. The American English texts studied; AmB = 1 6 2 0 - 1 6 7 0 , AmC = 1 6 7 0 - 1 7 2 0 Text Type

Period

Author/Text

Words

History

AmB AmC

William Bradford William Hubbard

48,300 102,200

Total AmC

Sarah Kemble Knight

Diaries

AmB AmC

Michael Wigglesworth Samuel Sewall

9,700 51,400 190,200

Total AmB AmC

241,600 Various writers idem

39,500 43,200

Total Official letters

AmB AmC

Total

150,500

Travel

Private letters

Total

82,700 Various writers idem

104,600 98,600

Total

203,200

Total

Non-speech-based

Sermons

AmB

John Cotton

Trials

AmB AmC

First Church Meetings Salem Trials

687,700 22,400

Total Total

Speech-based

Total

Non-speech-based

27,400 18,400 45,800 68,200

and

speech-based

755,900

with an official letter to Cardinal Wolsey, either private or official letters (not both) have been sampled from the British writers. The only official letters by women are by Queen Elizabeth. As to the "speech-based" texts, John Cotton preached in plain style, but the sermons included in the British English sub-corpus are polarised to represent both plain and florid styles. Moreover, Cotton's sermons were apparently recorded from the flow of speech during the sermon, while much of the British English material represents language written to be spoken. Further, among the British English state trial transcripts, the Earl of Essex's trial stands apart, owing to a manuscript version

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which shows more tampering by the side of the scribe than is the case with the other transcripts included. The texts taken as American counterparts have a slightly different background. Merchant Robert Keayne recorded the discussions that took place in the church meetings by the members of the congregation in Boston in the 1630s and 1640s, giving a fairly reliable picture of spontaneous language spoken in a formal situation. Half a century later, in Salem in the 1690s, both educated and less tutored scribes recorded what was said during the witchcraft trials. Extracts of these transcripts given in dialogue or in deposition form are included in the present sub-corpus. Caution should be taken when comparing the results obtained, especially for the "speech-based" texts: "speechlikeness" is a relative and continuum-related concept subject to recording practices, which may. vary radically from one situation to another.

4. 4.1.

Analysis Criteria for classifying the data

The extralinguistic factors discussed above present one angle from which to investigate the changes in the patterning of the variant fields. The linguistic factors discussed below present a way of defining the microcontext which might have promoted the choice of one variant form at the expense of another. In most languages the use of (modal) auxiliaries involves a gradient notion which embraces instances of both fuzzy and distinctively prototypical nature, defying attempts to arrive at a consistent and comprehensive classification of different "uses". In a variational study the aim is not so much to present an exhaustive description of these uses as to define the (extra)linguistic environments relevant to one variant form or another. Working through the occurrences of verbs in these contexts against varying textual backgrounds should shed light on the trends and causes of development. The English modals present a case of predominantly notional (as opposed to relational) syntactic paradigm in which the variants function as semantically loaded conceptualisors realising certain core concepts via a shaded spectre of meanings (Ryden — Brorström 1987: 12 — 13; Ryden 1987: 48 — 52). The previous work done on the history of English modals suggests that the universal processes of morphological erosion and de-

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245

semanticisation towards further grammaticalisation have set general guidelines to the trends of development (Ramat 1987: 12). It follows from the twofold nature of the syntactico-semantic function shared by the members of a variant pair that variation and change need, accordingly, be accounted for in terms of both historical syntax and semantics. From the point of view of historical syntax, it was possible to restrict the variant set-up to include a two-term paradigm (with "non-past" and "past" forms) of functionally comparable items, the verbs can (could) and may (might).24 In view of historical semantics, the criteria adopted for distinguishing different categories are of relevance, as shifts of meaning generally imply the existence of semantic categories common to different meanings and as the very existence of semantic categories has been seen to pattern the directions of development (Ramat 1972; 1987: 14; Goossens 1987: 12ff.; Traugott 1989: 3 3 - 3 4 ; Anderson 1989: 9 ff.). With the use of the modals, however, the syntactic and semantic categories have been seen to intersect (Goossens 1984), and attempts to keep them apart as an aim per se in the name of classificatory orthodoxy, have proved less fruitful. The linguistic factors I have focussed on are based on observations made in previous research on the history and the present-day use of the modals and on heuristic and intuitive impressions encountered when working on the data. A varied set of classificatory criteria inevitably yields a vast number of theoretically possible factor combinations influencing the choice of a variant form. At the expense of exhaustiveness, I have concentrated on a number of more meaningful points, answering the further questions raised by the results obtained. The figures, taken to mirror the reality of language, have been reported selectively when found to be of relevance. The classiflcational criteria used to arrive at the frequency surveys on the total data or parts of the data are listed below.

A.

Extralinguistic factors Real time Text type Relationship of the text to spoken language Setting (or level of formality of the text defined on the basis of a number of situational criteria) Author-related parameters: author's sex participant relationship in the communication situation

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Β.

Linguistic factors Category: Modality:

"full verb" "modal auxiliary" "possibility": "root": "ability" "permission" "neutral" "epistemic" "indeterminate" "necessity": "epistemic"

Time reference:

"non-past" "past"

Hypotheticality:

"hypothetical" "non-hypothetical"

Negation:

"affirmative" "negative"

Sentence function:

declarative sentence question (direct/indirect)

Sentence/clause type: final clause noun clause indicating volition conditional clause comparative clause relative clause other Voice

active passive

Subject:

animate inanimate

A number of the above factors demand some comment. Period divisions will be used throughout to highlight the temporal scope of the process of change. For the purposes of this study, of the author-related parameters author's sex and participant relationship in the communication situation have been viewed as potentially relevant. As women are in a clear minority with respect to types of text other than correspondence, frequency surveys

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247

on the author-related parameters will be produced for correspondence only. Participant relationship is interesting in that it could be thought to have a formalising or colloquialising effect on the setting and consequently on the choice of the variant form. Rank is another factor that might play a similar role. However, while it was possible to include representatives of different ranks among the British English writers, most American authors included in this study acted in highly respected or learned positions in the colonies. It is also uncertain to what extent we can measure the social structure of a rising colonial community in the same terms as the highly stratified structure established in the mother country. Information on the author's age would also be available in the parameter codings, but again, from the point of view of comparison, the interest in this parameter would lie not so much in the physical age of a colonist as in the number of years he has spent in the new country. The informant's age is implicitly taken into consideration when looking into the participant relationship (cf. section 4.2.6.2.2.). The linguistic factors considered help define the synsemantic microcontext of the variant form by offering a structurally constant ground for comparisons of the frequencies of the forms. The approach adopted is characteristically variational in that I shall investigate the shifts in the structure of the variant fields kaleidoscopically, concentrating on one angle (or factor) at a time while trying to hold the others under control. The relevance of the linguistic factors studied will be discussed below under the section dealing with the results obtained. 4.2. 4.2.1.

Choice of the variant form in declarative sentences Variant forms in "full verb" and "auxiliary" use

By the sixteenth century both can (could) and may (might) were only rarely used as "full verbs" (Kytö 1987: 210-213). One instance with a "full verb" use of could was recorded in a pre-1570 British English text (against the 213 examples attested with could and 401 examples with can in "modal auxiliary" use in the British English sub-corpus; cf. example (3))· (3)

But when the king had abused her, anon her husband (as he was an honest man & one that could his good, not presuming to touch a hinges concubine) left her vp to him al togither. (Sir Thomas More, BrA/History, 1963: II, 55)

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Two collocationally identical archaic instances of can used as a "full verb" with an adverb were recorded in one of the earliest American texts (dating from 1653, against the 1165 examples with can, and 1174 with could used as a 'modal auxiliary'; cf. examples (4 a) and (4 b)). (4)

a. I find vain thoughts and a vile heart ready to giue them lodging, slow to se and feel any evil in them, a slouthful frame that cannot away with taking pains in seeking god in resisting sin, but ready to giue way to it. (Michael Wigglesworth, AmB/Diary, 1946 [1965]: 12) b. God let me se the prevalency of a multitude of abominable sins in me. — great slouthfulness that cannot away with taking pains in constant seeking god vizt spirituall worship, {idem, p. 16)

4.2.2.

Overall survey of 'auxiliary' uses

As it would have been difficult to classify immediately and reliably the number of examples attested with "auxiliary uses" with respect to the notional categories traditionally distinguished ("ability", "permission", and so on), a structural distinction was first made according to the sentence type. The examples attested in declarative sentences will be dealt with first and those found in questions later. The main notional distinction will be that made between "epistemic", "root" and "indeterminate" uses. As can (could) was not used to express "epistemic possibility" in declarative sentences (the negative forms of these verbs appear in cases of "epistemic necessity", see Coates 1983: 18 —20),25 and as "indeterminate possibility" mainly involves the ambiguous or merger cases allowing both "epistemic" and "root" readings of may (might) (Coates 1983: 14 — 17, 145), the study of the rivalry of the variant forms could be restricted to the cases of "root possibility". Taking into consideration time reference, which divides the cases of could and might into "non-past" and "past" uses, and hypotheticality, which sets apart can from could and may from might in the "non-past" uses, the three basic categories which emerge are can vs. may and could vs. might in "non-past" contexts, and could vs. might in "past" contexts. As far as frequency is concerned, the best represented categories in both varieties are those of "root" can vs. may and "past root" could vs. might (see Table 3 a; the figures given in this study exclude instances of "scribe's comment" attested in "speech-based" texts).

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249

Table 3 a. The "non-past" and "past" uses of "root" can (could) and may (might) in Early Modern English, British ( 1 5 0 0 - 1 7 1 0 ) and American ( 1 6 2 0 - 1 7 2 0 ) BrE

"Modal auxiliary" "Root" "Non-past": "Past":

can vs. may could vs. might could vs. might Total

Am Ε

( 66.7)

Total

705 58 294

2420 304 1499

( 57.3) ( 7.2) ( 35.5)

3125 362 1793

( 59.1)

( 5.5) ( 27.8)

1057

(100.0)

4223

(100.0)

5280

(100.0)

( 6.9) ( 34.0)

The distributions of the forms within the categories distinguished are given in Table 3 b. Table 3 b. The overall distributions of "root" can vs. may and could vs. might ("non-past" and "past") in Early Modern English "Root" "Non-past"

"Past"

British English can 401 56.9 could 34 58.6 179 60.9

may 304 43.1 might 24 41.4 115 39.1

Total

705

58 294

American English can 1165 48.1 could 136 44.7 1038 69.2

may 1255 51.9 might 168 55.3 461 30.8

Total

2420

304 1499

In British English can and could are the forms that occur in approximately 60% of the cases; in American English can and may, as well as "nonpast" could and might, compete on more or less equal terms, while could is markedly more favoured in the category of the "past" uses. The figures obtained for the sub-periods point to the gradual rise of can in British English (cf. Figure 1); no such rise can be attested in early American English, a result pointing to the phenomenon of colonial lag referred to above (cf. again Figure 1). The examples attested with "non-past" could and might in British English were not many, making it hard to draw further conclusions (cf. Figure 2). A clear increase in the use of "nonpast" could as against might can be attested in early American English (cf. Figure 2). The rise of "past" could can be attested in British English from the 1570s on, with converging figures obtained for the sub-periods

250

Merja Kytö

• may VÄ can BrA 1500-1570 BrC 1640-1710 BrB 1570-1640

AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1 7 2 0

Figure 1. "Root" can vs. may in Early Modern English.

might could BrA 1500-1570 BrC 1640-1710 BrB 1 5 7 0 - 1 6 4 0

AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1 7 2 0

Figure 2. "Non-past root" could vs. might in Early Modern English.

distinguished in early American English (cf. Figure 3). The results obtained indicate, by and large, that the rise of could, notably that of "past" could, anticipates the rise of can in the two varieties. The overall figures for textual distributions of "root" can and may indicate that can is favoured in types of text such as diaries, private correspondence and trial proceedings in both varieties. Further, in British English travel accounts and sermons can and may compete on equal terms (the relatively low figures obtained for American English sermons probably reflect the fact that only sermons representing the first sub-

Can (could) vs. may (might)

251

% 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30

20 10 0

BrA 1500-1570 BrC 1640-1710 BrB 1570-1640

AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720

Figure 3. "Past-root" could vs. might in Early Modern English.

period could be included in the corpus; similarly, the figures obtained for American travel writing include only those representing the second subperiod; cf. Table 4). May prevails in colonial official correspondence and history writing (not many present tense forms were recorded in history writing, the genre typically favouring past tense uses; cf. Table 4). Table 4. The overall figures for the textual distributions of "root" can vs. may in Early Modern English

"Root" History Travel Diary Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial

Total

British English can may 9 50.0 26 52.0 18 72.0 130 63.4 35 44.3 96 51.6 87 61.3

9 50.0 24 48.0 7 28.0 75 36.6 44 55.7 90 48.4 55 38.7

401

304

Total 18 50 25 205 79 186 142

705

American English can may 33 26.0 8 66.7 253 64.7 340 58.4 379 38.4 43 39.4 109 51.4

94 74.0 4 33.3 138 35.3 242 41.6 608 61.6 66 60.6 103 48.6

1165

1255

Total 127 12 391 582 987 109 212

2420

252

Merja Kytö

That can rises gradually in British English in both "non-speech-based" and "speech-based" texts, and more sharply so in the latter, can be seen in the overall figures summed up to illustrate the diachronic development in Figures 4 and 5. As no rise can be attested in American English "nonspeech-based" texts, while such a trend is evident in colonial "speechbased" texts, we may conclude that the phenomenon of colonial lag hits the written standard in particular, leaving the spoken idiom more readily exposed to new developments.

•

may

E3 con Figure 4. "Root" can vs. may in Early Modern English "non-speech-based" texts.

• may mean

Figure 5. "Root" can vs. may in Early Modern English "speech-based" texts.

Can (could) vs. may (might)

253

The relatively few instances of "non-past" uses of could and might recorded in the sub-corpus of British English do not give much evidence on the influence of textual factors. We can see, however, that the colonists favour the form could in private correspondence (cf. Table 5; the percentages are given for the better represented categories only). Table 5. The overall figures for the textual distributions of "non-past root" could vs. might in Early Modern English (percentages are given for the better represented categories only)

"Non-past"

British English might could

Total

History Travel Diary

1 1 1

1 1 2

2 2 3

Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial

9

9

18

4

4

8

10 8

5 2

Total

34

24

American English could might 2

10

-

-

15 10

26 38.8 42 73.7 59 39.1 1 6

41 61.2 15 26.3 92 60.9 6 4

58

136

168

Total 12 -

67 57 151 7 10 304

Table 6. The overall figures for the textual distributions of " past root" could vs. might in Early Modern English

"Past" History Travel Diary Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial

Total

British English could might 40 63.5 36 63.2 27 58.7 23 60.5 9 45.0 5 45.5 39 66.1

23 36.5 21 36.8 19 41.3 15 39.5 11 55.0 6 54.5 20 33.9

179

115

Total 63 57 46 38 20 11 59

294

American English could might 391 67.6 23 82.1 250 60.5 89 89.0 174 70.7 19 76.0 92 84.4

187 32.4 5 17.9 163 39.5 11 11.0 72 29.3 6 24.0 17 15.6

1038

461

Total 578 28 413 100 246 25 109

1499

254

Merja Kytö

The overall figures for the textual distributions of the "past" forms confirm that could is the form favoured in most types of texts in British and American English (cf. Table 6). Except for history and diary writing, in which "past" could occurs in 60% to 70% of the cases attested with couldlmight in both varieties, the overall figures for the use of could are, relatively speaking, higher in American than in British English (notice, however, that the number of cases recorded for British English official correspondence and sermons remain relatively low). The general profile of diachronic development in the "non-speechbased" texts is apparent in Figure 6.

Figure 7. "Past root" could vs. might in Early Modern English "speech-based" texts.

Can {could) vs. may {might)

255

The breakthrough of "past" could is evident in British English from the 1640s on and in American English throughout the period studied. The colonial lag that could be seen in the scantier use of can in written American English does not affect "past" could, which was already established at the time of migration (for the influence of negation, cf. section 4.2.3.). The figures for the use of "past" could in "speech-based" texts indicate, similarly, the prevalence of this form in the two varieties (cf. Figure 7). The findings are based mainly on the data drawn from trial records, as no significant number of instances could be found in British English sermons (nor is there a representative of this text type for the latter subperiod in the American English sub-corpus). The rise of "past" could is particularly marked in American English in the latter sub-period, represented by the Salem witchcraft trials. 4.2.3.

Negation

As previous studies have indicated, negation developed into one of the major linguistic factors affecting the choice of the variant forms studied. 26 The distributions of the forms confirm the prevalence of can and "nonpast" and "past" could in "negative" contexts in Early Modern English (cf. Figures 8, 9 and 10).

% ^nn

• may E3 con "negative"

BrE

AmE

BrE

AmE

Figure 8. "Root" can vs. may in "affirmative" and "negative" contexts in Early Modern English.

256

Merja Kytö

%

Figure 9. "Non-past root" could vs. might in "affirmative" and "negative" contexts in Early Modern English.

/o

Figure 10. "Past root" could vs. might in "affirmative" and "negative" contexts in Early Modern English.

Can or could are the forms that occur in around 90% of the instances attested in "negative" contexts in early American English, except for "non-past" could, which occurs in no more than 60% of the cases with "non-past" could/might. The unexpectedly low figure for the use of "nonpast" could is accounted for by the type of examples attested with "nonpast" might: in twelve out of the fifteen instances with might we have a

Can {could) vs. may (might)

257

subordinate clause indicating purpose or volition, the domain for may and might irrespective of negation (for the influence of the clause type, cf. section 4.2.5.). In "affirmative" contexts may is the prevailing form in both British and American English (in 63% and 71% of the cases with can or may, respectively). The use of could is not as straightforward a case, as might is of equal or more frequent use than could in all the sub-categories. "Non-past" could is, relatively speaking, more frequent than can in "affirmative" contexts in the two varieties, with 23 instances of both could and might in British English; "non-past" might occurs in 57% of the cases with could or might in American English. In the category of "past" uses might occurs in 58% of the cases in British English, and in nearly half the cases attested in American English. Observing the process of diachronic development should throw further light on the overall figures. The use of can was already well established in "negative" contexts in British English from the 1500s on and, consequently, was similarly well established in early American English as well (cf. Table 7 a). Table 7 a. Can vs. may in "affirmative" and "negative" contexts in Early Modern English "Root" "Affirmative"

can

may

Total

38 25.7 44 30.8 87 54.4

110 74.3 99 69.2 73 45.6

148

Total

169 37.5

BrA

BrA BrB BrC

"Negative"

BrB BrC

Total

can

may

Total

—

143

Am Β

160

AmC

282 62.5

451

Total

52 86.7 68 87.2 112 96.6

8 13.3 10 12.8 4 3.4

60

232 91.3

22 8.7

259 28.4 235 30.7

654 71.6 530 69.3

913

494 29.4

1184 70.6

1678

407 91.1 264 88.3

36 8.1 35 11.7

443

671 90.4

71 9.6

742

765

—

78

AmB

116

AmC

254

Total

299

In "affirmative" contexts can is used in more than 50% of the cases only from the 1640s on. N o corresponding rise can be seen in the figures for

258

Merja

Kytö

"affirmative" can in the post-1670 American English texts, an indication of colonial lag. The relatively scarce number of instances of "non-past" could in British English does not tell us much about the course of development during the sub-periods; "negative non-past" could is, similarly, only scarcely represented in early American English texts (with eight cases of could and eight cases of might attested for the first sub-period, and fourteen of could and seven of might for the second sub-period). There is a clear increase (as was not the case with can), however, in the use of "affirmative non-past" could, from 36% (or 61 instances out of 168 instances of "nonpast" could/might) to 54% (or 53 instances out of the 99). The figures obtained for the better represented category of "past" uses are given in Table 7 b. Table 7 b. "Past root" could vs. might in 'affirmative' and 'negative' contexts in Early Modern English "Past root" "Affirmative"

could

might

Total

17 32.7 36 50.0 21 41.2

35 67.3 36 50.0 30 58.8

52

Total

74 42.3

101 57.7

175

BrA

24 75.0 48 92.3 33 94.3

8 25.0 4 7.7 2 5.7

32

—

52

AmB

35

AmC

105 88.2

14 11.8

119

Total

BrA BrB BrC

"Negative"

BrB BrC

Total

could

might

Total

202 58.7 250 47.4

142 41.3

344

in

527

452 51.9

419 48.1

871

185 94.4 401 92.8

11 5.6 31 7.2

196

586 93.3

42 6.7

—

72

AmB

51

AmC

Total

52.6

432

628

In both varieties the form preferred in "negative" uses is could throughout the period studied. As the dominance of "negative" can (could) is evident, and as the cases with "negative" may (might) can be accounted for by way of the sentence types or notional subcategories involved,27 I shall henceforth concentrate on the use of the variant forms in "affirmative" contexts.

Can (could) vs. may (might)

4.2.4.

Textual distributions

of the variant forms in "affirmative"

259

uses

How the type of text influences the choice of can and may in "affirmative" contexts is shown in Table 8 a. Table 8 a. The overall figures for the textual distributions of "root" can vs. may in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English British English can may

"Root" History Travel Diary Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial

Total

5 35.7 13 35.1 7 50.0 62 46.3 12 22.6 36 30.8 34 41.5

9 64.3 24 64.9 7 50.0 72 53.7 41 77.4 81 69.2 48 58.5

169

282

American English can may

Total 14 37 14 134 53 117 82

451

15 14.7 2 50.0 63 33.7 178 43.6 173 23.0 19 23.2 44 30.8

87 85.3 2 50.0 124 66.3 230 56.4 579 77.0 63 76.8 99 69.2

494

1184

Total 102 4 187 408 752 82 143

1678

The highest figures (between 40% and 50%) for the use of can in the better represented types of texts are attested in private correspondence in both varieties, and in trial proceedings in British English. The diachronic development within the more frequently represented types of texts is presented in Table 8 b. Table 8 b. The textual distributions of "root" can vs. may in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English (private and official correspondence, sermons and trials) "Root" Private correspondence

BrA Br Β BrC

Total

can

may

22 40.7 18 47.4 22 52.4

32 59.3 20 52.6 20 47.6

62

72

Total 54

can

may

Total

—

38

AmB

42

AmC

134

Total

75 44.9 103 42.7

92 55.1 138 57.3

178

230

167 241

408

260

Merja Kytö

Table 8 b. (continued) can

"Root" Official correspondence

BrA BrB BrC

Total Sermon

BrA

may

1 6.3 2 12.5 9 42.9

15 93.7 14 87.5 12 57.1

12 3

BrC

Total Trial

BrA BrB BrC

Total

may

Total

16

—

16

Λ mΒ

21

AmC

41

53

Total

27

—

6 16.7 27 50.0

24 88.9 30 83.3 27 50.0

36

AmB

54

AmC

—

—

36

81

117

Total

19

63

9 22.5 7 36.8 18 78.3

31 77.5 12 63.2 5 21.7

40

—

19

AmB AmC

89 76.1 10 38.5

117

23

28 23.9 16 61.5

34

48

82

Total

44

99

143

11.1 BrB

can

Total

86 22.2 87 23.8

301 77.8 278 76.2

387

173

579

752

19 23.2

63 76.8

82

365

—

82

26

In British English the figures point to a gradual increase in the use of can in the four types of text examined. Except for trials, no corresponding increase can be seen in these types of text in early American English, as may prevails in private and official correspondence (more distinctly so in the latter) throughout the period studied, pointing to colonial lag. The overall influence of the level of formality on the choice of the variant form is illustrated in Figures 11 and 12. The figures for the sub-periods point to a gradual rise in the use of can in British English "informal" texts (diaries and private letters). In "formal" texts (official letters, sermons and trial records) may prevails overwhelmingly until the 1640s, and the breakthrough of can takes place only during the third sub-period. From the 1640s on can is used in over 50% of the cases with can or may in British English, irrespective of the level of formality of the text. Further evidence for the phenomenon of colonial lag is seen in that no increase in the use of can can be attested in early American English: may is the

Can {could) vs. may (might)

(32)

593 (22)

40.7

'

(24) (28) (19) r — π 44.2

11 BrA

Figure

BrB

£ 2 (45.1 23)

(160)

(119) 42.7

57.3

(194) 61.4 (122) 38.6

1 BrC

11. "Root" can vs. may "informal" texts.

AmB

261

• may E3 con AmC

in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern

English

Figure 12. "Root" can vs. may in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English "formal" texts.

form used in about 60% of the cases with can or may in "informal" texts and prevails even more distinctly (in 70% to 80% of the cases) in "formal" texts throughout the period studied. The instances recorded for the category of "non-past" uses with could and might remain too few to yield information on the influence of the types of text in British English. The figures obtained for the more frequently represented types of text in American English are given in Table 9.

262

Μ er ja Kytö

Table 9. "Non-past root" could vs. might in "affirmative" contexts in early American English (diaries, private and official correspondence) "Non-past root"

could

Diary

Private correspondence

Official correspondence

might

Total

AmB AmC

19 5

(46.3) (26.3)

22 14

(53.7) (73.7)

41 19

Total

24

(40.0)

36

(60.0)

60

AmB AmC

17 18

(60.7) (85.7)

11 3

(39.3) (14.3)

28 21

Total

35

(71.4)

14

(28.6)

49

AmB AmC

21 29

(25.6) (53.7)

61 25

(74.4) (46.3)

82 54

Total

50

(36.8)

86

(63.2)

136

There is a clear increase in the use of "non-past" could in correspondence. The form is, relatively speaking, more frequent in private than in official correspondence. Similarly, in American English the use of "past" could is relatively extensive in "affirmative" contexts, in private correspondence and trials, in particular, with figures above 70%, and in history writing, official Table 10 a. The overall figures for the textual distributions of 'past root' could vs. might in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English

"Past" History Travel Diary Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial Total

British English could might 8 27.6 19 52.8 9 32.1 10 45.5 3 25.0 2 40.0 23 53.5

21 72.4 17 47.2 19 67.9 12 54.5 9 75.0 3 60.0 20 46.5

74

101

Total 29 36 28 22 12 5 43 175

American English could might 218 55.6 8 61.5 76 33.9 31 79.5 74 52.5 12 66.7 33 75.0

174 44.4 5 38.5 148 66.1 8 20.5 67 47.5 6 33.3 11 25.0

452

419

Total 392 13 224 39 141 18 44 871

Can {could) vs. may (might)

263

correspondence and sermons with figures above 50% (cf. Table 10 a). In British English, on the other hand, the overall use of might is more extensive: could occurs only in nearly or around 50% of the cases with could/might in trials, private correspondence and travel writing (the number of examples attested for official correspondence and sermons remains scarce, preventing further conclusions). Table 10 b. "Past root" could vs. might in "affirmative" contexts in Early American English (history and diaries, private and official correspondence) "Past root" History

Diary

Private correspondence

Official correspondence

Trial

could Am Β AmC

106 112

Total

218

AmB AmC

15 61

Total

76

AmB AmC

12 19

Total

31

AmB AmC

50 24

Total

74

AmB AmC

7 26

Total

33

might (59.2) (52.3)

73 101

Total (40.8) (47.4)

174 (51.7) (31-3)

14 134

392 (48.3) (68.7)

3 5

(20.0) (20.8)

8 (54.3) (49.0)

42 25

4 7 11

15 24 39

(45.7) (51.0)

92 49 141

67 (63.6) (78.8)

29 195 224

148 (80.0) (79.2)

179 213

(36.4) (21.2)

11 33 44

Owing to the scarce number of examples spread among different subcategories, no conclusions can be drawn from the diachronic development of "past" uses in British English. Neither do the figures obtained for the better represented categories show much change in the structure of the variant fields during the century of early American English studied (cf. Table 10 b). As was expected, the types of text favouring the use of "past" could prove to be private correspondence (the figures obtained for official correspondence lag behind) and trial records (with a rise in the use of could from the 1670s on). I shall now turn to the influence of a number of linguistic factors on the choice of the forms in "affirmative" contexts.

264

Μ er ja Kytö

4.2.5.

Distributions of the variant forms in different clause types; passive constructions

As a result of the history and development of the periphrastic subjunctive, in both regional varieties may and might are the forms favoured in final clauses indicating purpose and in noun clauses indicating volition (the figures are given for "affirmative" instances only, see Tables 11a and lib). Table lla.

"Root" can vs. may in "affirmative" clauses in Early Modern English

"Affirmative"

British English can may

Final clause

—

Noun clause of volition

—

Comparative clause Conditional clause Other

Total

Table lib.

Final clause Noun clause of volition Comparative clause Conditional clause

Total

169 37.5

282 65.5

American English can may

39

-

31

1 0.4 50 61.0 93 63.7 350 35.9

252 100.0 223 99.6 32 39.0 53 36.3 624 64.1

494 29.4

1184 70.6

49 19 313

451

Total 252 224 82 146 974

1678

"Root" could vs. might ("non-past'" and "past") in "affirmative"' clauses in Early Modern English

"Affirmative"

Other

33 67.3 9 47.4 127 40.6

39 100.0 31 100.0 16 32.7 10 52.6 186 59.4

Total

British English might could

_ 4 22.2 17 68.0 16 66.7 60 50.0

34 100.0 14 77.8 8 32.0 8 33.3 60 50.0

97 43.9

124 56.1

Total 34 18 25 24 120

221

American English could might

18 14.3 84 84.0 80 75.5 384 57.1

134 100.0 108 85.7 16 16.0 26 24.5 288 49.9

566 49.7

572 50.3

—

Total 134 126 100 106 672

1138

Can {could) vs. may (might)

265

The use of may and might is a knockout feature ruling out the forms can and could from final clauses (cf. examples (5), below and (2), above). (5)

Mr. Hibbens I humbly crave Leave to speake a word. Pastor Make silence in the church that every one may hear what now is to be spoken to the matter in hand which was begune the Last Lords day. (Robert Keayne, AmB/Meeting records, Μ. H. S. manuscript)

Similarly, the prevailing forms in clauses expressing hope, wish and similar notions are may and might (see example (6 a)), but one instance of can was also found (out of the 255 with can or may in the two varieties; cf. example (6 b)). (6)

a. my mayd abygall is suddaynlie to be maryed to robert Moulton of this towne: and I hope it maye proue a blessinge of comfort to her for the parents and sonne are people of a religious peacable life, andprouident in theeir estates: (Lucy Downing, AmB/Private letter, Winthrop Papers, 1931-1947: IV, 306) b. God gave me also some incouragement from the markes giv'n of good ground, sundry of them I hope I can owne in some measure before god. (Michael Wigglesworth, AmB/Diary, 1946 [1965]: 34)

Could occurs more frequently than can, mainly in the fixed phrases I wish ... could and I would ... could (cf. examples (6c) and (6d)). 28 c. Both for his sake and my own, I wish you cou'd contrive some way to acquaint my brother w'h my distress and prevaile w'h him to endeavour to get his son in law to stop ye mouth of ye hungry cur here - (Charles Hatton, BrC/Private letter, 1878: I, 160) d. But certainly, there is some Key to it; — I wou'dyou cou'd search it out, and send it to me. (Samuel Sewall, AmC/Official letter, 1886: I, 389) The instances of the variant forms, which occur in final clauses and clauses of volition will be excluded from further analysis. In comparative and conditional clauses can and could are the forms favoured, though far less distinctly than may and might in final clauses and clauses of volition, in the better represented categories in both varieties.

266

Merja Kytö

In view of diachrony, may and might were the prevailing forms in passive constructions from the Old English period on. The total figures (percentages) obtained for the use of the variant forms in passive constructions in the two varieties do not, by and large, differ much (the examples attested in British English are not many, see Table 12; for a corpus example, cf. example (1), above). Table 12. Can vs. may and could vs. might ("non-past" and "past") in "passive" contexts in Early Modern English "Passive" BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

can

_

may

2 10.0 4 23.5

9 100.0 18 90.0 13 76.5

6 13.0

40 87.0

could

might

BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

1 16.7 2 40.0 7 58.3

5 83.3 3 60.0 5 41.7

Total

10 43.5

13 56.5

Total

Total 9 20 17

46

can

may

Total

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

19 18.6 17 20.0

83 81.4 68 80.0

102

Total

36 19.3

151 80.7

187

could

might

Total

—

Total

85

6

—

5

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

15 40.5 21 38.9

22 59.5 33 61.1

37

Total

36 39.6

55 60.4

91

12

23

54

Can occurs in American English in around 20% of the cases (attested with can or may) throughout the period studied; at the same time could is, relatively speaking, more frequent and is used in about 40% of the cases with could/might. As passive constructions are difficult to deal with in terms of the notional sub-categories to be distinguished (the "ability" meaning can hardly be ascribed to sentences such as The world champion can be beaten by him; cf. Leech (1969: 223); or It may/can be done with ease', cf. Nakano (1982: 288)), only the variant forms occurring in the category of "active" sentences will be included in further analysis.

Can {could) vs. may (might)

4.2.6.

Notional

4.2.6.1.

267

sub-categories

"Permission" and "ability"

Previous research carried out on the history of the English modals has mainly been focussed on the semantic changes that different verbs, relatedly or irrespective of each other, have gone through during the centuries. In Old English the verb may (might) had the meaning 'to be able', expressed in Present-day English by the verb can (could), which originally meant 'to know how to do', 'to have power' (ASD, s. v. magan, cunnan). Ascribing a precise meaning on a vast number of corpus examples reliably would be difficult without a consistent set of contextual criteria. The principles I have applied in my studies on the topic are based, with modifications, on those presented in Coates (1983). Focussing on the source of "possibility", three sub-categories of uses indicating "permission", "ability" and "neutral possibility" will be distinguished. In the case of "permission" the source of "possibility" is a person or an institution in authority, and in that of "ability" some capacity or inherent property of the subject. In cases of "neutral possibility" no definite subject-bound source can be pointed out but external circumstances alone or a mixture of capacity or authority and external circumstances can be seen to influence the possibility of action or state referred to (for further criteria, cf. Coates (1983: 1 4 - 1 5 , 8 8 - 9 7 , 139); for corpus examples, cf. below). Though sometimes hard to apply (owing to syntactic constraints), a number of paraphrases help condense and transfer the meanings of the modals attested in the corpus examples: "permission": 'be allowed', 'be permitted' "ability": 'be able to', 'have an (inherent) ability to' "neutral possibility": 'it is possible ... for to' As may and might are the forms used to express "permission" {may in 119 and might in 38 cases of the total of "affirmative" uses recorded in the two varieties (see examples (7 a) and (7 b)), the study of variation can be restricted to the sub-categories of "ability" and "neutral possibility". (7)

a. Nor haue they any parkes, but Forrests, and Commons, wherein any man may hunt that will, saue only within 6. miles of Agra round about which is lymitted and reserued for the Kings priuate pleasure onely. (Robert Coverte, BrB/Travel, 1971: 41) b. As came down again through the Gate I ask'd my Lady's Leave that now I might call it Bellomont Gate. (Samuel Sewall, AmC/ Diary, 1973: I, 413)

268

Merja

Kytö

In the category of "ability" can and could have more or less ousted may and might (see Table 13). Table 13. Can vs. may and could vs. might ("non-past" and "past") expressing "ability" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English "Ability"

can

may

Total

BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

24 72.7 18 94.7 32 100.0

9 27.3 1 5.3

33

—

32

74

10

84

Total

could BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710 Total

might

9 90.0 15 100.0 7 100.0

1 10.0

31

1

19

can

—

15

—

7

32

Total

—

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720 Total

Total 10

may

78 100.0 63 100.0 141 could

—

78

—

63

-

might

141 Total

—

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720 Total

36 100.0 52 100.0 88

—

36 52

88

While may is still recorded in nearly 30% of the cases (or in 9 examples out of 33 with can or may) up to the 1570s (with might attested in one instance out of ten with might or could), can (could) prevails in British English, practically speaking, from the 1570s on (see examples (8 a) and (8 b)). No instances of may (might) indicating "ability" could be found in early American English.29 (8)

a. Therefore we ought to make a continuall prayer vnto god, for to graunt oure kynges grace suche a mate as maye knyt hys hert and heres, accordyng to goddes ordynaunce and lawe (Hugh Latimer, BrA/Sermon, 1869: 34) b. Mr. Sol. Gen. What Year was it? Mrs. El. Ireland. My Memory is not good enough for that; I cannot tell what Year, my Daughter can. (The trial of Titus Oates, BrC/Trials, 1730: IV, 74)

Can (could) vs. may (might)

4.2.6.2. 4.2.6.2.1.

269

"Neutral possibility" Textual distributions of the variant forms

The category to provide the main meeting ground for the variant forms studied proves to be that of "neutral possibility". N o differences can be seen in the total figures obtained, relatively speaking, for the use of can and may in the two varieties. However, no counterpart can be found in early American English for the gradual rise of can attested in British English, which, again, points to colonial lag (cf. Table 14 a; for illustration, cf. examples (9 a) and (9 b)). (9)

a. I have sent you with this letter 12 ounz. of counterfeite ose; if thay be not of the right sise I can have them changd. (Thomas Knyvett, BrB/Private letter, 1949: 59) b. heere are allso Partridge and heathe geese, and great multitude of pigeons, and Deare, but the Country is too full of Coverts for hunting or hawking, yet a man may ride all over the Countrye, except the Swamps which are very vaste and hideous. (John Winthrop, AmB/Official letter, 1931-1946: IV, 492)

Table 14 a. Can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English "Neutral" BrA

can 14

1500-1570 BrB

23.3 24

1570-1640

34.3

may 46 76.7 46

51

65.7 34

1640-1710

60.0

40.0

Total

89 41.4

58.6

BrC

126

can

Total

may

Total

60 70

AmΒ 1 6 2 0 - 1670

85

AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

215

Total

161 37.1

273 62.9

434

155 43.4

202

357

56.6

316 39.9

475 60.1

791

In early American English, on the contrary, the use of "non-past" could increases from the 1670s on (cf. example (10 a); the figures for British English are too low to base conclusions on; cf. Table 14 b). There is an increase in the use of "past" could after the 1570s in British English, with even higher figures obtained for the first sub-period of American English (for illustration, cf. example (10 b)).

270

Merja

Kytö

(10) a• If I were shure of good wether, I could com in Mr Pickets sloop. (Wait Winthrop, AmC/Private letter, 1892: VI/V, 352) b. Madame My first knowledg of this bearer's journye towards you made me differ my intentions of sending purposely to you, and by him to present you with so much balsom as I could gett in London - (Thomas Barrington, BrB/Private letter, 1983: 116) Table 14 b. Could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English "Neutral"

could

might

"Non-past" BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

3 33.3 3 25.0 1 20.0

6 66.7 1 75.0 4 80.0

7 38.9

11 61.1

11 40.7 21 55.3 12 50.0

16 59.3 17 44.7 12 50.0

44 49.4

45 50.6

Total

"Past" BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710 Total

could

might

Total

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

37 50.0 41 65.1

37 50.0 22 34.9

74

18

Total

78 56.9

59 40.1

137

27

-

AmB 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

159 72.3 157 60.9

61 27.7 101 39.1

220

Total

316 66.1

162 33.9

478

Total

9 4 5

38 24

89

-

63

258

The textual distributions of the variant forms throw further light on the tendencies observed above. May is the prevailing form in most of the better represented types of text, with the exception of private correspondence and trial records, in which can occurs in about 50% of the cases with can or may in the two varieties (cf. Table 15 a). Owing to the scarcity of examples, evidence of diachronic development can be found in the most represented categories only. The results obtained for private and official correspondence are given in Table 15 b. Can is used in about 50% of the cases in British English private letters from the 1640s on with convergent figures obtained for American English,

Can (could) vs. may (might)

271

ruling out the influence of colonial lag. May prevails in the more formal registers characteristic of official letters in American English (the instances attested in British English official letters are not many). Table 15 a. The overall figures for textual distributions of "root" can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English British English can may

"Root" History Travel Diary Private correspondence Official correspondence Sermon Trial

Total

1 25.0 6 31.6 5 62.5 38 47.5 7 31.8 19 35.2 13 46.4

3 75.0 13 68.4 3 37.5 42 52.5 15 68.2 35 64.8 15 53.6

89

126

Total 4

American English can may 8 17.0

19

30 50.8 132 55.2 128 34.8 8 17.8 10 31.3

39 83.0 1 100.0 29 49.2 107 44.8 240 65.2 37 82.2 22 68.7

316

475

-

8 80 22 54 28

215

Total 47 1 59 239 368 45 32

791

Table 15 b. Can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in private and official letters in Early Modern English "Neutral" Private correspondence

BrA BrB BrC

Total Official correspondence

BrA BrB BrC Total

can

may

Total

9 36.0 14 51.9 15 53.6

16 64.0 13 48.1 13 46.4

25

_

27

AmB

28

AmC

38

42

80

Total

1 20.0 1 16.7 5 45.5

4 80.0 5 83.3 6 54.5

5

7

15

can

may

Total

54 58.1 78 53.4

39 41.9 68 46.6

132

107

239

65 31.7 63 38.7

140 68.3 100 61.3

205

128

240

368

93 146

—

6

AmB

11

AmC

22

Total

163

272

Merja

Kytö

Table 16. Could vs. might ("non-past" and "past") expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in private and official letters in early American English "Neutral"

"Non-past" could might

Private correspondence

AmB

"Past" could

might

8 80.0 14 87.5

2 20.0 2 12.5

10

Total

13 81.3 13 81.3

3 18.7 3 18.7

16

Total

26

6

32

22

4

26

AmB

15 36.6 24 66.7

26 63.4 12 33.3

41

34 70.8 15 51.7

14 29.2 14 48.3

48

39

38

77

49

28

77

AmC

Official correspondence

Total

AmC

Total

16

36

16

29

The scanty number of examples recorded for British English yield no further information on the diachronic development of the forms could and might. The figures for early American English show, however, that could is the form favoured overwhelmingly in both "non-past" and "past" uses in private letters throughout the period studied (see Table 16). In official letters, on the contrary, while a rise can be attested in the use of "non-past" could, in the category of "past" uses might is still resistant, gaining ground in the latter sub-period. 4.2.6.2.2.

Author's sex and participant relationship

To keep the textual and a number of linguistic factors under control at this stage of the analysis, I shall concentrate on the cases of "neutral possibility" attested in private letters (and occurring in active affirmative declarative sentences other than a final clause or a clause of volition). I shall look into the possible influence of such extralinguistic factors as author's sex and participant relationship (in view of comparisons, no sufficient number of examples were recorded in the British English official letters written by men, and the few official letters by Queen Elizabeth stand alone against the more numerous official letters written by colonial women). N o difference can be seen in the use of can in the private letters written by women in Britain and in the colonies, while in men's letters can is somewhat more frequent in America than in the mother country (see Table 17 a). Interestingly enough, comparing the figures obtained for

Can {could) vs. may (might)

273

women with those obtained for men within both varieties, we see that in Britain women stand in the forefront of development by favouring can in 60% of the cases with can or may, while the corresponding figure obtained for men is only 40%; practically no difference can be seen in the figures obtained for women and men corresponding in the colonies, cf. Table 17 a. Table 17 a. The overall figures for can vs. may and could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in private correspondence by men and women in Early Modern English (percentages are given for the more represented categories only) Private corr. "Neutral" BrE AmE

"Non-past" BrE AmE

Women can

Men can

may

18 39.1 109 55.1

28 60.9 89 44.9

could

might

Total

2 8

2 18 75.0

1 6 25.0

3 24

4 5

4 18 85.7

6 3 14.3

10 21

may

Total

20 58.8 23 56.1

14 41.2 18 43.9

34

could

might

1 8

1 —

41

Total

Total 46 198

"Past" BrE AmE

2 4

2 1

Table 17 b. Can vs. may expressing ' 'neutral possibility" in " affirmative" contexts in private correspondence by men and women in early American English Private corr. "Neutral"

Women can

may

Total

AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720

17 56.7 6 54.5

13 43.3 5 45.5

30

23

18

41

Total

11

Men can

may

37 58.7 72 53.3

26 41.3 63 46.7

109

89

Total 63 135

198

The instances of could and might remain too few for comparisons. Similarly, the examples with can or may spread among the British English sub-periods are too scarce to provide further insights. In American

274

Merja

Kytö

English no significant differences can be seen in the development during the period studied (cf. Table 17 b). The participant relationship, which has to do with the degree of intimacy between the language users, should influence the level of formality in the communication situation and thus the choice of the variant form. Three degrees of intimacy have been distinguished in the following (definitions are those adopted for the coding of the Helsinki Corpus). In an "intimate down" relationship the addressee is seen to occupy an inferior position in terms of a generation gap or social distinctions to the author (e. g., letters by parents to children, by the husband to the wife), in an "intimate up" relationship the author stands in an inferior position, and in an "intimate equal" relationship no external factors can be pointed out which would place one or the other participant in an inferior position (e. g., letters between "intimate equal" brothers and sisters). The figures for British English suggest, as one might expect, that in an "intimate down" situation the more colloquial form can is more popular than in an "intimate up" situation, a more formal setting from the point of view of the writer (cf. Table 18 a). No difference can, practically speaking, be seen in the use of can in these two settings in American English. On the other hand, the figures for can are, interestingly enough, higher in an "intimate equal" situation, perhaps the most "informal" of the three settings distinguished (no letters in this category are included in the British English sub-corpus, cf. Table 18 a). Table 18 a. Overall figures for "participant relationship" and can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English private correspondence Private corr. "Participant relationship" "Neutral" "Intimate down" "Intimate up" can may Total can may BrE AmE

25 53.2 69 49.6

22 46.8 70 50.4

47 139

13 39.4 10 55.6

20 60.6 8 44.4

Total 33 18

"Intimate equal" can may Total —

53 64.6

—

29 35.4

—

82

The breakdown figures for the sub-periods distinguished in British English indicate the rise of can in "intimate down" situations from the 1640s on. The use of can lags behind in American English throughout the period studied, but again, figures are, relatively speaking, higher for the cases

Can (could) vs. may (might)

275

Table 18 b. "Participant relationship" and can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English private correspondence (figures given for the sub-periods) Private corr. "Neutral"

"Participant relationship" "Intimate down" "Intimate up" can may Total can may Total

British English BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710 Total American English AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720 Total

1 11.1 13 65.0 11 61.1

8 88.9 7 35.0 7 38.9

25

9

"Intimate equal" can may Total

8 50.0 6

16

-

-

-

20

8 50.0 1

7

-

-

-

18

4

6

10

-

-

-

22

47

13

20

33

-

-

-

26 52.0 43 48.3

24 48.0 46 51.7

50

6 40.0 2

15

19 67.9 34 63.0

9 32.1 20 37.0

28

89

9 60.0 1

69

70

139

10

8

18

53

29

82

3

54

attested in contexts involving an "intimate equal" relationship (cf. Table 18 b). 4.2.6.2.3.

Constructions in comparative and relative clauses

Broadening again the textual basis to include in addition to private correspondence the other types available, I shall look into a number of linguistic factors with the examples recorded in the category of "neutral possibility" (occurring in the active voice in affirmative declarative sentences other than final clauses and clauses of volition). As pointed out above, can and could are, by and large, the forms favoured in comparative and conditional clauses. In both varieties (collocational) constructions with a comparative expression followed by than (cf. example (11), below), and expressions with so) as ...as followed by a verb other than be (cf. example (10 b), above) attract, in particular, the forms can and could, which share affinities with the meaning of "ability" (cf. Table 19). (11) Therefore procure flocks with what speed you can. You may sooner do it than we can. (Elizabeth Ward Saltonstall, AmC/Private letter, 1972: I, 189)

276

Μer ja Kytö

Table 19. Cart vs. may and "past" could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" comparative clauses in Early Modern English "Neutral" Comparative clause

British English can may Total

Comparative + than sofas ...as — so/asjso as ... be other

American English can may Total

2 15 1 1

1 4 1 8

3 19 2 9

16 21 1 3

2 10 7 8

18 31 8 11

Total

19 57.6

14 42.4

33

41 60.3

27 39.7

68

"past"

could

might Total

Comparative + than so/as ...as — so/as/so as ... be other

1 5 1 -

7 50.0

Total

—

3 1 3 7 50.0

could

might Total

2 8 2 3

8 45 1 1

1 6 2 4

9 51 3 5

14

55 80.9

13 19.1

68

Table 20. Can vs. may and "past" could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility" in "affirmative" relative clauses in Early Modern English "Neutral" Relative clause Superlative expression What ( + noun) Other Total "Past" Superlative expression What ( + noun) Other Total

British English can may

Total

16 80.0 7 87.5 10 35.7

4 20.0 1 12.5 18 60.7

33 58.9

23 41.1

56

might

Total

could

20 8 28

—

5

-

3

5 100.0 3 100.0 4 30.8

9 69.2

13

12 57.1

9 42.9

21

American English can may

Total

52 92.9 30 58.8 30 26.8

4 7.1 21 41.2 82 73.2

112 51.1

107 48.6

219

could

might

Total

43 97.7 36 97.3 33 49.3

1 2.3 1 2.7 34 50.7

44

112 75.7

36 24.3

148

56 51 112

37 67

Can (could) vs. may (might)

277

Can and could are, similarly, the forms prevailing in superlative expressions, and in constructions with what ( + noun) introducing a relative clause (cf. Table 20; for superlative expressions, cf. example (12), below; for what + noun, cf. example (11), above). (12) However, the said Agent making the best he could of a bad Cause, used all means to pacifie the Complayments — (William Hubbard, AmC/History, 1677 (From Pascataqua to Pemmaquid), p. 37) 4.2.6.2.4.

The use of the variant forms with animate and inanimate subjects

An animate subject and an agentive verb are characteristic contextual features of can (could) with the sense of "ability". Similarly, in the category of "neutral possibility" can co-occurs more readily with animate than with inanimate subjects and gains ground in this context in both varieties throughout the period studied. In British English there is a rise in the use of can with inanimate subjects as well (however, the instances recorded are relatively few); in American English may remains resistant Table 21 a. Can vs. may expressing "neutral possibility" with animate and inanimate subjects in "affirmative" contexts in Early Modern English "Neutral" Subject

British English Animate can may

Total

BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

12 22.6 21 35.0 40 59.7

41 77.4 39 65.0 27 40.3

53

Total

73 40.6

107 59.4

Inanimate can

may

Total

2 28.6 3 30.0 11 61.1

5 71.4 7 70.0 7 38.9

180

16 45.7

19 54.3

35

13 11.8 1 1.2

97 88.2 82 98.8

110

14 7.3

179 92.7

193

60 67

7 10 18

American English AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720

148 45.7 154 56.2

176 54.3 120 43.8

324

Total

302 50.5

296 49.5

598

274

83

278

Merja Kytö

and no rise of can with inanimate subject can be attested (cf. Table 21 a; the figures given in Tables 21 a, b, c include instances attested in active voice in affirmative declarative sentences other than final clauses and clauses of volition). The use of "non-past" could is, similarly, linked with animate subject. N o t many instances were recorded in the British English texts, but the Table 21 b. "Non-past" could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility" with animate and inanimate subjects in "affirmative" contexts in early American English "Neutral" Subject "Non-past"

American English Animate could might

AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720

35 57.4 41 77.4

26 42.6 12 22.6

61

Total

76 66.7

38 33.3

114

Total

53

Inanimate could 2 15.4 —

2 8.7

might 11 84.6 10 100.0 21 91.3

Total 13 10

23

Table 21 c. "Past " could vs. might expressing "neutral possibility'' with animate and inanimate subjects in "affirmative " contexts in Early Modern English "Neutral" Subject "Past"

British English Animate could might

BrA 1500-1570 BrB 1570-1640 BrC 1640-1710

11 45.8 20 58.8 9 50.0

13 54.2 14 41.2 9 50.0

24

_

34

1 25.0 3 50.0

3 100.0 3 75.0 3 50.0

Total

40 52.6

36 47.4

76

4 30.8

9 69.2

13

6 30.0 5 20.0

14 70.0 20 80.0

20

11 24.4

34 75.6

Total

18

Inanimate could

might

Total 3 4 6

American English AmB 1620-1670 AmC 1670-1720

153 76.5 152 65.2

47 23.5 81 34.8

200

Total

305 70.4

128 29.6

433

233

25

45

Can (could) vs. may (might)

279

results obtained for the early American English texts point to an increase in the use of the form in this context; might is the form used with inanimate subjects (see Table 21 b). "Past" could is clearly linked with the use of animate subject as well, peaking in the post-1570s period in British English. N o rise can be seen in the corresponding figures obtained for American English. There are not many instances recorded with inanimate subject in British English; in American English the prevailing form with inanimate subject is might (cf. Table 21 c).

4.3.

Choice of the variant form in direct questions

In both varieties the form prevailing in direct questions is can (the instances recorded with could and might are few and omitted in discussion). In British English the number of instances attested is relatively small yielding little evidence of diachronic development (cf. Table 22; the Table 22. Can vs. may in direct questions in Early Modern English "Roof

can

BrA 1 5 0 0 - 1570 BrB 1 5 7 0 - 1640 BrC 1 6 4 0 - 1710

6 85.7 9 64.3 10 90.9

1 14.3 5 35.7 1 9.1

Total

25 78.1

7 21.9

may

can

Total 7 14 11

32

may

Total

_ Am Β 1 6 2 0 - 1670 AmC 1 6 7 0 - 1720

24 85.7 34 85.0

4 14.3 6 15.0

Total

58 82.3

10 14.7

28 40

68

figures include both "affirmative" and "negative" instances, as negation does not seem to have any influence on the choice of the form in direct questions). In early American English can occurs in around 85% of the cases with can or may throughout the period studied (cf. Table 22 and example (12)). (12) Can you act Witchcraft here, & by casting your eyes turn folks into fits? You may judge your pleasure, my soul is clear. (Salem Trials, 1977: 426)

280

5.

Merja

Kytö

Final remarks

By way of summary, the study of the two sub-corpora sampled to represent the two varieties of Early Modern English yielded evidence pointing to regional variation in the use and development of the modals indicating "root possibility". The main trend of development was the gradual rise of can (could), promoted by a number of extralinguistic and linguistic factors, with the 1570s and the 1640s as main starting points for the breakthrough of the forms in various uses in British English. At the same time, the phenomenon of colonial lag was found to retard the rate of development in early American English, in the written medium in particular. Interestingly enough, no evidence for colonial lag could be found for the developments which had already been established in British English usage by the time of migration. The differences attested in the paths of development with the main uses (can vs. may; "non-past" and "past" could vs. might) highlight the necessity of paying major attention to contextual factors when devising the set-up of the forms in a variational study. The two sub-corpora, though different in size and structural detail, proved useful for retrieving data pointing to consistent and unidirectional paths of development in the two varieties. The limits of the material met with can be overcome by keeping the selections of texts, in terms of further additions and supplementary material, flexible and open-ended (Rissanen 1989: 17). Though a diachronic corpus-based study cannot claim to cover all the aspects of the process of linguistic change, it can nevertheless be seen to test empirically the validity of the hypotheses made. Its justification lies, ultimately, in the basic axiom of the socio-historical approach to language development, that of "reconstruction of language in its social context" (Romaine 1982 a: 1 2 2 - 1 2 3 ; 1982 b: 295).

Notes 1. The terms used to refer to the two-fold nature of the factors involved are many and of varying scope, e. g., "linguistic" vs. "social" ("extralinguistic") factors (Weinreich — Labov —Herzog 1968; "internal" ("intralinguistic") vs. "external" ("extralinguistic") (Samuels 1972); "linguistic" vs. "stylistic" ("external", "social") (Romaine 1982); "linguistic" ("structural") vs. "extralinguistic" ("textual") (Rissanen 1986); "structural" ("internal") vs. "extra-structural" ("external") (Ryden 1979); "structure-inherent" ("syntactico-semantic" or "lexico-semantic") vs. "structure-external" or "extra-structural" ("social", "stylistic", "pragmatic" etc.) (Ryden — Brorström 1987); "structureinherent" ("texture-specific") vs. "structure-external" ("extra-structural") (Ryden 1987).

Can (could) vs. may (might)

2.

3.

4.

5.

6. 7. 8.

9. 10.

11.

12. 13. 14. 15.

281

Ryden furthermore points out that the extralinguistic factors as such are of a twofold nature with respect to the communicative setting (or situation) and to the social backgrounds, in which the variant forms occur (Ryden 1987: 53). The blanket terms "linguistic" and "extralinguistic" are adopted for the purposes of the present study. Sources for the examples will be referred to by the name of the author, sub-period code (cf. section 3.3.), type of text and information on the edition. Bibliographical references will be given in full only for the works cited; for other primary sources, cf. Kytö (1988, forthcoming b). Cf. Kytö (1986 a, 1986 b, 1987, 1990; forthcoming a, b). To emphasise the individuality and the extending diachronic and diatopic identity of the new variety, the term "early American English" is preferred to a number of other terms used freely in the literature ("17th century American English", "Colonial American English", "early New England English" etc.; for outlines of the (diachronic) research carried out on the new variety, cf. Viereck (1982, 1986). For works on the principles of socio-historical study of variation, cf. note 1; for the applicability of different variational approaches to historical research, cf. RaumolinBrunberg (1988). Cf., for instance, Altenberg (1982) on the genitive vs. the o/-construction, Nevalainen (1986) on the English exclusive focussing adverbials, Ryden—Brorström (1987) on be/ have variation, Tieken-Boon van Ostade (1987) on the do-periphrasis and KahlasTarkka (1987) on the words for every and each in Old English; cf. also, the works cited in note 1. For the problem of actuation, cf. Weinreich — Herzog— Labov (1968: 102, 111 — 112, 186-187); Milroy - Milroy (1985: 342 ff.). For opposite views on the nature and course of the development of the modal system, cf., e. g., Plank (1984) and Goossens (1984) against Lightfoot (1979: chapter 2). For instance, the spread of the first person will (would) for shall (should) in predictive statements in (colloquial) Present-day American English (Krapp 1925 [I960]: II, 265 — 268; Quirk et al. 1985: 230 — 231), anticipating the increase of these uses in Present-day British English. Lass (1990, forthcoming); I am indebted to Professor Lass for letting me consult the typescripts. For the phenomenon of "arrest of development", cf. Ellis (1869:1, 19 — 20); Lounsbury (1880: 480); Krapp (1925 [I960]: I, 50ff.); Mencken (1945: 140-142); Baugh (1963: 417-419). Lass (1990); for a summary of the origin and linguistic background of the settlers, cf. Wakelin (1988:141 —142); for a survey on the rise of the main English overseas varieties, cf. Leith (1983: chapter 7). "Wee shall be as a Citty vpon a Hill" (Matt. 5: 14), as cited by John Winthrop, the leader of the Puritan Hegira in the 1630s (Rutman 1972: 3—4). For different classificatory approaches cf., for instance, Werlich (1982 [1983]), Fowler (1982) and Dimter (1985). Similarly, both British and colonial Puritan preachers favoured "plain style", but in Britain there were also advocates of "florid style" among the Anglican preachers. Only texts produced on the American soil have been included in the material; similarly, with the exception of Madam Knight's Journal (The Journal of Madam Knight, with an introductory note by George Parker Winship, New York, 1920 [1935]), only texts available as original manuscripts or American imprints were included in this study.

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16. The selectional criteria and the structure of the corpus are discussed in Kytö (1988: 33 — 59); for an introduction to a number of the texts sampled, cf. Kytö — Rissanen (1983: 476—485); for a pilot study on parts of the material included in the present study, cf. Kytö (1989 a). The whole corpus exists in non-magnetic format only, and the data on modals was collected and handled manually; samples of some of the texts have been keyed in for computer use for the purposes of the Helsinki Corpus (cf. section 3.2.). 17. For background information on the Helsinki Corpus, cf. Kytö — Rissanen (1988), and Kytö (1989 b). 18. Kytö (1989b: 12—13); the words were counted with the mainframe version of the Oxford Concordance Program (version 2.3.), cf. note 20 below. 19. The team specialising in the Early Modern English part of the Helsinki Corpus includes Matti Rissanen, Terttu Nevalainen, Helena Raumolin-Brunberg, Anneli MeurmanSolin, Ritva Tiusanen and Merja Kytö; for an introduction to the principles of compilation and the selection of texts, see Nevalainen — Raumolin-Brunberg (1989). 20. At the same time the experimentation needed to retrieve the data from the working files of the Helsinki Corpus served as a useful study case for testing the technical and practical usability of the material for both microcomputer and mainframe use. The microcomputer runs were executed with WordCruncher Text Indexing and Retrieval Software (version 4.1. by Brigham Young University and Electronic Text Corporation 1987) and Micro-OCP, the microcomputer implementation of the Oxford Concordance Program by Oxford University Computing Service (Oxford University Press 1988). Similarly, OCP (versions 1.4. and 2.3.) was the program used for the mainframe runs (on a cluster of VAX8800 and VAX8300 with the VAX/VMS operating system version 4.7. by Digital Equipment Corporation; for OCP, cf. Susan Hockey —Ian Marriot, Users' manual, version 1.0., Oxford University Computing Service, 1984 and Susan Hockey— Jeremy Martin, Users' manual, version 2, Oxford University Computing Service, 1988). 21. The description of the Early Modern British English part of the Helsinki Corpus is based on Nevalainen — Raumolin-Brunberg (1989), and on the examination of the lists of parameters coded in the current working files of the Helsinki Corpus. 22. The words were counted with a microcomputer program devised by Mr. Micha! Jankowski in June 1988 (Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland); the figures given exclude headings, text in foreign languages, and our and the editor's comments. 23. For the printed and unprinted material available, cf. Stout (1986); for future study, Professor James F. Cooper, Jr. (Oklahoma State University) kindly let me know about his plans to edit minister Samuel Parris' sermon notebook in collaboration with Dr. Ken Minkema. Samuel Parris was the minister in Salem Village during the witchcraft crisis of 1692, and the notes seem to convey much of the spoken expression. 24. No examples of the verb motan used in the declining sense of 'permission' were attested in the early American English sub-corpus. In one example recorded in the British English sub-corpus the use of motan comes close to the 'quasi-subjunctive' use of may in wishes and assertions (in sentences such as May he live long!, excluded from this study (cf. OED, s. v. mote, 1 c and Simon-Vandenbergen 1983: 75). The father of heauen mote strenght thy frailtie, my good daughter and the frayltie of thy fraile father too (Sir Thomas More, BrA/Private letter 1947: 545). 25. For a survey of the use in Early Modern English, cf. Behre (1961).

Can (could) vs. may (might)

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26. See Kytö (1986 a: 131-132; 1987: 152-153; 1989 a: 172-173; forthcoming a). According to Western (1897: 40) the preference for can in negative sentences became fully established only from the Early Modern English period on. 27. See Kytö (1987: 162 — 163); the number of instances recorded with may not (might not) was 22 (15) in British English and 71 (57) in American English. 28. Michael Wigglesworth uses both might and could in the optative expression oh that ... could/might; might (4 examples) tends to occur with the main verb be and could (9 examples) with other main verbs: Blessed be god for Jesus christ and for the hopes which I haue in him, ο that my hopes might always be in him alone! (p. 43) And oh that I could se still more of my owne vileness, and the sweet louve of my gracious god, whom woe is me I abuse, (p. 5). 29. For the possible connection between the loss of the "ability" meaning of may and the disappearance of the form from non-authoritative contexts, cf. Simon-Vandenbergen (1984: 363).

Primary

texts

Barrington, Thomas 1983 Barrington family letters, 1628 — 1632. (Camden Fourth Series 28), edited by Arthur Searle. London: Offices of the Royal Historical Society and University College London. Coverte, Robert 1971 A trve and almost incredible report of an Englishman (London 1612). (The English Experience 302) Amsterdam — New York: Theatrum Orbis Terrarum — Da Capo Press. Downing, Lucy 1931-1947 Winthrop papers, 1623-1649. Vols. I I - V , edited by Samuel Eliot Morison et al. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society. Fryer, John 1909, 1912 A new account of East India and Persia. Being nine years' travels, 1672—1681. Vol. I 1909, Vol. II 1912, edited by William Crooke. London: The Hakluyt Society. Hatton, Charles 1878 Correspondence of the family of Hatton, being chiefly letters addressed to Christopher First Viscount Hatton, A.D. 1601 — 1704. 2 vols. (Camden New Series XXII —XXIII), edited by Edward Maunde Thompson. Westminster: The Camden Society. Hubbard, William 1677 A narrative of the troubles with the Indians in New-England, from the first planting thereof in the year 1607, to this present year 1677. Boston: John Foster. Keayne, Robert n. d. Microfilm reproductions of the manuscripts of Robert Keayne's Note-Books (1639—1642; 1643—1646) in the holdings of the Massachusetts Historical Society.

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Knyvett, Thomas 1949 The Knyvett letters (1620-1644), edited by Bertram Schofield. London: Constable & Company. Latimer, Hugh 1869 Seven sermons before Edward VI, on each Friday in Lent, 1549. (English Reprints), edited by Edward Arber. London: Alex. Murray & Son. More, Sir Thomas 1947 The correspondence of Sir Thomas More, edited by Elizabeth Frances Rogers. Princeton: Princeton University Press. 1963 "The history of King Richard III", in: The complete works of St. Thomas More. Vol. 2, edited by Richard S. Sylvester. New Haven and London: Yale University Press. Oates, Titus 1730 A complete collection of state-trials and proceedings for high-treason, and other crimes and misdemeanours; from the reign of King Richard II. to the end of the reign of King George I. Vol. IV. (2nd edition), edited by Francis Hargrave. London: Printed for J. Walthoe Sen. etc. Salem Trials 1977 The Salem witchcraft papers. Verbatim transcripts of the legal documents of the Salem witchcraft outbreak of 1692. 3 vols., edited by Paul Boyer and Stephen Nissenbaum. New York: Da Capo Press. Saltonstall, Elizabeth (Ward) 1972 The Saltonstall papers, 1607-1815. Vol. I: 1607-1789. (Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society 80), edited by Robert E. Moody. Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society. Sewall, Samuel 1886 Letter-book of Samuel Sewall, 1686-1729. Vol. I: 1686-1712. (Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Sixth Series I —II, I) Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society. 1973 The diary of Samuel Sewall, 1674-1729. Vol. I: 1674-1708, edited by M. Halsey Thomas. New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux. Wigglesworth, Michael 1965 (1946) The diary of Michael Wigglesworth, 1653 — 1657: The conscience of a Puritan, edited by Edmund S. Morgan. New York: Harper and Row. Winthrop, John see Downing, Lucy Winthrop, Wait 1892 The Winthrop papers. (Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society, Sixth Series, V) Boston: Massachusetts Historical Society.

References Altenberg, Bengt 1982 The genitive v. the οΐ-construction. A study of syntactic variation in 17th century English. (Lund Studies in English 62) Lund: Gleerup.

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Anderson, John 1989 Grammaticalisation and the English modals. (Universität Duisburg Gesamthochschule, L. A. U. D., Series A 253) Duisburg: Linguistic Agency University of Duisburg. Α SD = An Anglo-Saxon dictionary. 1898 [1973] Edited by Joseph B o s w o r t h - T . Northcote Toller; with Supplement (1921 [1972]), edited by T. Northcote Toller with revised and enlarged addenda by Alistair Campbell. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Baugh, Albert C. 1951 [1963] A history of the English language. (Second edition). London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Behre, Frank 1961 "It cannot be: it is impossible. A study in diachronic grammar" in: Alvar Ellegard — Yngve Olsson (eds.), Papers on English vocabulary and syntax edited on the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday. (Gothenburg Studies in English 10) Göteborg: Almqvist & Wiksell, 128-158. Bryant, Frank Egbert 1907 "On the conservatism of language in a new country", Publications of the Modern Language Association of America 22. (New series 15): 277 — 290. Coates, Jennifer 1983 The semantics of the modal auxiliaries. (Croom Helm Linguistics Series) London — Canberra: Croom Helm. Coates, Jennifer —Geoffrey Leech 1980 "The meanings of the modals in modern British and American English", York Papers in Linguistics 8: 23 — 34. Dimter, Matthias 1985 "On text classification", in: Teun A. van Dijk (ed.), Discourse and literature. Amsterdam — Philadelphia: John Benjamins, 215 — 230. Ellis, Alexander J. 1869 On early English pronunciation, with especial reference to Shakspere and Chaucer. Part I. London — Berlin: Asher. Fowler, Alastair 1982 Kinds of literature. An introduction to the theory of genres and modes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Goossens, Louis 1984 "The interplay of syntax and semantics in the development of the English modals", in: N. F. Blake — Charles Jones (eds.), English historical linguistics: studies in development. (CECTAL Conference Papers Series 3) Sheffield: University of Sheffield, 149-159. 1987 "The auxiliarization of the English modals: a functional grammar view", in: Martin Harris —Paolo Ramat (eds.), Historical development of auxiliaries. (Trends in Linguistics, Studies and Monographs 35) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 1 1 1 - 1 4 3 . Kahlas-Tarkka, Leena 1987 The uses and shades of meaning of words for every and each in Old English, with an addendum on Early Middle English developments. (Memoires de la Societe Neophilologique 46) Helsinki: Societe Neophilologique.

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Kisbye, Torben 1971 — 1972 An historical outline of English syntax. 2 vols. Aarhus: Akademisk Boghandel. Krapp, George Philip 1925 [1960] The English language in America. 2 vols. New York: The Century Co. 1 9 2 6 - 1927 "Is American English archaic?", Southwest Review 12: 2 9 2 - 3 0 3 . Kytö, Merja 1986 a "On the use of the modal auxiliaries can and may in early American English" in: David Sankoff (ed.), Diversity and diachrony. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 53) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 123 — 138. 1986 b " M a y and might indicating 'epistemic possibility' in early American English", in: Sven Jacobson (ed.), Papers from the Third Scandinavian Symposium on Syntactic Variation. (Stockholm Studies in English 65) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell, 131-142. 1987 "On the use of the modal auxiliaries indicating 'possibility' in early American English", in: Martin Harris —Paolo Ramat (eds.), Historical development of auxiliaries. (Trends in Linguistics, Studies and Monographs 35) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 145-170. 1988 Variation and diachrony: studies in English modal auxiliaries. [Licentiate thesis, University of Helsinki, Department of English.] 1989 a "Can or may? Choice of the variant form in early Modern English, British and American", in: Thomas J. Walsh (ed.), GURT '88: synchronic and diachronic approaches to linguistic variation and change. (Georgetown University Round Table of Languages and Linguistics 1988) Washington, D. C.: Georgetown University Press, 163 — 178. 1989 b "Progress report on the diachronic part of the Helsinki Corpus", ICAME Journal 13: 1 2 - 1 5 . 1990 "Shall or will? Choice of the variant form in early Modern English, British and American", in: Henning Andersen — Konrad Koerner (eds.), Historical linguistics 1987. Papers from the 8th International Conference on Historical Linguistics (8. ICHL) (Lille, 31 August —4 September 1987). Amsterdam: Benjamins, 2 7 5 - 2 8 8 . forthcoming a "On the early development of can, may, could and might", in: Ralph Fasold —Peter Lowenberg — Deborah Schiffrin (eds.), Language variation and change: cross language perspectives. Amsterdam: Benjamins. forthcoming b Manual to the diachronic part of the Helsinki Corpus of English texts: coding conventions and lists of source texts. Kytö, Merja —Matti Rissanen 1983 "The syntactic study of early American English: the variationist at the mercy of his corpus?", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 84: 470 — 490. 1988 "The Helsinki Corpus of English Texts: classifying and coding the diachronic part", in: Merja Kytö — Ossi Ihalainen — Matti Rissanen (eds.), Corpus linguistics, hard and soft. Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora. (Language and Computers: Studies in Practical Linguistics 2) Amsterdam: Rodopi, 169—179. Lass, Roger 1990 "Where do extraterritorial Englishes come from? Dialect input and recodification in transported Englishes", in: Sylvia Adamson — Vivien A. Law —Nigel

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Vincent — Susan Wright (eds.), Papers from the 5th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 65) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 245 — 280. forthcoming Toward a history of South African English: first steps. [Unpublished MS. University of Cape Town, Department of Linguistics.] Lass, Roger—Susan Wright 1986 "Endogeny vs. contact: 'Afrikaans influence' on South African English", English World-Wide 7: 201 - 2 2 3 . Leech, Geoffrey N. 1969 Towards a semantic description of English. London: Longman. Leith, Dick 1983 A social history of English. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Lightfoot, David 1979 Principles of diachronic syntax. (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 23) Cambridge, London etc.: Cambridge University Press. Lounsbury, Thomas Raynesford 1880 "The English language in America", International Review 8: 472 — 482, 596-608. Mencken, Henry Louis 1963 The American language. An inquiry into the development of English in the United States. The fourth edition and the two supplements, abridged, with annotations and new material, by Raven I. McDavid, Jr. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul. Milroy James — Lesley Milroy 1985 "Linguistic change, social network and speaker innovation", Journal of Linguistics 21: 3 3 9 - 3 8 4 . Morgan, Edmund S. 1971 "The first American boom: Virginia 1618 to 1630", William and Mary Quarterly (third series) 28: 169-198. Morison, Samuel Eliot 1936 [1970] The intellectual life of colonial New England. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Mustanoja, Tauno F. 1960 A Middle English syntax. Part I. (Memoires de la Societe Neophilologique de Helsinki 23) Helsinki: Societe Neophilologique. Nakano, Hirozo 1982 "An approach to the semantic developments of can and may", in: Hirozo Nakano — Kenji Kondo — Hidetoshi Iida (eds.), Studies in linguistic change in honour of Kazuo Araki. Tokyo: Kenkyusha, 271 —303. Nevalainen, Terttu 1986 English exclusive focusing adverbials and the empirical study of diachronic variation. [Licentiate thesis, University of Helsinki, Department of English.] Nevalainen, Terttu —Helena Raumolin-Brunberg 1989 "A corpus of early Modern Standard English in a socio-historical perspective". Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 90: 67 — 110. OED = The Oxford English dictionary. 1933 [1970] 13 vols. Edited by James A. H. M u r r a y - H e n r y Bradley-W. A. C r a i g i e C.T. Onions. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

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Partridge, Eric—John W. Clark 1951 British and American English since 1900. London: Andrew Dakers. Piercy, Josephine K. 1939 Studies in literary types in seventeenth century America (1607—1710). (Yale Studies in English 91) New Haven: Yale University Press. Plank, Frans 1984 "The modals story retold", Studies in Language 8: 3 0 5 - 3 6 4 . Quirk, Randolph —Sidney Greenbaum — Geoffrey Leech—Jan Svartvik 1985 A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman. Ramat, Paolo 1971 —1972 "Die Analyse eines morphosemantischen Feldes: die germanischen Modalverben", Indogermanische Forschungen 76: 174—202. 1987 "Introductory paper", in: Martin Harris —Paolo Ramat (eds.), Historical development of auxiliaries. (Trends in Linguistics, Studies and Monographs 35) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 3 - 1 9 . Rankin, Hugh F. 1960 [1965] The theater in colonial America. Chapel Hill: The University of North Carolina Press. Raumolin-Brunberg, Helena 1988 "Variation and historical linguistics: a survey of methods and concepts", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 89: 136—154. Rissanen, Matti 1986 "Variation and the study of English historical syntax", in: David Sankoff (ed.), Diversity and diachrony. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 53) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 97 — 109. 1989 "Three problems connected with the use of diachronic corpora", ICAME Journal 13: 1 6 - 1 9 . Romaine, Suzanne 1982 a Socio-historical linguistics, its status and methodology. (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 34) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1982 b "The reconstruction of language in its social context: methodology for a socio-historical linguistic theory", in: Anders Ahlqvist (ed.), Papers from the 5th International Conference on Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 21) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 293 — 303. Rutman, Darrett B. 1965 [1972] Winthrop's Boston. A portrait of a Puritan town, 1630-1649. New York: W. W. Norton and Co. Ryden, Mats, 1979 An introduction to the historical study of English syntax. (Stockholm Studies in English 51) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. 1987 "Syntactic variation and paradigmatic typology", Studia linguistica 41: 48-58. Ryden, Mats —Sverker Brorström 1987 The be/have variation with intransitives in English, with special reference to the late Modern period. (Stockholm Studies in English 70) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell.

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Samuels, Michael Louis 1972 Linguistic evolution, with special reference to English. (Cambridge Studies in Linguistics 5) Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Simon-Vandenbergen, A. M. 1983 "'Subjunctive' MAY: a fossilizing pattern", Studia Anglica Posnaniensia 16: 71-76. 1984 "Deontic possibility: a diachronic view", English Studies 4: 362 — 365. Stone, Lawrence 1966 "Social mobility in England, 1500-1700", Past and Present 33: 1 6 - 5 5 . Stout, Harry S. 1986 The New England soul. Preaching and religious culture in colonial New England. New York — Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tieken-Boon van Ostade, Ingrid 1987 The auxiliary do in eighteenth-century English. A sociohistorical-linguistic approach. Dordrecht: ICG Printing. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1972 A history of English syntax. A transformational approach to the history of English sentence structure. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. 1989 "On the rise of epistemic meanings in English: an example of subjectification in semantic change", Language 65: 31—55. Viereck, Wolfgang 1982 "Das Amerikanische Englisch in Forschung und Lehre", Zeitschrift für Dialektologie und Linguistik 49: 351—365. 1986 "On colonial American English: a research proposal", in: Winfried Herget — Karl Ortseifen (eds.), The transit of civilization from Europe to America. Essays in honor of Hans Galinsky. Tübingen: Narr, 75 — 85. Visser, Frans Theodor 1963 — 1973 An historical syntax of the English language. Leiden: Brill. Wakelin, Martyn 1988 The archaeology of English. London: Batsford. Weinreich, Uriel —William Labov —Marvin I. Herzog 1968 "Empirical foundations for a theory of language change", in: Winfred P. Lehmann — Yakov Malkiel (eds.), Directions for historical linguistics: a symposium. Austin: University of Texas Press, 95 — 195. Werlich, Egon 1982 [1983] A text grammar of English. (Uni-Taschenbücher 597) Heidelberg: Quelle and Meyer. Western, Aug. 1897 Om brugen af can, may og must. En sproghistorik undersogelse. (Videnskabsselskabets Skrifter (II). Historisk-filosofisk Klasse 1897:1) Kristiania: Jacob Dybwad. Winslow, Olga Elizabeth 1952 [1972] Meetinghouse hill, 1630-1783. New York: W. W. Norton and Co.

Locative valency of the English verb: a historical approach Anatolij M. Mukhin — Natalya M.

Yulikova

The chief aim of this paper is the study of the nature of valency as a syntactic property of elementary lexical units, e. g. verbal lexemes. Limitations of space forbid a general discussion of the various theories of verb valency that have been proposed so far and that differ from our own in several ways. Instead, we will concentrate on the locative valency, or, more precisely, a range of locative valencies of the verb from the point of view of the interaction of elementary lexical and syntactic units, i. e. we will be concerned with the fundamental problem of the interaction of language levels. We will begin with an analysis of Modern English material, which will then be compared with Old English data in order to illustrate the problems raised by a historical study of verb valency. Our interpretation of valency as a syntactic property of lexemes implies, first, the definition of the latter as elementary units of the lexical level of the language, which constitute building material for sentences, and, second, the recognition of syntaxemes as elementary syntactic units which accompany verbs, nouns, and other kinds of lexemes within the sentence, and which are established on the basis of syntactic bonds. A lexeme is a lexical unit belonging to a definite part of speech and possessing lexical content, which reveals itself in the ability of a lexeme to combine with other lexemes. A syntaxeme is an elementary syntactic unit (an invariant) represented in the language by a system of variants, which may be expressed by both individual lexemes and syntactically indissoluble combinations of lexemes with auxiliary elements, e. g. prepositions. The content of a syntaxeme is formed by its syntactic semantics, or, more precisely, the totality of the different syntactico-semantic features which manifest themselves by the distributional characteristics of the syntaxeme, as well as by its specific system of variants (Mukhin 1985: 397, 404). Verbs within sentences may be accompanied by different syntaxemes (e.g. the objective, indirect-objective, causal, instrumental, mediative, locative syntaxemes, etc.), and consequently we will also have to distinguish different kinds of valency, e.g. locative valency (Mukhin 1987: 262 — 266). Moreover, valency is manifested not just by individual verbs,

292

Anatolij Μ. Mukhin — Natalya Μ.

Yulikova

but by certain lexico-semantic groups of verbs, whose members possess identical or at least similar semantics and a similar ability to combine with other lexemes. Furthermore, we have to distinguish two major types of verb, transitive and intransitive, the former having the ability of government (prepositional, non-prepositional, or variational). Government can be defined as a lexical bond between a transitive lexeme and a complementary lexeme and obtains within lexical constructions (wordcombinations, or phrases). It is a property of language itself, regardless of the historical period under consideration, and irrespective of the existence of case distinctions. The notion of government therefore allows us to study the combinability of transitive verbs by using it as a formal criterion for the establishment of lexico-semantic verb groups and the appropriate classification of individual verbs (Mukhin 1985: 398 ff.; 1987: 7ff.). In the following, we will concentrate on the valency of verbs admitting locative syntaxemes in any of their variant forms, rather than deal with general problems of government and the combinability of lexemes. Nor will we discuss differences between the objective or indirect-objective syntaxemes which may only be formed with transitive verbs (both in dependent position and in subject position), and all the other syntaxemes which — more or less frequently — accompany both transitive and intransitive verbs, and of which the locative syntaxemes represent one example. As a first example of a locative syntaxeme, consider the following sentences with the transitive verb look governing by means of the preposition for, and the intransitive verb live: (1)

a. He looked for his friend in London, b. James lived in London.

Somers (1984: 508) classified the prepositional group in London as an adjunct in (1 a) and as a complement in (1 b), because in (1 b) it is obligatory as against (1 a), where it is optional. We do not, however, consider obligatoriness to be a suitable criterion for determining the status of a linguistic unit. According to our own analysis, we are dealing with the same syntactic unit in both sentences, viz. one having locative semantics. The conclusion is supported by the fact that the prepositional group in London can be replaced by the adverb there, i. e. by an adverbial variant of the locative syntaxeme:

Locative valency of the English verb

(2)

293

a. He looked for his friend there. b. James lives there.

In Modern English there are quite a number of syntaxemes sharing a common syntactico-semantic feature of locativeness, e.g. the locative syntaxeme proper, the locative allative, the locative ablative, the locative illative, the locative elative, the locative mediative, etc. In the following, we will limit the discussion to a selection of these without any exhaustive analysis of their variants. The most frequently used locative syntaxeme is the locative syntaxeme proper. It is represented by a system of variants consisting of combinations of nouns (substantival lexemes = S) or personal pronouns with various prepositions, e. g. on S, in S, near S, about S, over S, beneath S, etc., cf.: (3)

A minute later he had reappeared on the farther tower (Huxley).

Since the system of variants of the locative syntaxeme proper includes the pronominal adverbs there and here, one can easily replace the prepositional group by the adverb, cf. (2 a, b) above, in order to demonstrate the locative semantics of the former. The locative allative syntaxeme, whose system of variants is also represented by combinations of nouns or personal pronouns with prepositions (to S, toward S.for S, onto S, etc.) as well as adverbs, is fairly widespread, too, cf.: (4)

a. I returned to my compartment (Christie). b. ...he then shepherded her towards the door (Christie). c. Denis turned towards her (Huxley).

The locative ablative syntaxeme is constituted by the combination of nouns or personal pronouns with the preposition from, cf.: (5)

The conductor emerged from the compartment. (Christie).

Moreover, various combinations of adverbs with the preposition from (from here, from there, from without, from out there) occur as variants of this syntaxeme:

294

Anatoli)

Μ. Mukhin —Natalya

Μ.

Yulikova

(6)

a. Yet I made up my mind I would not like you. Just because you come from out there. (Fowles). b. It came to me you know from without. (Huxley).

The most frequent variant of the locative elative syntaxeme is the combination of a noun or pronoun with the preposition out of. (7)

At 9.15 punctually the train pulled out of the station. (Christie).

There is also a negative locative elative syntaxeme expressed by the combination of the adverb nowhere and the same preposition: (8)

But young men didn't ... drift coolly out of nowhere (Fitzgerald).

The locative illative syntaxeme is typically represented by the combination into S: (9)

The train plunged into a tunnel (Christie).

The locative mediative syntaxeme occurs most frequently in the variants through S, along S, down S, up S, by way of S, cf.: (10) a. The attendant vanished through the doors at the other end (Christie). b. Did anyone pass along the corridor? (Christie) Speaking of the locative valency of verbs thus refers to the ability of any of the above syntaxemes to occur in any of their variants with the verbs in question, with a concomitant further differentiation between the locative valency proper, the locative allative valency, the locative ablative valency, etc. As has already been mentioned above, the verbs themselves are not studied individually but within lexico-semantic groups formed on the basis of identical or similar lexical semantics and similar ability to combine with other lexemes. Accordingly, we may distinguish several monotransitive groups with non-prepositional government. The smallest group consists of verbal lexemes with the meaning 'keep someone or something in a certain position or condition', e. g. hold, keep, lock, park, trap, which are characterised by the locative valency proper:

Locative valency of the English verb

295

(11) a. He held Guilliadun in his arms (Fowles). b. The last machines ... were parked in the motor pool (Simak). c. He had trapped the old king in one of his fortified cities (Fowles). Verbs with the meaning 'displace someone or something', e. g. bring, carry, drive, drag, draw, fly, jump, proddle, remove, run, slide, trail, whirl only rarely occur with a locative syntaxeme proper; most characteristic is the locative allative valency, e. g. (12) He carried the bench back to the tea-tent (Huxley), the locative ablative valency, e. g. (13) Each rise and fall of the sea removes some sediment from continental margines (Science). and the locative illative valency, e. g. (14) ... this Fusionist had jumped them into a cloud (Asimov). The locative mediative valency is much less frequent: (15) ... we would be able to run sand cars safely across the Martian plains (Pohl). A third group of verbs is characterised by the meaning 'let, make fall', e. g. drop, get, lay, place, plant, push, put, set, scatter, slam, slide, slip, throw. These normally manifest the locative valency proper, e. g. (16) She lifted the portfolio and slipped it down beside the table (Fowles), and the locative illative valency, e. g. (17) He dropped it into his pocket (Sheckley), while the locative allative valency is less pronounced, e. g. (18) ... these treasures were being scattered to all the corners of the galaxy as trinkets (Silverberg).

296

Anatolij

Μ. Mukhin — Natalya

Μ.

Yulikova

Intransitive verbs can also be subdivided into a number of lexicosemantic groups. One rather large group consists of verbs denoting 'reside, be at rest', e. g. be, hang, kneel, lie, live, quarter, rest, sit, stay, squat, stand, weekend, etc. which are characterised by the locative valency proper, as in (19) a. If they are not seen anywhere, you are in a dust cloud ... (Asimov). b. In the midst of this brown gloom Mr. Bodiham sat at his desk (Huxley). The largest group comprises verbs of motion, e. g. advance, adjourn, arrive, barge, bicycle, come, climb, crawl, creep, cross over, drift, drive, dash, fly, flit, float, flow, get, go, move, pad, pass, return, ride, saunter, shift, start, steal, stroll, tiptoe, trot, walk, wander, whirl. These manifest the following valencies: a) locative proper, cf. (20), b) locative allative, cf. (21), c) locative ablative, cf. (22), d) locative illative, cf. (23), e) locative mediative, cf. (24). (20) ... tractors went amazingly fast on the Moon (Leinster). (21) For their after-luncheon coffee the party generally adjourned to the library (Huxley). (22) As I tiptoed from the porch ... (Fitzgerald). (23) He rides into the forest after Eliduc (Fowles). (24) He passed through the gate in the park wall into the garden (Huxley). Another intransitive group includes verbs denoting 'fall, lower' such as collapse, descend, drop, fall, jump, plunge, slip, sink, spring (down) with locative allative (cf. (25)) and locative illative (cf. (26)) valency: (25) The treasure slipped to the bottom ... (Sheckley). (26) The dust cloud descended into the valley. (Huxley). A similar analysis of the various locative syntaxemes occurring with transitive and intransitive verb groups can also be carried out for Old English; here, these syntaxemes have variants represented by single nouns without prepositions along with adverbs or prepositional word groups.

Locative valency of the English verb

297

We will begin with a survey of the prepositional variants. As in Modern English, one of the most frequent Old English syntaxemes is the locative proper, whose variants include combinations of various prepositions with nouns in the dative case, e. g. in Sd, on S d , etc., as in (27) In öys ginnan gründe 'in this wide world' {Judith 2)1. The locative allative syntaxeme is also represented by the combination of a preposition and a noun in the dative case (e. g. to Sd, in Sd, etc.), cf. (28) Comon twegen englas to δ sere birig 'There came two angels to that town' (Genesis 19: 1). The locative ablative syntaxeme is most frequently expressed by the combination of the preposition fram with a noun in the dative, as in (29) Ic ferde to foldan ufan fram ejjle Ί went to earth from the realm above' (Caedmon, Metr. Par. Thorpe 205: 25). The locative illative is expressed, among others, by the prepositional groups in Sa, into Sd, cf. (30) a. /£> don he in heofenas astige. 'Before he ascended into heaven' (.Blickling Homilies 125: 16). b. Da eode he in öa cetan. 'Then he went into the cell' (Blickling Homilies 219: 14). (31) Some urnan into cyrcean and belucan da durran into heom. 'Some ran into the church and shut the door upon them' (Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (Earle) 1082; 217: 13). The prepositional groups ut of S d , of Sd are variants of the locative elative syntaxeme, cf. (32) Fyse he man ut of öysan eoröe. 'Let them be driven out of this country' (Laws of Ethelred vi: 7). (33) Ne cuman eow das worde of gemynde. 'Let not these words depart out of your mind' (Deut. 49).

298

Anatolij

Μ. Mukhin—Natalya

Μ.

Yulikova

The locative mediative syntaxeme is typically expressed by combinations such as purh Sa, geond Sa, cf. (34) Durh öa dura we gad in. 'We go in through the door' (TElfric, Grammar 47). (35) Giond das widan worulde 'through this wide world' (Bt.Met. (Fox) 11: 45). Besides prepositional groups, we also find non-prepositional datives and accusatives as representations of various locative syntaxemes, e. g. (36) a. ... wicum wunian ... 'to live in the dwelling' {Beowulf 3083). b. Donne him ccelp, he cepp him hlywj?e 'When he is cold, he betakes himself to shelter' (Hexameron 20; Norm. 28: 23). Adverbial variants of various locative syntaxemes are par 'there', ponan 'from there', her 'here', benorpan 'to the north', besupan 'to the south', ham 'home', etc., e. g. (37) a. Dar abidan sceal maga miclan domes 'There the being (Grendel) shall await his great doom' {Beowulf 977). b. He eft ham ferde. 'He went home again' (Bede, Hist. Eccl. (Smith) 512: 5). Let us now turn to the verbs which admit the occurrence of the various locative syntaxemes in their different manifestations. As a first group, we can distinguish a set of transitive verbs denoting 'deplace someone or something', e. g. beran 'carry', bringan 'bring', dragan 'draw', drifan 'drive', ferian 'convey\forswapan 'sweep away', settan 'put', scufan 'push', wecgan 'move'. These allow the following valencies: locative allative, cf. (38), locative illative, cf. (39), and locative ablative, cf. (40). (38) He pone sand ferodon to öaere byrig. 'They conveyed the saint to the city' OElfric, Homilies (Thorpe) ii. 518: 29). (39) Hafap us God forswapan on öas sweartan mistes. 'God has swept us into these dark mists' (Casdmon, Metr.Par. (Thorpe) 21; Genesis 391).

Locative valency of the English verb

299

(40) Mid dy we ure scyp fram öam yjmm upp abceron. 'With this we brought our ship up from the waves' (Bede, Historia Ecclesiastica (Smith) 614: 11). Among the intransitive verbs, one important group consists of verbs denoting 'reside, be in a certain place or position', such as beon 'be', belifan 'remain', bidan, abidan 'abide', libban 'live', licgan 'lie', sit tan 'sit', standan 'stand', wician 'lodge', wunian 'dwell'. They are most characteristically combined with the locative valency proper, e. g. (41) a. Da creopendan licgeap mid ealle lichoman on eorjaan 'Creeping things lie on the earth with all their body' (iiilfred, Cura pastoralis (Sweet) 155: 17). b. Abraham belaflpaer. 'Abraham remained there' (Genesis 21: 32). Another important group consists of intransitive verbs of motion, e. g. cuman 'come', creopan 'creep', gan 'go', faran 'go', fleogan 'fly', lacan 'swing, move about', lipan 'travel, go, sail', ridan 'ride on horseback', rowan 'go by water, row, sail', siglan 'sail', stceppan 'step, go', swimman 'swim', wadan 'go, pass, proceed', wandrian 'wander'. These have a wide range of locative valencies, viz. locative proper, cf. (42), locative allative, cf. (43), locative ablative, cf. (44), locative illative, cf. (45), locative elative, cf. (46), locative mediative, cf. (47): (42) Da munecas crupon under öam weofode. 'The monks crept under the altar' {Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (Earle) 1083; 217: 22). (43) Hannibal to öam lande becom. 'Hannibal came to that land' (Orosius (Bosworth) 90: 14). (44) Gewiton feorh heora fram Jaam folcstyde fleame nergan. 'They went away from that city saving their lives' (Genesis 1999). (45) In öa ceastre becuman meahte. 'Thou mightest come into the city' {Andreas 931). (46) He of öam grimnan gryre treddenon. 'They went from that fierce terror' {Ccedmon (Thorpe) 243: 21). (47) He ferode Jjurh öa ceastre. 'He went through the town' {Old English Gospels, Lk. (Skeat) 8: 1).

300

Anatolij Μ. Mukhin — Natalya

Μ.

Yulikova

A third major group of intransitive verbs is characterised by the meaning 'fall, lower', e. g. cringan 'fall, perish, die', dreosan 'fall down', dufan 'sink, immerge', feallan 'fall down', hleapian 'leap, jump', sincan 'sink', springan 'spring'. They allow the locative valency proper, cf. (48), and the locative illative valency, cf. (49). (48) Hi sceoldon begen crincgan on waelstowe. 'They should both fall on the battlefield' (Battle of Maldon (Thorpe) 140: 23). (49) a. Roger het an of heom se hleop into öam castele cet Norpwic. 'Roger was the name of one of them, he threw himself into the castle at Norwich' {Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (Earle) 1087; 224: 34). b. Ne sceolon rade feallan on grimme grund. 'They shall fall rapidly into the grim abyss' (Beowulf 1070). Summing up, the results presented above demonstrate the relevance of the notion of valency for historical syntax. In this connection one will have to recognise syntaxemes as language-specific categories, e. g. the locative syntaxemes, which are represented by systems of variants. Generally speaking, the fact that syntactic units (as well as the units of other linguistic levels) can be represented by a system of variants provides us with a better understanding of substantial changes within the language itself (cf. Ryden 1979: 12). Consequently, one should study the mutual relations between variants of different syntaxemes within limited periods in the history of a given language, and determine their functional characteristics on both the paradigmatic and syntagmatic planes of the language. Minor differences between the variants of a syntaxeme may be due to different shades of meaning or some stylistic feature (although they still convey the same syntactic semantics), to their lexical basis or to their immediate lexical environment. And unquestionably the variants of a syntaxeme may differ in their occurrence, which is why statistical investigations are also required. The variant problem cannot be solved without also analysing the elementary syntactic units which by their nature are invariant. Thus, if we were dealing with a single or unified syntaxeme characterised by locative semantics (e. g. an "adverbial modifier of place" as in traditional grammar) instead of with a number of locative syntaxemes (locative proper, locative allative, locative ablative, etc.), we would not have to talk about a system of variants for such a unit, since they would not

Locative valency of the English verb

301

correlate in terms of their functional characteristics. In this hypothetical case, the linguist would also not be concerned with the lexico-semantic group of verbs which constitute the immediate lexical environment for the locative syntaxemes and are indicative of the respective locative valency. The interpretation of the above locative syntaxemes as different functional units (invariants), on the other hand, makes it possible to establish their systems of variants alongside with lexico-semantic groups of verbs which admit their occurrence within a sentence. Note 1. All Old English examples are quoted from Bosworth —Toller (1954—1955).

References Bosworth, Joseph — T. Northcote Toller 1954—1955 An Anglo-Saxon dictionary and supplement. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Mukhin, Anatolij M. 1985 "Lexical and syntactic semantics in historical aspect", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.) Historical semantics. Historical word-formation. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 397-405. 1987 Sistemnyje otnosenija perekhodnych glagolnych lexem. Na materiale anglijskogo i russkogo jazykov. [Systematic relations of transitive verbal lexemes on the basis of material from English and Russian], Leningrad: Nauka. Ryden, Mats 1979 An introduction to the historical study of English syntax. Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. Somers, Harold L. 1984 "On validity of the complement adjunct distinction in valency grammar", Linguistics 22: 5 0 7 - 5 3 0 .

Motivated archaism: the use of affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose Terttu

1.

Nevalainen

Introduction

Few topics in English diachronic syntax have attracted more scholarly attention than periphrastic do. As the present volume testifies, the interest in the auxiliary shows no signs of flagging. While the monumental quantitative investigation by Ellegärd (1953) still remains a standard reference, recent work on do has also greatly benefited from the application of new variationist methods to language change. Analysing linguistic variation reveals the actual complexity of ongoing changes thus contributing decisively to our understanding of them. My study of the diachronic evolution of do focusses on some aspects in its development that may strike one as unexpected or nonnatural. Consequently, the present paper has little to say about the spread of the periphrasis, or why the use of do so rapidly declined in affirmative declarative sentences during the latter half of the 17th century (cf. e.g. Ellegärd 1953: 162, Rissanen, this volume). My attention is directed to another intriguing question, which has been largely neglected in the literature: given this general decline, why did do nevertheless sometimes survive, or even reappear, in affirmative declaratives in certain contexts after the mid-sixteen hundreds? Why did the archaic usage prevail in the language of liturgy, for instance? In more general terms, I am examining an instance of what Labov (1972: 290) calls change from above. This process of more or less conscious linguistic selection is commonly contrasted with natural language change that originates from below the level of social awareness. Whether the decline of do in 17th century written documents resulted from a natural change is a matter of some dispute (cf. Rissanen 1985). All we can say is that affirmative do was not codified as an obligatory tense and mood carrier in declaratives in standard English. 1 Hence its retention in, or introduction into, certain contexts must have been to some extent a matter of conscious selection.

304

Terttu

Nevalainen

My discussion of do is organised as follows: I shall first briefly introduce my data and then examine whether any inherent semantic function might motivate the use of the periphrasis in this particular case. Since no single function seems to cover enough ground, I will adopt the empty periphrasis approach. The remainder of the paper will be devoted to analysing doperiphrasis and the simple finite verb form as two alternative syntactic variants in Early Modern English.

2. The data My primary linguistic evidence is derived from two Early Modern English editions of the Anglican Liturgy, The Book of Common Prayer (BCP). The contemporary sermon and Bible extracts in the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts serve as comparative material. I have selected the Common Prayer Book for two obvious reasons. First, the dates of the two principal editions, 1552 and 1662, approximately coincide with the periods of the rise and decline of do, respectively (cf. Ellegärd 1953: 162). Secondly, the bulk of the 1662 text had undergone only a linguistic revision with comparatively few substantive changes. This makes it possible to investigate the operations of conscious linguistic change in highly stable environments. The foundations for an English liturgical prose were laid by the two Edwardine Books of Common Prayer of 1549 and 1552. With a few alterations the 1552 Book prevailed as the Anglican Service Book until its overall revision was undertaken in 1661 and enforced by the Act of Uniformity in 1662. The linguistic grounds for the revision are stated in the Preface of the 1662 edition (p. 3 1 - 3 3 in Brightman's (1921) paralleltext edition): most of the alterations were made ... for the more proper expressing of some words or phrases of antient vsage, in terms more suteable to the language of the present times. As I have shown in more detail elsewhere (Nevalainen 1987), most of the alterations were carried out along rather conservative lines. If it is measured against the standard core grammar of its time, the 1662 Book appears on the whole much more archaic than the 1552 Book in its day. This archaic usage set the model for liturgical language for centuries to come, until The Alternative Service Book was published in 1980.

Affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose

305

3. The incidence of do in The Book of Common Prayer My study of the affirmative do is based on all the non-biblical matter shared by the two editions that was subject to revision in 1662. A systematic search yielded a total of 116 instances of do in affirmative statements in the 1552 edition, and 114 in the 1662 edition. While the great majority of the occurrences in the earlier version were retained, a number of interesting alterations were also made in the revision: eleven instances of do were deleted and nine new ones added in 1662. Other linguistic alterations that were made in the adjacent contexts reinforce the impression that the distribution of do represents a nonrandom choice on the part of the revisers. In what follows I shall try to motivate the retention of do. While the additions and deletions of do are not frequent, they serve as indispensable cues to the use of do in liturgical language. Table 1 shows the frequency of do in the Prayer Book data, and in the comparative material that will be discussed in section 7, below. Table I. Frequency of affirmative do in the Prayer Book and the comparative Helsinki Corpus material. 2 Prayer Book

Ν

Bible

Ν

Sermons

Ν

BCP 1552:

116

Tyndale: AV 1611:

13 25

1500-1570: 1570-1640: 1640-1700:

27 45 12

—

BCP 1662:

114

-

4. The inherent meaning hypothesis Evidence on modern regional dialects shows that affirmative do may be grammaticalised, for instance, as an aspect marker in English (Ihalainen 1976, 1981). A number of suggestions to that effect have also been advanced concerning periphrastic do in Late Middle English and Early Modern English. It has been attributed the transitory functions of an indicative mood indicator (Traugott 1972: 139) and a non-stative Aktionsart marker (Denison 1985: 54) in Late Middle English, as well as the possible function of marking progressive aspect in competition with be ± -ing (Samuels 1972: 176) in Early Modern English. I will discuss each suggestion in turn in the light of the BCP data. This evaluation is made in order to find out how far the inherent functions would seem to account for conservative and prestigious Early Modern English usage.

306

Terttu Nevalainen

Indicative mood indication has been suggested by Traugott (1972: 139), among others. She maintains that do was used in the indicative partly to prevent confusion with the simple finite verb (V) in the subjunctive. Hence do would assert the truth of the proposition while the simple V would express uncertainty or noncommitment. Do would occur especially in sentences involving perception verbs. In the BCP data, most instances of do are in the indicative. But since subjunctives also occur (as in (1)) the auxiliary is not confined to mood marking (cf. also Stein 1985 a: 215 — 267). While do seems to be connected with verbs of perception in Present-day English (Nevalainen —Rissanen 1986), this combination occurs only once or twice in the BCP data. In fact do is deleted from one such context in 1662. This instance is cited in (2). (1)

At whiche daye of marriage if any man doe allege and declare any impediment why thei may not be coupled together in Matrimony ... the Solemnizacion must be deferred ... (1552, p. 803)

(2)

ALmightye God, whyche doest see that we haue no power of oure selues to helpe oure selues: (1552, p. 299) Almighty God, who seest that we have no power of our selves, to help our selves: (1662, p. 299)

A better case could be made for what Ellegärd (1953: 172) calls strong emotional content verbs, items such as believe, beseech, assure and confess. Not surprisingly, in both editions of the Prayer Book, do occurs with these and similar speech act verbs. However, the comparative material of simple finite forms that I have collected shows that a verb like beseech is in fact more common in the simple finite form than with do in both editions. The instances in (3) illustrate the two in the same context. (3)

We synners doe beseche thee to heare vs (Ο Lorde God) and that it may please thee to rule and goerne thy holy Church uniuersally, in the ryghte waye. We beseeche thee to heare vs good Lorde. (1552, p. 937)

The degree of emotional emphasis associated with do in this and other similar contexts is notoriously difficult to measure. If emphatic do arose out of periphrastic do in the latter half of the 16th century, as Tieken (1988: 20 — 21) among others suggests, then the Prayer Book usage would antedate it and could not be explained by it.

Affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose

307

Equally non-conclusive is the possible association of do with progressive aspect marking. This suggestion is put forward by Samuels (1972: 176) on the basis of Pepys's use of do in his diary. Except for the Preface, most instances of non-past do in the BCP are timeless or omnitemporal, and hence apt to take on a habitual interpretation. The past tense form did is also very common in both Books. In so far as it is aspectually motivated, did is used to disambiguate between the present perfect and the non-progressive simple past. In 1662, did was reintroduced four times into affirmative contexts where it replaced the earlier present perfect (cf. (4)) (4)

LOrd almightie, which hast indued thy holy Apostle Barnabas, with singuler giftes of thy holy gost: (1552, p. 589) Ο Lord God Almighty who didst endue thy holy Apostle with singular gifts of the holy Ghost: (1662, p. 589)

Barnabas

Yet another semantic function has been connected with do in Late Middle English. Denison (1985: 54) checked the Aktionsart of the infinitive clause occurring with do in some 400 cases against the Vendler classification, and drew the conclusion that do was primarily associated with non-stative infinitives. Hence it would serve as an Aktionsart marker for non-statives. In my BCP data, too, a great majority of the infinitives associated with do denote either events (including both achievements and accomplishments) or habitual processes (cf. Carlson 1981, Mourelatos 1981). My tentative analysis of the infinitives indicates that roughly 15 to 20% of them are stative (as in (5)). But the analysis is again complicated by the omnitemporal character of the text. (5)

That it maye please thee to strengthen suche as doe stände, and to comforte, and helpe the weake hearted. (1552, p. 939)

The fact that do appears to favour non-stative contexts is an interesting instance of etymological conditioning: as a lexical verb do always denotes either a process or an event. As with the rest of the semantic functions associated with do, however, the simple verb form may express the same function as do in the BCP. The original Aktionsart preferences of do may nevertheless partly account for some formulaic expressions. In prayers, the Latin qui vivit et regnat, for example, is regularly translated with two coordinate finite verbs as who liveth and reigneth.

308

Terttu

Nevalainen

Thus, what emerges from these observations is the general conclusion that no single semantic function could account for the use of affirmative do. Even the conservative 17th century revision of the prestigious BCP was not conducted along purely semantic lines. We must therefore turn to the empty periphrasis alternative for a more accurate analysis.3

5. The structural periphrasis hypothesis The structural periphrasis hypothesis is usually taken to imply that there is "no distinction in cognitive or descriptive meaning between the use of do or finite form" (Stein 1985 b: 155). The fact that this analysis ignores complex verb phrases, which might also be relevant to the analysis, has been pointed out by Frank (1985). In spite of the counterargument, I shall base my discussion only on variation between the simple finite form and Jo-periphrasis. It is of course worth bearing in mind that, in the Prayer Book data, the distribution of do is semantically weighted towards indicative non-statives. The structural motives for Jo-periphrasis discussed in the literature range from phonotactic to discourse-semantic and textual, and they are usually presented in terms of syntagmatic constraints. I examined my primary data using some 15 different criteria, from among which I then selected eight that appeared to covary significantly with the 230 instances of periphrastic do in the two editions of the BCP. For comparative purposes, I then sampled double that number of simple finite verb forms, in the same proportion and from the same contexts of use as do in both Books (prefaces, prayers, and orders of service). In what follows I will compare the different syntagmatic constraints in the two sets of data rather than calculate a degree of periphrasis index for the texts. Further points of comparison were established with the incidence of affirmative do in the sermon and Bible data in the Helsinki Corpus, a total of 122 instances covering the entire Early Modern English period (see Table 1). Some of the 15 criteria examined did not prove useful. I left out certain purely lexically motivated constraints, such as the phonetically unstable strong preterites of verbs like break (Samuels 1972:172 — 175), and identical present and past tense forms of such verbs as put (Dahl 1956:11). The BCP contains too few of them for meaningful quantification, only one instance of did break, for example. On the other hand, factors like loan word accommodation do not seem to warrant the use of do in the BCP (cf. Samuels 1972: 174). According to The Oxford English Dictionary, of some 40 non-

Affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose

309

native infinitives occurring with do, only three go back to the 15th century (viz. instruct, prevail and promise), and none to the 16th. The factors that I selected for closer study can be grouped into four sets of contexts in which affirmative do occurs: (1) phonotactic: second person singular, past tense (2) syntactic: subject separated from verb, preverbal adverbial (3) stylistic: coordinate structure, clause-final verb (4) textual: clausal subordination, translation.

5.1.

Phonotactic factors

The relevance of phonotactic constraints on Jo-periphrasis has already been discussed by Ellegärd, Dahl and Visser, and later amply demonstrated by Stein (1985 a, 1985 b, 1986). It is also in line with the hypothesis of the spoken language origins of do discussed in Rissanen (1985, and this volume). The inclusion of this factor group is equally well motivated here because 85% of all the occurrences of do that are retained in 1662, and all those that are added, appear in Prayers and Orders of Service, which are intended for oral delivery. In speech periphrastic do can serve as a convenient means of bypassing awkward consonant clusters in verbal inflections. From the phonotactic person and tense variables I selected those that have been shown to correlate best with the incidence of do, namely the 2nd person singular and the past tense. Both occur in example (6 a). In fact, didst is the single most common person and tense combination in both editions of the BCP. It is found in seven out of the nine additions made in 1662, and none were deleted. The deletions mainly occurred in the 3rd person plural. Past and present tenses combined, the 2nd person singular covers 40% of the instances of do shared by the two Books. However, the 2nd person singular does not necessarily trigger do in the BCP, as the example in (6 b) demonstrates. (6)

a. Ο Almighty God, who by thy blessed Son didst call Matthew from the receipt of custome to be an Apostle ... (1662, p. 619) b. Almighty God, who calledst Luke the Physician, whose praise is in the Gospel, to be an Evangelist ... (1662, p. 625)

310

Terttu

Nevalainen

5.2.

Syntactic factors

There is a great deal of variation in the syntactic constraints on periphrastic do (Ellegärd 1953). Most of them are related to word order and the growing analytic tendency in Middle and Early Modern English. The two factors that were checked against affirmative do in the BCP are separation of the subject from the verb (cf. the pattern subject-adverbί/ο-verb in Ellegärd 1953) and preverbal adverbial (Ellegärd's subject-doadverb-verb). If nonrestrictive relative clauses and postmodifiers also count as separators, the first, subject-verb separation, is attested in 45% of the shared instances of do in both Books. It occurs in as many as six additions in 1662, but it is also deleted three times. Two instances of subject-verb separation are exemplified in (7). (7)

ALmightie God, whiche at the beginning dyd create our fyrst parentes Adam and Eue, & did sanctifie & ioine the(m) together in manage: (1552, p. 813)

According to Ellegärd (1953: 181), more relevant for do is the second pattern, the presence of an adverbial before the main verb. It is not very frequent in the present data; only some 11 % of the instances show the sdav pattern. Nevertheless, it is found in two of the additions in 1662, cf. (8): (8)

I require and charge you ... that ye confesse it. (1552, p. 803) I require and charge you ... that ... ye do now confess it; (1662, p. 803)

5.3.

Stylistic factors

The stylistic factors promoting do are often discussed in terms of balance and structural compensation (cf. Dahl 1956, Rissanen 1985). I have studied the factors of structural coordination and clause-final verb. Coordination, the way I have interpreted it, involves a cline of Jo-constructions with two infinitives or structures of predication at one end, as in example (7). At the other end come structurally parallel coordinate clauses with do. Example (9) illustrates clausal coordination. Some degree of coordination is involved in 55% of the instances of do that are shared by the two Books. Do-periphrasis is added to one such context in the 1662 edition, but it is again deleted three times from other similar contexts.

Affirmative periphrastic do in Early Modern English liturgical prose

(9)

311

And moreouer, they be neither darke not dombe ceremonies: but are so sette furthe, that euery man may vnderstande what they doe meane, & to what vse thei do serue. (1552, p. 45)

The other stylistic feature is compensation for the thematic oddity of a single clause-final predicate verb by means of ifo-periphrasis (Rissanen 1985: 173). As in Present-day English, by making the verb phrase bipartite, the auxiliary will serve as a transition between theme and focus (Quirk et al. 1985: 1401). A clause-final do + verb structure occurs in one quarter of the cases shared by the two editions, and in one addition in 1662. Only absolute clause-finality is taken into account here, as in example (9), for instance. This means that infinitives followed by subordinate clauses are excluded from the analysis.

5.4. Textual factors Two textual factors have also been analysed in the Prayer Book data: translation and clausal subordination. Although it is not commonly counted among the constraints on do, I have included translation in order to test the internal heterogeneity of the Prayer Book. More specifically, I wanted to find out whether there was any difference in the use of do between the sections that were translated from Latin (or occasionally from German) and those of native composition. The result of the analysis is that some 50% of all the instances of do occur in translations. Moreover, two thirds of the additions appear in translations, but there is only one deletion. Examples of translation include those in (2), (3), (4), (7), (10) and (11). Evidence from Present-day English suggests that various discourse functions account for the use of periphrastic do in speech (Nevalainen — Rissanen 1986). In the diachronic context, both Dahl (1956: 92) and Stein (1985 c) have emphasised the role of discourse: periphrastic do can be a main clause phenomenon that marks the pivotal points in the message. Having analysed the incidence of do in the BCP, I came to the conclusion that, if anything, in liturgical language do serves as a subordinate clause marker. A total of 86% of the cases occur in subordinate clauses. All of the 1662 additions also appear in subordinate clauses, but so do seven of the eleven deletions of do. It is interesting to compare these findings with the simple finite verb forms in the same contexts (cf. section 6).

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Before embarking on the comparisons, I should perhaps make it clear that clausal subordination need not, however, diminish discourse relevance in the present data. The instance of do in (10), taken from the Creed in Public Baptism, could easily be motivated on discourse grounds as a marker of the pivotal point in the sequence of events. (10) Dost thou believe in God the Father Almightie, Maker of heaven and earth. And in Jesus Christ his only begotten son our Lord? And that he was conceived by the holy Ghost, born of the Virgin Mary. That he suffered vnder Pontius Pilate, Was crucified dead and buried, That he went down into hell, and also did rise again the third day? (1662, p. 737)

6.

Comparison of do with the simple finite verb

The first conclusion of the above analysis is that the factors promoting periphrastic do seem to vary greatly in frequency in the Prayer Book. Their distribution is presented graphically in Figure 1. It is organised according to the descending frequency of the different factors in the two editions. However, without comparison with the simple finite verb, the results cannot tell very much. In order to put them in perspective, I have plotted on the same figure the corresponding frequencies in the finite %

Figure 1. Factors associated with affirmative do compared with the simple finite verb form (V) in the two editions of the BCP.

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verb data, a total of 460 instances in the two Books. All the factors also occur with the finite verb, but their frequency is usually appreciably lower than in clauses with periphrastic do. Calculation of the statistical significance for each factor using the chisquare test confirms the general impression. Both the phonotactic and textual factors yield a highly significant difference between the simple verb form and periphrastic do (p < 0.001). Of the two syntactic factors, subject-verb separation is almost significant in the 1552 Book (p < 0.025), and becomes significant in 1662 (p < 0.005), but the preverbal adverbial factor does not reach the level of significant difference in either. Finally, the stylistic factor of verb finality is significant in both editions (p < 0.01), but more so in 1662 (p < 0.005), and coordination is almost significant in both (p < 0.025).

7.

Marking of do in the comparative material

Figures 2 and 3 plot the frequencies of the above factors in the comparative material, extracts of Tyndale's Bible translations and the Authorised Version, and sermons from three Early Modern English periods in the Helsinki Corpus. It seems that periphrastic do was comparatively more frequent in the 16th and early 17th century sermons (N = 72 in about 20,000 running words) than in the two Bible translations dating from the same periods (N = 38 in about 42,000 running words). In both sources the early 17th century marks the peak frequency of do (cf. Table 1 above). Brook (1965: 110) also maintains that periphrastic do is more common in the Authorised Version than in the Prayer Book. When making comparisons, it has to be borne in mind that the Bible and to a lesser extent the sermons are heterogeneous. Hence, the narrative Bible passages in the Helsinki Corpus show relatively few instances of the second person singular context. In these samples, this factor cannot promote the use of do. The same must be said about translation, which is not a universal constraint on do: although the Bible is a work of translation, it has far fewer instances of do than the sermons, which only contain some occasional translated passages. The factors that have a relatively high incidence with do in the comparative data include the past tense, subordination, and coordination, and, in the sermons, subject-verb separation. It seems that all the main factor groups are relevant, although to a lesser extent than in the Prayer Book data. A comparison of factor frequencies associated with do in

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%

Figure 2. Z)o-marking in the Helsinki Corpus extracts of Tyndale's Bible translations and the Authorised Version.

%

Figure 3. Do-marking in the Helsinki Corpus extracts of Early Modern English sermons (A = 1 5 0 0 - 1 5 7 0 , Β = 1 5 7 0 - 1 6 4 0 , C = 1 6 4 0 - 1 7 0 0 )

these texts reveals an interesting inverse relation between factor frequency and the frequency of the occurrence of do. Proportionately, do is most common in the (second period) sermons and least common in the BCP. Table 2 indicates that the mean number of factors co-occurring with do in the 1552 Book is 3.3 and in the 1662 Book 3.6, with a median of 3 in both. The 1662 additions have an average of 4.3 and a median of 5, whereas the deletions are on average marked by only 1.5 factors, and a

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median of 2. With the exception of the 1662 deletions, these figures are lower than the mean and median for the simple finite verb in the BCP, 2.1 and 2, respectively. Table 2. Constraint frequencies associated with affirmative do and the simple finite verb in the Early Modern English data. Range

Mean

Median

BCP 1552 BCP 1662

0-7 1-7

3.3 3.6

3 3

1662 additions 1662 deletions

2-5 0-3

4.3 1.5

5 2

Tyndale's Bible Authorized Version

1-5 1-5

2.8 2.8

3 3

Sermons 1 5 0 0 - 1 5 7 0 Sermons 1 5 7 0 - 1 6 4 0 Sermons 1 6 4 0 - 1 7 0 0

0-5 0-4 0-3

2.1 1.8 1.4

2 2 1

0-6 0-6

2.1 2.1

2 2

Data source Affirmative do in:

Finite verb in: BCP 1552 BCP 1662

Table 2 indicates that affirmative do is on average more marked in the BCP than in the Bible extracts, which in turn are more marked than the sermon extracts. Although the factors may vary or be differently weighted in different text types, it is always possible to make meaningful comparisons within one and the same text type. The figures clearly indicate that, in the 1662 Prayer Book, do is only added to heavily marked contexts. This is of course what one would expect in a change-from-above situation: conscious changes will emerge in the most salient linguistic environments (Naro — Lemle 1976; cf., however, the more problematic case of the relative pronoun who discussed in Nevalainen 1987: 310 — 311).

8.

Most marked contexts: do in collects

With the Prayer Book data, it is possible to pursue the issue of markedness even further to arrive at a more satisfactory description. The quantitative investigation has shown that the phonotactic and textual factors tend to

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override in significance stylistic and especially syntactic factors in the BCP. What are then the most salient factor combinations in the use of do? The additions to the 1662 Book will give us the clue: the auxiliary is systematically introduced into a translated passage, where it occurs in a subordinate clause that has a simple past tense verb and a second person singular subject. This context is found in the collect, a short formulaic prayer with a clear internal structure. Collects account for 40% of the instances of do in the 1552 Book and for 45% in the 1662 Book (examples (2), (4), (6), (7) and (11)). The occurrences of do are more marked in the collects than anywhere else in the BCP: the average number of factors is 4.2 in the 1552 Book, and 4.4 in 1662 (range 2 — 7, median 5).4 In collects, do is regularly introduced into the section that comes immediately after the invocation (i. e. address to God). This section forms the "basis" for the petition, and it contains some quality of God or some action attributed to him (Ferguson 1976: 102). Collects have a long and complex history in the Roman Church, but their basic structure was preserved when they were translated and adapted for use in the vernacular services after the Reformation. With their Latin-based syntax, they are at the very margins of acceptability in Present-day English. The instance in (11) is mentioned by Ferguson (1976: 106) as an extreme case — and it also contains a do. (11) Ο God, whych by the leadinge of α starre dyddest many feste thy onely begotten sonne to the Gentyles: Mercyfully graunt, that we which know thee now by fayth, may after this lyfe haue the fruicion of thy glorious Godhead, through Christ our Lorde. (1552, p. 249)

9.

Discussion and conclusion

Both in 1552 and in 1662, the Prayer Book use of affirmative do is syntagmatically more marked than that of the simple finite verb. Convergent evidence suggests that it was motivated first and foremost by generic considerations. Since the second person singular was preserved when addressing God in the 1662 edition, and since these addresses were used in the formulaic context of prayer, the phonotactic and textual constraints also prevailed. It would be tempting to speculate that do was retained not only for the ease of oral delivery but also in order to restore

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the common rhetorical pattern. In other words, it might have been recognised as a subgeneric marker of the collect. Elsewhere in the Prayer Book do occurred at about the same level of markedness as in the Bible. This is not surprising in view of the close connection between the two. The evidence on do thus lends support to Stella Brook's suggestion of a common religious usage (1965: 107): The rough alternation between the issue of revised editions of the Book of Common Prayer and revised translations of the Bible may have helped to establish a standardised 'religious' usage, common to both books, kept alive by tradition in the face of changing linguistic habits. In spite of their assignment, the revisers of the Common Prayer Book must have been mindful of the established religious usage. Even outside the highly formulaic context of the collect there remained a number of textual environments that would promote the use of the auxiliary. By retaining do in these contexts the revisers demonstrated that, in liturgical language, it was not stigmatised as one of the "words or phrases that were either of doubtfull signification or otherwise liable to misconstruction" (Preface, p. 3 1 - 3 3 ) . Notes 1. These and other aspects of the diachronic distribution of do are discussed elsewhere in this volume in the contributions by Rissanen, Stein, and Wright. Other recent treatments of the topic include Tieken (1987, 1988) and Poussa (1990). I would like to thank the participants of the Kellner Symposium for their valuable comments on the spoken version of my paper. My special thanks are due to Dr. Ingrid Tieken and Professors Matti Rissanen and Dieter Stein for their insightful comments on the prefinal version of the paper. Any inadvertences that remain are my own responsibility. 2. These Helsinki Corpus samples vary in length from roughly 10,000 to 20,000 running words per text type in each subperiod. The extracts from Tyndale's Bible translations (1530, 1534) and the Authorised Version (1611) both contain the same Old and New Testament passages (about 10,000 words of OT and 11,000 words of NT each). Sermons are represented by extracts from the works of Fisher and Latimer (first subperiod; c. 10,000 running words in all), Hooker and Smith (second subperiod; c. 10,000 words), and Taylor and Tillotson (third subperiod; c. 12,000 words). For information on the Helsinki Corpus in general, see Kytö — Rissanen (1988), and for the Early Modern English subcorpus in particular, Nevalainen — Raumolin-Brunberg (1989). 3. This approach seems especially appropriate in the context of a Kellner Symposium. One of Leon Kellner's guiding principles was to study the history of English syntax and accidence, not in isolation, but at the level of the sentence: "the parts of speech and their grammatical functions are always dependent on the place which they occupy in the sentence" (Kellner 1905: 4).

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4. The corresponding mean for the simple finite verb form in the collects is 2.4 (range 05, median 2). In prefaces and rubrics the mean factor frequency for do is 3.0 in 1662 (1.6 for the simple V), and in the orders of service 2.9 (1.9 for the simple V). On stylistic differences between the different parts of the BCP, cf. Nevalainen (1987).

References Brightman, F. E. 1921 The English Rite, being a synopsis of the sources and revisions of The Book of Common Prayer. 2 vols. (Second, revised edition). London: Rivingtons. Brook, Stella 1965 The language of The Book of Common Prayer. London: Deutsch. Carlson, Lauri 1981 "Aspect and quantification", in: Philip J. Tedeschi — Annie Zaenen (eds.), Syntax and semantics. Volume 14. Tense and aspect. New York: Academic Press, 3 1 - 6 4 . Dahl, Torsten 1956 "Linguistic studies in some Elizabethan writings II: the auxiliary do", Acta Jutlandica 28: 3 - 1 0 4 . Denison, David 1985 "The origins of periphrastic do: Ellegärd and Visser reconsidered", in: Roger Eaton —Olga Fischer — Willem Koopman—Frederike van der Leek (eds.), Papers from the 4th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 41) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 45 — 60. Ellegard, Alvar 1953 The auxiliary do, the establishment and regulation of its use in English. (Gothenburg Studies in English 2) Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell. Ferguson, Charles A. 1976 "The collect as a form of discourse", in: William J. Samarin (ed.), Language in religious practice. Rowley, MA: Newbury House, 101 —109. Frank, Thomas 1985 "The rise of do-support in Early Modern English: a reappraisal", Revista Canaria de Estudios Ingleses 10: 1 —29. Ihalainen, Ossi 1976 "Periphrastic do in affirmative sentences in the dialect of East Somerset", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 77: 608 — 622. 1981 "A note on eliciting data in dialectology: the case of periphrastic do", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 82: 25 —Π. Kellner, Leon 1905 Historical outlines of English syntax. London: Macmillan. Kytö, Merja—Matti Rissanen 1988 "The Helsinki Corpus of English Texts: classifying and coding the diachronic part", in: Merja Kytö—Ossi Ihalainen — Matti Rissanen (eds.), Corpus linguistics, hard and soft. Proceedings of the Eighth International Conference on English Language Research on Computerized Corpora. (Language and Computers: Studies in Practical Linguistics 2) Amsterdam: Rodopi, 169—179. Labov, William 1972 Sociolinguistic patterns. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.

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Mourelatos, Alexander P. D. 1981 "Events, processes and states", in: Philip J. Tedeschi — Annie Zaenen (eds.), Syntax and semantics. Volume 14. Tense and aspect. New York: Academic Press, 1 9 1 - 2 1 2 . Naro, Anthony J. —Miriam Lemle 1976 "Syntactic diffusion", in: Sanford B. Steever — Carol A. Walker—Salikoko S. Mufwene (eds.), Papers from the parasession on diachronic syntax. Chicago, 111.: Chicago Linguistic Society, 221—240. Nevalainen, Terttu 1987 "Change from above: a morphosyntactic comparison of two Early Modern English editions of The Book of Common Prayer", in: Leena Kahlas-Tarkka (ed.), Neophilologica Fennica. (Memoires de la Societe Neophilologique de Helsinki 45) Helsinki: Societe Neophilologique, 295 — 315. Nevalainen, Terttu—Helena Raumolin-Brunberg 1989 "A corpus of Early Modern Standard English in a socio-historical perspective", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 90: 67 — 110. Nevalainen, Terttu —Matti Rissanen 1986 " D o you support the rfo-support? Emphatic and non-emphatic do in affirmative statements in present-day spoken English", in: Sven Jacobson (ed.), Papers from the Third Scandinavian Symposium on Syntactic Variation. (Stockholm Studies in English 65) Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 35 — 50. Poussa, Patricia 1990 "A contact-universals origin for periphrastic do, with special consideration of OE-Celtic contact", in: Sylvia Adamson—Vivien A. Law —Nigel Vincent—Susan Wright (eds.), Papers from the 5th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 65) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 407 — 434. Quirk, Randolph —Sidney Greenbaum — Geoffrey Leech —Jan Svartvik 1985 A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman. Rissanen, Matti 1985 "Periphrastic do in affirmative statements in Early American English", Journal of English Linguistics 18: 163 — 183. Samuels, Michael L. 1972 Linguistic evolution, with special reference to English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Stein, Dieter 1985 a Natürlicher syntaktischer Sprachwandel. Untersuchungen zur Entstehung der englischen do-Periphrase in Fragen. München: tuduv-Studie. 1985 b "Stylistic aspects of syntactic change", Folia Linguistica Historica 6: 153 — 178. 1985c "Discourse markers in Early Modern English", in: Roger Eaton —Olga Fischer—Willem Koopman — Frederike van der Leek (eds.), Papers from the 4th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 41) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 283 — 302. 1986 "Syntactic variation and change: the case of do in questions in Early Modern English", Folia Linguistica Historica 7: 121 — 149. Tieken-Boon van Ostade, Ingrid 1987 The auxiliary do in eighteenth-century English, a sociohistorical-linguistic approach. (Geschiedenis van de Taalkunde 6) Dordrecht: Foris.

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"The origin and development of periphrastic auxiliary do: a case of destigmatisation", Dutch Working Papers in English Language and Linguistics 3: 1-30. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1972 A history of English syntax, a transformational approach to the history of English sentence structure. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston.

Spoken language and the history of ^-periphrasis Matti

Rissanen

1. Introduction In his Historical syntax, Leon Kellner does not give too many details of the history of periphrastic do. He points out that do had the meaning 'to cause' from the beginning of the thirteenth century to the end of the fifteenth, "thus making up for the loss of causative verbs". He also refers to the "redundant" use of do which occurs "as early as the time of Robert of Gloucester ... along with can or gan". Finally, he adds that this use of do is common in German, and occasionally occurs in Old French (Kellner 1892: 221). Today, a hundred years later, this scanty information still forms the basis of our discussion of the origin and development of ί/ο-periphrasis. However, new linguistic insights and an easier access to vast amounts of varying text material help us to sharpen the picture of the earliest development of this construction. The main argument of my paper is that do-periphrasis has probably always been a structure typical of spoken discourse. If this hypothesis is accepted, it may become easier to describe and understand its origin and early development. The present paper is, to a certain extent, a continuation and elaboration of an earlier article (Rissanen 1985); it is based on more extensive Early Modern British English text material provided by the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts: Diachronic and Dialectal, 1 and the earliest development of the periphrasis is discussed here in more detail. I will concentrate on the use of do in affirmative statements (the type He did go home by train as against He went home by train).2 It may sound a truism to argue that the discussion of the history of periphrastic do, or of any other syntactic structure, should take spoken language as its starting point. But in this particular case, it may be useful to emphasise this point because Ellegärd, whose study (1953) is still one of the most extensively used standard works on the development of doperiphrasis, systematically treats this structure as a feature typical of literary language and formal style (e. g. pp. 164 — 169). Ellegard's study is still today of great value as a coherent and highly systematic treatment of a detail in historical syntax. His arguments (1953:

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21—23) against Langenfelt's (1931) view of the popular and colloquial origin of öfo-periphrasis are also worth attention. It seems, however, that the relevant question is not whether the periphrasis originates from a formal or colloquial register but whether or not it is (and was) a structure typical of spoken discourse. As is well known, "spoken" is not synonymous with "colloquial", or "informal"; there is as much stylistic or register variation in speech as in writing.

2. Z)o-periphrasis in present-day spoken English I will begin my survey of the history of periphrastic do with a brief discussion of the present-day use of this structure in affirmative statements, and then work my way backwards in time. The occurrence of periphrastic do in present-day spoken English, as represented by the London — Lund Corpus of spoken English, is discussed in Nevalainen — Rissanen (1985). This corpus is compared with the Lancaster—Oslo/Bergen Corpus of written British English. 3 The comparison shows that Jo-periphrasis (in affirmative statements) is much more common in spoken than in written English. The difference is significant both for the absolute figures of occurrence and for the proportionate number of the occurrences of do in comparison to simple verb form occurrences. Furthermore, the recorded evidence indicates that, in this use, do can have most varying phonetic prominence, from unstressed to nuclear stress. It seems that the standard descriptions of do as a means to express either contrastive or emotive emphasis are too narrow. In addition to these emphatic functions, do is used in discourse functions in spoken English: to introduce a new discourse topic, to introduce an instance only loosely connected with the topic but still maintaining it, to develop or elaborate on a topic and, finally, to round off or summarise a topic. In these functions, do is essentially non-contrastive. The comparison of the spoken with the written corpus also reveals the interesting although not surprising fact that the afore-mentioned discourse functions are less common in written text than in speech. Furthermore, in literary reproduction of dialogue (in novels and short stories), ifo-periphrasis is not remarkably more common than in other types of writing: it is obviously not one of the features which authors resort to in order to make the dialogue sound natural and lifelike.

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A survey of present-day dialects further illustrates the variety of the spoken uses of periphrastic do.4 In the South-Western dialects of English, Jo-periphrasis occurs in abundance. At least in East Somerset, do is an aspect marker indicating habitual action: They did go to Taunton every Saturday, but They went to Taunton last Saturday. This is of course not an invariable rule but rather a trend. 5 It is of some interest that as early as the sixteenth century, the grammarian Palsgrave suggests that doperiphrasis would be an equivalent to the French past imperfect tense (Visser 1969: 1503-1504): one of the uses of the past imperfect is to indicate habitual or repetitive action. I have not found any aspectual tendency in the use of periphrastic do in Early Modern English written texts. Yet it is not impossible that we are here dealing with a trend which makes use of the markedness of the periphrasis to indicate aspectual distinctions in speech although this trend was never established at the level of written language. Denison (1985: 53 — 54) calls attention to another possible aspectual use of rfo-periphrasis: in the majority of the thirteenth and fourteenth century instances the meaning of the main verb is perfective or completive. This use would be almost diametrically opposed to the habitual or repetitive indication of the present-day dialectal use — or to Palsgrave's statement. This problem need not, however, be too serious. The verb do in itself, when preceding an infinitive, does not contain any aspectual meaning beyond its basic semantics; this is particularly true of its grammaticalised uses. It is simply a device to make the verbal group more marked; contextual clues give the phrase its more detailed meaning (cf. Denison 1985: 52). If this vagueness is accepted, the shift from (among other things) a perfectivity marker to (among other things) a habitual action marker is not as unlikely as one might think at first sight.

3. Dö-periphrasis in Modern English The main purpose of the above survey has been to show that a study based on written texts alone would give an unsatisfactory and incomplete picture of the functions of cfo-periphrasis in affirmative statements in present-day spoken English. And it is obvious that the picture that can be sketched of the origin and history of periphrastic do on the basis of extant written evidence is even more deficient. We are obviously dealing with a structure which has a much richer and more varied lease of life at the level of speech than in written language.

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Practically the only way to get information on the expressions typical of the spoken language of past centuries is through observations based on the types of writing which can be assumed to represent the oral mode of expression. 6 In comparing eighteenth-century private letters and drama texts with other genres, Tieken (1985, 1987) argues convincingly that there were two processes in the development of Jo-periphrasis going on at the same time, one in the written language and one in speech. The latter is characterised by a less regular use of the periphrasis in questions and negations. Also, the periphrastic use seems somewhat more varied in affirmative statements in the oral mode of expression than in the literate one, although the figures of occurrence are too low for definite conclusions (Tieken 1987: 115 ff.). In sixteenth and early seventeenth-century writings, the frequency of periphrastic do in affirmative statements is highest (cf., e. g., Ellegärd 1953: 162). It shows a rapid increase in the course of the sixteenth century and an equally rapid decline in the seventeenth century. For this reason, a study of the occurrences of the periphrasis in different types of texts dating from this period is particularly illustrative. Table 1 shows the occurrences of do in the types of text included in the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts.7 The figures given in Table 1 can, of course, only have restricted value as evidence concerning the Early Modern English spread and decline of periphrastic do in affirmative statements. As each text type in each period is represented by extracts from one or two texts only, idiolectal and idiosyncratic variation is unavoidable. Certain conclusions concerning general trends can, however, be drawn. In Period I, between 1500 and 1570, the text type "trials" is represented by the trial of Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, in 1554. As can be seen in Table 1, it has by far the highest frequency of periphrastic do in affirmative statements, of all the text types in all the three periods. Of the texts of the Helsinki Corpus, the trials probably best represent the oral mode of expression. It is in this text type that the discoursal use of do seems most obvious. 8 Typically, Jo-periphrasis does not occur very often in quick exchanges of the following type: Bromley. No, the Order is not so, you must first pleade whether you be giltie or no. Throckmorton. If that be your Order and Law, judge accordingly to it. Hare. You must firste aunswer to the Matter wherwith you are charged, and then you may talke at your pleasure.

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Table 1. Frequencies of do-periphrasis per 10,000 words in affirmative statements in Early Modern English.

Trials Science Education Diaries Sermons Comedies Handbooks Letters, off. Fiction Laws Biographies The Bible Letters, priv. Travelogues History Philosophy

Period I 1500-1570

Period II 1570-1640

Period III 1640-1710

88 34 31 28 25 23 11 11 11 8 6 6 4 4 1 (no sample)

23 53 46 42 43 8 30 48 10 13 46 12 33 37 15 32

28 11 11 42 10 2 4 26 9 12 11 (no sample) 13 3 3 (no sample)

Throckmorton. But things spoken out of place wer as good not spoken. Bromley. These bee but delayes to spende time, therfore answer as the Law willeth you. Throckmorton. My Lords, I pray you make not too much hast with me, neither thinke not long for your Diner, for my Case requireth leysure, and you haue well dined when you haue done Justice truely. Christ said, Blessed are they that hunger and thirste for Righteousnesse. Bromley. I can forbeare my Dinner as well as you, and care as little as you peraduenture. Shrewsbury. Come you hither to checke us Throckmorton; we will not be so used, no, no, I for my parte haue forborne my Breakfast, Dinner and Supper, to serve the Queene. Throckmorton. Yea, my good Lord, I know it right well; I meant not to touche your Lordship, for youre Service and Paines is euidently knowen to all Men. Southwell. M. Throckmorton, this Talke neede not, we know what we haue to do, and you would teach us our Duties; you hurt your Mater, go to! go to! (64, Col. 1) What really accounts for the high frequency of the periphrasis is its clustering in longer turns in which the speaker wants to underline the importance of the discourse. 9

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Hare. But how say you to this, that Wyat and you had Conference togither sundry times at Warner's House, and in other places? Throckmorton. This is a very general Charge, to haue Conference; but why was it not as lawful for me to confer with Wyat, as with you, or any other Man? I then knew no more by Wyat, than by any other; and to proue to talke with Wyat was lawful and indifferent, the last Day I DID talke with Wyat, I sawe my Lord of Arondel, with other noble Men and Gentlemen, talke with him familiarly in the Chamber of Presence. Hare. But they did not conspire nor talke of any stur against the Spanyards as you DID pretend, and meant it against the Queen; for you, Croftes, Rogers and Warner, DID oftentimes deuise in Warner's House aboute youre traiterous purposes, or else what did you so often there? Throckmorton. / confess I DID mislike the Queenes Mariage with Spain, and also the comming of the Spanyards hither: and then me thought I had reason to doe so, for I DID learne the Reasons of my misliking of you M. Hare, M. Southwell, and others in the Parliament House; there I DID see the whole Consent of the Realm against it; and I a Hearer, but no Speaker, DID learne my misliking of those Matters, confirmed by many sundry Reasons amongst you: but as concerning any sturre or vprore against the Spanyards, I neuer made any, neyther procured any to be made; and for my much resort to M. Warner's House, it was not to conferre with M. Wyat, but to shew my Friendship to my very good Lord the Marques of Northampton, who was lodged there when he was enlarged. (66, cols 1 — 2) In the above extract, there are thirteen affirmative statements in which do could vary with the simple verb form; 1 0 the periphrasis is used in no less than seven. As is well known, there is a variety of syntactic, stylistic and rhythmic factors which probably favoured the use of ifo-periphrasis in affirmative statements in Early Modern English. 11 Some of the instances in the Throckmorton passage show the influence of these factors: did pretend is at the end of the clause, deuise is preceded by the adverb oftentimes, and did learne is separated from the subject. But, essentially, the clustering of periphrastic do in this extract of intensive dialogue seems determined by factors typical of spoken discourse: the clustering of do marks the importance of the action asked about by Hare and narrated by Throckmorton. In most text types, notably in the non-imaginative narrative prose of histories, biographies and travelogues, 12 the frequency of the periphrasis

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is remarkably low; the same is true of private and official letters and law texts. The relatively high frequency of periphrastic do in scientific and educational treatises (though only about half the frequency of the trial text) is of interest. Of the two extracts of scientific prose, most of the instances of the periphrasis (36 out of 42) occur in Robert Record's Geometry, which is written in the form of a first person/second person discourse, as can be seen from the following example: then open I the compas as wide as K. L. (that is all .v. partes) and set one foote in G, (that is the iij. pricke) and with the other I draw an arch line toward H. also: and where those .ij. arch lines DO Crosse (whiche is by H.) thence draw I a line vnto F, and that maketh a very plumbe line to F. G, as my desire was. The maner of workyng of this conclusion, is like to the second conclusion, but the reason of it DOTH depend of the .xlvi. proposicion of the first boke of Euclide. An other waie yet. set one foote of the compas in the prick, on whiche you would haue the plumbe line to light, and streiche forth thother foote toward the longest end of the line, as wide as you can for the length of the line, and so draw a quarter of a compas or more, then without stirring of the compas, set one foote of it in the same line, where as the circular line DID begin, and extend thother in the circular line, settyng a marke where it DOTH light, then take half that quantitie more there vnto, and by that prick that endeth the last part, draw a line to the pricke assigned, and it shall be a perpendicular. Example. A. B. is the line appointed, to whiche I must make a perpendicular line to light in the pricke assigned, which is A. Therfore DOO / set one foote of the compas in A, and extend the other vnto D. makyng a part of a circle, more then a quarter, that is D. E. Then DO I set one foote of the compas vnaltered in D, and stretch the other in the circular line, and it DOTH light in F (Fol. C3 V-C4R) Of the seven instances of Jo-periphrasis, three occur with a clause-final verb (do crosse, did begin, doth light) and two with inversion (did I set). In the extracts taken from educational treatises (Elyot's Governor and Ascham's Scholemaster), the frequency of the periphrasis is slightly higher in the expository, essay-type passages (34 instances/10,000 words) than in the instructive passages (26 instances/10,000 words). 13 The text, again, takes the form of first-person/second-person discourse. Both authors are conscious of the demands of rhetorical elegance and symmetry in their style.

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The frequency of c/o-periphrasis is also relatively high in sermons (25/ 10,000 words), comedies (23/10,000 words) and diaries (28/10,000 words). In both sermon extracts (Fisher and Latimer) the discourse is personal and second-person biased, and the argumentative element is strong. The samples representing early sixteenth-century comedies (Gammer Gurion's Needle and Ralph Roister Doister) do not give reliable evidence of the use of periphrastic do because they were written in rhyming couplets, 14 and the periphrasis was used to place the main verb at the end of the line. Finally, in the diaries (Henry Machyn and King Edward VI), the popularity of the ifo-periphrasis is partly explained through Machyn's frequent use of the periphrasis with the verb preach in clauses with an initial adverbial causing inversion. This use seems idiosyncratic: it may have been caused by the awkward final consonant cluster that this verb had in the 3rd person pret. sg. (cf. also my comments on Pepys' Diary below). In Period II, 1570 — 1640, the use of periphrastic do in affirmative statements reaches a peak. 15 There is a distinct rise in the frequencies of the ifo-periphrasis in all text types with the exception of trials, fiction and comedies. This sudden increase can best be explained through the developments of the prose styles in the sixteenth century. The prose styles which favour either end weight or balanced structures obviously benefit from the possibility to use the periphrastic structure. In comedies and fiction (Shakespeare's Merry Wives of Windsor, Middleton's A Chaste Maid of Cheapside, Deloney's Jack of Newbury and Armin's Nest of Ninnies) these stylistic trends were less significant as the texts are based on witty and humorous dialogue consisting of relatively short utterances, and, in fiction, on simple narration with little stylistic ambition. The decrease in the frequency of the periphrasis in the comedies can be explained through the shift from verse to prose; in verse drama, periphrastic do remains common. It is also obvious that ifo-periphrasis is a marked form even in spoken discourse (cf. my comments and examples of its use in the trial dialogue above), and for this reason the authors had no motivation to use it as a feature enhancing the colloquial flavour of the dialogue in drama or imaginative narration — any more than they do in present-day fictive dialogue. It may seem astonishing, however, that the frequency of Jo-periphrasis drops sharply in trials (Raleigh and Essex),16 while it increases in most other text types. But if we assume that the rapid increase in the use of the periphrasis in the 16th century began in spoken language and moved

Spoken language and the history of (2) se pe > (3) pe i.e., (1) independent deictic pronoun 'that' becoming (2) marked as subordinated by the purely subordinating particle, and then (3) reduction to the particle alone, which then gets its person/ number/gender features from the antecedent, since they are redundantly expressed in the deictic pronoun at stage (2). But for adverbial clauses, since copy-correlatives (as distinct from correlatives like if ... then) disappeared altogether from the language, Kellner's stages 1—4 cannot be the whole story. There must be an intermediate stage — let us call it STAGE 3.5 — at which the subordinate member of the correlative pair is explicitly marked by the forms which are the direct ancestors of the unambiguous subjunctions in Middle English and Modern English, not by a copy of the main clause introductory adverbial particle. Thus we can imagine a development like this: (STAGE 3) then SUB-CLAUSE, then MAIN-CLAUSE > (STAGE 3.5) when SUB-CLAUSE, then MAIN-CLAUSE > (STAGE 4) when SUBCLAUSE, MAIN-CLAUSE. For example: (10) Oderhwile, hwanne du dencst dat godd de hafd forlaten oder forgeten, öanne seid he: ... Ην mai dat moder forgeten dat child de hie bar in hire wombe? ... Vices and Virtues 87.20 — 4 (Yamakawa 1969: 37).

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Postponing for now the reasons for the replacement of dome by hwonne and peer by hwar, we agree with Kellner that our STAGE 3.5, while it belongs logically in the sequence, is really only a matter of the superficial form of the first member of the correlative pair and does not disturb the logic inherent in the change from STAGE 3 to STAGE 4. However, it is a striking commentary on the by-ways of linguistic change that this thby wh- replacement (STAGE 3.5), though superficial in itself, is the change that makes possible the sweeping demise of the Old English copy-correlatives, with all of their word order implications, in favour of the Middle English system of explicit subjunctions. Finally, subordinate clause marking in Old English could be correlated with verb morphology, i.e., use of the subjunctive in the subordinate clause. This additional criterion of subordination can only be applied with a degree of consistency to noun clauses (especially involving a negative), adverbial clauses of concession, condition, purpose, and result, some comparative clauses and clauses dependent on subjunctive verbs. With temporal and locative clauses, which develop explicit marking of subordination earlier than other types, it is only the clauses introduced by cer that have a morphologically distinct verb. Since our focus is on the adverbial clauses of time and place as they appear in correlative structures, we will not be especially concerned with morphologicallybased criteria. There were undoubtedly prosodic correlates at all dates, as has been noted many times: presumably reduced stress on the subordinating thor wh- particle as compared with the corresponding deictic and interrogative use, and rising intonation at the end of the subordinate member of the pair. But of course we cannot know the details. Whenever subordination was marked by correlative particles (STAGE 3), the possibility of genuine ambiguity or of deliberate vagueness — the possibility that one might not be able to distinguish between main and subordinate — was very real, especially in adverbial clauses linked by copy-correlatives. This is not all the same as asserting that the internalised grammar of the speaker of Old English failed to discriminate between main and subordinate clauses (or root and embedded, in more precise terminology). It is reasonable to assume that this distinction is a genuine linguistic universal. We do not agree with Mitchell (1978: 393) that "in Old English the relationship between the two clauses was [i. e., could be in a particular instance — RPS & DM] closer than that of two principal clauses and less close than that of a principal and a subordinate clause," if the word

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"relationship" in Mitchell's usage entails the notion "grammatical relationship" in its generally understood sense, as it certainly seems to in this passage. We believe that grammatically the possible relationships between two clauses are these three: (1) relationship unstipulated (two root clauses with no overt linkage — e. g., a pair of independent sentences, butt-joined or not); (2) coordinate (two clauses of the same status — either both root or both embedded under the same node — linked by a coordinating conjunction); (3) one clause subordinate to the other (or of course both could be subordinate to a third, and not related to each other directly at all). This says nothing about the extremely wide range of possible semantic (including referential and contextual) relationships between clauses, but surely that is an altogether different matter. And also surely, this is not an arbitrary narrowing of the domain of responsibility of the syntactician but a principled restriction based on the range of tools the syntactician as such has at his disposal. Five devices to minimise the syntactic ambiguity between main and subordinate clause status (or to eliminate it altogether, if the writer chose) existed: (1) Doubling the subordinate correlative marker (the result, as far as we know, is always an unambiguous subjunction — pa pa, ponne ponne, peer peer, swa swa, nu nu, py py). (2)

Adding pe or pcet to the subordinate correlative marker 6 .

(3) Use of the subjunctive in the subordinate member of the pair. Though morphological evidence has been used in determining the demonstrative-conjunctive-adverbial status of, e.g., hwonne (Mitchell 1965: 159), there is no evidence that, in the most frequent correlative structures, verb morphology is important in eliminating ambiguity. 7 (4) Replacement of a deictic by the corresponding indefinite, of th- by wh-. Though this device was the one ultimately favoured, it was extremely uncommon in Old English, if it can be proved to have occurred at all. In particular, the indefinite adverb (and interrogative) hwonne occurred exclusively, as far as we have been able to determine, in noun clauses (i.e., indirect questions) and of course direct questions, never as a subjunction introducing an adverbial clause; 8 and (5)

Differentiation by word order — the focal point of this paper.

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The functionality of verb position in Old English subordinate clauses

There seems little reason to doubt that end-position of the finite verb in the clause was associated with subordination in Old English. But unlike modern German and Dutch, this association was never categorical (at least on the surface). It was neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for subordination. (i) Sufficiency. It was not a sufficient condition because both the prose and the poetry include too many verb-final main clauses to be ignored, even if it is a small percentage of the total. These are not just "accidentally" verb-final instances (e. g., intransitives, or transitives with pronominal objects which were cliticised to the left), but examples where the verb is transitive and the NP's and PP's are fully fledged. Examples cited by Mitchell (1985: §3914) include these: (11) Hi pa pat lond forleton ('They then abandoned that land') — Or. 44.22 (12) Ic unforhtmod dees drences onfo ( Ί fearlessly accepted the drink') — AECHom i.72.17 Not everyone agrees about the relevance of poetic evidence to arguments about the history of word order in the grammar of the language 9 (the spoken language is thought to be closest to what we find in prose, if anything resembling the spoken language is to be found anywhere, which may itself be a dubious proposition). It is nonetheless striking that in Beowulf Zimmermann (1983: 351) finds that "[among] about two hundred instances [of X + NP ... + V, where X = ambiguous function word 10 ] containing preterite forms of full verbs and the most frequent ambiguous function words ... [there are] only nine probable instances of main clauses, whereas the vast majority is clearly dependent". That is, in Beowulf we find almost 100% verb-finality marking as subordinate those clauses that would otherwise be ambiguous. We know of no counts of prose texts that sort out just the precisely relevant examples that Zimmermann sorted in Beowulf. Using his criteria, we have sorted the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle 892 — 900, with results which leave no room for doubt about the regularity: 63 clauses qualify under Zimmermann's selectional criteria; of these, 37 are clearly main, and only

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one is not verb-second; the other 26 are clearly subordinate, and only 9 are not absolutely verb-final; of those 9, 6 contain internal evidence of verb-finality with obvious extraposition, so that in fact only three of the 26 are really not verb-final; all three of those have some form of the copula as main verb, and one of them is explicitly marked subordinate by doubling the subjunction {pa pa). There is one match-up between figures drawn from the poetry and those drawn from the prose which suggests that poetry can provide a valid indication of earlier word order regularities. According to Ries (1907: 310), verb-final main clauses in Beowulf are about 30% of the total (whereas 64% of subordinate clauses are verb-final), and this figure coincides exactly with Bean's figure (1983: 66) for verb-finality in the Cynewulf/Cyneheard episode of the Chronicle, supposed to represent an archaic insert (no other episode of the Chronicle rises above about 10% verb-final in main clauses, generally not even that high). We are not absolutely sure of all the facts and trends in the prose yet. From the figures in Bean (1983: 129), one must infer that there is a gradual decrease in verb-finality between Alfred's Letter on Learning and the time of Wulfstan and ^Elfric — except that the Orosius is very different from the Letter and from the later prose, a difference which one must attribute to stylistic level ("high style" vs. "colloquial narrative style"). The figures for verb-late order in all subordinate clauses except relative clauses are: Alfred 82%

Orosius 18%

Wulfstan 56%

^Elfric 41%

60% ·

72%

36%

For relative clauses: 69%

From these figures we conclude that verb-lateness was on the decline through the last 150 years of the Old English period; it came to an abrupt halt in the second continuation of the Peterborough Chronicle. (ii) Necessity. But it was also not necessary for subordinate clauses to have the finite verb in end position. This argument, however, is much more delicate. Verb-final main clauses like those cited above are absolute exceptions to any categorical rule which associates verb-finality exclusively with subordination. But a subordinate clause with the finite verb

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in some position other than at the end is not necessarily an exception, since there are movement rules in the grammar which may, on the surface, obscure the regularity. The best-known of these is extraposition. As summarised in van Kemenade's study (1987: 37), comparing Old English with Dutch: "OE shows freer extraposition of object and adverbial material over the VP-final verb; besides S and PP as in Du, OE also extraposes NP, manner adverbs, and predicate adjectives and participles". Although scholars since Delbrück have entertained the view that Old English subordinate clauses were somehow, basically, verb-final, the arguments that Old English was underlyingly verb-final seem quite compelling. These arguments have been presented recently in Koopman (1984) and in a somewhat enriched form in van Kemenade (1987: 14 — 65, especially 23 — 39). We see no need to rehearse them here; we merely emphasise that any subordinate clause which does not have the finite verb in final position needs to be explained by some subsidiary rule, under the SOV hypothesis. We are satisfied that such surface counterexamples are indeed possible to explain in nearly all instances, though there remains a small residue where the explanation is not readily forthcoming. However, some of the principles by means of which counterexamples are "explained away" are so powerful that doubts may linger against one's better judgment. It will therefore be useful to review the nature of these principles briefly, starting from examples of the working of these rules in Modern English. Modern English has three rules, operating in both main and embedded clauses, that move constituents to the right periphery of the clause: extraposition, heavy-NP-shift, and right dislocation. Extraposition applies to prepositional phrases and subordinate clauses (i. e., it does not apply to NP's). (13) a. A hotel [t;] was left unoccupied [Si that could have housed all the homeless in Los Angeles]. b. He repeated his account [tj] to the police [PPi of the main events that day], Heavy-NP-Shift applies only to post-verbal NP's that are made heavy by virtue of NP-internal modification, and they are always set off by intonation: (14) I left t; to my son [NPi more money than he had ever seen].

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Right dislocation moves any heavy N P to the right periphery, leaving a pronoun copy, and requires an intonation break: (15) He, never cleans his room, [NPi that son of mine]. If we found rightward-movement rules behaving in roughly just these three ways in Old English, we would not be uncomfortable. In comparison with Old English, the problem of excessive power results from the claim (van Kemenade 1987: 39 ff.) that extraposition applies not only to S and PP but also to full-NP direct objects in Old English. This greatly extends the power of the rule beyond what is allowed in Modern Dutch, Modern German or Modern English. She asserts that "the phenomenon of extraposition started off in early Old English as the postposing of heavy constituents such as S, PP and heavy NP's, and was broadened later to include other constituents, light NP's, adverbials" (van Kemenade 1987: 41). Concerning the manner in which this all-inclusive extraposition developed, she agrees with Pintzuk — Kroch (1985, 1989), who have shown for Beowulf that two distinct rules are needed for what van Kemenade includes "for ease of exposition" under a single rule of extraposition: namely, (1) extraposition itself, as found in all the Germanic languages, applying to S or PP, and (2) heavy-NP shift, a rule specific to Old English and Modern English (it is disallowed in Modern German) with a number of properties which differentiate it from extraposition. Heavy-NP shift results in the same superficial form as does extraposition. Pintzuk — Kroch argue, to our minds persuasively, that this rule, not extraposition, is responsible for the post-verbal NP's of early Old English. Their most convincing example (1985: 98): (16) hwilum heaporofe at-times warriors

hleapan gallop

leton let

on geflit faran fealwe mearas in rivalry go bay horses 'At times the warriors let the bay horses gallop and go in rivalry' Beowulf 8 6 4 - 5 This example is significant in two ways: (1) the N P on the right periphery of the clause is the subject of the infinitives hleapan and faran (in an accusative-plus-infinitive construction). In no Germanic language does extraposition apply to subjects of infinitives, whereas heavy-NP-shift does

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not discriminate between accusative objects and accusative subjects. And (2) the caesura before fealwe mearas corresponds to the appropriate intonation break. However, while Pintzuk — Kroch have metrical evidence for the claim that the shifted NP's they find in Beowulf are set off by intonational boundaries (they occur after a metrical boundary, which must be presumed to correlate with intonation), there is, in the nature of the case, no such evidence in the prose. It is, one acknowledges, not difficult to find the occasional example of full-NP direct objects, positioned after the verb in Old English prose subordinate clauses, that do not appear to be "heavy": (17) pa hie gefengon micle herehyj), ...pa forrad sie fierd hie for an 'When they had seized much booty, then the army intercepted them.' ASC 893.2111 But in the same text (ASC 891—900) there are no other instances of simple NP-object extraposition in subordinate clauses, whereas there are numerous examples of PP's and clauses extraposed, e. g., (18) pa se cyning hine pa west wende mid pare fierde wip Exancestres ... 'When the king then turned west with the army to Exeter, ...' ASC 893.62 Even if one allows the extrapositional escape hatch, yet another is needed: either "verb-raising" (van Kemenade 1987: 55 — 62) or "verbfronting in subordinate clauses" (Pintzuk — Kroch 1989: fn 17). The latter proposal is limited to Beowulf it requires the application, within embedded clauses, of the basic verb-fronting rule that generates verb-second main clauses. This proposal loses the beautiful generalisation which explains so satisfyingly why SOV languages with main clause finite-verb fronting (like Modern German) typically do not allow verb-fronting in subordinate clauses: namely, the landing site (COMP) of the moved constituent is occupied by the subordination marker, the subjunction. 12 We therefore reject, for now, the claim that verb-fronting applied in both main and subordinate clauses. We rely on verb-raising (discussed below) and the various extraposition rules to account for the fact that the finite verb is often found closer to the subject. Pintzuk —Kroch cite one example in Beowulf where they claim that verb-raising fails, because, as they say,

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"the tensed verb [is] in second position and a non-pronominal subject [appears] between the tensed verb and the infinitive": (19) pcet hie ne moste, pa Metod that them not might when Lord

nolde, did-not-will

se scynscapa under sceadu bregdan the malefactor down-to shadows drag Beowulf

106-Ί

This example does not, however, persuade us that verb-fronting is a rule which must be permitted to apply in subordinate clauses, for two reasons: (1) the example obeys Kuhn's law of sentence particles — which is to say, for the present purpose, that a well-known poetic convention has overridden normal syntax in this instance; and (2) though there are numerous examples of what appears to be subordinate clause verbfronting in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, not one has the subject intervening, so that all of them fall properly under the rule of verb-raising (discussed below). At least until we find clear counterexamples, we will take it as correct that true verb-fronting (i. e., the rule that produces verbsecond main clauses) is in fact not possible in Old English subordinate clauses. But there are instances that look like verb-fronting, and these are the ones that van Kemenade [1984, 1987] accounts for under the heading of verb-raising. 13 Thus in the example below, the finite verb is in the third position (counting the complementiser pcet as occupying a position, as one must): (20) pcet hi mihton swa bealdlice Godes geleafan bodian (AHTh, I, 232) 14 'that they could preach God's faith so boldly' But it is presumed to derive from final position by transforming the sentential complement into an infinitival complement which may then either follow (as above) or precede (as below) the finite verb: (21) pat hi swa bealdlice Godes geleafan bodian mihton We shall not pursue the extremely complicated ramifications of the possible interactions between verb-raising and the rightward movement rules, and we confess that we are not clear just exactly what all the

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arrangements of constituent order are that would actually be disallowed in Old English subordinate clauses (other than orders that are disallowed in all clauses, main and subordinate, such as positioning the adverb ne anywhere except immediately before the finite verb). One arrangement that is disallowed is to have the subject appear between the two verbs. For the sentence above, in addition to the attested order and the verbfinal example we created above, these others should be well-formed. We have made no effort to scramble constituents randomly, in ways that are not relevant to the question of verb-raising — one can easily construct sequences like *pcet hi bodian mihton geleafan Godes swa bealdlice, but these are of no interest in the present context. Do any of the sentences below seem objectionable?15 (22) a. poet hi mihton bodian Godes geleafan swa bealdlice b. pcet hi mihton Godes geleafan bodian swa bealdlice c. pcet hi swa bealdlice Godes geleafan mihton bodian d. pcet hi Godes geleafan mihton bodian swa bealdlice e. *pcet hi Godes geleafan mihton swa bealdlice bodian Given that various movement rules can destroy the surface appearance of verb-finality, the salient alternative order-feature which fairly consistently differentiates Old English subordinate clauses is the one singled out by Andrew (1934: 177): "We are justified in concluding that the 'da he com' sentence form in prose is unambiguously subordinate, and that apparent exceptions are always explicable." Here, as elsewhere, Andrew has overstated his case. A much more conservative view is that of Mitchell (1985: §3922), who writes that "despite of difficulties, editors of prose texts should not disregard too easily the rule of thumb that after par, panon, pider, pa, and ponne clauses with SV or S ... V are likely to be subordinate", pa he com is an unfortunate example, because the intransitive com, lacking complements, could be in end position by mere accident; and also because pronominal subjects have order properties not shared by nominal subjects. The real point is not that it is final, but that it is in third position, following ADV/COMP and SUBJ. This principle is basically correct 16 , and it is this marking of subordination which becomes the critical trigger for reanalysis in favour of subject-verb syntax in English. That is, the order

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(23) ADV/COMP + SUBJ + V-FINITE ... is a variant of verb-finality, for purposes of distinguishing main from subordinate, because the corresponding main clause will normally be (24) ADV + V-FINITE + SUBJ ... Whatever the source of verb-third order (V-raising, extraposition, verbfronting, or any other similar rule one might succeed in justifying), it is this order which both marks subordination and anticipates the future syntax of English: and — crucially to our argument — this order, which is in contrast with verb-second order — is grammaticised in subordinate clauses 200 years before it is in main clauses. This point, which was made first specifically about Old English without reference to later developments in Andrew (1934), is considerably enriched from general Germanic and diachronic English points of view, in Vennemann (1984). We return to Vennemann's discussion below. At this point we have rapidly surveyed the arguments which make plausible an underlying verb-final analysis for subordinate clauses in Old English by attributing the surface appearance of other orders to rightward-movement rules and verb-raising. We are in agreement with the tradition which asserts that verb-lateness was a fundamental demarcating syntactic property of subordinate clauses (though not sufficient, given verb-final main clauses); the extreme form of verb-lateness, namely verbfinality, was lost suddenly and cataclysmically — it has been claimed (Canale 1978, Lightfoot 1979, van Kemenade 1987) - in the second half of the 12th century. 17

3. The rise of explicit subjunctions We address this question as an independent issue because we are interested in evaluating the hypothesis (Vennemann 1984: 632 — 3) that loss of the verb-late device in English "presupposes the development of a separate category of subjunctions". With respect to its logic, this claim is impeccable: if you cannot tell main from subordinate, the syntax is seriously dysfunctional (with Lass (1980), we are somewhat skeptical about the notion of linguistic teratogenesis, but this looks like a real teras to us). With respect to the final score — Modern English has a full set of

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unambiguous subjunctions — it is also impeccable. But there are some empirical curiosities along the way. As a corollary of the assumption that loss of verb-lateness presupposes the development of a separate category of subjunctions, we would expect this loss to be most advanced and conspicuous in precisely those subordinate clauses which not only are now but always have been (within the relevant time frame) introduced by explicit subordinators. In such clauses the verb-late device was always redundant. Old English ^/-clauses provide an optimal test case. An examination of all entries under if in both the Oxford English Dictionary and the exhaustive Michigan Middle English Dictionary shows consistent verblateness (in Vennemann's sense, allowing occasional extraposition) until about 1200. Some examples: (25) a. 900. Martyrol in Ο Ε Texts 178: And gif monn minne noman nemneö in cenigre frecenisse [PP-Extra] ... donne gefylge se öinre mildheortnesse b. 1175. Bod Horn 100/7. Gif he hit icwaede, hit ware sone iworden. Extraposition and verb-raising are frequent in the entries between ca. 1000 and the second half of the 14th c. But as late as 1460 verb-finality persists after i f . (26) 1460 Oseney Reg 204/2: And yf by case de same noo religiouse howse founde, lete him assyne hit to whoome he wylle. That is, the sample shows a slower rate of disappearance of verb-lateness in if clauses than one would expect, given the unanimous observations in the literature about the "dramatic" decrease of this feature prior to ca. 1200. So verb-lateness itself, at least as a fossil, continued, though at a diminuendo, to be fairly common in the clause-types, like those beginning with i f , where it was totally redundant. Indeed, what seems to have disappeared is not verb-lateness, as usually stated, but the only construction in which verb-lateness served a genuine function: namely subordination within copy-correlative constructions. They themselves become increasingly rare, though occasional instances are found as late as Caxton. In the three texts18 studied by Kohonen (1978: 185), the figures are 40 in CH, 20 in VV, and none in SW. Kohonen concluded that "the pattern

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thus seems to have disappeared after 1200". This is not quite true, as Kellner's Stage 3 examples demonstrate. U p to 1400, the disappearance of copy-correlatives happens gradually. However, these structures, if attested at all after 1400, are so rare and unusual as to allow us to dismiss them as aberrations from the norm. The survival of copy-correlatives is not threatened by the disappearance of verb-finality, but by the loss of verb-second. Wherever we find copycorrelatives in Middle English, they are accompanied by word-order differentiation, by virtue of the preservation of verb-seconding in main clauses. (27) öanne du dus hauest dine luue to gode, öanne behoued de dat du bie wel warr pat tu luuige dine nexte, ... — Vices and Virtues 39.12 — 3. (Yamakawa 1969: 24) Once verb-second was lost, the "monster" of ambiguity could arise; but contrary to what a functionalist scenario might suggest, copy-correlatives were largely defunct before the loss of the verb-second constraint and establishment of subject-verb syntax around 1400. Opaque structures of the following type are extremely rare: (28) Riehe men rutte tho and in here reste were. Tho it schon to the schepherdes a schewer of blisse. -Piers Plowman Β xii. 1 5 2 - 3 . (Yamakawa 1969: 29) It is an interesting question why copy-correlatives disappeared, given that there was no ambiguity that would have resulted from their continuance up to the loss of verb-second. Influence from Latin and French have been suggested (Yamakawa 1969: 31, 1973: 41). Yamakawa (1969: 31) also suggests that "weak functional distinctness", as between ponne 'than' and ponne 'then/when', may help account for their discontinuance. Probably more important, by the 14th century English had developed (or in some instances borrowed) a rich set of explicit subjunctions (till, because, while, before, after, since, unless, etc.) in whose company the correlatives must have seemed increasingly strange even when they were totally unambiguous. An issue related to the disappearance of copy-correlatives is the question of what replaced them. The development of OE hwonne (from interrogative adverb to subordinating conjunction) and the ultimate replacement of then by when (in the subordination-marking function) is

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thoroughly studied in Yamakawa (1969). In Yamakawa (1971) the corresponding development of OE pcerjhweer is analysed along lines closely parallel to those of ponne/hwonne, with the story of the development through Middle English continued in Yamakawa (1973). The reasons for these replacements, as presented in these studies, are purely semantic — the result of semantic deflnitisation of the "indefinite adverb" sense of hwcer and hwonne (i. e., 'in/at some place', and 'at some time' respectively being extended to 'at some place/time, namely as specified in the following clause'). Assuming the correctness of Yamakawa's arguments and exemplification, we put aside from the remainder of our discussion the motivation of the replacement of th- words (i. e., deictics) by wh- words (i. e., indefinites) in the specifically correlative constructions. One thing is clear, though: the introduction, after 1200, of relative when and where should not either entail or preclude verb-finality. As it happens, the examples we have found show frequent verb-finality in poetry (coexisting with SVO) and almost no clear verb-finality in prose. That is, predictably, poetry preserves an archaic feature. (29) a. Quan abram was to egipte cumen Sone him was sarrai binumen. Genesis and Exodus, 771 —219 b. Michel gestinge ['feasting'] made Abraham Quane he dat sune to borde name. Genesis and Exodus, 1209 — 10

4.

The role of subordinate clauses in English word order reanalysis

Up to this point we have been concerned with word order in Old English subordinate clauses. We have taken it as established that the order was verb-final (of which a variant is ADV/COMP + SUBJECT + V-FINITE), and that exceptions to final position are not to be taken as counter-examples because other regular and well-motivated rules brought about the appearance of exceptions. We turn now briefly to the word order of Old English main clauses (by which we mean "root sentences" in the sense of Emonds 1976). Here we shall depend largely on van Kemenade (1987), since she has, with arguments that we find fully

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persuasive, established that Old English indeed has both a verb-fronting rule and a topicalisation rule, which together add up to a verb-second constraint. These rules are formulated in such a way that neither of them can apply in subordinate clauses, the former because the landing site for the finite verb is COMP (which is filled by a complementiser in subordinate clauses), and the latter because a topic node is generated only in root S's (i. e., the highest S, conjoined clauses aside). Virtually everyone who has looked at Old English word order has noted the similarities to Dutch and German in this respect. But almost everyone who has looked closely at the Old English data has been baffled by the numerous apparent counter-examples. Campbell (1964: 192), in criticising Bacquet (1962), argues (correctly, we believe) that a sentence like (30) aft ere pcem pe Romeburg getimbred was iiii hunde wintrum ond xxvi, feng Alexander to Macedonia rice Orosius, ed. Sweet, 122 is not an instance of verb-first in the main clause, but rather an inversion "which is part of the general tendency to invert subject and verb in principal clauses if the subject has not the first place, so that the verb remains in the second place." Mitchell's comment on this (1985: §3929) is: "But it is obviously no more than a tendency" [our emphasis]. To make his point that verb-seconding is not the result of regular syntactic rules, Mitchell organises a list of examples, sets where some are verb-second and the other(s) not, in his view. We underline the relevant focus of comparison in each set. (31) a. Her gefestnode Eadward cyng for neode frid - ChronE 95.1(906) vs. Her Englehere & Dene gefuhton at Teotanheale - ChronE 95.3(910) vs. Her hine bestal se here into War ham20 - ChronE 75.7(876) b. py ilean geare dreht on pa hergas ... WestSeaxna lond - ChronA 90.11(897) & Mine gebrodra, gyrstandag gemedemode ure Drihten hine sylfne - AECHom i.56.28

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ά Hwilon wacodon menn ... - AE LS 21.290 vs. Ac pare ilcan niht pe mon on dag hafde pa burg mid stacum gemearcod, swa swa hie hie pa wyrcean woldon, wulfas atugan pa stacan up - Or 226.17 & Odrum dagum pu underfenge me on minum limum, gyrstandag pu underfenge me on me sylfum - AECHom ii.286.25 c. Bi dam cuced Salomonn se snottra - CP 37.15 vs. Be dam Paulus se apostol cuced -

CP 43.8

d. On gastlicum andgite getacnode pes hreoflia man eal mancyn - AECHom i. 122.16 vs. Of Egypta lande ic geclypode minne sunu - AECHom i.80.4 e. Eft on pare ylcan nihte cwced se Halend - AECHom ii.286.23 vs. Witodlice purh dines feondes lufe pu bist Godes Freond - AECHom i.56.5 & Gyrstandag ofer midne dag hine forlei se fefor21 - AECHom i.128.12 f. Gif hi forseod Moyses a and dara witegena bodunga, nellad hi gelyfan, peah hwa of deade arise - AECHom i.334.20 vs. Gif ge me gehyrad, ge etad pare eordan god; if ge me ne geyrsiad, eow fornimd min swurd. - AECHom ii.322.11 Until we studied these examples, we had thought that Mitchell fully grasped the clitic nature of personal pronouns. In his paper on the syntax of The Peterborough Chronicle, Mitchell (1964: 119) points out that "Pronoun objects and certain adverbs can precede the verb in principal

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clauses, but the resulting order is a variation of SV rather than a type of S ... V (our emphasis)." That is to say, they do not count as violations of verb-second word order. However, these examples make it clear that he sees only pre-verbal p r o n o u n objects as not violating verb-second order. Preverbal pronominal subjects are treated by him as if they were full n o u n phrases and therefore, if preceded by any other constituent, violations of verb-second. Indeed, to bring Kellner into the discussion once again, he had, it appears, an admirably clear vision of syntax. A hundred years ago he m a d e the following observation, which we see as the precursor of the analysis we find most persuasive today: ... the history of English syntax shows that this order of words, namely the personal or reflexive pronoun before the verb is the rule [our emphasis] in the Old English, and that this rule survived as late as the sixteenth century (Kellner 1892: 305)

Van Kemenade (1987) has argued that all the personal pronouns are clitics, not just the object pronouns. 2 2 A subject p r o n o u n may count as occupying the first slot if it is topicalised; but if some other constituent has been topicalised, a subject p r o n o u n must be cliticised just like an object p r o n o u n , thereby not disrupting verb-second order. The one exception to this, as van Kemenade (1987: 111) notes, is the following: "when the first constituent [in main clauses] is ... pa 'then/when' or the negative particle ne 'not', we always find 'subject-verb inversion', even when the subject is a p r o n o u n . " The normal order, then, is nellad hi but ge et ad, as in (6) above. That is, the topicalisation of an operator (WH-, ne, pa) — i.e., movement to the left periphery of a clause — always blocks clitic attachment to the left of I N F L (i. e., to the left of the finite verb, which is one of the normal positions of clitic attachment), so that other clitics must appear to the right of the finite verb. If we accept van Kemenade's analysis of Old English personal pronouns as syntactic clitics, the details of which are too complex to rehearse fully here, then one of the many desirable consequences of the analysis is that main clauses with two or three personal pronouns in front of the verb, which previously looked like horrendous counter-examples to the claim of second position for the finite verb, are no longer problematic. In such sequences, a clitic (ne and personal pronouns) in the absolutely first position (which is the topic slot) counts in calculating verb-second; other clitics (except, as noted above, after an operator) are attached to the left periphery of I N F L (the finite verb) and do not count as separate con-

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stituents. Thus all the following examples from the Chronicle (Smith's edition, referenced by year and line) are equally verb-second main clauses: (32) a. pa foron hie to ('then they went to [Beamfleet]', 893.47 b. pa ne mehte seo fird hie na hindan offaran ('then the army could not overtake them from behind') 893.93 c. da pees on sumera on dysum gere tofor se here ('then after this in the summer of this year the army dispersed') 895.123 d. ic hi ne lufige ( Ί do not love her/them') 24 e. f>a he pa wid pone here peer wast abisgod wees ... foron begen cetgcedere up be Temese ... ('When he was occupied against the invading army there in the west, ... both went together up along the Thames ...') 893.68 With this analysis in mind, we can now return to Mitchell's putative counter-examples in (31) above and see whether it is really possible to write off verb-second as "only a tendency". In group (a), all examples are okay except the second, where — as is the case more often than not — her at the beginning of an entry in the Chronicle cannot be counted as an initial adverb within the clause, presumably because it was felt to constitute a major intonational phrase by itself. In these instances, modern editors should always set her off with a comma, we think. In group (b), all examples are okay except the fourth, where the very long introductory adverb has two subordinate clauses within it, such that the writer perhaps lost track of verb-second and, as it were, started over. Among all the rest — groups (c) through (f) — only the second in (c) is a counterexample, and it is genuine. But clearly, verb-second is much more than a mere tendency. We turn now to the question, Is there any interaction between main clause order and subordinate clause order in the reanalysis that produced subject-verb syntax rather than verb-second syntax? The explanatory goal of historical linguistics is to identify the triggering experience that forces a reanalysis by the language learner. From the evidence of main clauses alone, the child learning English could not possibly abduce a subject-verb ordering relation before 1400, because it is not present in main clauses before 1400. The only clauses where a subject-verb ordering relation could be abduced regularly — not as a result of the coincidence of subject being promoted to topic and therefore

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looking like a positionally-determined subject — were the subordinate clauses, where the word order had become, by 1200 on the evidence of some documents and by 1300 virtually everywhere, COMP + SUBJECT + FINITE VERB + N O N - F I N I T E VERB + X. The only relevant exceptions to this were relative clauses, where COMP and SUBJECT could be a single constituent whenever the WH-word was the subject of the relative clause: this gives the appearance of verb-second order rather than verb-third in such clauses after the loss of verb-finality. How did this situation in the subordinate clause arise? That is, how did subordinate clauses lose their verb-finality as a general rule (not merely superficially, as in Old English, by applications of rules like verbraising and extraposition)? What we take to be the standard explanation of this is first presented with both theoretical justification and a solid evidential base by Canale in his unpublished 1978 dissertation. 25 This view, simply put, is to attribute it to the analogical spread of the word order of main clauses, predominantly verb-second, into subordinate clauses. We do not think it is necessary here to review the numerous proposals which have not linked the change to verb-second syntax, since these have all been based, in our judgment, on a mistaken premise, namely that subject-verb and verb-object order were grammaticised in Old English main clauses to a considerable extent in the way that they are in Modern English, and that this became rigidified when nominal inflections were eroded. This premise — or any other which sets up for Old English any kind of positional identification of subjects in main clauses (i.e., SV syntax) — is wrong because verb-second syntax is utterly different conceptually from SV syntax even though the surface strings may look alike much of the time. Vennemann (1984: 634) estimates that surface SV occurs 60% of the time in Standard German running text, though, as he correctly notes, Standard German "is still very remote from subject-verb order". Vennemann's estimated figure is considerably higher than the figures for verb-second = SV in Old English narrative prose. Late Old English, as represented in the Peterborough Chronicle 1122 — 1154, which contains 219 verb-second main clauses, shows the order subject-verb only 38% of the time (Mitchell 1964: 121 ff.), the remainder being XVS. Late classical Old English, as represented in i d f r i c ' s St. Edmund, rarely exceeds 35% SV as against all other verb-second instances. Early classical Old English, as represented in the 892 — 900 segment of the Chronicle, is only about 33%. The discrepancy may be accounted for by the narrational

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style of these texts. They all have many initial orientational adverbs like pa, ponne, peer, nu, which normally require VS order. Of those proposals about the reanalyses in which the explanations have been linked at least in part to V-seconding, to the best of our knowledge Kuhn (1933: 67) is the earliest to have made the claim in a form close to what we take to be the current widely held view, represented most clearly in Canale (1978) and Vennemann (1984), as we shall see: Die verben der gebundenen sätze hielten sich im allg. zunächst in ihrer alten Stellung, s o dass die differenzierung der beiden Satzarten v o l l z o g e n

war. Auf dieser stufe blieb nur das deutsche stehen, während die verben der gebundenen sätze in England und Skandinavien später der analogiewirkung derer der selbständigen erlagen, so dass die differenzierung wieder verloren ging (Kuhn 1933: 67). 26

Of course Kuhn was not the earliest to have noted verb-seconding in Old English, which is a common observation in the last decade of the 19th century as well as the much debated analysis of Kuhn's contemporary Andrew (1934, 1940, 1948), but he was, as far as we know, the earliest to associate causatively this fact with the subsequent grammaticisation of the order SV in subordinate clauses. Other accounts of the change which draw upon common assumptions about verb-seconding and, generally speaking, about the form of grammar, are those of Vennemann (1974), Stockwell (1977), Canale (1978), Bean (1983 [1976]), Vennemann (1984), Gerritsen (1984), Haider (1986), and van Kemenade (1987). We deal with Vennemann's (1984) views only, since they were considerably refined after 1974. Stockwell's (1977) claim, which draws heavily from Vennemann (1974) except for the question of how verb-seconding arose, is that reanalysis of verb-second clauses took place mainly because (1) most of the time the topicalised constituent was the subject, so that the position immediately preceding the finite verb came to be reanalysed as the subject position; (2) much of the time the finite verb was the only verb, and there it sat with no evidence that it had been moved there, since (3) rightward movement rules for S, PP, and heavy NP's had encouraged a perception of verb-mediality. Gerritsen (1984) reinforced this argument by pointing out that the use of two-part verbs, in particular the use of perfect have/be ... en for preterite, was much rarer in Old English than in the other West Germanic languages, so that evidence of verb-finality was proportionately less available. Neither Vennemann (1974), nor Stockwell, nor Gerritsen dealt with subordinate clauses, which we now believe are central to the process

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of reanalysis that eventually took place in main clauses: that is, we do not think that a direct reanalysis of main clause verb-second syntax into subject-verb syntax ever took place — we believe the reanalysis in main clauses was mediated by analogy from the subordinate clauses where the reanalysis was completed much earlier; and there were other factors in the reanalysis (see discussion of van Kemenade (1987), below). Canale (1978) dealt with the order of elements within the VP, especially focussing on the development of the orders v-O, v-PP, and v-V. He does not count clauses with auxiliary- and modal-type finite verbs (beon, habban, weorpan, cunnan, magan, etc.), which makes it difficult to compare his figures with those of Bean's 1976 dissertation (Bean 1983) based on the same textual materials. There is an unfortunate contradiction between his figures and hers: as he summarises it, "Bean ... concludes that SVO order is 'fully grammaticized' in dependent clauses before in main ones in OE; to the extent that this conclusion implies that v - 0 structures are more frequent in dependent clauses than in main ones at either the Early or Middle OE stage, then it is not supported by the findings in Table 3" (1978: 65). It is not our place or intent to adjudicate this difference: we only note that they did not really count the same strings, given that Canale ignored modal-types in his totals. It is important also to note that Bean's and Canale's counts of word order in subordinate clauses do agree both with each other and with Mitchell (1964) for the 1122 — 54 Chronicle, the first document in which verb-finality had largely disappeared. Bean's own conclusion that Old English main clauses were basically verb-third (i.e., like modern English) rather than verb-second is now probably vitiated by her failure, as well as almost everyone else's except Canale (1978), P i n t z u k - Kroch (1985), and van Kemenade (1985, 1987) to discount personal pronouns in her calucations of verb position. But her counts of the surface facts, and Canale's, remain reliable and useful, since (unlike Bacquet) they carefully sort out the conjunct clauses and distinguish between verb-second clauses and other types both main and subordinate. Canale (1978) takes the position that Emonds' structure-preserving constraint explains the fact — as he takes it to be — that word order changes spread from main to subordinate clauses. But, as Canale acknowledges (1978: 69), the facts are in conflict with predictions made by the structure-preserving constraint, since "Emonds' (1976) structure-preserving constraint would require that v - 0 and v-V patterns not occur in any dependent clause at these [up to 1070] stages." Canale tries, without much enthusiasm or explicitness, to write off the counter-examples under

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labels like "errors, borrowing influence, and stylistic expressivity" (1978: 69). Nonetheless, he has argued persuasively that several root clause rules created a sort of surface word order conspiracy in Old English main clauses that forced a reanalysis of the base from OV to VO in the VP by about 1200. The new order in subordinate clauses can be attributed directly to "spread of the innovative patterns [from root] to nonroot sentences" (Canale 1978: iii). He goes on to argue that "a base reanalysis provides a principled account of the simultaneous fashion in which the innovative patterns are established in nonroot sentences". Canale does not argue that subordinate clause order later reversed the direction of analogical influence by playing a role in the ultimate development of subject-verb syntax in main clauses, as we would. Neither does Haider. His (very brief) summary (1986: 73 — 4) of what he calls "The English Reanalysis" simply entails making the INFLPosition (the position where finiteness is marked on the verb) a basic clause position rather than outside the left periphery of the clause where it had previously served as a landing site for the fronted finite verb. The closest he comes to an explanation is a reference to Lightfoot (1979) and an attribution to that work of the view that "it is the peculiar development of English modals which is the trigger" (Haider 1986: 73). We cannot find any reason to interpret Lightfoot (1979) as having claimed that the development of the modals is assigned to the AUX node, equivalent to INFL, in its Modern English basic clause position (between NP and VP, not outside). For the I N F L repositioning to depend on the modal reanalysis, V-seconding would have had to remain alive and well for 200 years later than the evidence will countenance, assuming the correctness of Lightfoot's dating of the modal reanalysis (around 1600). It is certainly true that the position of I N F L "entails the loss of the V-second property" (Haider 1986: 74). (Actually, what it entails, as we see it, is loss of the verb-fronting rule. A language could still canonise verb-second by disallowing topicalisation.) If the new modals had played any role, it should have been to help preserve verb-fronting — and therefore also verbsecond surface appearance (i. e., in Haider's terms, having I N F L outside the left periphery of the clause), since both the modals and "Jo-support" are new devices which arose in the language in part as a means, it would appear, of preserving verb-fronting in interrogatives and verb-second in negative statements: at least those are clear consequences of the development. In 1984 Vennemann added a new turn to this controversy, enriching Canale's earlier argument. Canale (1980: ms 6 — 7) had noted that Light-

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foot's theory of change (1979: 149 — 50) needs at least the following restriction added to it in order for Canale's predictions based on Emonds' structure preserving constraint to be correct (namely, that structurechanging syntactic innovations should affect root sentences before nonroot ones): reanalysis of underlying structure must be motivated by surface structure. The prediction that follows from this, taken with Lightfoot's other four principles (preservation of communication between generations, therapy rather than prophylaxis in grammatical change, optimisation toward more highly valued grammars, and optimisation of certain therapeutic changes), is this: ... the theory of grammar incorporating some form of the SPC will interact with this modified theory of change to predict that structure changing innovations in syntax first affect root sentences — in a gradual manner — and then affect nonroot sentences in a simultaneous manner.

What we claim is that the "motivation by surface structure" required by Canale's principle was not to be found, as a structure, in Old English main clauses, but only as an accidental surface order. Vennemann (1984) came close to this observation but continued to believe that the innovative syntax was introduced in main clauses and then percolated downward. Here is the crucial portion of his insightful argument in full: Once a category of subjunctions had been established, the analogical remodeling of subordinate clauses after main clauses was innocuous, even in cases where the subjunction was still homophonous with some coordinating constituent: Main clause word order, i.e., verb-second, amounts to verb-third after a subjunction, and thus main clause word order itself became a new mark of subordination, viz. after subjunctions, e. g. in Icelandic: (a) honum batnadi (a1) pegar batnadi honum (a") pegar honum batnadi

'he got well' 'already he got well' 'when he got well'

One may note that the generalization crucially depends on verb-second syntax. It would not work with subject-verb syntax. Generalized subjectverb syntax not only requires a category of subjunctions but a clear division between subjunctions and anaphorical elements: (a) he got well (a') then he got well (a") when he got well

(Vennemann 1984: 633 — 4)

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There are two differences between what Canale and Vennemann have argued and what we now claim: (1) The remodelling of subordinate clause order was based on a selective subset of main clause verb-second exemplars, namely those that happened to have subject as topic, since it was not verb-seconding which transferred analogically down into subordinate clauses but simply the order "subject followed immediately by finite verb". This is hardly a trivial point. It is a consequence of the theory of syntax itself that main clause orders other than SV (of which there were many, including in particular large numbers of the order ADV + V-FINITE + SUBJECT) that a speaker might randomly try to analogise down into the subordinate clause, would be blocked by the fact that the first position was filled by the complementiser (the subjunction). In effect, therefore, the possible analogy is constrained by the theory at the same time that it is, as Canale argued, motivated by surface structure in a clear sense. (2) The order subject-verb in subordinate clauses became itself one of the principal analogical bases for remodelling main clauses27 (Vennemann apparently assumes that the reanalysis of main clause order as subject-verb had already taken place by the time of the establishment of subject-verb in subordinate clauses, which is not what the documents show). 28 The influence must have been in the direction from subordinate to main (from embedded to root clauses) if we are to account for the considerable lag-time between the establishment of SV order in subordinate clauses, on the one hand, and in main clauses, on the other. It is of course conceivable that the two developments were independent; one would want to start from that hypothesis only if there were obstacles in the way of this one. We do not, we hasten to add, think that word-order levelling was the only factor in the reanalysis of main clauses, but that it was at least a significant factor. Another potentially significant factor that was almost taken for granted in the late 19th century is influence from French (the notion that the "German" word order became "French" word order in English). Kellner himself mentions the possible influence of French (1892: 305) but notes that there is a serious problem in the chronology. Smith (1893: 226) rejects the claim of French influence as an initial factor, on the grounds that the chronology is wrong. He points to the appreciable number of SVO subordinate examples in the Orosius — 46 of 314 (15%) in subordinate clauses with simple verbs. Out of 186 sentences with compound tenses only 31 (17%) do not allow SVO interpretation (discounting cliticisation), a function of the large number of raised verbs in such

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clauses. We therefore do not further entertain the possibility that this central word order development could have been initiated by French influence, though no doubt this was a source of later reinforcement. Excellent documentation of the lag-time (i. e., main SV less well established than subordinate SV) is to be found in MacLeish (1969). His prose corpus covers 1369 — 1394, and includes three prose Chaucerian documents (Astrolabe, Melibeus, and Parson 's Tale), Wiclif s Of Feigned Contemplative Life, Thomas Usk's Appeal before the Coroner of London, and the anonymous First Petition to Parliament in English). His statistics for Chaucer's prose (MacLeish 1969: 40, 51, 62) show about 75% SV in main clauses, 95% SV in subordinate clauses. If Chaucer does not have the subject first in the main clause, he inverts subject (whether pronoun or full NP) and verb to conform to verb-second more than 80% of the time. By contrast, the statistics for Wiclif (MacLeish 1969: 72) show almost complete assimilation to SV in both main and subordinate clauses (89% and 96% respectively). In the 11% of Wiclif s clauses where inversion occurs, he never inverts a pronoun, only full NP's. The statistics of the Appeal and the Petition with respect to main vs. subordinate frequency of SV (88% to 93% in the Appeal, 88% to 98% in the Petition) echo the Wiclif figures, also with respect to inversion. It is important to note that both Vennemann (1985) and Canale (1978) and (1980) assumed that syntactic innovations originate in main clauses and later percolate into subordinate clauses. Their scenario, that is, assumes prior independent reanalysis of main clauses from verb-second to subject-verb. But we know that main clauses in some dialects of Middle English up through Chaucer still had a verb-second constraint, as Schmidt (1980) showed in detail and van Kemenade (1987: 2 1 9 - 2 5 ) interpreted in seeking to account for the demise of verb-fronting in declarative main clauses of English. Note that in the randomly selected examples below, ranging from about 1250 to 1420, the main clauses are verb-second, clearly, while the adverbial and nominal subordinate clauses are generally subjunction-subject-verb. These examples, we believe, represent the norms of Middle English usage, especially in the midlands and south, up to around 1400. In the earliest major Middle English literary prose text — the Ancrene Wisse of ca. 1175 — verb-finality is not uncommon in subordinate clauses, unlike in the final continuation of the Chronicle, twenty years earlier, where it is rare (all references to Middle English texts are given by page and line in Mosse — Walker (1968) unless otherwise stipulated):

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(33) Alswa is pis scheid ... per me hit sonest seo. Ancrene Wisse, Mosse 146.117. (34) ...as

hit i-writen is. Sawles Warde (E. Mid., ca. 1200), Mosse 151.38.

(35) pe bodi is ananriht ['right away'] wipute lettunge ['obstacle'], for ne mei ham na ping ageines etstonden.29 Sawles Warde, Mosse 151.44 (36) And so hi were in do ssipe, so aros a great tempeste of winde. Kentish Sermons (ca. 1250), Mosse 176.4 (37) And also po men, pet weren in po ssipe, hedde i-seghe po miracle, so awondrede hem michel. Kentish Sermons, Mosse 176.11 (38) In pis maner sail a trewe lufar of Jhesu Criste do: his hert sal swa byrne in lufe pat it sal be turned into fyre of lufe, and be, als it war, al fire, and he sal sa schyne in vertues pat in na parte of hym he be myrke in vices. Richard Rolle, The Form of Living (York, ca. 1340), Mosse 233.96. (39) In pri pinges nameliche lip pe zenne of zuyche volke. Ayenbite of Inwyt (South, 1340), Mosse 225.38 Both the Midland prose treatment, Pe boc of vices and vertues (about 1400), and Caxton's The Ryall Book, have identical verb-second order in this sentence. (40) And pan wolde he schewe hem his entent and seye hem pat, 3if pei wolde go sie such a lord or such a man pat was his enemye or contrarious to his list, pat pei scholde not drede to don it... The Travels of Sir John Mandeville (SE Mid, ca. 1410), Mosse 279.4

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Looking at these Middle English examples and others like them, one must conclude that the loss of verb-finality (OV—>VO) is not as total as a cataclysmic base reanalysis would suggest. Phrases like "sudden stop", "striking" and "dramatic" are somewhat hyperbolic. Anglicists have always known and emphasised to their students, though published discussions at times lose sight of this fact, that linguistic change is gradual. It is a puzzle how to capture gradualness in syntactic change, especially when the change consists of base reanalysis. In the case of a base reanalysis from OV to VO, one surely does not want to say the language learner masters two sets of base rules and then selects from them randomly in forming sentences. But it is clear that two distinctive features of Old English syntax persisted long beyond the OY reanalysis to VO. (1) The "verb brace", which is a consequence of verb-final base rules plus a verb-fronting rule, persisted into late Middle English, more commonly in subordinate than in main clauses but not by any means confined to them. Indeed, the brace construction in main clauses is quite steady. Figures quoted in Morohovskij (1980: 101) are: 8th to 9th c., 14.6%; 10th to 11th c., 12.6%; Middle English (So.) 10.8%; Middle English (No.) 11.2%; London ( 1 4 - 1 6 c.) 7.6%. These figures do not take into account differences between clause types. (2)

Verb-second positioning in main clauses.

The latter merely means that verb-seconding persisted in Middle English as in the modern Scandinavian languages. The former remains an unresolved problem. The best option we have is probably Henning Andersen's (1973) suggestion of "adaptive rules", where one would claim that the Middle English acquisition device (i. e., a young human) worked out the grammar as SVO and then added rules to allow him to produce "old-fashioned" sentences that would have been routinely generated a couple of hundred years earlier by an SOV base grammar. Van Kemenade (1987) is the most precise account yet published of the two distinct reanalyses that have, in most previous work, been conflated into a single reanalysis (stated, roughly, as SOV—>SVO). The reanalysis has two parts: (1) OV to VO, with respect to which she accepts V-raising and extraposition as sufficient basis for the language learner to determine that VP is right-branching (this she assumes, based on Canale (1978) and Hiltunen (1983), to have been completed, as a base reanalysis, by about 1200). (2) Replacement of verb-second syntax by subject-verb syntax.

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This is achieved by the base reanalysis proposed in Haider (1986) (summarised above), namely moving I N F L from outside S, on the left periphery, to inside S. This reanalysis, unlike the OV/VO reanalysis, is invisible on the surface. It shows up through the loss of verb-fronting in main clauses and the development of a new surface identification of topicalisation: topics are now adjacent to subjects, on their left, and subjects are identified by virtue of being adjacent to the finite verb. Verbfronting is no longer possible, because there is no landing site. To form questions and certain types of negative statements (Hardly ever ...), subject and finite verb must be inverted. Why was verb-fronting (verb-seconding) lost? Equivalently, why did I N F L get moved inside S (which is the government-binding way of talking about what Vennemann (1984) calls "subject-verb syntax")? Van Kemenade relates the loss of verb-seconding to loss of clitic status on the part of personal pronouns, which in turn she relates, somewhat loosely, to loss (i. e., severe reduction) of agreement marking in the verbal morphology of late Middle English. She provides two accounts, one for Chaucer, the other for Wiclif. The essence of her account of Chaucer's prose, based on the Treatise on the Astrolabe — which is rigidly verb-second, including inversion with both nominal and pronominal NP's, with pronouns counted as identical to full NP's with respect to their constituent status —, is that "pronominal subjects ceased to be interpreted as clitics, and therefore came to behave like nominal subjects" (van Kemenade 1987: 222). 75% of the root clauses are verb-second SVO (Mac Leish 1969: 62), except that Chaucer had few if any ambiguous adverb/subjunctions. Though van Kemenade cannot be blamed for this conclusion, it is our view that if Chaucerian syntax had been the direct source of Modern English syntax, we would probably still have verb-second syntax with an SVO base, as Swedish does. Chaucer's subject pronouns were not clitics, but his main-clause syntax was not SV. Her account of Chaucer's regular verb-second syntax fails to demonstrate a causative relation between decliticisation and loss of verbsecond. In any case we expect, without yet having any empirical data to support this claim, that decliticisation is not a sweeping, uniform change across the board; rather, there were probably different rates of decliticisation with subject and object pronouns. It is her account of Wiclif s English — which there is good reason to believe was one of the major sources for the rise of Chancery standard (Fisher 1977, 1979), and therefore of modern norms of syntax — that provides an insightful explanation of how decliticisation helped to bring

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about loss of verb-second and the fixing of subject-verb syntax (i.e., movement of I N F L to a position after the subject N P inside S). Wiclif has "no inversion of subject pronouns, and non-regular [i.e. sporadic —RPS & DM] inversion of nominal subjects" (van Kemenade 1987: 220). Since subject pronouns do not invert in this dialect, unlike Chaucer's (i.e., even with initial adverbs they remain to the left of the verb) and nominal subjects with increasing frequency follow them analogically into preverbal position, the verb-second constraint breaks down because the position is reanalysed as not a clitic position (full NP's can't be clitics), giving verb-third (with initial adverbs) exactly as in Modern English and exactly as it had been in subordinate clauses for about 200 years. The analogy within Wiclifs dialect, between subject clitics and subject NP's, is — roughly — "get uniform! get consistent!" The questions to which van Kemenade gives no answer are, How do we know that subject pronouns had decliticised in Wiclif, and what made them do so? Since subject pronouns did not invert, we really do not know directly that they had decliticised. It is reasonable to assume they had because the object pronouns also position themselves like regular NP's. So assuming that they did, why did they? Our speculation is that it was in dialects of the Midlands like Wiclifs that the analogy from downstairs finally took hold fully. Subordinate clause order must have been the key basis for the analogy, because only there were preverbal subjects, both nominal and pronominal, fully established. It is the merging of nominal and pronominal subjects, such that they behave alike with respect to inversion and all other positioning, that destroys the clitic status of the subject pronouns: and it is consistently, and only, in the subordinate clauses where they had already merged, as far as a learner could perceive on the surface, in the order which, transferred consistently to main clauses, also necessarily destroyed the verb-second constraint.

5.

Summary

Old English clauses were underlyingly SOV but changed to SVO by about 1200. Main clauses in Old English and Middle English up to about 1400, on both base orders, were verb-second, a word order quite distinct from subject-verb. Subordinate clauses after 1200, and up to half of the instances before 1200, were mostly complementiser-subject-verb, which was sufficient to count as "verb-late" (i.e., not verb-second, and functionally

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equivalent to verb-final) in marking subordination. We argue that this change in subordinate clauses, which resulted in part from the surface appearance that verb raising produced, was basically brought about by analogy from verb-second order in main clauses (verb-second in a subordinate clause would on the surface appear to be verb-third — i.e., ADV/COMP + S -Ι- V). This early preponderance of subject-verb order in subordinate clauses was a major factor in the later reanalysis of main clause order as subject-verb (and loss of the verb-second constraint), where decliticisation also played a role (and possibly there was reinforcement from French, too). This position contradicts the standard view that main clause word order changed independently of developments within subordinate clauses.

Appendix Verb-raising is somewhat more complex than the rightward movement rules such as extraposition. Essentially what this rule does is take a structure with a sentential complement and convert it to one with an infinitival complement. Either the VP or the V alone could be raised to the right of the matrix verb. We use "MODAL" in this diagram to include the ancestors of Modern English modal auxiliaries, causatives and verbs of perception, and the verbs beon and habban, all of which participated in verb-raising constructions (cf. p. 401). The effect of this transformation is to merge a higher and a lower verb into a single complex verb phrase, producing clause-union and reducing the status of the lower S from an underlying sentential complement of the modal verb to an infinitival complement of the modal verb on the surface. Once the two clauses are merged into a single clause, all the rules which can apply to any VP can apply to this new VP, including in particular the rightward movement rules such as extraposition and heavyNP-shift. It is apparent that the result will look like verb-fronting. Notes 1. We are grateful to Mats Johannson for assistance in preparation of a data base; and to Susan Pintzuk for comments on a draft of a paper of ours that is closely related to this one. During the conference where this paper was presented, a number of participants, and subsequently also Willem Koopman, David Denison, and Theo Vennemann, made helpful comments. In the body of the paper we have acknowledged several specific points where their comments have been especially useful. They are not account-

Subordination and word order change in English UNDERLYING

ι I NPi

ι I VP ι I I I S I

I I V 'MODAL"

I I NPi

I I VP I I I NP

I V ["MAIN"

SURFACE S ι ι I I NP

I I VP

I I

I I

V

VP

"MODAL"]

! I I

I I

I I NP

I I V-INF ["MAIN"]

401

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able, of course, for our errors of fact or interpretation. We are deeply grateful to Dieter Kastovsky for organising the Kellner Conference in the first place, for his able administration of it, and for his extraordinarily generous hospitality during it. Finally, we wish to express our appreciation to the UCLA Research Committee and the generous system of research-travel support provided by the University of California. 2. About a year and a half after the claims set forth in this paper were formulated, we had the opportunity to read a pre-publication version of a paper by Talmy Givon, "The evolution of dependent clause morpho-syntax in Biblical Hebrew" (U. Oregon mimeo 1988), in which the following statement appears: This change is again of considerable typological interest, representing an instance of what may be called 'syntactic liberation', whereby erstwhile nominalized clauses gradually acquire finite-clause syntactic properties. Such changes have often resulted in a total re-evaluation of the syntactic markedness situation in a language, so that what used to be a subordinate clause syntax became characteristic of the least marked, finite main clause [our emphasis]. 3. The examples are cited from Kellner without any changes except omission of accent marks on etymologically long vowels; translations and source references are also unchanged. 4. The term "parataxis" is not used identically by all scholars. It has been used (e. g. by Andrew (1940: 87ff., Q u i r k - W r e n n (1955: 96), and most explicitly by Shores (1971: 208)) to refer to pairs of clauses, one of which is logically subordinate to the other, where no syntactic relationship is marked (or, as a second sense in Andrew (1940), where coordination is marked but subordination must be inferred — Leave me and I'll simply die = 'If you leave me, I'll die'; we ignore this second usage altogether, since it is not at issue in Kellner or in the history of word order within clauses of any kind). Since our starting point is Kellner, we shall follow his actual usage, though his definitional statements in part contradict his usage. Definitionally, he writes (Kellner 1892: 52): "We call this sort of combination which indiscriminately places sentences of different syntactic value one by the side of the other, paratactic combination, parataxis or coordination." But then he goes on to contradict the possibility of "coordination" being involved in parataxis: "The absence of connecting particles is a characteristic feature of this combination, and thus the sentences look as if there were no connection whatever between them, as if they were independent of each other ... But what seems to be parataxis, mere coordination in this connection, is only apparent ... In short, what was formally a paratactic connection, is logically hypotaxis or subordination (Kellner 1892: 53)". Our usage, following Kellner's actual usage, is to take as paratactic those pairs of verb phrases and clauses (or, logically though not at issue here, other constituent pairs) in which one is logically subordinate to the other though formally butt-joined and lacking any formal marker of subordination. It would make sense to use the terms "parataxis" and "hypotaxis" to label logicosemantic relations, and the terms "coordination" and "subordination" to label formally marked syntactic relations. Mitchell (1985: 1683) defines parataxis only as absence of formal markers of subordination (though this will not cover Andrew's usage, noted above). He distinguishes between "syndetic" and "asyndetic parataxis", though he does not go the whole way to use the parallel pair of terms, "syndetic" and "asyndetic" hypotaxis (he takes hypotaxis as always syndetic). It would be clearer if certain types

Subordination and word order change in English

5.

6.

7.

8. 9.

403

of structures called paratactic by Kellner could be called "asyndetic hypotaxis", e. g. He said he was leaving. In any case, it seems clear that there is not a modern standard of either linguistic or philological usage for these terms. In this paper, we use "parataxis" to include only asyndetic subordination; we use "hypotaxis" to include only syndetic subordination; and "coordination" is only syndetic. Finally, "correlative" constructions can be logicosemantically either coordinating (both ... and , either ... or) or subordinating (then/ when ... then, i f . . . then). The only correlatives of interest here are the subordinating ones. Our understanding of the terminology above has had the benefit of extensive discussion with Andreas Jucker, for which we gratefully express our appreciation, though he should not be held accountable for our conclusions. We owe this nicely illustrative, though slightly contrived, Modern English example to David Denison (personal communication). Modern English of course has no true copycorrelatives at all. We agree with Mitchell (1984: 2810) that pe, either alone or in combination with a deictic or an adverb, is simply a subordinating particle, not a relative pronoun. The same is true of the conjunctive that in Modern English. Sentences of the type cer hi sind [indicative] gebundene cer hi beon [subjunctive] geborene AE Horn ii.252.34 'They are bound before they are born' (quoted in Mitchell 1985: §1885), where the subjunctive is decisive, are rare. See especially Mitchell (1965). The same ground is covered briefly in Mitchell — Robinson (1986) (esp. § 159, note 2). Such that van Kemenade (1987: 4) excludes poetry altogether from her data base, saying that "It is well-known that OE poetry had a language of its own, going back to Old Germanic traditions. Word order in poetry is very different from that in prose. Therefore, poetry cannot be considered a reliable source of information on the standard of OE." Actually, we believe that this is too strong a position to take, since there is nothing found in poetry which is not also exemplified in the prose, though verb-first main clauses are much more frequent in poetry (they correspond properly to verb-second in the prose), as also are verb-final main clauses. Verb-finality in subordinate clauses is consistent — though of course by no means without exception — in Beowulf.\ especially in those instances where it was critical to the interpretation, as Zimmermann (1983) showed (see below). The opinion of Hock (1985: 82 — 3) seems reasonable to us, namely that "in terms of stages of linguistic development, Beowulf takes a position intermediate between the earliest Germanic (as reconstructed and/or represented by the Older Runes) and 'standard' Old English etc." Hock distinguishes sharply between the word order testimony of lyric poetry (which he, and we, would ignore) and that of the epic poetry. He cites three facts about the syntax of Beowulf which support his claim concerning its intermediate position: (1) the verb-second main clauses are generally limited to auxiliaries, the copula, modal-types, and "the 'raising' or accusative-with-infinitive type" (i.e., from this limitation one concludes that verb-fronting is incipient and stress dependent); (2) the old ad-positions are still postposed (e.g., Beowulf was breme ... Scyldes eafera Scedelandum in [Beo 18 — 19]); and (3) in relative clause structures, the correlative head is case-marked from the main clause (it is generally case-marked from within the relative clause in later prose).

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10. Zimmermann's list of frequent ambiguous function words consists of pa, peer, oppcet, sippan, ponne, swa. 11. All citations from the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle not otherwise attributed are taken from Smith's edition of the Parker Chronicle. 12. Cf. Köster (1975) for a full development — for Modern Dutch — of this view. 13. Cf. Appendix for explanation of verb-raising. 14. Example from van Kemenade (1987: 59). 15. After the conference at which this paper was presented (September 1988), Professor W. Koopman kindly sent us a preprint of a paper of his which is to appear in Folia Linguistica Historica 9.1 (1990). In this paper he investigates all Old English constructions containing three verbs and exemplifies the surface orders derivable from V-raising and V-Projection raising. On the basis of his findings he claims that the last example below must be ungrammatical, because there is no way the raising rule can apply so as to generate Godes geleafan in a position between the subject and the finite verb while the two verbs are separated. This seems correct, to us, and we have left the example in the text to show that in fact there are clear limits to the extent of superficial scrambling that can result from raising rules and extraposition rules. The asterisk on the last example was added to the final copy of this paper on the basis of Koopman's inference about grammaticality in Old English. 16. Pace Mitchell (1985: §3934). The ond clauses with VS are not really a problem except for one who insists they are subordinate (as distinct from "take subordinate order"): but in either case, they remain formally unchanged into Modern English. That leaves existentials, mainly, on Mitchell's list — i. e., the equivalent of Modern English there are/were. It is certainly not clear to us how to analyse existentials (with a zero subject, perhaps?), but as long as this class of subordinate clauses remains the principal ordering counterexample, Andrew's generalisation is not seriously threatened. 17. We have said nothing about the status of andjac clauses and conjunct verb phrases. As Campbell and Mitchell, in their reviews of Bacquet (1962) and elsewhere, have made emphatically clear, these constructions are fairly consistently verb-final. Campbell (1964: 191) asserts: "He [Bacquet] is not aware that all conjunctions including and and ac require subordinate word order, i. e. the subject follows the conjunction, and the verb may be in the third or any later place." Note that in this instance Campbell says "require subordinate order", not "are subordinate". But just below that statement, in dealing with word order in conjunct VP's (i. e., "word order in co-ordinated clauses in the second of which the subject is not re-expressed"), Campbell says "Such clauses are subordinate." Since we have discussed clauses of this type elsewhere (Stockwell — Minkova 1990), and since they disappear from English at the same time as other verbfinal clauses, we forego further discussion of them here. But we do think a distinction must be made between "taking subordinate order" and "being subordinate". 18. The Catholic Homilies, ca. 990; Vices and Virtues, ca. 1200; and Sawles Warde, also early 13th century. 19. This and other quotations from Genesis and Exodus are from the Morris edition (1895). 20. Mitchell (1985: § 3929): "I believe [this] to be an example of OVS rather than a variation of VS". 21. Mitchell (1985: §3929): "this too is unlikely to be a variation of VS". 22. W. Koopman (personal communication) has pointed out to us that van Kemenade "now agrees that there are indeed some object pronouns which cannot be clitics." But these are the ones in the Peterborough Chronicle after 1122 where decliticisation has

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begun to take place (van Kemenade 1987: 189). The more interesting question raised by Koopman is whether there are earlier cases. His example is not persuasive: A E C H o m ii.101.302 Sum eawfcest degen beed done halgan wer pat he mid his munecum on his lande him munuclif araran sceolde. But him is not only in a non-clitic position, the correct translation seems to us to be 'a monk life for himself/themselves' rather than 'establish for himself/themselves'. The two readings are very similar, but our proposed reading suggests that the pronoun is a nominal adjunct and therefore not subject to verbal cliticisation rules. 23. The entire phrase before tofor functions as a single temporal adverb. 24. Cited by Campbell (1964: 191) as "a real type, though immensely less frequent than M. Bacquet believes it to be." But it is, we think, not verb-final as Campbell took it to be, but simply verb-second, with ic topicalised and both hi and ne clitic to the verb. 25. The general claim had been proposed earlier by Vennemann (1974) and others, and was assumed to be correct — we now believe mistakenly — in Stockwell (1977). 26. "Verbs in subordinate clauses at first retained their old position [verb-final], so that the differentiation between the two clause types was accomplished. Only German remained on that level while the verbs in subordinate clauses in England and Scandinavia were later subjected to analogy from the main clause, so that the difference was lost once again." Without going into detail, we should explain that Kuhn derived the verb-second order of main clauses from rhythmic principles. Whether or not that explanation holds, his description of the distinction in Old English and of the later analogy is clear. 27. This is the point that RPS tried to make in a talk presented in Cambridge at the Fifth International Conference on English Historical Linguistics, April 1987. At that time he had not seen Vennemann's paper and did not succeed in sorting out the various cross-currents satisfactorily, and hence did not submit the paper for publication. 28. Smith (1893: 231 —2) took the position that verb-final subordinate order might explain the sporadic appearance of verb-final main clause order. We have nothing better to offer for explanation of such clauses. Because of such clauses, the verb-fronting and topicalisation rules have to be considered optional. MacLeish (1969) seems to have misunderstood Smith's position about analogical relations between main and subordinate clauses. He writes (215): "C. A. Smith is right when he states that the AngloSaxon dependent cluster is the most forceful levelling influence toward common order." This is O U R position, but Smith explicitly refers (1893: 238) to "the norm [i.e., SVO, according to Smith] set by independent clauses and the consequent levelling of dependent clauses under this norm". We are grateful to David Denison for drawing our attention to this contradiction between MacLeish's reading and the actual statements found in Smith. 29. Verb-raising also is apparent in this example.

References Andersen, Henning 1973 "Abductive and deductive change", Language 49: 765 — 93. Andrew, Samuel Ogden 1934 "Some principles of Old English word-order", Medium Aevum 3: 167 — 88. 1940 Syntax and style in Old English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1948 Postscript on 'Beowulf. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

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Bacquet, Paul 1962 La structure de la phrase verbale a lepoque Alfredienne. (Publications of the faculty of letters of the University of Strasbourg 145) Paris. Bean, Marian C. 1983 The development of word order patterns in Old English. London: Croom-Helm. Campbell, Alistair 1964 Review of Paul Bacquet 1962. Review of English Studies 15: 1 9 0 - 3 . Canale, William Michael 1978 Word order change in Old English: base reanalysis in generative grammar. [Unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, University of Toronto]. 1980 "Main clauses, root sentences, and syntactic change", in: John T. Jensen (ed.), Proceedings of the 10th Meeting of the North-eastern Linguistics Society. Ottawa: University of Ottawa. Dahlstedt, August 1901 Rhythm and word-order in Anglo-Saxon and Semi-Saxon. Lund: Malmstrom. Emonds, Joseph E. 1976 A transformational approach to English syntax. New York: Academic Press. Faarlund, Jan Terje (ed.) 1985 Germanic linguistics. Bloomington: IULC. Fisher, John H. 1977 "Chancery and the emergence of Standard written English in the fifteenth century", Speculum 52: 870 — 99. 1979 "Chancery standard and Modern written English", Journal of the Society of Archivists 6: 136 — 44. Fisiak, Jacek (ed.) 1984 Historical syntax. Amsterdam: Mouton. Gardner, Faith F. 1971 An analysis of syntactic patterns of Old English. The Hague: Mouton. Gerritsen, Marinel 1984 "Divergent word order developments in Germanic languages: a description and a tentative explanation", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.) 1984: 107 — 36. Haider, Hubert 1986 "V-second in German", in: Hubert Haider —Martin Prinzhorn (eds.) 1986: 49-76. Haider, Hubert — Martin Prinzhorn (eds.) 1986 Verb second phenomena in Germanic languages. Dordrecht: Foris. Hiltunen, Risto 1983 The decline of the prefixes and the beginnings of the English phrasal verb. Turku: Turun Yliopisto. Hock, Hans Henrich 1985 "Pronoun fronting and the notion 'verb-second' position in Beowulf', in: Jan Terje Faarlund (ed.), 1985: 7 0 - 8 6 . 1986 Principles of historical linguistics. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Karlberg, Göran 1954 The English interrogative pronouns. A study of their syntactic history. Lund: Bloms. Kellner, Leon 1892 Historical outlines of English syntax. London: Macmillan.

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Kohonen, Viljo 1978 On the development of English word order in religious prose around 1000 and 1200 A. D. Äbo: Abo Akademi. Koopman, Willem F. 1984 "Some thoughts on Old English word order", in: Erik Kooper (ed.), Current research in Dutch and Belgian universities on Old English, Middle English, and historical linguistics. Utrecht, 2—20. 1989 "Old English constructions with three verbs", Folia Linguistica Historica 9: 271-300. Koster, Jan 1975 "Dutch as an SOV language", Linguistic Analysis 1: 111—36. Kuhn, Hans 1933 "Zur Wortstellung und -betonung im Altgermanischen", Beiträge zur Geschichte der deutschen Sprache und Literatur 57: 1 —109. Lass, Roger 1980 On explaining language change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Lightfoot, David 1979 Principles of diachronic syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1982 The language lottery. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press. MacLeish, Andrew 1969 The Middle English subject-verb cluster. Mouton: The Hague. McKnight, George 1897 "The Primitive Teutonic order of words", Journal of English and Germanic Philology 1: 136-219. Mitchell, Bruce —Fred Robinson 1986 A guide to Old English. (4th edition) Oxford: Blackwell. Mitchell, Bruce 1964 "Syntax and word-order in The Peterborough Chronicle 1122—1154", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 65: 113 — 144. 1965 "The status of hwonne in Old English", Neophilologus 49: 157 — 160. 1978 "Old English 'οδ Jjaet' adverb?", Notes and Queries 223: 390-394. 1980 "The dangers of disguise: Old English texts in modern punctuation", The Review of English Studies. New Series 31,124: 3 8 5 - 4 1 3 . 1984 "The origin of Old English conjunctions: some problems", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.), 1984: 2 7 1 - 9 9 . 1985 Old English syntax. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon. Morohovskij, A. N. 1980 Slovo i predlozenie ν istorii angliyskogo yazika. ['Word and sentence in the history of the English language.'] Kiev: Visca skola. Mosse, Fernand 1968 A handbook of Middle English. (Translated by J. Walker) Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press. Pintzuk, Susan — Anthony S. Kroch 1985 "Reconciling an exceptional feature of Old English clause structure", in: Jan Terje Faarlund (ed.), 1985: 8 7 - 1 1 1 . 1989 "The rightward movement of complements and adjuncts in the Old English of Beowulf', in: Elmer H. Antonsen —Jan Terje Faarlund — Hans Henrich Hock (eds.), Studies in Germanic linguistics. Amsterdam: Benjamins.

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Quirk, Randolph — Charles Leslie Wrenn 1955 An Old English grammar. 2nd ed. London: Methuen. Ries, John 1907 Die Wortstellung im Beowulf. Halle/S.: Niemeyer. Schmidt, Deborah Ann 1980 A history of inversion in English. [Unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, Ohio State University]. Shores, David L. 1971 A descriptive syntax of the Peterborough Chronicle. The Hague: Mouton. Smith, Albert Hugh 1935/1966 The Parker Chronicle (832-900). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. Smith, C. A. 1893 "The order of words in Anglo-Saxon prose", Publications of the Modern Language Association 7: 210—42. Stockwell, Robert P. 1977 "Motivations for exbraciation in Old English", in: Charles Li (ed.), Mechanisms of syntactic change. Austin: University of Texas Press, 291 — 314. Stockwell, Robert P. — Donka Minkova 1990 "Verb Phrase conjunction in Old English", in: Henning Andersen — Konrad Koerner (eds.), Historical linguistics 1987. Papers from the 8th International Conference on Historical Linguistics. (8. ICHL) (Lille, 31 August—4 September 1987). (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 66). Amsterdam: Benjamins, 499-515. Swieczkowski, Walerian 1962 Word order patterning in Middle English. The Hague: Mouton. van Kemenade, Ans 1985 "Old English infinitival complements and West-Germanic V-raising", in: Roger Eaton et al. (eds.), Papers from the 4th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 41) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 73 — 84. 1987 Syntactic case and morphological case in the history of English. Dordrecht: Foris. Vennemann, Theo 1974 "Topics, subjects and word order: from SXV to SVX via TVX", in: John M. Anderson — Charles Jones (eds.), Historical linguistics. Amsterdam: North Holland, 3 3 9 - 7 6 . 1984 "Verb-second, verb late, and the brace construction: comments on some papers", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.), 1984: 627 — 686. Yamakawa, K. 1969 "The development of when as subordinate conjunction or relative adverb", Hitotsubashi Journal of Arts and Sciences 10: 8 — 42. 1971 "OE peer and hwcer. a study of where developing in the subordinating function", Hitotsubashi Journal of Arts and Sciences 12: 1 —19. 1973 "ME ther and wher — A study of where developing in the subordinating function (II)", Hitotsubashi Journal of Arts and Sciences 14: 1 —44. Zimmermann, Rüdiger 1983 "Parataxis and hypotaxis in Old English", in: Sandor Rot (ed.), Languages in function. Budapest [no indication of publisher], 347 — 52.

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English Toril Swan

In recent years there has been a tremendous growth of a certain class of adverbials in English (as well as in some other Germanic languages), viz. sentence adverbials (SA) such as surprisingly, fortunately, annoyingly enough, etc. There is some evidence that, historically speaking, sentence adverbials in English have been formed by means of adverbial shifting. The present paper discusses the concept of adverbial shifting (§1), and outlines the history and development of English sentence adverbials (§ 2). Additionally, the paper contains a brief outline of Norwegian adverbials and the growth of a sentence adverbial class in Norwegian (§ 3). Finally, §4 contains a summary and conclusion. 1

1. 1.1.

Adverbial shifts Definition of terms

I will start by briefly explaining some of the terms used, notably adverbial shifts, sentence adverbials and some related terminology. 2 By an adverbial shift I mean the change of scope whereby an adverb comes to modify a different element, group of elements, etc. than it did initially, scope being adverbial function in terms of logical relations between the adverb and a variable number of linguistic as well as meta-/extra-linguistic features — or, to put it differently, a syntacticpragmatic shift whereby an adverb changes function, e. g. from being word-modifying to becoming sentence-modifying. The adverbial shift from word-modifier to sentence-modifier generally involves, among other things, a change towards the abstract. Examples of possible shifts are those with frankly in (1), surprisingly in (2), and hopefully in (3): (1)

a. She spoke frankly about his shortcomings. b. Frankly, I cannot stand truffles.

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(2)

a. The cat stared hopefully at its dish. b. Hopefully they'll feed me soon.

(3)

a. The cat was surprisingly agile. b. Surprisingly (enough), they didn't forget to lock up.

In the (b)-sentences frankly, surprisingly and hopefully in some sense can be said to modify the whole sentence, or have the sentence within their scope. In the (a)-sentences, however, only the verb ((1 a) and (3 a)) and adjective (2 a) are within the scope of the adverbs. Mostly I will be concerned with this type of shift, i. e. shifts from lesser scope to sentence adverbial scope; there exist, however, shifts within the sentence adverbial class, as well as others (cf. e.g. Bolinger 1972 and Stoffel 1901). I mean by sentence adverbial basically what Greenbaum (1969) calls disjuncts. I consider these sentence adverbials to be adverbialised speaker comments by means of which the speaker in various ways expresses his/ her attitude, e. g. evaluatively. In fact, the sentence adverbial class is part of an extensive system of speaker comments and what Halliday (1970: 335) calls the interpersonal component of language, speaker participation in the speech event. This aspect of language is also often called modality. Thus Palmer (1986: 16), essentially following Lyons (1979: 452), suggests that modality at least partly could be defined as the grammaticalisation of speakers' subjective attitudes and opinions, and specifically seems to consider sentence adverbials as one type of grammaticalisation. The sentence adverbials, then, while differing widely semantically, share the component [+ speaker comment], recognisably constituting the speaker's expression of his/her subjective attitude to the fact, state of affairs, etc. denoted by the sentence, or indeed to the speaker's own performance of the speech act. In (4) —(7) I have listed examples of the four basic subclasses. (4)

EVALUATIVE ADVERBS (EA): surprisingly, fortunately, ironically

(5)

MODAL ADVERBS (MA): possibly, certainly, reportedly, obviously

(6)

SUBJECT DISJUNCTS (SD): wisely, cleverly, rightly

(7)

SPEECH ACT ADVERBIALS (SPA): frankly, honestly, briefly

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Many (probably most) of the adverbs in (4) and (5) correspond to It is AD J that S/That S is ADJ structures, and those in (6) to It is ADJ of SUBJ that S. Not everyone agrees, usually for syntactic reasons (cf. e. g. Schreiber 1968 and 1971), that the adverbs in (6) and (7) are sentence adverbial, and indeed I would agree that in many respects those in (4) and (5) are the most sentence-adverbial-like (the robins of the sentence adverbial world, as it were, to refer to Lakoff) in that they are purely sentence-modifying, whereas the adverbials in (6) and (7) are also related to the subject and speaker respectively (i. e. predicate something of subject or speaker. Thus in Wisely she refused to leave wisdom is predicated of the subject, while in Frankly, she refused to leave frankness is predicated of the speaker). Obviously, there are a great many phrases of various sorts that are more or less synonymous with such one-word adverbials, and are also speaker comments (as in (8)), but my concern has been the one-word adverbials, and especially those realised by -ly adverbs. (8)

a. To my surprise .../In all probability .../... which seems obvious. b. It is surprising I probable I obviousI fortunate that ...

1.2.

Adverbial shifts

My contention, then, is that historically speaking, English has developed a tendency to adverbialise speaker comments, using existing syntactic elements that are not speaker comments, such as intensifiers or manner adverbs, and transforming them pragmatically, or rather syntactic-pragmatically, into one-word sentence adverbials (cf. (9)). (9)

INTENSIFIER + SPEAKER COMMENT CONCEPT (-ly adverb) + (It is ADJ that ...) —> SA A surprisingly good vodka —• It is surprising how good it was. —• Surprisingly, the vodka wasn't/was very good.

SA

In English, obviously, such shifts are simplified because there is no special sentence adverbial suffix, thus blends are more likely to happen, or are at least greatly facilitated. I will return to this below. The shifts outlined here are in one sense highly hypothetical. However, in Swan (1988), a study of sentence adverbials in a relatively large corpus

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of English texts, I attempt to show that there must have been syntacticpragmatic shifts of this type in the course of the history of English (cf. note 1). §2 summarises the findings of this study, outlining the historical development of English sentence adverbials and of sentence adverbial shifting.

2. 2.1.

English Outline of the history of English sentence adverbials

In the present section each period of English (i. e. Old English, Middle English, etc.) will be dealt with separately, though Old English and Present-day English will be discussed in slightly more detail than the other periods. Each attested example sentence will be marked with a code word, and the bibliography supplies the sources of these code references. It is evident that Old English differs greatly from Present-day English with respect to sentence adverbial usage. Partly, of course, this might have something to do with the texts/subject matter (e.g. the lack of variety of the texts), but Early Modern English is very similar in this respect, despite a greater literary variety, so this does not seem likely. Briefly, then, in my Old English corpus of about 2,500 pages (cf. Swan 1988: ch. 2) there are mainly sentence adverbials of the type I have called "truth intensifiers" (cf. (11)), which emphasise the truth or importance of the statement, and resemble or are the forerunners of Present-day English modal adverbs/speech adverbials. There are 12 of them, and among these, sodlice and witodlice clearly dominate, occurring 202 times out of a total of 292 (cf. example (10) and Swan 1988: 221); indeed, in many respects these two adverbs are the only true sentence adverbials, are found initially a great deal, occur with stative verbs, etc. A couple of examples of sentences with truth intensifiers are given in (12) —(14). (10) OLD ENGLISH SA OCCURRENCES BY CLASS: Class

No. of occurrences

Truth intensifiers Evaluatives Epitheticals

292 44 230

Total

566

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413

(11) T R U T H INTENSIFIERS: sodlice, witodlice, gewislice, swutollice (12)

Witodlice god celmihtig wat ealle ping. (/Elfric)

(13) Da sodlice geendode pe gebeorscipe. (Apollonius) (14) and he swor pcet hi wceron gewislice peer on cefen. (/Elfric) The other large group of adverbs which might be called sentence adverbials in Old English are the "epitheticals", a term I have adapted from Jespersen's (1949) term "epithet adverb". These are the precursors of Present-day English. Examples are shown in (15) —(18). (15)

EPITHETICALS: rihtlice, wislice, manfullice

(16) Suide ryhtlice hit wees awriten. (Cura Pastoralis) (17) ac sum oder pcegn wid-cwced his gedeahte wislice. OElfric) (18) purh done deofol pe he dwollice gehyrsumede. (/Elfric) Epitheticals are subject-oriented, and refer to the subject being wrong, right, wise, clever, etc. They occur a great deal in religious texts, of course. In this class it is rihtej rihtlice that dominate. They do not, however, occur initially as much as the truth intensifiers, nor are there many examples with stative verbs. Indeed, in this sub-class there are many ambiguous examples, that is cases where it is hard to determine whether the adverb is a manner adverb or not. The third group of adverbs, a very small and insignificant group (44 occurrences), is to me the most interesting of them all. I have called them "evaluatives", since they resemble the evaluative adverbs (cf. (4)), but they certainly are not real sentence adverbials, at best one might call them embryo sentence adverbials. They are, however, the stuff adverbial shifts are made of, I believe. Wundorlice, for example, occurs in sentences like (19) —(20), where it certainly would appear to constitute some kind of speaker comment component, yet many of the other evaluatives,

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probably most of them, are more like present-day evaluative intensifiers, cf. Swan (1985) and Swan (1988: 23 ff.), like astonishingly (nice), charmingly (polite), incredibly (polite). (19) ac se fot-cops awende wundorlice to prexe. (yElfric) (20) and wundorlice mid peotum wceter ut-teah wolde renas wyrcan. (JE lfric) (21) yhine mon peer laölice deade cwealde. (Bede) In any case, while these evaluatives in most cases seem to have a wordmodifying function ((19) and (20) are two among the handful of examples which are most like sentence adverbials), they are clearly used to evaluate some state of affairs as being good or bad, and thus represent the voice of the interfering speaker. The further development of such intensifiers, or embryo sentence adverbials, must have depended on the aforementioned shifts, and indeed, many such shifts are taking place in Presentday English as well, shifts based on intensifiers like staggeringly, for example (or on manner adverbs). There are no speech act adverbials of the one-word type in my Old English corpus, but many similar phrases, cf. e. g. (22).3 (22) a. hrcedest is to cwepanne b. Hit is gecueden dcet c. jwe secgad nu sceortlice p To sum up, then, Old English differs greatly from Present-day English with respect to sentence adverbial usage, having few sentence adverbials altogether, and those that do exist are not very diversified semantically. Basically, Old English sentence adverbials constitute moral or truth intensifying speaker comments (e.g. rihtlice and sodlice), and only very rarely do we find sentence adverbials denoting such attitudes as the speaker feeling something is lucky, surprising, etc., the latter being a very important and productive group in Present-day English. However, those adverbs that really are sentence adverbials occur relatively often initially, cf. the first column of the table in (23) (which also shows the proportion of initial adverbs in the other periods of English and will be referred to throughout the paper; the table has been adapted from table VI.5 in Swan 1988: 516).

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415

(23) PROPORTION O F INITIAL SENTENCE ADVERBIALS BY CLASS OE

ME

ModE

PresE

Truth int./MA Evaluat./EA Epithet./SD Speech act adv.

37.5% 25.0% 15.6%

63.1% 10.9% 15.2%

37.7% 24.2% 21.3% (all 4)

41.6% 68.3% 22.3% 58.9%

Total

27.7%

51.1%

34.7%

45.1%

One interesting feature of these Old English adverbs is that when in initial position, they are usually not accompanied by inversion, the exceptions being — expectedly — those cases where there is a sentence adverbial + another topicalised element (object, adverbial, or complement) — as in (13) above with pa, or (24), cf. also Swan (1989). (24) Sodlice swa micle lufe hcefde eal se ceasterwaru to him. (Apollonius) It is well known, of course, that initial adverbs very frequently are accompanied by inversion in Old English (cf. e.g. Barrett 1953, Bean 1983, Kohonen 1978), and indeed it has been discussed whether it is a verb-second language (cf. e.g. Breivik 1983 and Stockwell 1984); I take my findings as evidence that these adverbs are on their way to "disjuncthood", as it were, and are not experienced as topicalised — hence there is no inversion. However, they are clearly marked in some sense in initial position, or at least the epitheticals and evaluatives are. I should note finally that the Old English corpus contains a number of adjectival speaker comment structures, such as in (25). (25) a. b. c. d.

poet is sarlic pcette wees eac wundorlic genog sweotol hit is pcet hit is sod pcet

As far as Middle English is concerned, the sentence adverbial situation does not differ greatly from that of Old English, nor indeed does that of Early Modern English. The same basic classes are found, though in Middle English one finds the first beginnings of a genuinely modal

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sentence adverbial class in the sense of containing also low-probability items, e. g. possibly and actually (only one or two examples) and peradventure. Actually is however not used in its Present-day English sentence adverbial sense. Many of the Old English sentence adverbials live on in the Middle English corpus (e. g. sodlicejsoothly) — and there are new French ones (e. g. certes and possibly). Additionally, the truth intensifier class has grown enormously and the adverbs occur initially with great frequency (cf. (26) and Swan 1988: 356), as also (23) shows. (26) MIDDLE ENGLISH SENTENCE ADVERBIAL OCCURRENCES BY CLASS: Class Truth intensifiers Evaluatives Epitheticals Total

No. of occurrences 816 91 170

ion

The high proportion of initial truth intensifiers would seem to furnish some evidence that this class is stabilising as a sentence adverbial class, the sentence adverbial occurring initially to provide a sort of propositional setting (cf. Swan 1988: 141 and 240). The epithetical class is beginning to dwindle in the Middle English period, and note that the evaluative class increases numerically but remains very like the Old English class; mostly its adverbs are still more modifiers than sentence adverbials. However, there are a few that seem well on their way to true sentence adverbial status (whereas in Norwegian of that early period I have not yet been able to come up with even one evaluative adverb-like item). I have listed a few of the best examples in (27) —(29), and a couple of speech act adverbial phrases in (30). (27) a. Verrayly es he my salvacion. (Rolle) b. Now sicurly pese ben foule begyled. (ME Sermons) (28) a. Wondurfulli Jihesu wirkes in hys lovers. (Rolle) b. which was myraculously translatyd fro Bedlem in-to pat place. (Margery Kempe) (29) a. and swide rihtlice ham swa gelamp. (Homilies) b. Now pat God hap mercy fully /orjeven f)ise synnes ... (ME Sermons)

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

417

(30) a. Shortely to sey, per is all manner of turments ... (ME Sermons) b. So breffly to make an ende ... (Morte Darthur) In the Modern English 4 period (as here defined), however, there are some changes. Mainly the truth intensifier class now really becomes a modal adverb class, with high- and low-probability adverbs as well as the undeveloped beginnings of later semantic sub-classes. In (31) it is shown that the sentence adverbial class has grown steadily (cf. also Swan 1988: 437). (31) M O D E R N ENGLISH SENTENCE ADVERBIAL OCCURRENCES BY CLASS: Class Modal adverbs Evaluative adverbs Subject disjuncts Speech act adverbials Total

No. of occurrences 987 103 164 4 1258

Towards the end of the period, in the 18th and 19th centuries, some shifting apparently has started, as all of a sudden there are adverbs like naturally, happily, and strangely which previously have been encountered as word-modifiers, but here occur as sentence adverbials. There are in fact a couple of instances of very early (i. e. late 17th century) fortunately and happily where they essentially are sentence adverbials. In the 16th century examples, however, happily is used in its early sense 'by chance', 'perhaps', though I have one example (32) where it might be beginning to shift, possibly meaning 'by happy chance' — this is from Ro:Ba's life of Thomas More (late 16th century), cf. also the 19th century (33). Finally in (34) are two of the first sentence adverbials; there are 2 in the Early Modern English Pseudodoxia (17th century) and 2 in the Late Modern English period (19th century). (32) If hapilie vertue paced not equallie with these studies and rare knowledge. (Ro:Ba) (33) letters, which happily came on the wrong day. (Barrett Browning)

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(34) a. Briefly, it consisteth of parts so ... (Pseudodoxia) b. Seriously, though, my dear Barton, I have been a good deal annoyed. (Fanu) Finally we turn to the Present-day English period, i.e. 20th century English. The class has, as (35) shows, grown enormously since the Old English period, as well as diversified semantically (cf. Swan 1988: 504). (35) PRESENT-DAY ENGLISH SENTENCE ADVERBIAL OCCURRENCES BY CLASS: Class No. of occurrences Modal adverbs Evaluative adverbs Subject disjuncts Speech act adverbs

1336 303 85 39

Total

1763

The modal adverb class is now divided into fairly distinct semantic subsets (compare allegedly I reportedly with apparently I obviously, or possibly/ unquestionably). Low-probability modal adverbs, incidentally, occur initially in very high proportions much more so than high-probability modal adverbs — as if modern speakers hedge where Old English speakers emphasise! The speech act adverbial class has grown, though speech act adverbials are of course mainly an oral language phenomenon. The subject disjunct class has dwindled; there are quite a few members, but they occur only once or twice each in my corpus. The most remarkable change has been in the evaluative adverb class. In the 20th century they have shifted a great deal, and indeed appear to continue to do so. I found, in my Present-day English corpus, many evaluative adverbs that have existed for centuries as lowly intensifiers or manner adverbs, some representing a new and imaginative adverbial short-hand for various speaker attitudes. There are examples of evaluative adverbs, e. g. staggeringly, encouragingly, terrifyingly, and also, by the way, hopefully, normally a sort of modal adverb shifted from manner hopefully (as in (2)), but here unmistakably shifted once more (cf. (41)). Hopefully has been hated and denounced as American and all sorts of nasty things, but is of course solidly entrenched as a sentence adverbial nevertheless (cf. e.g. Greenbaum 1986: 7)! In (36)-(41) I have listed

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

419

some examples of recent (1980's) evaluative adverbs used in various positions and ways. There seems to be no end to the creativity and ingenuity of writers with respect to creating new sentence adverbials, as any glimpse through even serious newspapers will prove. (36) But perhaps most intriguingly at all, it turns out that ... (37) Electric stimulation of the temporal cortex produces, enough, random scenes from one's past life.

astonishingly

(38) Stupendously that was true. (39) Or rather, somewhat perplexingly, it fits both ... (40) Often, moreover ...he disconcertingly finds sex. (41) Hopefully, there are signs that some of these very children are getting through to their parents ... less hopeful are the prospects of... To conclude this survey of sentence adverbials in English, I can sum up as follows: a) the class as such expands enormously from Old English up to today; b) it becomes semantically diversified gradually, and c) modal, i.e. truth evaluating adverbs, are numerically most important in all periods of English. 2.2.

Word order

A few points need to be made about word order. It seems that the sentence adverbials described here follow two distinct word order patterns: On the one hand they move into initial position, i. e. leftwards. On the other hand they also move rightwards, into various post-subject and even post-verbal positions. Thus while stabilising as a class in initial position, they are also apparently included in the general word order shift from an SXV to an SVX syntax. In (42), for instance, it is shown that while in the Modern English period mid-VP placement is becoming more common (twice as high a proportion in fact as post-verbal placement), in Present-day English these adverbs occur more frequently in post-verbal position (cf. also Swan 1988: 521 ff. and 524 f.). (42) POST-SUBJECT ADVERB POSITION ModE (1500-1900) PresE (20th C)

Mid-VP 43.5% 25.8%

Post-verbal 18.7% 36.7%

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2.3.

Adverbial shifting revisited

I would now like to return to the concept of adverbial shifting again. It would seem that empirically, adverbs have indeed shifted in the course of the development of the English language. In fact, adverbial shifting in many ways can be seen as roughly parallel to shifts like the reanalysis of initial dative forms as sentence subject, which both English and Norwegian have undergone, e. g. mik dreymir —> ek dreymi 'me dreams' —» Ί dream' (cf. Falk —Torp 1900: 5 f.), the shift of there from a locative to an existential function (cf. Breivik 1981: 20), and perhaps even more analogically, what Samuels (1972: 59) calls "the historical rankshifts" whereby earlier adverbs have become prepositions (in modern times phrases like concerning, owing to, due to, etc. have often similarly become prepositions). The syntactic shift illustrated in (2) for instance (with hopefully) also constitutes a pragmatic reinterpretation of the adverb. Sentence adverbials have been said to represent reduced clauses whose covert subject is the speaker, and indeed it is possible to relate all sentence adverbials but the speech act adverbials to some sort of clause with a propositional attitude verb (cf. Corum 1974): I deem it possible that —> possibly. In fact earlier English contains such clauses, as well as It is A D J clauses. The latter structure of course has often been proposed as the underlying structure of sentence adverbials, e. g. by Schreiber, the first linguist to offer any kind of analysis of sentence adverbials. In fact, while I do not subscribe to Schreiber's analysis and certainly not to his general framework, it is rather interesting that the basis of adverbial shifts would seem to be, historically, structures like those described above. Similarly the I tell you briefly structure indeed occurs historically, and earlier than the one-word speech act adverbial briefly, unbeknownst apparently to Schreiber and others who proposed such a source (/ tell you A.D /^manner) for speech act adverbials. The historical, underlying structures, then, of English sentence adverbials (or rather, sentence adverbial-shifts) are — in my opinion — a very varied and rich class of intensifying adverbial modifiers as well as It is A D J structures, the one grafted onto the other, as it were, via blends, and with what one might call syntactic consequences (e.g. the move towards initial position). It may be of interest to look at a few examples of the various stages of naturally shifting, as in (43). (43) a. Forwhy the covetise of verray good is naturely iplaunted in the hertes of men, but ... (Chaucer) b. which Naturally each man desyr'd (Queen Elizabeth)

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

421

c. The grief we naturally feel at the death of... (Samuel Johnson) d. He was quite sick with worry, naturally. (Allingham) In (43 a, b) the adverb simply means 'by nature', 'in a natural way'. In (43 c) there appears to be a blend; it is hard to decide whether it is our sentence adverbial or the old naturally (or indeed a combination of these two). In (43 d), however, there is no remnant of the old sense at all. Finally I would like to point out that sentence adverbial formation is partly non-predictable, though the usual candidates are those adjectives or participles that can take sentential subjects. Recent shifts, and some not so recent, have occurred without there being corresponding It is ADJ phrases, notably hopefully, thankfully, and mercifully which I think have been formed by analogy. Mercifully is the oldest of these; in Middle English texts (cf. Swan 1988: 338 and 341) mercifully is generally used as a subject disjunct, predicating mercy of the subject (often God); in the 20th century the sentence adverbial functions both as subject disjunct and as evaluative adverb. In any case, it appears relatively certain that the predominance of -ly as an adverbial suffix greatly facilitates adverbial shifting (though of course it might conceivably have been the other way around, i.e. that adverbial shifting has made possible the great productivity of the -ly suffix). According to Western (1906), with whom I will close this section of the paper: "No other Teutonic language has developed to the same degree the faculty of expressing so much by a single adverb as English ... It is largely to the free and easy use of the adverbs that English owes its terseness and picturesqueness of expression ... it is this willingness, so to speak, of the adverbs to do the same work as is done by whole phrases in other languages, as much as anything else, that shows English to be, in every sense of the word, a living language."

3.

Norwegian

As we mentioned in note 1, the data used for the present article have been taken from a pilot study of adverbial development in Norwegian. Norwegian is a sadly underdescribed language, so there are few sources to seek additional information from. However, in the following I will provide a brief outline of the Norwegian sentence adverbials, and of the historical development of sentence adverbials in Norwegian, to the extent this has been revealed in the pilot study.

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The Norwegian examples will be provided with glosses; the glosses are word-by-word translations as far as is possible; especially in some cases it is important that the reader be able to follow the original word order. However, if the ensuing result is not readily understandable, an idiomatic translation will be provided. The sources of attested examples are listed in the bibliography. 3.1.

Norwegian adverb formation/morphology

Basically, Norwegian uses the neuter form of the adjective for adverbial functions: the -t suffix, as (44) shows. 5 However, some adjectives do not have a neuter -f, e.g. those ending in -(l)ig as well as some others, especially those with final consonant clusters. Adjectives that are present participles are also used adverbially without any suffix, cf. (45) —(46). Note that present participles are used as intensifiers quite often, and are also a quite productive source of sentence adverbials. 6 (44) a. En rar mann (m) Ά strange m a n ' ) / ^ rart brev (η) Ά strange letter' b. Hun snakket rart. 'She spoke strangely.' (45) a. En overraskende latter (m) Ά surprising laughter'/ Et overraskende svar (η) Ά surprising answer' b. Hun reiste overraskende. 'She left surprisingly.' (46)

Müssende rod 'blushing red'jsvulmende stor 'swelling big'/ isnende kald 'freezing cold'

Old Norwegian has an adverbial suffix: -liga (-lika/-lega), the corresponding adjectival one being -ligr (-likr). -liga becomes -lige by around 1500, so when the e has been deleted altogether by 1700, and the final r of the adjective also is deleted, the adjective and adverb become one, cf. Falk — Torp (1900: 111 f.) and Torp (1974: 33). -lig is to this day a productive adjectival suffix (as the corresponding German -lich is, cf. Fleischer 1974: 268), but of the old -liga adverbs relatively few remain (e.g. sannelig, visselig, trolig)\ many of these seem to be sentence adverbials. Sentence adverbials in Present-day Norwegian are not as uniform with respect to suffix as their English counterparts, as (47) shows. Additionally, according to Heggelund (1981: 80), Norwegian sentence adverbials are not typically one-word adverbs, but phrases and clauses. However, there

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423

are two major sentence adverbial suffixes: -vis and nok (cf. (47 a, b)). Nok is a free-standing particle, meaning 'enough', but is normally considered to be a suffix, and in a couple of relatively old sentence adverbials it is in fact written in one word with the stem. Only nok is productive (cf. Heggelund 1981: 81), and is also used exclusively with sentence adverbials (-vis usually occurs as a sentence adverbial suffix, but cf. e. g. vanligvis 'usually'). Additionally, there are sentence adverbials with the -t ending (neuter adjectives, cf. (47 c)), and with -lig; the latter are often the remnants of the old -liga adverbs and are frequently not used as adjectives, or may be used only predicatively (cf. (47 d)). Norwegian also has sentence adverbials that are one-word adverbs now, but which were originally clauses or phrases, as in (47e), cf. e.g. Falk — Torp (1900: 110), as well as the speech act adverbials which are ADJ + past participle of tale 'speak' (cf. (47 f)). Kanskje and dessverre in (47 e) must be among the most frequent adverbs in Norwegian, while maaskje is archaic. Note that there are quite a few -vis/nok pairs, sometimes synonymous, sometimes not (cf. (48)-(49)). (47) a. -vis: heldigvis 'fortunately' / naturligvis 'of course' / beklageligvis 'regrettably' b. nok: rart nok 'strangely enough' / overraskende nok 'surprisingly enough' / utrolig nok 'incredibly enough' / naturlig nok 'understandably' / visstnok 'probably' / riktignok 'to be sure', 'certainly' (concessive) c. -t: äpenbart 'obviously' / sikkert 'surely' / visst 'certainly' d. -lig: trolig 'presumably' / sannelig 'indeed, truly' / antagelig 'supposedly' e. kanskje I maaskje 'may/can happen' = 'perhaps' / dessverre 'the worse' = 'unfortunately' / gudskjelov 'God be praised' = 'fortunately' f. talt: oppriktig talt 'frankly spoken' = 'frankly' / alvorlig tail 'seriously' / arlig talt 'honestly' (48) a. beklagelig = beklageligvis = beklagelig nok b. naturligvis φ naturlig nok c. heldigvis = heldig nok (49) a. Det avhenger naturligvis av forventningene. 'It depends of course on the expectations' b. og tenkte da naturlig nok pä Nord-Korea, 'and understandably considered North Korea in this connection'

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Nok can be used, in principle, with any adjective that can take a sentential subject, or have impersonal det as subject (as in (50)), cf. Heggelund (1981: 153). These paradigms in fact look very much like those proposed for English. However, in English, as we have noted, it is possible to form sentence adverbials that do not conform to this structure, while Norwegian apparently observes this rule more stringently. It must also be noted that nok is productive mainly as a suffix for factive sentence adverbials, chiefly evaluative adverbs, but to some extent apparently also subject disjuncts. Thus modal adverbs and evaluative adverbs in Norwegian tend not to have the same suffix, though there are a few older -vis modal adverbs, now sometimes with -vis deleted, e.g. antagelig(vis) 'probably'. Note also that the older -vis adverbials apparently do not have the abovementioned constraints (e. g. *Det er forhäpentlig, but forhäpentligvis 'hopefully'). (50) a. Det er irriterende/rart/*bekymret. 'It [impersonal] is irritating/strange/worried' b. Irriterende nok/Rart nokj*Bekymret nok S.

3.2.

Word order

As far as the position of Norwegian sentence adverbials is concerned, there is again a rather maddening lack of studies, though Heggelund (1981: 88 ff.) suggests that they are relatively mobile, occurring initially as well as in post-auxiliary (cf. (51 a)), post-verbal (cf. (51 b)), and final positions. In main clauses pre-auxiliary placement is possible only in inverted sentences like (51 c), i. e. initial sentence adverbial followed by the auxiliary. (51 d) is unacceptable because of the verb-second constraint, but in subordinate clauses pre-auxiliary placement is possible, as (51 e) shows. It is very likely, however, that Norwegian sentence adverbials do not occur initially as much as do English sentence adverbials; my pilot study as well as personal observation over a few years would suggest that this is the case. Indeed, while most Norwegian sentence adverbials are perfectly acceptable in initial position, others are strange, and certainly highly marked (e.g. sikkert 'surely, certainly'); no Present-day English sentence adverbial would be strange initially. (51) a. Hun har antagelig drukket vinen. 'She has probably drunk the wine'.

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b. c. d. e.

425

Hun gikk utrolig nok ikke. 'She left incredibly enough not'. Heldigvis har de sett det. 'Fortunately have they seen it'. *De heldigvis har sett det. 'They fortunately have seen it'. Hun sa at de heldigvis har sett det. 'She said that they fortunately have seen it'.

Since Norwegian is a verb-second language, one might expect that sentence adverbials cause inversion when in initial position (as do other adverbials), or — conversely — that sentence adverbials might be defined as non-integrated items and hence might not cause inversion. However, it appears that the verb-second constraint is overruled by some sentence adverbials, while others conform to it (for a discussion of initial sentence adverbials and word order, cf. Swan 1989). The examples in (52) —(57) illustrate this: (52) a. /Erlig talt, han er rar. 'Honestly spoken, he is strange', b. */Erlig talt, er han rar. 'Honestly spoken, is he strange'. (53) a. Heldigvis, hun er hjemme. 'Fortunately she is home', b. Heldigvis er hun hjemme. 'Fortunately is she home'. (54) a. Pussig, hun er hjemme. 'Strange, she is home', b. *Pussig er hun hjemme. 'Strange is she home'. (55) a. *Muligens hun mä gä. 'Possibly she must go', b. Muligens mä hun gä. 'Possibly must she go'. (56) a. *Klokelig hun lukket vinduet. 'Wisely she closed the window', b. Klokelig lukket hun vinduet. 'Wisely closed she the window'. (57) a. ALrlig talt, ham invited'. b. Heldigvis, ham not invited'. c. *Muligens ham invited'. d. *Klokelig ham invited'.

har de ikke invitert. 'Honestly, him have they not har de ikke invitert. 'Fortunately him have they har de ikke invitert. 'Possibly him have they not har de ikke invitert. 'Wisely him have they not

Apparently, there is a scale of disjunctiveness where those sentence adverbials lowest on the scale (notably modal adverb and subject disjuncts) invariably must be accompanied by inversion (cf. (55) —(56)), and are

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also unable to accept other topicalised elements in the sentence (cf. (57 c, d)). Speech act adverbials, on the other hand, must have non-inversion 7 (cf. (52)), and also accept topicalised elements (as in (57 a)). The evaluative adverbs occur with or without inversion, cf. (53). (53 a), however, is the marked member of the pair and would be used only if someone had previously expected or asserted that she, the subject, was not at home, while (53 b) is neutral and can be used in all contexts. Evaluative adverbs do accept topicalised elements readily, as (57 b) suggests. As (54) shows, adjectival evaluative adverbs must have non-inversion. It is assumed that these are Det er ['it is'] ADJ clauses with Det er deleted, or ADJ nok clauses with nok deleted (cf. Heggelund 1981: 160).8 3.3.

A very brief outline of Norwegian sentence adverbial development

The three periods of written Norwegian are generally considered to be approximately as in (58), cf. e.g. Indrebo (1951: 32). 9 (58) Old Norwegian Middle Norwegian Modern Norwegian

1050-1350 1350-1525 1525-

The pilot study referred to in note 1 includes a small corpus of texts spanning 800 years. Middle Norwegian has not been included. Old Norwegian is represented by a homily collection (here called Homilies) from approximately 1190 and Kongespeilet (Speculum Regale), here referred to as Speculum, from approximately 1250. Early Modern Norwegian texts include several treatises and a chronicle from the late 1500's and early 1600's (written by Peder Clausson Friis), and somewhat later Modern Norwegian by some essays by the playwright Holberg from the 1750's, and some by the poet Wergeland from the early 1800's. Finally, Presentday Norwegian is represented by several texts, including newspapers. Altogether, the corpus is approximately 1000 pages long (cf. also the bibliography). On the whole, earlier Norwegian resembles earlier English with respect to sentence adverbial use. Thus in both languages the sentence adverbials are mainly of the truth intensifier or, secondarily, epithetical type. It would seem, however, that Norwegian is even less diversified than early English with respect to one-word sentence adverbials, and also — importantly — with respect to evaluative intensifiers and modifiers. How-

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

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ever, Old Norwegian dictionaries list a fairly large group of -liga manner adverbs; these, of course, could in principle have been a source of later sentence adverbials. In the two Old Norwegian texts there are really only two truth intensifiers, vist 'certainly', and sannliga 'truly'. The epithetical, which occurs occasionally in Homilies, is macleca 'rightly'. Some examples are shown in (59)-(63). (59) Sannlega er sa sail er ret trvr ok vcel lifir. (Homilies) 'Truly he is blessed who believes rightly and lives rightly'. (60) Vist patti mer nu frodleikr ivara af ec ... (Speculum) 'Certainly I would think [there] was wisdom in [it] if I ...' (61) pcetta er vist astscemdar rad. (Speculum) 'this is certainly affectionate advice'. (62) Maclega valde drotenn ser .iiii. gudspiallamenn. (Homilies) 'Rightly the Lord chose 4 gospel-men [evangelists]'. (63) Maclega callasc han prydr. (Homilies) 'Rightly is he called ornament'. Vist, which occurs relatively frequently in the Speculum, is related to the verb vitan 'know' and the adjective vissr 'certain'. It is seldom found in initial position, though cf. (60). The Homilies contains only a very few occurrences of the sentence adverbials sannlega and maclega. It is indeed curious that a religious text should be so restricted, and English religious texts of the same period have a greater variety (cf. Swan 1988, especially section 2.5.0.1.). It may be noted that both visst and sannlega occur in Present-day Norwegian, the latter in the slightly modernised form sannelig.10 Both the Old Norwegian texts contain speaker comments of various sorts; some of these are listed in (64) — (67). (64) eigi er undarligt, at ... (Speculum) 'not is strange that' (65) er pat ulict, at ... (Speculum) 'is that not likely that ...' (66) Bat var oc maclect at Cristr ... (Homilies) 'It was also right that Christ ...' (67) en mir Jyikir meiri lijkindi ... (Speculum) 'but me seems more reasonable'

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Note that the phrases in (64) —(66) are Det er ['It is'] ADJ-clauses, but with det deleted in (64) —(65). There are verb-first structures like these as late as in the 1700's, but later than that det insertion is obligatory. In the texts from the late 1500's there are still very few sentence adverbials, really only five or six, but a great many phrases of the It is ADJ type and others, as well as modal particles. In (68) —(75) I will list some examples from the Clausson Friis texts (1590's — 1600's). (68) —(71) show speaker comment phrases; note especially (71) where the modal speaker comment has been inserted parenthetically. (72) —(73) show a truth intensifier and an epithetical, respectively, and (74) shows an early speech act adverbial phrase. (75) contains one of the very few evaluative intensifiers I have come across in earlier Norwegian; indeed, this type appears to be relatively rare even in Present-day Norwegian. As it happens, merkelig nok is today a sentence adverbial. (68) oc er troeligt at ... 'and is likely [believable] that ...' (Friis) (69) oc er mueligt at ... 'and is possible that ...' (Friis) (70) och er det at forundre at Biorninden haffuer Melch ... 'and is it to surprise that the bearess [i. e. 'bear' + feminine suffix] has milk' (71) huilchen Ulff var (uden Tuiffel) aff Kuld oc Frost oc stuor Hunger bleffuen galen. (Friis) 'which wolf was (without doubt) of cold and frost and great hunger become mad' (72) Gud vil visselig belone (Friis) 'God will surely reward' (73) som Olaus Magnus retteligen schriffuer (Friis) 'as Olaus Magnus rightly writes' (74) Vill jeg derfor nogedt kortelig antegne ... (Friis) 'Will I therefore somewhat briefly note ...' (75) Dette Diur kand merchelige veil somme endoeg det ... (Friis) 'This animal can strangely/? noticeably well swim even though it ...' In the following centuries there are not many changes with respect to sentence adverbial usage; sentence adverbials like sannelig, rettelig, and visselig occur with some frequency, as do also the many phrases. However, in the mid-1700's texts, there is a new modal adverb, maaske 'may happen' cf. (76). Later, also kanskje appears; kanskje exists to this very day, and is a high-frequency adverb. It is only in the texts from the early 1800's

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

429

that we see a proliferation of modal adverbs, e.g. those listed in (77) — (78), found in Wergeland's works. (76) Saa siger han og maaske: er dette ...? (Holberg) 'Then says he also perhaps: is this ...?' (77) formodentlig 'presumably' / muligens 'possibly' / hoist sandsynlig 'highly likely' / maaske 'perhaps' / sandelig 'truly' (Wergeland) (78) Og det troer jeg nok du vil. (Wergeland) 'And that believe I probably you will' Note that all of the modal adverbs in (77) (except maaske) have the suffix •lig; there are, however, a couple of -vis modal adverbs in Wergeland, e.g. sandsynligviis 'probably'. In the 19th century texts, however, -vis is sometimes used as an evaluative adverb suffix (e. g. naturligvis 'naturally'), and nok is used in a couple of words (e. g. visstnok 'presumably' riktignok 'indeed', 'admittedly'). Additionally, nok is used as a modal particle, cf. e. g. (78). However, in the Wergeland text -lig sentence adverbials (modal adverbs) are clearly in the majority. Western (1921: 551), whose Norwegian grammar was published almost a century later than Wergeland's essays, lists among the sentence adverbials the -vis type (chiefly evaluative adverbs, such as heldigvis 'fortunately', lykkeligvis 'happily') and the -lig type (chiefly modal adverbs/ truth intensifies, e. g. oiensynlig 'apparently', visselig 'certainly'). He does not mention nok sentence adverbials, for the simple reason, it would seem, that nok has not yet become a productive sentence adverbial suffix. Nok, however, as we have seen, does occur in the adverbs rigtignok and visstnok in early 19th century texts. Finally, in Present-day Norwegian there is a proliferation of sentence adverbials of many types, though the evaluative adverb class in many ways does not seem to be quite as inventive as that of English. The modal adverbs, however, are the dominant group, even more so, it would appear, than is the case in English. It would seem that the -vis formations were the first evaluative adverbs, and nok became productive later, in fact quite late in the present century. 11 Some examples of Present-day Norwegian sentence adverbials are shown in (79) — (82). Note the punctuation in (79), and also the final sentence adverbial in (80) and (82). Such sentence-final sentence adverbials (evaluative adverbs and modal adverbs) appear to be quite common in Norwegian.

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(79) Og paradoksalt nok; hans troskyld gjorde ham til en pasientenes lege ... (Sveen) 'And paradoxically enough, his naivete made him to a patients' doctor ...' (80) ... knis, knis, det gär nok over, forhäpentlig. (Sveen) '... giggle, giggle, it will probably pass, hopefully' (81) Banken er symbolsk nok en del av det gamle kommunehuset. 'The bank is symbolically enough a part of the old municipal hall' (82) Gambler er han, utvilsomt. (Aftenposten) 'Gambler is he, doubtless'

4.

Conclusion

This very brief outline of Norwegian and English sentence adverbial history and development shows that clearly in many respects they are quite similar. Thus earlier types of Norwegian, just like earlier types of English, have very few sentence adverbial-like items; those that do exist are chiefly of the truth intensifying type (e. g. sodlice, witodlice, sannliga, visst). The Norwegian material examined so far, however, is not large enough to show whether the actual frequency of sentence adverbials is, or has been, like that of English. At any rate, at a certain point in history (and probably — as far as I can tell at present — first in English) increasing numbers of sentence adverbials come into existence, with a proliferation in the 20th century. Seemingly speakers acquire a new need to codify in one word sentence-modifying speaker comments such as e. g. It is natural that, etc. —*• naturally (in Norwegian Det er naturlig —> naturligvis). English and Norwegian sentence adverbials and sentence adverbial formation differ in many respects, however. Even in earlier English one may simply make use of existing adverbs such as naturally, and sentence adverbial formation therefore can be seen as an extension of the grammatical system12 in that the use of the adverbial form is extended. According to Samuels (1972: 52), extension in lexis or grammar usually leads to loss of information value. English sentence adverbials can be seen to counter such reduced information value by means of adverbial placement, especially with frequent use of the disambiguating initial position (cf. e.g. Wisely, she invested her money and She invested her money wisely). Norwegian sentence adverbials do so more rarely.

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

431

In general Norwegian sentence adverbial formation does not involve extension of this type. Entirely new forms come into being as Norwegian sentence adverbials are usually marked with special suffixes, i. e. they differ morphologically from other adverbs. Curiously, it is difficult to premodify most Norwegian sentence adverbials unless the sentence adverbial suffix is deleted, cf. Heggelund (1981: 87), whereas English sentence adverbials can be, with some exceptions, freely premodified. One-word English sentence adverbials on the whole are uniform and have a -ly suffix which is capable of occurring with all types of stems, e. g. adjectives and participles such as in sad-ly, admitted-ly, surprising-ly. Norwegian, on the other hand, tends to use different suffixes for different stems, and to some extent for different functions. Thus infinitive stems chiefly are found in modal adverbs and have the suffix -lig (e. g. trolig 'believe' + -lig), while present participle stems must have nok (e. g. overraskende nok 'surprising enough'); these latter sentence adverbials are mainly evaluative adverbs and, to some extent, subject disjuncts. It must be mentioned, however, that the infinitive is not now productive as an adverbial stem. 13 Finally, it would seem that Norwegian sentence adverbials are less disjunctive than their English counterparts, being more integrated in the clause structure (e.g. accepting or indeed requiring inversion when in initial position) as well as less likely to occur initially. 14 Many of the above-mentioned factors are important with respect to shifting. To the extent there has been adverbial shifting in Norwegian, then, it is very likely of a different type than that of English. In English, shifting is a fairly simple process because of the general use of the -ly suffix as an adverbial marker. Blends are obviously facilitated when all, or almost all, adverbial types require a -ly suffix; by contrast, Norwegian chooses the more cumbersome suffixing process. The use of special suffixes, while less conducive to blend formations, causes less potential ambiguity, and hence (as has been suggested above) less need to use the disambiguating initial position. Norwegian adverbial shifting, then, could be conceived as based on the adjective (which, as has been mentioned, in its neuter form typically also has adverbial use) or present participle, cf. (83) —(85). (83) a. Dette er utrolig. 'This is incredible' —>• b. Utrolig nok lo hun. 'Incredible enough laughed she' (84) a. Det var overraskende. 'It was surprising' —> b. Overraskende nok lo de. 'Surprising enough laughed they'

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(85) a. Hun sa noe rart. 'She said something strange' —> b. Rart nok lo hun. 'Strange enough laughed she' Partly, but by no means as extensively as in English, such adjectives as those above are or may be used as modifiers or intensifiers, the present participles being perhaps most productive in this respect. Clearly, the great majority of recent nok sentence adverbials are derived from structures like those above, and also perhaps from the corresponding intensifiers. Many evaluative adverbs, however, do not have corresponding intensifiers. Thus there is rart nok and pussig nok, but rart and pussig are not capable of modifying adjectives as intensifiers; they are, however, manner adverbs, cf. (86) —(87) below. Naturally, English, too, has evaluative adverbs that are not also intensifiers, e. g. ironically, though it is rare that such evaluative adverbs as express wonder or incredulousness do not. -ly adverbs in general, however, can easily be used as adjectival modifiers. In any case, the one important factor in English sentence adverbial formation is the existence of uniform adverbial types (among which the evaluative intensifier adverbs are quite important); this facilitates blends and shifts. Norwegian, as has been pointed out, largely lacks this feature, though Old Norwegian does have an adverbial -liga suffix which can be used for e.g. manner adverbs. Additionally, Norwegian probably is more restricted with respect to the use of evaluative modifying adverbs (e. g. such as stupidly in stupidly stubborn, with no corresponding dumt sta), though insofar as Norwegian does have such modifiers they often seem to turn up as sentence adverbials in later years. English, on the other hand, has a very extensive and productive set of evaluative intensifiers (cf. e.g. Bolinger 1972: 242ff.). (86) Hun var utrolig modig / overraskende modig / *rart modig / *pussig modig. 'She was incredibly brave / surprisingly brave / strangely brave / amusingly brave' (87) a. Hun gikk rart. 'She walked strangely' b. Hun lo pussig. 'She laughed oddly' In some sense, then, recent Norwegian may be seen to have had a type of adverbial shifting whereby adjectives have become sentence adverbials by means of suffixing. In recent times only nok shifting has been productive, while earlier -vis shifting was more common. Nok shifting how-

Adverbial shifts: Evidence from Norwegian and English

433

ever, is basically restricted to evaluative adverb/subject disjunct formation. I have found no evidence of further shifts, i.e. from one type of sentence adverbial to another, cf. Swan (1988: 533 ff.). To conclude, then, Norwegian sentence adverbial shifting has always involved suffixing, though in a very few cases only a -t is suffixed; this, of course, is the normal non-sentence-adverbial suffix as well as the neuter form of the adjective, cf. (88). If one disregards this very rare sentence adverbial form, one might illustrate the shifts of Norwegian and English schematically as in (89). (88) a. Dei er äpenbart. 'It is obvious' b. Apenbart er dette vanskelig. 'Obvious(ly) is this difficult' (89)

ENGLISH

NORWEGIAN

It is ADJ that ... + intensifier/manner

Det er ADJ at ... ± intensifier/manner + nok (-vis, etc.) I SA

I SA

Additionally, however, there is some evidence that now that nok sentence adverbials (ADJ + nok) are fairly entrenched and productive in Norwegian, there is a slight trend towards nok deletion such as in (90) —(92). This is at present mostly a feature of journalistic style, whether oral or written (the examples in (90) — (92) are from a newspaper and a broadcast, respectively), and native speakers disagree wildly on the acceptability of such sentences (as indeed English native speakers have disagreed on the acceptability of various sentence adverbials, e. g. hopefully, and on newer prepositions such as due to). Note that not infrequently such nok deletion causes a return to the old -lig adverbial suffix, as in (90) and (91). 15 (90) Han ble lykkelig reddet over til Citia de Milano. 'He was happy (i. e. happily) rescued over to Citia de Milano'. (91) for de forhäpentlig sendes ut av landet 'before they hopefully are sent out of the country' (92) Pa tredjeplass kom overraskende en ung mann. 'In third place came surprising(ly) a young man'. The question arises, if Norwegian has become a language with relatively high sentence adverbial formation of the type discussed here, as it (and

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apparently also German) has, is this in imitation of English, parallel to the adoption of English vocabulary and other features that is an undoubted (as well as much discussed and bemoaned) fact of Norwegian in post-war and perhaps earlier times (cf. e.g. Hellevik 1979: 71—80)? Or, is it a language-internal and a socio-cultural linguistic phenomenon shared by the Germanic languages? To answer this question one must necessarily have more data; it is clear, however, that while English has the advantage of a uniform adverbial suffix system, all the Germanic languages and probably other languages as well, have the basic linguistic ingredients for sentence adverbial shifting, e. g. sentence adverbial suffixes and sentence-modifying structures. Journalistic style no doubt has been influential in the growth of a class of such "short-hand" items which, according to Bolinger (1980: 33), encapsulate entire sentences. Hence their enormous popularity (and the process of shifting in recent times, and particularly evaluative adverbs shifting) may be explained without reference to English, but may be seen as part and parcel of a universal trend. However, it appears that English almost certainly developed this particular type of adverbial "short-hand" before the other Germanic languages, and may have done so more easily because of the predominance of the -ly suffix. Notes 1. The discussion in the present work is based on the findings of Swan (1988), my study of sentence adverbials in English, and on the data investigated in a pilot study of Norwegian sentence adverbials, which in its completed form will appear as A diachronic investigation of Norwegian sentence adverbials. 2. The following abbreviations will be used: EA — evaluative adverbs EETS — Early English Text Society M A — modal adverbs SA — sentence adverbials S D — subject disjuncts S — sentence SPA — speech act adverbials SUB J - subject ADJ — adjective A D V - adverb(ial) VP — verb phrase EModE — Early Modern English M E — Middle English OE - Old English PresE — Present-day English

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435

3. Actually, one could perhaps see the truth intensifiers as a class combining speech act adverbial and modal adverb functions. 4. With respect to the Modern English period it should be noted that I have maintained a rather awkward division in my book between Modern English (Early Modern English 1500-1700 and Late Modern English 1700-1900) on the one hand, and 20th century English (for the sake of convenience called Present-day English) on the other. This is justified adverbially, as it were, since the sentence-adverbial watershed is the turn of the century, apparently — at least with respect to evaluative adverbs. The present paper will make use of the same terminology. 5. It is beyond the scope of this paper to go into this, but it may be noted that the relationship between adverbial and adjectival functions is slightly different from that of English. 6. This type is in fact so productive that there are participles that are NOT participles, but e. g. noun + the participle suffix -ende, cf. (i) below: (i) a. ildende gul 'fire' + -ende 'yellow' b. eitrende sint 'venom' + -ende 'angry' 7. With sa insertion it is possible to have inversion following these speech act adverbials, as (i) below shows: (i) /Erlig talt sä er han rar. 'Honestly spoken so is he strange'. 8. However, it seems unlikely that this is a deleted /ioA>phrase in view of the fact that newer sentence adverbials (often participles), which clearly have nok deletion, must have inversion in as far as they can occur initially, cf. (i) (cf. also §4). (i) a. Overraskende nok er han hjemme. 'Surprising(ly) enough is he home' b. Overraskende nok, han er hjemme. 'Surprising(ly) enough he is home' c. *Overraskende han er hjemme. 'Surprising(ly) he is home' d. ?Overraskende er han hjemme. 'Surprising(ly) is he home' 9. There is, naturally, a problem with respect to the extent to which Early Modern Norwegian is Norwegian, and not Danish, and this is of course a frequently discussed question. However, it has been pointed out that the two languages were in any case very similar, though there were great pronunciation differences, cf. e.g. Skard (1972: 23). 10. Visst is mainly a modal particle in Present-day Norwegian, cf. (i) below, but may also be truth intensifying, cf. (ii). (i) Pettingen er visst ute. 'P0ttingen is probably/supposedly out' (ii) Visst er hun hyggelig! 'Certainly is she nice' 11. Unfortunately, at the present time I have not yet examined texts from the earlier parts of the 20th century, and thus cannot say exactly when the proliferation of sentence adverbials in Norwegian started. However, it seems certain that the nok sentence adverbials, at least, are quite new, perhaps post-war; as was suggested in §3, the Norwegian grammarian Western does not mention them at all (nor do Falk—Torp 1900), though he does mention -vis sentence adverbs. 12. I use the term "extension" as Samuels (1972: 52) does to mean "any process by which the use of a form is extended to a larger number of meanings or grammatical functions than it has hitherto possessed ..."

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13. Past participle sentence adverbs such as supposedly and admittedly are also not used in Norwegian, though there are speech act adverbials with the past participle talt, cf. e. g. the examples in (47 f.). 14. Interestingly, the highly disjunctive nature of English sentence adverbials appears to surface as early as in the Old English period. Thus Old English sentence adverbials, unlike many other types of adverbials and topicalised objects and complements, generally are not accompanied by inversion unless there are topicalised elements present. Cf. e.g. Swan (1988: 2 2 8 f t ) . 15. Forhäpentlig, as it happens, initially has the suffix -vis (forhäpentligvis), and not nok. However, I use the term nofc-deletion for this type of deletion generally. Heggelund (1981: 223 — 228) contains a list of sentences with nofc-deleted sentence adverbials.

English primary

sources

ALlfric = iElfric's Lives of saints, edited by Walter W. Skeat (London: EETS 1881-1900). [Reprinted as two volumes 1966]. Apollonius = The Old English Apollonius of Tyre, edited by Peter Goolden. [Oxford English monographs 6] Oxford: Oxford University Press 1958. Barrett Browning = Elizabeth Barrett Browning. Letters to her sister 1846 —1859, edited by Leonard Huxley. London: J. Murray 1929. Bede = The Old English version of Bede's Ecclesiastical history of the English people, edited by Thomas Miller (London: EETS 1890-1891). Chaucer = The complete works of Geoffrey Chaucer (second edition), edited by F. N. Robinson. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Cura Pastoralis = King Alfred's version of Gregory's Pastoral care, edited by Henry Sweet (London: EETS 1871) [Reprinted 1958]. Fanu = The watcher, by J. Sheridan Le Fanu (London: New English Library 1974) [First published 1894], Homilies = Old English homilies and homiletic treatises of the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, edited by Richard Morris (London: EETS 1868). ME Sermons = Middle English sermons, edited by Woodburn O. Ross (London: EETS 1940). Morte Darthur = The works of Sir Thomas Malory (second edition), edited by Eugene Vinaver. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1967. Pseudodoxia = Sir Thomas Browne's Pseudodoxia epidemica, edited by Robin Robbins. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1981 [First published in 1646]. Queen Elizabeth = Queen Elizabeth's Englishings of Boethius, De Consolatione Philosophiae, edited by Caroline Pemberton (London: EETS 1899). Ro.Ba = The life of Syr Thomas More. By Ro.Ba, edited by Elsie V. Hitchcock — P. E. Hallett. ( L o n d o n - N e w York - Toronto: EETS 1950). Rolle = The English writings of Richard Rolle, hermit of Hampole, edited by Hope Emily Allen. Oxford: Clarendon Press 1931. Samuel Johnson = Samuel Johnson: Sermons on different subjects left for publication by John Taylor, published by Samuel Hayes, London: Caddell 1788 — 89.

Norwegian

primary

sources

Aftenposten = Aftenposten [newspaper] August 20th and 27th 1988. Friis = Peder Clausson Friis Samlede skrifter, edited by Gustav Storm. Kristiania: Den norske historiske forening 1881.

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Holberg = Ludvig Holberg, Epistler, edited by Kjell Heggelund. Oslo: Cappelen 1981. Homilies = Gamal norsk homiliebok, edited by Gustav Indrebe. Oslo: Kjeldeskriftfondet 1931. Speculum = Konungs skuggsjd Speculum regale. Kjebenhavn: Nordisk forlag 1920. Sveen = Kvinnen som forsvant, by Karin Sveen. Oslo: Pax 1987. Wergeland = Henrik Wergelands Samlede skrifter III, edited by Hartvig Lassen. Christiania: Chr. Tensbergs forlag 1853.

References Barrett, Charles R. 1953 Studies in the word-order of JElfric's Catholic homilies and Lives of saints. (Department of Anglo-Saxon Occasional papers) Cambridge University. Bean, Marian C. 1983 The development of word order patterns in Old English. London: Croom-Helm. Bolinger, Dwight 1961 "Syntactic blends and other matters", Language 37: 366 — 381. 1972 Degree words. The Hague: Mouton. 1980 Language — the loaded weapon. The use and abuse of language today. London: Longman. Breivik, Leiv Egil 1981 "On the interpretation of existential there", Language 57: 1—25. 1983 Existential there: A synchronic and diachronic study. (Studia Anglistica Norvegica 2) University of Bergen: Department of English. Coram, Claudia 1974 "Adverbs ... long and tangled roots", in: Michael W. La Goly et al. (eds.), Papers from the tenth regional meeting of the Chicago Linguistic Society. University of Chicago: Department of Linguistics, 90—102. Fleischer, Wolfgang 1974 Wortbildung der deutschen Gegenwartssprache. Leipzig: Bibliographisches Institut. Greenbaum, Sidney 1969 Studies in English adverbial usage. London: Longman. 1986 "The grammar of contemporary English and The grammar of the English language", in: Gerhard Leitner (ed.), The English reference grammar. (Linguistische Arbeiten 172) Tübingen: Niemeyer, 6—14. Halliday, Michael Α. K. 1970 "Functional diversity in language as seen from a consideration of modality and mood in English", Foundation of Language 6: 322 — 365. Heggelund, Kjell 1981 Setningsadverbial i norsk. Oslo: Novus. Hellevik, Alf 1979 Spräkrekt og sprakstyring. Oslo: Det norske samlaget. Indrebo, Gustav 1951 Norsk malsoga. Bergen: John Griegs boktrykkeri. Jespersen, Otto 1949 A modern English grammar on historical principles. Vol. 7. London—Copenhagen: Allen & Unwin.

438

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Kohonen, Viljo 1978 On the development of English word order in religious prose around 1000 and 1200 A. D.: A quantitative study of word order in context. Äbo: Publications of the Research Institute of the Äbo Academy Foundation. Lyons, John 1977 Semantics. Vol. 2. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Mustanoja, Tauno F. 1960 A Middle English syntax. Vol. 1. (Memoires de la Societe neophilologique) Helsinki. Palmer, Frank R. 1986 Mood and modality. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Samuels, Michael 1972 Linguistic evolution, with special reference to English. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Schreiber, Peter 1968 English sentence adverbs: A transformational analysis. [Ph. D. dissertation, New York University]. 1971 "Some constraints on the formation of sentence adverbs", Linguistic Inquiry 2: 8 3 - 1 0 1 . 1972 "Style disjuncts and the performative analysis", Linguistic Inquiry 3: 321 — 347. Skard, Vemund 1972 Norsk sprakhistorie. Vol. 2. Oslo: Universitetsforlaget. Stockwell, Robert P. 1984 "On the history of the verb-second rule in English", in: Jacek Fisiak (ed.), Historical syntax. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 575 — 591. Stoffel, C. 1901 Intensives and downtoners. A study in adverbs. (Anglistische Forschungen 1) Heidelberg: Winter. Swan, Toril 1985 "Comments on some English and Norwegian sentence adverbs and intensifiers", in: Tove Bull —Anton Fjeldstad (eds.), Heidersskrift til Kare Elstad. University of Tromse: School of Languages and Literature, 132 — 153. 1988 Sentence adverbials in English: A synchronic and diachronic investigation. Oslo: Novus. 1989 "Initial adverbials and word order in Norwegian and English", in: Leiv Egil Breivik —Stig Johansson—Arnoldus Hille (eds.), Festskrift for Bertil Sundby. Oslo: Novus, 3 3 1 - 3 4 4 . Torp, Alf 1974 Gamalnorsk ordavleiding. New edition corrected and edited by Gosta Holm. [First published in 1909] Lund: Kungliga humanistiska vetenskapsamfundet. Western, August 1906 "Some remarks on the use of English adverbs", Englische Studien 36: 75 — 99. 1921 Norsk riksmälsgrammatikk. Christiania: John Griegs forlag.

Lexical diffusion in syntactic change: frequency as a determinant of linguistic conservatism in the development of negation in English1 Gunnel Tottie

It is in fact not unlikely that each verb has its own history. (Ellegärd 1953: 201)

1.

Introduction

There has been considerable controversy in recent linguistic debate whether sound change proceeds gradually across the lexicon — i.e. by so-called "lexical diffusion" — or whether it obeys the Neogrammarian laws of regularity. Wang and Cheng's work on Chinese as well as many other papers published in Wang (1977) have given considerable support to the lexical diffusionist stance, whereas Labov (1981: 267) has argued that lexical diffusion and Neogrammarian regularity can coexist and that the paradox may be resolved by "distinguishing abstract phonological change from change in lowlevel output rules". Much less attention seems to have been paid to the problem of regularity versus lexical diffusion in syntax, presumably because the Neogrammarians were not in a position to say much about that area of grammar (cf. Lightfoot 1979: chapter 1, and Lightfoot 1986: 439 f.). In both morphology and syntax, lexical diffusion seems to have been implicitly taken for granted by many writers. Others have been more explicit; a good example is the epigraph to this paper, where Ellegärd (1953: 201) suggests that each verb has its own history with regard to the use of dosupport. Lack of a uniform development of Jo-support in negative sentences had been previously pointed out by Jespersen (1917: 13 f.): When do became the ordinary accompaniment of not, it was not at first extended to all verbs; besides the well-known instances with can, may, need, ought we must here mention know, which now takes do, but was long used in the form of know not, thus pretty regularly in the seventeenth and often in the eighteenth and even in the first part of the nineteenth century.

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Following Rohde (1872), Ellegärd argues that it is their status as "fixed expressions" without ί/o-support which prevents some verbs from adopting the new type of negation. Residual forms with have in Present-day English (Ihaven't a clue, etc.) certainly support this view (cf. Tottie 1978). Similarly, it is well known that other syntactic phenomena have applied to individual verbs rather than wholesale across the lexicon. Thus e. g. the transition from the Old English impersonal constructions (as in e. g. me pyncp) to Present-day English personal constructions (as in I think) applied idiosyncratically to different verbs (cf. e. g. Fischer —van der Leek 1983). Many other examples could be cited; from a theoretical point of view, Denison's work on the development of the prepositional passive in English is particularly interesting as the author explicitly raises the question of lexical diffusion in syntax: Once the prepositional passive enters the language, does it spread by lexical diffusion or is it available from the first for any suitable collocation? Lightfoot has suggested that the prepositional passive did not spread by lexical diffusion, and that the apparently gradual increase in variety and frequency of use is "probably an artifact of the restrictions on our data" (1979 a: 280 n) (Denison 1985: 194).

Contra Lightfoot, however, Denison comes down in favour of lexical diffusion, saying that he has made "some attempt to explain not just which syntactic patterns become available when, but which collocations take part in them" and that "functional factors and surface syntax are necessary to a complete account of the origins of the prepositional passive" (Denison 1985: 194). In this paper I too shall support the view that (morpho)syntactic change does proceed gradually across the lexicon, and I shall further argue that the frequency of a lexical item or construction may act as a powerful determinant of linguistic conservatism, i.e. that the more frequent a construction is, the more likely it is to be retained in its older form for a longer period of time. This is not an entirely new idea either — cf. Ellegard (1953) and Rohde (1872) — but it seems not to have been systematically pursued. It has certainly not been applied to the problem which I shall discuss here, viz. the alternation of the two types of negation seen in I do not know anything and I know nothing, which I shall refer to as not-negation and no-negation in what follows. I will show that the older type, no-negation, which dates back to Old English, is retained to a large extent in Present-day English in collocations with high-frequency verbs or constructions, whereas the more modern type, not-negation,

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which began to spread in Middle English, tends to occur in collocations with items of lower frequency. I shall begin in section 2 by presenting in some detail the data on the distribution of not-negation and no-negation in Present-day English which led me to believe that the current situation can only be explained by studying the frequencies of individual collocations in a historical perspective. I will then proceed to a diachronic survey of the use of the two types of negation from Old English to Early Modern English in section 3, and finally, I will discuss the evidence and theoretical implications in section 4.

2.

Background: the synchronic data

The present study originated from a synchronic study dealing with negation in Present-day English speech and writing, Negation in English speech and writing (Tottie, in press). This work deals with several aspects of negation, one of which is of interest in this context, viz. the variation between not-negation and no-negation, as in (1) —(4). (1)

a. He did not see any books. b. He saw no books.

(2)

a. He did not see anything. b. He saw nothing.

(3)

a. He did not see it any longer. b. He no longer saw it.

(4)

a. He did not see either me or my brother. b. He saw neither me nor my brother.

What I call noNnegation and no-negation has been variously referred to in the literature (cf. Tottie, in press: chapter 6). Perhaps the most wellknown term for no-negation is "NEG-incorporation into indefinites", used by Klima in his 1964 transformational-generative account of negation in English. I shall make use of this term especially in my discussion of older stages of the language when not had not yet begun to be used as a negative adverb and the terms not-negation and no-negation are thus not appropriate, and occasionally when referring to the variation as a process.

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Determiner: Pronouns:

Adverbs: Correlatives:

jVo/-negation not...a/an/any not... anybody not... any thing not...any not... anyone not... ever not...anywhere not...either...or

Figure 1. The forms where variation between not-negation Present-day English

yVo-negation no nobody nothing none no one never nowhere neither...nor and no-negation may occur in

Notice that variable NEG-incorporation, as in ( l b ) —(4b), can only occur after a verb. Before the verb NEG-incorporation is obligatory, as in (5) and (6), and there is thus no possibility of variation. (5)

a. Nobody left. b. *Not anybody left.

(6)

a. Nothing happened. b. *Not anything happened.

The forms between which variation may occur are listed above in Figure 1. The material examined for the study of not-negation and wo-negation in Present-day English was drawn from two computerised corpora, viz. The London —Lund Corpus of Spoken English (LLC) (cf. Svartvik — Quirk 1980), and the Lancaster —Oslo/Bergen Corpus of Written English (LOB). My subsample of LLC was entirely made up of conversation between British academics, recorded mostly in the 1960's. LOB consists of written British English from 1961, drawn from several stylistic strata; for the purposes of the present investigation all fictional material and all direct quotations from speech were excluded so that a sample representing only journalism, popular lore, belles-lettres and scientific writing (LOB categories A, B, C, F, G, and J) remained. Conversation and expository prose constitute polar opposites in a typology of speech and writing (cf. e. g. Tottie et al. 1983 and Biber 1988); these types will therefore sometimes be referred to as "speech" and "writing" tout court in what follows. The two corpora were subjected to a computerised lexical search for the items listed in Fig. 1, including all enclitic forms of not. This resulted in two samples of negative sentences2 from which those satisfying the

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criterion of having an indefinite expression capable of or having NEGincorporation after the verb — about 15% of the total — were extracted manually. As the written sample was much larger than the spoken, it was subsequently reduced by means of a random search to better approximate the size of the spoken sample. 3 The spoken and written samples then had to be further reduced to eliminate cases where variants turned out not to be semantically equivalent, as in (7) and (8). For a full discussion of the problem of semantic equivalence between negative variants, cf. Tottie (in press, esp. chapter 6). (References prefaced by S indicate texts and tone units in the spoken sample, and those beginning with A, B, C, F, G, J refer to texts in the written sample. Numbers followed by ' indicate unattested variant sentences. Important words and passages have been highlighted by Roman font). (7)

{!')

(8) (8')

... mathematics professors at Cambridge # don't lecture to ordinary undergraduates (S. 1.6.964) ('... don't lecture to undergraduates, who are an ordinary kind of person') mathematics professors at Cambridge lecture to no ordinary undergraduates ('lecture to undergraduates who are out of the ordinary') when you just can't do a thing (S.1.5.1232) when you can just do nothing

Furthermore, a small number of sentences having both NEG-raising and variation between noi-negation and no-negation, as in I don't think it's anything new/I think it's nothing new 11 think it isn't anything new, where it is impossible to tell whether the raised version corresponds to «o-negation or noi-negation in the non-raised versions, were also removed from the sample. The very large number of sentences with variation between never and not ever were also excluded, as not ever occurred only in about one per cent of all cases, and this distribution would have skewed the results out of all proportion. Table 1 shows the distribution of noi-negation and «o-negation in the spoken and written samples. Notice the difference between the spoken and written samples as regards the frequency of the two types of negation; expressed in terms of rco-negation, the spoken sample had only 34%, whereas the written sample

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Table 1. The distribution of not-negation and no-negation in the spoken and written samples. All sentences with never/not ever, NEG-raising, quotations from direct speech, and lack of semantic equivalence between original and variant, have been removed

Spoken Written

«o/-negation

«o-negation

Totals

196 169

99 289

295 458

(66%) (37%)

(34%) (63%)

had 63%. (The difference between these figures, 29 percentage points, is large enough for the difference in sample sizes, 295 vs. 458, to be immaterial.) However, even in the residual samples represented in Table 1 variation between not-negation and «o-negation turned out not always to be actually possible, either because of syntactic constraints, as in (9), or because of other constraints of various types, which may be represented by (10), with an adverbial constraint, cf. further Tottie (in press: chapters 8 through 10) on factors determining the variability of not-negation and no-negation. (9)

(9')

and do you know there was simply # no central heating # of any kind #. in their rooms # — they just had the odd electric fire # and no servants # to rush around lighting (S. 1.13.548) *they just had the odd electric fire # and not any servants # to rush around lighting

(10) but there were plenty of people like Ludendorff # who had absolutely no . [a:] . kind of family or anything # behind them (S.2.3.193) (10') *but there were plenty of people like Ludendorff # who absolutely didn't have any . [a:] . kind of family or anything # behind them The whole samples were therefore tested for variability by a native speaker. This led to the establishment of variable and invariable subsamples in both speech and writing, with the latter containing such sentences as those in (9) and (10) above, and the variable sample consisting of straightforward sentences as those given below in (11) —(15), listed here by verb types. (Stative have is have used to mean 'possess'; other uses are infrequent and will be disregarded here.) 4

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Be as copula: (11) he isn't a . self . self[ev] evident [am] # [s:] top candidate is he (S.2.6.44) (11') he is no . self . self[ev] evident [dm] # [a:] top candidate is he (12) ... we as a nation are not doing well enough. That is not a new discovery. (A21 194) (12') ... we as a nation are not doing well enough. That is no new discovery. Existential ^-constructions: (13) ... by to do (13') ...by work

the time they got to the summer # there was no more work (S. 1.4.680) the time they got to the summer # there wasn't any more to do

(14) At last she got up in desperation. There was no fire and she was out of aspirins. (F33 153) (14') At last she got up in desperation. There wasn't any fire and she was out of aspirins. Stative have: (15) The Fellowship had no funds ... (F20 199) (15') The Fellowship did not have any funds ... In this finally reduced "variable sample" the proportions of rco-negation were higher in both samples, 51% in the spoken sample and 79% in the written sample, as demonstrated by Table 2. This is because it was mostly «oi-negation that was de rigueur in a large number of syntactic environments (cf. Tottie, in press: chapters 8 — 10). More importantly, the difference between the spoken and written samples remained almost the same, with «o-negation leading by 28 percentage points in writing. Table 2. The distribution of «of-negation and ««-negation in the variable spoken and written samples

Spoken Written

noi-negation

«0-negation

Totals

82 62

87 233

169 295

(49%) (21%)

(51%) (79%)

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At first it seemed natural to interpret the predominance of no-negation in writing in the same way as I had previously interpreted the distribution of affixal and non-affixal negation in speech and writing. As shown in Tottie (in press), there was a two-thirds preference for non-affixal negation (as in It is not common) in speech and a two-thirds preference for affixal negation (as in It is uncommon) in writing. It had been possible to show that this difference in distribution is almost certainly due to the use of different discourse strategies in the two media, strategies which are conditioned by the usual production constraints of speech and writing, and which lead to the adoption of a more "fragmented" style in speech due to the on-line successive production of idea units, and to the use of a more "integrated" style in writing, as the situation in which writing is produced normally permits more reflection and therefore a denser packaging of idea units (cf. Chafe 1982 and Tottie in press: chapters 4, 5). It seemed natural at first to assume that not-negation and no-negation represented another pair of exponents of the dichotomy of fragmentation and integration, and that not-negation was preferred in speech because of its fragmented, one-idea-at-a-time character, while wo-negation was preferred in writing because it was more condensed and integrated, perhaps demanding more time and reflexion to be produced. However, a closer look at the distribution of not-negation and wo-negation in sentences with different verbs suggested that production constraints could not be the factor determining the use of the two types of negation. It was clear that different verbs tended to collocate with different types of negation, in similar patterns (although to different degrees) in speech and writing. Thus, in existential sentences with be, as (13) and (14) above, He-negation was preferred, and the same applied to sentences with stative have, as in (15), whereas in sentences with be as copula, as in (11) and (12), «o-negation was much less frequent. In sentences with other verbs, subsumed here under the label "lexical verbs", «oZ-negation predominated, as in (16)-(18):

Typical lexical verbs: (16) though that may merely have meant # mother was at home with the girls # so . it doesn't prove anything (S.2.14.845) (16') though that may merely have meant # mother was at home with the girls # 5 0 it proves nothing

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(17) ... I hope I didn't tell anyone my dilemma ... (G24 59) (17') ... I hope I told no one my dilemma ... (18) ... she is short and stout and does not require insulin. (J 14 190) (18') ... she is short and stout and requires no insulin. Table 3 shows the distribution of not-negation and no-negation in the variable subsample. (A small number of sentences with non-stative have — seven in speech and four in writing — have been left out because of their heterogeneity.) Table 3. The proportion of ««-negation in sentences with copular and existential be, stative have, and lexical verbs in the variable spoken and written samples. Non-stative have omitted. Spoken Existential be Stative have Copular be Lexical verbs

34/38 18/28 12/20 20/76

Written 89% 64% 60% 26%

96/98 41/42 26/47 67/104

98% 98% 55% 64%

Table 3 shows that in speech lexical verbs had only 26% no-negation in the variable sample, thus much less than the other verb categories. Copular be had 60% no-negation, stative /zave-sentences 64% and existential ^-sentences 89%. In writing, the proportion of no-negation was also low in sentences with lexical verbs, 64%, compared with existential ^-sentences and stative /zave-sentences, which both had 98% no-negation. However, it was higher than for copular 6e-sentences, which had only 55%. This fact will be discussed in section 4. It seemed improbable that discourse factors such as production constraints imposed by the time normally allowed for on-line speech and premeditated writing, respectively, would lead to the use of no-negation with some verbs and constructions, and not-negation with others. The explanation for the predominance of noi-negation in speech and nonegation in writing would obviously have to be sought elsewhere. One solution was suggested by a statement by Poldauf (1964: 373): In older than the latest Modern English, the tendency to prefer the synthetic negation [i. e. no-negation] appears to have been much stronger. Sentences like I turned aside to visit no objects of interest or I am ashamed to tell my

name to no man, quoted by Jespersen, would be hardly possible nowadays.

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Poldauf does not further substantiate his claim; nor does he seem aware of the positional restrictions on the variation between woi-negation and wo-negation. However, if he is right and «»-negation predominated in "older than the latest modern English" and noi-negation has thus become more current in Present-day English, this would tally well with the general development of English from a more synthetic to a more analytic type, and it could provide an explanation of the differences in occurrence of not-negation and «o-negation in Present-day English. If spoken language is the locus where change first takes place, as is usually the case, we could view the current situation as one where the "wedge of change" (cf. LaBrum 1982: 74) has penetrated furthest in speech, where not-negation has come to predominate, but where forms with «o-negation survive as residues of earlier usage. Assuming that this is correct, it would still be necessary to explain why precisely those verbs and constructions, stative have and existential /^-constructions, retained the older type of negation in both speech and writing, with lexical verbs taking the lead in both varieties. Could it be because these verbs/constructions are high-frequency items and such collocations tend to preserve older forms? (As pointed out above, copular ^-sentences were a maverick category which, in spite of their high frequency of occurrence, had a high incidence of «oi-negation and which thus constituted an exception to the rule that frequency of occurrence would trigger no-negation, something which would have to be explained.) This hypothesis was strengthened by a closer examination of sentences with lexical verbs in the spoken sample, which revealed that in the atypical sentences with no-negation, a small number of verbs tended to recur, in particular know and main verb do. Cf. (19) —(23): Atypical lexical verbs: (19) no # Marilyn does no teaching # I imagine # she's a research assistant (S. 1.5.424) (20) he was quite happy to sit about doing nothing in particular (S.2.14.1006) (21) I've done nothing # except you know # bring up this family since I . left school (S.3.1.43) (22) and that was # an extremely abstruse talk #... # and . on a topic most people knew nothing whatever about (S. 1.6.1008)

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(23) after a time # they only know about # six people in their own year # and know nobody above them # and nobody below them (S.3.3.852) (24) ... I know nothing about his first wife (S.2.14.833) It seemed that if these verbs with «o-negation in the spoken sample were residual forms, there should be similar phenomena of preferred collocations in the written sample. I therefore checked the type-token ratios of verb + negation collocations in both samples. A low type-token ratio for either type of negation would mean that certain verbs tended to recur with that type of negation more often. As appears from Table 4, it was indeed the case that the type-token ratio was lower for nonegation with lexical verbs in both speech and writing. In speech the type-token ratios were .45 for «o-negation and .57 for «oi-negation (χ 2 = 8.859,1 d. f., significant at .01), and in writing the type-token ratios were .63 for no-negation and .86 for «oi-negation (χ 2 = 8.714, 1 d.f., significant at .01). Table 4. Type/token ratio of lexical verbs in variable sentences in the spoken and written samples Spoken

Written

Variable no/-negation Variable «o-negation

31/54 (.57) 9/20 (.45)

33/38 42/67

«o-neg + not- neg

40/74 (.54)

75/105 (.71)

(.86) (.63)

Returning to individual verb types, we saw that main verb do tended to collocate with «o-negation in the spoken sample. This is also true in writing, as appears from (25) —(27). (Notice that in (25) —(27), do collocates not just with «o-negation but with a particular lexical exponent of that category, viz. nothing.) (25) If I want food but do nothing to get it, that surely is intelligible. (J54 144) (26) It need not have been such a burden if Western Governments had not been convinced that they must do nothing to harm even remotely Dr Adenauer's chances of being returned as Chancellor. (B02 184) (27) Dr Alec operated but could do nothing. (G25 135) In writing, moreover, give and make showed a strong tendency to take flo-negation. Cf. (28)-(31):

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(28) ... the readers themselves will give us no conscious assistance. (G38 152) (29) ... the split in the Conservative Party over Africa gives me no joy. (B26 4) (30) ... the ballads make no mention of the trapping of rabbits ... (F27 56) (31) Make no mistake about it, the divisions are very serious ... (B26 6) Table 5. The distribution of not-negation and no-negation in variable sentences with main verb do, know, give and make in the spoken and written samples

do know give make

not

Spoken no

Total

Written not no

8 2 0 2

7 4 1 0

15 6 1 2

1 0 2 1

6 1 6 5

7 1 8 6

12

12

24

4

18

22

Total

The distribution of the two types of negation with the verbs having the highest frequency of patterning with «o-negation is shown in Table 5. The fact that it is precisely these verbs, main verb do, know, give and make, that tend to select no-negation tallies well with the hypothesis put forward above that it is the high-frequency items that pattern with this type of negation. Francis — Kucera's Frequency analysis of English usage (1982: 465) lists these verbs among the most frequent lexical items of the language. Thus make has rank 40, know rank 63, and give rank 72 among the c. 6,000 items included. As auxiliary and main verb uses are not separated, no conclusions can be drawn from the even higher ranks of do, have and be, but at least for have and be their very high frequency of occurrence in the present samples are sufficient evidence of their frequency in the language. Moreover, existential there is listed in Francis — Kucera (1982) as having rank 41, and do is the most frequent lexical verb in the present survey.5 Table 6 combines the data in Tables 3 and 5 and shows the overall frequencies of all verb types. (Percentages for lexical verbs are given to facilitate comparisons only; with such a limited material as the present samples, there may of course be distributions due to chance fluctuations.)

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Table 6. The frequency of no-negation with verbs/constructions in variable structures in spoken and written English. Figures below the dotted line are part of the lexical verb sample and do not add up to the total. Non-stative have omitted.

Existential be Stative have Copular be Lexical verbs: Lexical verbs:

Overall sample frequency

Spoken η

%

Written η

%

Totals

34/38 18/28 12/20 20/76

89% 64% 60% 26%

96/98 41/42 26/47 67/104

98% 98% 55% 64%

Average frequency Main verb do know give make

1.74 7/15 4/6 1/1 0/2

26% 47% 67%

1.4 6/7

64% 86%

1/1 6/8 5/6

87% 83%

51%

79%

It thus seems clear that the more frequent a verb is, the more likely it is to occur with no-negation. The one exception to this rule is be as copula, which will be discussed in section 4 below. Moreover, if we can assume, as seems likely, that those verbs and constructions have also been frequent items in earlier periods of the language, it would be reasonable to conclude that their very frequency has something to do with their tendency to preserve the older type of negation, no-negation, in Present-day English. Summing up the arguments of this section, then, we have seen that the distribution of the two types of negation differs in speech and writing, with not-negation as the dominant type in speech and no-negation as the dominant type in writing. The unequal distribution over different verb types made it unlikely that this difference could be explained as purely a result of production constraints due to time factors; although production constraints may have served to reinforce the tendency to prefer different types of negation in speech and writing, it seemed best to postulate that the differences were due to ongoing change from an older type of negation, no-negation, to a more modern one, not-negation, with the primary locus of change in speech, as is the normal case in language. Some diachronic evidence relevant to this hypothesis will be examined in section 3.

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Diachronic evidence

There is no complete history of the development of negation in English, but the most basic facts are known from the works of Jespersen (1917), Mustanoja (1960), Traugott (1972), Jack (1978 a, b), LaBrum (1982) and Hogg (in press). We know that in Old English negation was usually conveyed by the negative particle ne, which could cliticise to verbs, determiners and pronouns. In early Middle English ne began to be used together with adverbial not, derived from nawiht (< ne + a + wiht, 'no creature, thing'), and then not alone gradually came to take over the function of the negative adverb after a period of double negation by means of ne ... not.6 The standard view of the development of negation from Old English into Modern English is illustrated in Table 7, based on LaBrum (1982: 1). I'uble 7. A summary of the development of verb negation in earlier English (from LaBrum 1982: 1) OE

EME 1200

ne V

ne V ne V not

M E 1400

LME 1500

ne V not V not

V not

None of the authors quoted above have much to say about the use of NEG-incorporation, i. e. forms where ne is cliticised to determiners, adverbs or pronouns, except that it was possible in Old English.7 It is of course clear that forms that were precursors of the modern no-negation must have antedated «o/-negation, which only dates back to Middle English, but the variation between forms with and without NEG-incorporation (i. e. forms with ne only on the verb and forms with ne both on the verb and cliticised to an indefinite element after the verb) seems not to have been systematically studied. However, Mitchell (1985: §§1595 — 1632) provides some information. Although he gives no statistics, he states (1985: §1607 and §1628) that the normal usage in prose was that shown in (32) — (34), with double or multiple negation: (32) Ac pa fif dysigan namon leohtfatu, and ne namon nanne ele mid him 'and the five foolish [virgins] took the lamps, and not took no oil with them' (Matthew XXV: 3)

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(33) pa naefde he na ma scipa ponne an then not-had he no more ships than one 'then he had only one ship' (King Alfred, Boethius IV: 3) (34) for pam pe pa Iudeiscan noldon naefre brucan nanes because the Jews not-would never use no Ringes mid J>am hasten um thing with the heathens 'because the Jews would never have anything to do with the heathens' OElfric, Homilies 5.124) (32) and (33) have double negation; in (32) there is ne on both the verb and the indefinite element, the determiner (n)anne, and in (33) the verb and the adverb (n)a both carry negation. In (34) there is multiple negation, with ne on the verb (ne + woldon), an adverb ((n)cefre) and an indefinite determiner ((n)anes). Forms without NEG-incorporation occurred mostly in poetry according to Mitchell (1985: §1609), as in (35), where, apparently for reasons of metre, there is no determiner for ne to fuse with, and in (36) where the determiner cenigra does not carry ne.% (35) ne bip pe wilna gad not will be for you of good things lack 'you will suffer no lack of good things' (Beowulf 660) (36) Ne bip pe asnigra gad / worolde wilna 'not will be for you any lack of the world's good things' (Beowulf 949/50) It is beyond the scope of the present paper to provide a complete history of negation in older English, including sentences with indefinite elements following the verb and thus permitting variation between forms with and without NEG-incorporation (cf. Tottie forthcoming). However, some interesting evidence concerning the development of negation in the most frequently occurring type of sentence with a postverbal indefinite, i.e. existential there-sentences with be, is available in Breivik (1983), which treats existential there from both a synchronic and a diachronic perspective. Chapter four outlines the use of there in existential sentences from Old English up to 1550 and contains some five hundred instances of different types of existential sentences, many of which are negative.

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Table 8. A survey of negative existential sentences recorded in Breivik (1983) NEG-incorporated forms A Β c ne + ne — ne

Period I II III IV

1070 1 0 7 0 - 1225 1 2 2 5 - 1425 1 4 2 5 - 1550

3

1 5 5

3 1

-

7

11

28

Totals

4

4 6 14 26

4

50

—

1 6 21

—

D not

Negative existentials with peerI there were infrequent in Old English and in early Middle English but became the dominant type of existential construction during the Middle English period, as demonstrated by Breivik. Negation in existential sentences is not a main concern of Breivik's, and although he discusses negation in existential sentences in the Old English, Middle English and Early Modern English material he investigated, he does not mention the variation between «oi-negation and nonegation but dwells briefly only on the variation between ne and noht (1983: 338 ff.). However, his material does yield some evidence concerning the variation between not-negation and wo-negation in existential sentences, as is shown by Table 8. In Table 8 column A displays sentences with only ne as a free morpheme or cliticised to the verb; column Β shows sentences with free or cliticised ne plus NEG-incorporation into indefinites as nan, ncenig, etc; column C shows sentences without ne but with NEG-incorporation; and column D shows the sentences with not. The evidence is scant of course, with very few instances from Old English and early Middle English, and examples are taken from both prose and poetry, but NEG-incorporated forms are definitely a majority. It is also worth noticing that not-negation does not occur at all in the material quoted by Breivik until the very latest period investigated, thus considerably later than in the contrastive constructions studied by LaBrum, where not-negation appears as early as c. 1200. 9 Existential clauses thus seem to have resisted the introduction of notnegation longer than other constructions. 10 Examples (37) — (45) below display instances of what may be taken to be the most typical usage from each of the four periods represented in Breivik's material, thus with NEG-incorporation, mostly with ne in the earlier periods and without it in later periods. Notice the one instance of

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NEG-incorporation without ne on the verb in (40). (Breivik's number codes are given at the end of each reference.) I:

(37) ... peer naes nan man mid him on pam huse ... 'and there not-was no man with him in the house' (/Elfric 2 XXXI: 8 6 0 - 1 , B.4.118)

II:

(38) Nis per nawiht prof.n 'Not-is there nothing thereof.' (Ancrene 10:26, B.4.167) (39) nis par nan swa heih: nis par nan swa laih. pat we nabbet his freond: ifelled to gründe. 'not-is there none so high, not-is there none so low/that we not-have his friend felled to the ground' (Layamon 494 — 6, B.4.168) (40) Quen pai cam par was par na bote. 'When they came there was there no help.' (Cursor Mundi, Göttingen MS 1780, B.4.40c)

III:

(41) Vor per ne is/ no zenne zuo grat: pet god ne uoryefp 'for there not is/ no sin so great that God not forgives' (Ayenbite 11: 1 4 - 1 9 , B.4.211) (42) For wyndowe on the wal ne was ther noon ... 'For window on the wall not was there none ...' (Chaucer/Knight 1988, B.4.246) (43) For ther was noon so wys that koude seye/ That any hadde of oother avauntage/ Of worthynesse, ne of estaat, ne age ... (Chaucer/Knight 2 5 8 7 - 9 2 , B.4.249)

IV:

(44) there ys none of the good knyghtes that here be that woll fayle you (Malory 45: 3 0 - 1 , 46: 1, B.4.306) (45) ... but there was non such wrytyng in that letter. (Paston Letters 404: 6, B.4.347)

As shown in Table 8 above, not-negation in Breivik's sample, cf. (46) —(48): IV:

occurred only in period IV

(46) ... there were not a good indyfferent clergye. (More 160: 5 - 7 , B.4.319)

iudge in all the whole

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(47) And there is not in the world so grete ease/ as to have a wyfe sure & stedfast. (Caxton 26: 3 6 - 7 , B.4.295) (48) This is a very colde cause of thys new dyuysyon, to say that ther be not now comenly so badde men in the temporaltye as ther be some in the spirytualtye. (More 76: 20 — 2, B.4.313) It is interesting to consider the sentences which did not have NEGincorporation but only ne on the verb, as they were severely constrained. Consider first (49) from Old English and (50) from Chaucer: (49) nis peer on pam londe lap-genipla / ne wop ne wracu 'not-is there on the land foe/neither weeping nor persecution' (Exeter Book IV: 5 0 - 1 , Β 4.124) Notice first that (49), which lacks a determiner which might NEGincorporate, is taken from poetry, and that the absence of a determiner is most certainly due to metrical considerations. In (50) the lack of an indefinite determiner must also be due to the exigencies of metre: (50) In al the world, to seken up and doun,/ So evene, withouten variatioun,/ Ther nere swiche compaignyes tweye ... (Chaucer/Knight 2587 — 92, B.4.249) The other examples, mostly from prose, are more illuminating. Consider (51): (51) ... paer naes fyrod genoh ongen heora fynd there not-was army enough against their enemy 'their forces were not big enough to withstand the enemy' (iElfric 2 XXX: 2 9 5 - 6 , B.4.116) In (51) the indefinite noun phrase is followed by the quantifying determiner genoh, which probably precludes the occurrence of an indefinite quantifier capable of NEG-incorporation. Compare the situation in Present-day English, where «oi-negation without a quantifier would be de rigueur if enough follows its head-word as in (52), now a somewhat archaic use (cf. Quirk et al. 1985: 5.23 n). Notice that if enough is absent, the indefinite noun phrase may be preceded by an indefinite determiner which can NEG-incorporate; cf. (53):

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(52) a. b. c. d.

457

There was money enough. There was not money enough. * There wasn't any money enough. * There was no money enough.

(53) a. There was money. b. There wasn't any money. c. There was no money. We cannot of course be quite as sure of what was possible or impossible in Old English, but it seems likely that the same situation would have held there, so that a determiner capable of NEG-incorporation would have been equally impossible when the head noun was followed by genoh. Next, consider (54), also from Old English: (54) ... sume men scegden poet par naere buton twegen dcelas: some men said that there not-were but two parts: Asia ; ^ poet oper Europe Asia and the other one, Europe 'some men said that there were only two parts ...' (Orosius 8: 1—6, B.4.125) In (54) the notional subject cannot be preceded by an indefinite determiner because of the numeral in the noun phrase; the same situation prevails in Present-day English, as can be seen from the gloss to (54). There can be no determiner which may NEG-incorporate. Furthermore, of course, the ne in (54) is part of the restrictive expression ne ... buton corresponding to the Present-day English restrictive adverb only, the sentence is thus doubly constrained with regard to NEG-incorporation. There are no instances in Breivik (1983) of non-NEG-incorporated forms among the early Middle English examples, but in Period III, the same constraints as in (54), viz. ne ... but (on) and a numeral in the notional subject, operate in (55) and preclude NEG-incorporation: (55) ther nys but ο God... there not-is but one God 'there is but one God' (Chaucer: Boece Book III, Prosa 10: 147 — 8, B.4.237) In (56), from period IV, there is another occurrence of formulaic ne...but, but in a structurally different use from that seen in (54) and (55):

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(56) Ther nys syknes but helth it doth desyer. ... There not-is sickness but health it does desire 'There is no sickness which does not desire health' (Wyatt XXV: 22, B.4.362) All the prose examples cited so far which contain only ne thus have some kind of "knockout" constraint on the use of NEG-incorporation. Only in (57), from period III, is there no such absolute constraint on the use of NEG-incorporation; notice, however, that the indefinite noun phrase does contain a premodifying adjective. Premodification has been shown to be a weak constraint on the use of no-negation in Present-day English (cf. Tottie in press: chapter 9). (57) yef per nere/ kueade uelages 'if there not-were evil fellows' (Ayenbite 52: 3 — 5, B.4. 215) Thus in (49) — (56), NEG-incorporation is either inhibited by the presence of knockout constraints or by metrical considerations; only in (57) is a weaker constraint present. NEG-incorporation is thus used in virtually all cases, except where it cannot be used for syntactic reasons. Summing up the historical evidence presented so far, it seems to support the hypothesis put forward on the basis of data from Present-day English, that the distribution of ««/-negation and «o-negation is a step in an ongoing process of change from no-negation to not-negation, where constructions with more frequent verbs, such as existential ^-sentences, resist the trend longer than less frequent ones, and where not-negation occurs mostly in cases where «o-negation is syntactically impossible. What could be the reason for this difference between verbs of higher or lower frequency? It seems likely that the answer is to be found in the strength of collocations, i. e. strings of "habitually co-occurring words", as Kjellmer (1982: 25) puts it, or "actual words in habitual company", as defined by Firth (1968 [1957]: 14). The strength of collocational links has been demonstrated by many psycholinguistic studies (cf. Aitchison 1987: 78 ff.). These studies show that collocational links are "powerful and long-lasting" (Aitchison 1987: 79) and do not deteriorate with old age. Aitchison, quoting studies by several researchers, mentions that idioms "appear to be treated by humans as if they were ordinary, single lexical items" and also mentions the overlap of "cliches" and idioms. It seems unlikely that there should be any difference in the treatment of idioms and other collocations, and it is highly probable that collocations

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are learned, stored and transmitted as unitary elements, something which would explain their comparative stability over long periods of time. If collocations are thus stable, they are still not rigidly monolithic. They may be compared to words consisting of productive affixes joined to other morphemes: although such words tend to be used predominantly in certain constructions, they can alternate with non-affixal constructions, and the affixes may also, when necessary, be used in novel combinations. Cf. e. g. the variation between affixal and non-affixal negative forms in He is unaware of it/He is not aware of it and the use of productive affixes to form new words, as in non-starter, non-aligned: the examples can be multiplied indefinitely. Similarly, there is both inherent stability and variability in collocations. This is clearly demonstrated by existential ^-constructions in Presentday English. Although wo-negation is overwhelmingly preferred, these constructions are also almost totally variable, as shown by Tottie (in press: chapter 9). Having so far presented only data which support the hypotheses of lexical diffusion and of the frequency of collocations as a factor promoting conservatism, I will now proceed to present and discuss some apparent counterevidence in section 4.

4.

Evidence and counterevidence: a discussion

One piece of counterevidence to the hypothesis that frequency of occurrence may act as a retarding factor in morphosyntactic change is the fact that in the written sample, sentences with copular be have a much lower tendency to take «o-negation than the other two most frequent types of verbal constructions, existential be and stative have (cf. Table 3). In fact, in writing copular be sentences have a lower frequency of «»-negation than the average of lexical verbs, 55% vs. 64%. It is obviously impossible to fully explain this fact given that the full data on negation in the older stages of the language are not yet fully known, but certain facts may be worth mentioning in this connexion. Existential sentences with be and sentences with stative have differ from sentences with copular be in one important respect: Both existential be and stative have usually serve in a presentative function, and both verbs would therefore regularly tend to occur with indefinite complements (notional subjects in existential sentences and direct objects in havesentences). It is known that existential sentences have indefinite notional

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subjects in c. 85% of all cases (cf. Quirk et al. 1985: 18.50); although I know of no similar statistics concerning /zave-sentences there is crosslinguistic evidence which supports the existence of syntactic parallelism between the two verbs. We know that languages which lack a verb meaning 'have' make use of verbs meaning 'be' instead to express possession, and vice versa, that languages lacking a verb meaning 'be' make use of verbs meaning 'have' to convey existential constructions. Thus in Russian the equivalent of / have a book is expressed by a sentence whose literal meaning is 'by me is a book'. In Serbo-Croatian the opposite holds, so that e.g. There are ghosts is conveyed by a sentence meaning 'has ghosts'. Examples from many other languages of widely different families, such as Estonian and Chinese, may be cited. On the other hand, although copular be may certainly be followed by an indefinite complement, this is not regularly the case. I am aware of no statistics here and must base this assumption on impressionistic data, but it seems that sentences like He is (not) a tall man and He is (not) the tallest man I know are equally natural and probably of similar frequency. When copular be takes a definite complement it must of course take «oi-negation, and it therefore seems likely that no such strong collocational links will be established between copular be and «o-negation as is the case with existential be and stative have. This would then serve to explain why «o-negation is less frequent with copular be than with the other two high-frequency verbs. 12 There is also some other evidence which must be examined, and which may force us to modify the hypothesis of a change from «o-negation to not-negation. In section 3, I presented only such evidence from Breivik (1983) as supported the hypothesis of such a development. However, a closer look at the atypical examples in Breivik's material, i. e. those which do not have NEG-incorporation but only ne on the verb in spite of the presence of indefinite elements in the sentence, suggests that we must also consider another hypothesis. We saw above that those existential sentences in Breivik's material which did not have NEG-incorporation were either absolutely constrained by three factors, viz. the presence of genoh, a numeral in the notional subject, and/or the ne...but(on) construction, or weakly constrained by the presence of a premodifying adjective in the noun phrase serving as notional subject. It could of course be the case, in sentences with indefinites as in the language in general, that «of-negation has simply taken over the functions which used to be served by ne in earlier periods, and

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that the sets of NEG-incorporating and non-NEG-incorporating sentence types have been relatively stable over time. What we would then be dealing with is development from "we-negation" in older English to notnegation in Modern English, not from no-negation to not-negation. This hypothesis is supported by the fact that the examples from period IV which had not-negation, (46) —(48), all had premodified noun phrases in the indefinite elements and were thus constrained by the same factor as (57) with ne. Fortunately, the two hypotheses are not mutually exclusive. It is likely that they are both correct, and that the two processes operated at different points in time. Thus, just as we know that in negative sentences without indefinites ne disappeared in Middle English and was replaced by not, it seems natural to assume that the same development took place at the same time in sentences with indefinite elements where constraints on NEG-incorporation operated. The overall change from «o-negation to floi-negation with all verb types would then have been a later development, starting when not was fully available in late Middle English or Early Modern English. Some support for this two-step hypothesis is given by Table 9, which gives a comparison between the situation in Early Modern English and Present-day English. The Early Modern English texts are drawn from the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts (cf. Kytö — Rissanen 1988) and consist of samples from law, secular instruction, religious instruction, narrative, travel, fiction, plays, trials and private letters from 1640 — 1710. They are compared with the entire spoken and written samples from LOB and LLC, thus both variable and invariable sentences. The entire samples were used for comparison because of the problems involved in assessing variability in the historical sample. It is of course difficult to compare the Helsinki Corpus with the spoken and written samples of Present-day English. The Helsinki Corpus consists predominantly of material originating in writing but also contains texts which are either designed to resemble speech, such as drama, or texts which unintentionally resemble speech in their intimate and impromptu character, such as private letters, or texts which have their origin in speech, such as trials, and which are thus all similar to spoken language along various dimensions of variation (cf. Biber 1988; Biber —Finegan 1988). However, because of the predominance of archetypically written texts, the whole Helsinki sample is closer to the written sample of the Present-day English material than to the spoken sample.

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Table 9. The use of no-negation in sentences with indefinite complements in Book III of the Early Modern English sample in the Helsinki Corpus (1640 — 1710), consisting of texts from law, secular instruction, religious instruction, narrative, travel, fiction, plays, trials and private letters, and the whole spoken and written samples from LOB and LLC Helsinki Existential be Stative have Copular be Lexical verbs

50/54 50/62 34/64 117/252

93% 81% 53% 46%

LOB: written

LLC: spoken

111/113 48/50 36/39 85/184

35/40 21/33 14/72 27/137

98% 96% 36% 46%

88% 64% 19% 20%

Given these caveats, the general impression of Table 9 is that Early Modern English had reached more or less the same stage of development as the written Present-day English sample, but that, under the hypothesis of a development from «o-negation to no/-negation, the Helsinki Early Modern English sample is somewhat less conservative than the written Present-day English sample, in that the proportion of «o-negation is a little lower with existential ^-sentences and /zave-sentences than in the LOB sample. This would only be natural, given the "spoken" character of parts of the Helsinki material. On the other hand, the Helsinki sample has more no-negation in copular 6e-sentences, and is thus more conservative in this respect. The most "advanced" stage, under the same hypothesis, is that shown in the Present-day English spoken sample, with only 19% and 20% «o-negation in sentences with copular be and lexical verbs, respectively, compared with 53% and 46% in the Helsinki Corpus sample. This could indicate that there has been a development from no-negation to «oi-negation between the late seventeenth century and the present day. One objection to this interpretation of the data is of course that we do not know how a pure spoken sample from 1640 — 1710 would look. There may well have been much more not-negation with copular be and lexical verbs in speech than in the available mixed sample from the Helsinki Corpus, and it is conceivable that lexical verbs and copular be had already by then undergone a change from negation by means of ne to negation by means of not. However, Shanklin (1988) strongly supports the hypothesis that there has been development from no-negation to not-negation during the Modern English period. Shanklin demonstrates that in 11,000 lines of Middle English poetry taken from the Gawain poet and Chaucer, constructions with NEG-incorporation dominated heavily, and also that in sentences

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without NEG-incorporation, verb negation by means of ne collocated only, in a small number of instances, with the indefinite article or numeral ajoon and only once with any.13 Shanklin's material is taken only from poetry, and especially the evidence from the alliterative metre of the Gawain poet must be regarded with some circumspection as alliteration would have favoured ne plus a negative determiner rather than any, but the Chaucer evidence supports that from the Gawain group. Even if Shanklin's material is restricted to poetry, it must have been the case that verb negation with ne in sentences with indefinites was extremely unusual in Middle English, whereas we know that it is frequent in Present-day English. We may thus conclude that there has been a change from «o-negation to not-negation in the Modern English period, and that it has affected different verb types to different degrees, i. e. that there has been lexical diffusion. It seems probable that this could be linked to the use of different types of negation with different types of verbs in the earlier periods of the language (cf. Tottie forthcoming), something which has yet to be demonstrated. More work needs to be done. Notes 1. I thank Matti Rissanen for giving me access to the Helsinki Corpus of English Texts and Merja Kytö for giving me assistance in using the Corpus. I have benefited f r o m comments by John Anderson, Leiv Egil Breivik and Matti Rissanen at the Vienna Conference, by Bill Labov at Ν WAVE 17 in Montreal, where a slightly different version of this paper was read, and from Trevor Shanklin when I presented some of the data at the University of Southern California. I am especially grateful to G o r a n Kjellmer, who read the article in manuscript and made many valuable suggestions. Any remaining mistakes or inadvertencies are my own responsibility. 2. I use the term "sentence" for simplicity, to cover any spoken or written syntactic string analysable as (subject)-verb-indefinite. 3. In fact, the written sample still remained considerably larger than the spoken one, but the distributions of the two types of negation were sufficiently different to be significant. 4. For a full account of the assessment of variability as well as of a survey of constraints, see Tottie (in press: chapters 6 — 10). 5. There is no reason to believe that frequencies differ much in British and American English. Although there is as yet n o completely lemmatised frequency dictionary of British English, a comparison between Johansson —Hofland (1989) and Kucera — Francis (1967) shows great similarity. 6. The reason for the introduction of not is not clear; it has been variously argued that its use was due to a wish to reinforce the phonetically weak ne (e. g. Jespersen), that it had specific syntactic functions, which might be summarised as appearing in nonquestions (Jack 1978 a), and that it was pragmatically motivated as an item used to convey contrast (LaBrum 1982). As pointed out to me by G ö r a n Kjellmer, it may of

464

7.

8. 9. 10.

11.

12.

13.

Gunnel Tottie course also initially have been due to the almost universal tendency to reinforce the negative meaning by means of multiple negation. The only work known to me that addresses the problem of indefinites in negative sentences in a diachronic perspective is Shanklin (1988), which was written with a somewhat different purpose in view, viz. the study of negative polarity items. Shanklin's paper was written at exactly the same time as the present article and I can therefore only refer to a few of the most salient points here. Editors have sometimes (unnecessarily, according to Mitchell) emended anigra to ncenigra. Chaucer did use noi-negation in existential sentences, as shown by Shanklin (1988). This is still a late development and does not invalidate the present argument. Shanklin's survey of negative existentials in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde (1988: 38) provides corroboration of my figures based on Breivik's material. In Troilus and Criseyde, 30/43 sentences had only NEG-incorporation. 7/43 had ne + NEG-incorporation, and 3/43 either ne + a or ne + oon; thus 37/43 or 86% had NEG-incorporation. Nawiht is of course etymologically the same word as not, but it functions as a pronoun rather than a negative adverb in (38). This instance must therefore be classified as an instance of NEG-incorporation or no-negation rather than nof-negation. Göran Kjellmer has suggested (personal communication) that «o/-negation could also have been favoured with be as copula because it is the more neutral, less marked variant in pairs where semantic equivalence is lacking, as in He is not a teacher vs. He is no teacher. However, this distinction needs to be made much more rarely than the discussion of the phenomenon in the grammatical literature would lead one to believe: most of the cases in my samples were of the type seen in (11) and (12), with no semantic difference between variants. Frequency need not be determinative of course, but this will probably have to remain an open question. The one instance of verb negation plus any quoted by Shanklin is from Troilus and Criseyde, book V, line 441. He fedde hem day by day, that swich noblesse, As seyden bothe the mooste and ek the leeste, Was nevere er that day wist at any feste. Notice that the last line would scan as well with no instead of any. One should of course be wary of suggesting scribal change from no to any, although it would fit the linguistic facts very well. I am grateful to Alan Renoir for discussing this point with me.

Primary

sources

The Lancaster—Oslo/Bergen Corpus of British English, for use with digital computers (LOB). Bergen: The Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities. The London — Lund Corpus of Spoken English (LLC). The Helsinki Corpus of English Texts.

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References Aitchison, Jean 1987 Words in the mind. Oxford: Blackwell. Biber, Douglas 1988 Variation across speech and writing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Biber, Douglas — Edward Finegan 1988 "Drift in three English genres from the 18th to the 20th centuries: a multidimensional approach", in: Merja Kytö — Ossi Ihalainen —Matti Rissanen (eds.), Corpus linguistics, hard and soft. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 83—101. Breivik, Leiv Egil 1983 Existential there. A synchronic and diachronic study. (Studia Anglica Norvegica 2) Bergen: University of Bergen. Chafe, Wallace 1982 "Integration and involvement in speaking, writing, and oral literature", in: Deborah Tannen (ed.), Spoken and written language. Norwood, N. J.: Ablex, 35-53. Denison, David 1985 "Why Old English had no prepositional passive", English Studies 66: 189-204. Ellegärd, Alvar 1953 The auxiliary do. The establishment and regulation of its use in English. (Gothenburg Studies in English 2) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. Fischer, Olga C. M. —Frederike C. van der Leek 1983 "The demise of the Old English impersonal construction", Journal of Linguistics 19: 3 3 7 - 3 6 8 . Firth, J. Robert 1968 "A synopsis of linguistic theory, 1930 — 55", in: Frank Robert Palmer (ed.), [1957] Selected papers of J. R. Firth 1952 — 59. (Longman's Linguistic Library) London —Harlow: Longman, 168 — 209. Francis, W. Nelson —Henry Kucera 1982 Frequency analysis of English usage. Boston: Houghton — Mifflin. Hogg, Richard In press "Negation in English: synchronic structure and diachronic change", in: Paul Valentin (ed.), Aspects of negation in the Germanic languages. Amsterdam: Benjamins. Jack, George B. 1978 a "Negative adverbs in early Middle English", English Studies 59: 295 — 309. 1978 b "Negation in later Middle English", Archivum Linguisticum 9 (New series): 58-72. Jespersen, Otto 1917 Negation in English and other languages. (Historisk-filologiske Meddelelser udgivet af det kgl. Danske Videnskabernes Selskab 1/5) Copenhagen: Ejnar Munksgaard. Johansson, Stig —Knut Hofland 1989 Frequency analysis of English vocabulary and grammar I—II. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

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Kjellmer, Goran 1982 "Some problems relating to the study of collocations in the Brown Corpus", in: Stig Johansson (ed.), Computer corpora in English language research. Bergen: Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities, 25 — 33. Klima, Edward 1964 "Negation in English", in: Jerry A. Fodor —Jerrold J. Katz (eds.), The structure of language. Englewood Cliffs, N. J.: Prentice Hall, 246 — 323. Kucera, Henry—W. Nelson Francis 1967 Computational analysis of Present-day American English. Providence, R. I.: Brown University Press. Kytö, Merja—Matti Rissanen 1988 "The Helsinki Corpus of English Texts: classifying and coding the diachronic part", in: Merja Kytö — Ossi Ihalainen — Matti Rissanen (eds.), Corpus linguistics, hard and soft. Amsterdam: Rodopi, 169 — 177. Labov, William 1981 "Resolving the Neogrammarian controversy", Language 57: 267 — 308. LaBrum, Rebecca 1982 Conditions on double negation in the history of English with comparison to similar developments in German. [Unpublished Ph. D. dissertation, Stanford University.] Lightfoot, David 1979 Principles of diachronic syntax. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 1986 Review of Jacek Fisiak (ed.) 1984, Historical syntax. Berlin: Mouton, in: Language 62: 4 3 9 - 4 4 2 . Poldauf, Ivan 1964 "Some points on negation in colloquial English", in: Josef Vachek (ed.), A [1947]

Prague school reader in linguistics. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. 366 — 374. [Previously published in Prague Studies in English 1947.] Mitchell, Bruce 1985 Old English syntax. 2 vols. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Mustanoja, Tauno F. 1960 A Middle English syntax. Part 1. [Memoires de la societe neophilologique de Helsinki 23] Helsinki. Quirk, Randolph — Sidney Greenbaum — Geoffrey Leech —Jan Svartvik 1985 A comprehensive grammar of the English language. London: Longman. Rohde, D. 1872 Das Hülfszeitwort 'to do' bei Shakespeare. [Ph. D. dissertation, University of Göttingen.] Ryden, Mats 1979 An introduction to the historical study of English syntax. (Stockholm Studies in English 51) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. Shanklin, M. Trevor 1988 The grammar of negation in Middle English. [Unpublished MS, Department of Linguistics, University of Southern California.] Svartvik, Jan — Randolph Quirk (eds.) 1980 A corpus of English conversation. Lund: Gleerup.

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Tottie, Gunnel 1978 "Idioms with have? An experimental study of negative sentences with have in British and American English", in: Mats Ryden — Lennart Björk (eds.), Studies in English philology, linguistics and literature presented to Alarik Rynell 7 March 1978. (Stockholm Studies in English 46) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell, 151-169. In press Negation in English speech and writing. A study in variation. New York: Academic Press. Forthcoming "NEG-incorporation in English: a diachronic perspective." Traugott, Elizabeth Closs 1972 A history of English syntax. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Wang, William S.-Y. (ed.) 1977 The lexicon in phonological change. The Hague: Mouton. Wang, William S.-Y. — Chin-Chuang Cheng 1977 "Implementation of phonological change: The Shuang-Feng Chinese case", in: William S.-Y. Wang (ed.), 148-158.

On the stylistic basis of syntactic change Susan M. Wright

1. Introduction In the variationist studies which have characterised the field of English historical linguistics over the last decade, the term "style" seems to have generated a great deal of argument, redefinition and refinement (cf. for instance the role of the work which culminates in the 1985 issue of Folia Linguistica Historica and the paper on style in socio-historical linguistics by Traugott — Romaine introducing that work). The position of (sociolinguistic) style in distinguishing text types and defining corpora has been central in historical studies of verb syntax (as well as in studies of relativisation and adverbials) notably in the work of the Helsinki school and Ingrid Tieken, among others. Another different use of the notion "style" has occurred in the work of Stein, who is concerned to analyse the relation between text type and syntactic change within a discourse-analytic framework, thus using style rather more narrowly or locally than the others mentioned. In this paper I consider the use of style from a perspective which subsumes both its methodological adaptation from variationist sociolinguistics, as well as its (sometimes vague) invocation from literary stylistics. This paper is a return to the subject of style, discourse and the rise of dummy do. Previously (cf. Wright 1990), I had tried to trace the emergence of the nascent auxiliary from the bleached remains of causative do by looking at three fifteenth century texts — all different. One important objection to this treatment is provided by Denison (1985), who shows that the dummy auxiliary was already beginning to appear (albeit sporadically) in the course of the thirteenth century. Consequently, one task was to assess the different effects of the various guises of the verb do in the spread and subsequent establishment of the so-called "nice" properties of the dummy verb. Some cogent criticisms of my methodology were also offered from a sociohistorical perspective — that the parameters of types of discourse, author and geographical provenience, for instance, were all different, and so there was no way to assess whether the differences in the uses of do are idiosyncratic to the authors, their sex, their geographical origin or the types of texts they produce. This criticism is right, but my aim was one which did not hinge

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solely on a classificatory notion of text-type, but on the careful analysis of the relationship between textual concerns — informative, persuasive, confessional, phatic — and the occurrence of do. It seemed to me then that the criteria used to define the texts in this way were rather more important than those focussed in the criticism. What did emerge quite clearly, was that the term "style" seems to be applied too vaguely and loosely to be useful for its rigorous application in sociohistorical linguistics. Style provides a basis for examining a syntactic construction which appears to behave in different ways in different (con)texts. That is, if a text determines the pattern of variation in any way, what aspects of the text condition a particular use, and how do they do this? I wanted to interpret the notion "style" as a dynamic phenomenon: as a flexible interactive, speaker-dependent strategy. In this view, "style" is adopted to effect a particular communicative intention on the part of the speaker; and it becomes a defining property of the text which is the consequence. And eventually, it becomes a convention which can be described as typical of the genre established by the multiplicity of similar texts. At a general level, this interest involves approaching "style" yet again, and considering two things in the light of the criticism mentioned: its adoption as a variable in the quantitative methodology of sociohistorical linguistics; and its more local use, derived from literary studies (in the sense of "stylistics"). These concerns are not incompatible, and indeed, they have often been hinted at in the work mentioned. It is perhaps time though to explore their connections. My aim in this paper is to argue that the use of "dummy" auxiliary do in Malory's Morte Darthur is closer to the use of anaphoric do than to causative do. Serious, close and open-minded (and -hearted) investigation of the combination of intra- and extra-linguistic factors which make up the notion style is crucial in studying syntactic change. Full consideration of the structural properties of genre as well as the rhetorical features used to shape specific aspects of the text can lead to the articulation of a stylistic basis for syntactic change.

2. Style as context The stylistic basis of syntactic change is usually taken to refer to the complex context in which change occurs. In sociohistorical linguistics, this context is made up of or defined by variables which are accorded more or less importance. Some used are the following:

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M E D I U M : cf. Tieken's (1987) media writing, speech in writing, speech; MODE: cf. Nevalainen (1982), Kytö - Rissanen (1983), Tieken (1987, 1988), Romaine (1982), etc., who use the continuum of oral > literate modes; G E N R E : this is probably the most broadly interpreted, and therefore most problematic variable; cf. Romaine, Tieken: prose vs. poetry; fiction vs. non-fiction; narrative vs. commentary; etc.; LEVEL O F FORMALITY: one of the earliest and most enduring variables used, adopted from Labovian sociolinguistics, but frequently too broadly used and applied at different levels. In addition, there are variables adapted from synchronic sociolinguistics: setting and participant relationship. It is clear that none of these criteria is absolutely independent of any of the others. Kytö — Rissanen (1983: 471) deal with what they term the "combined effect and hierarchy of various intra- and extra-linguistic factors", which include, within an individual text, syntactic context, shade of meaning, arrangement of new and given information, as well as changes of "style" and type of presentation. Extra-linguistic factors include attitude, subject-matter, regional dialect. Basing their organisation of text-types on the Labovian continuum from informal > formal (which translates from one of the central concerns of sociohistorical linguists to approach the reconstruction of spoken language; cf. Tieken's use of the continuum of oral > literate), they distinguish between texts in terms of markedness too. This factor distinguishes between more or less "conscious" levels of formality. A problem with the distinction of texts as formal or informal is the danger of circular reasoning. And they observe that a text may be classified as informal because it contains forms typical of informal language; on the other hand, these forms may be regarded as typical of informal language because they occur in texts classified as informal ( K y t ö - R i s s a n e n 1983: 474).

Kytö — Rissanen argue that this risk can be reduced if the labelling of the style of the texts is based, at least in part, on extralinguistic factors, such as the situation of the communication, the purpose of the text, and the relationship that exists between the writer and reader. Another way of expressing this would be to suggest the division of texts using everyday labels. This kind of consideration has led to the programmatic statement on style by Traugott — Romaine (1985), which has been adopted as a manifesto for treatments of syntactic change from a variationist/sociohistorical perspective. Style is then

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primarily ... a relationship between participants in speech events who, as individuals, negotiate speech acts and thereby create "styles" strategically, ... [Thus] there is ultimately no such thing as "saying the same thing in stylistically different ways", since each choice is (socially) marked or unmarked in terms of speaker/hearer expectation in a given situation (Traugott-Romaine 1985: 29).

This statement encourages the integration of two types of strategic shift: i. e. variation of purpose, presentation, setting, topic (and formality levels) within any given text with the more categorical or classificatory variation that we associate with the distinction between texts. However, perhaps because this statement is programmatic, it is still very broad, requiring adaptation and refinement each time it is used. The question is whether it is possible to consider, within the ambit of the methodology and perspective of sociohistorical linguistics, problems within texts of the variability of syntactic features which appear vulnerable and unstable in the flux of change in relation to other texts.

3. So to do As illustration of how a complex notion of style can be used in explaining contrast, and perhaps change in syntax, I'll examine the different guises of do in Malory. In previous work on the relation between the decline of causative do and the rise of periphrastic do in the fifteenth century, I looked at texts which I considered to be distinguished principally by the nature of the audience (i. e. participant relationship) and communicative purpose (phatic, self-expressive, narrative) (Wright 1987). My principal claim was that the nascent do auxiliary seemed to be regulated (or better, chosen) as part of a discourse strategy to focus particular aspects of the narrative event. This claim echoed Stein's (1985) thesis that do appears to serve a narrative point in sixteenth century prose texts (e. g. in Greene and Nashe) as part of a communicative strategy in the structure of discourse. A major salient criticism made of this previous treatment was that I had essentially accepted Ellegärd's (1953) causative origin for auxiliary do as an a priori assumption, though the question of origin is still by no means settled. And I had then (blithely) tried to deal with the relation between causative do and dummy do as the latter occurs in Malory. It is clear that adherence to Ellegärd's theory of origin is independent of this interpretation of the use of the new dummy do, not least because the dummy verb first appears in the course of the thirteenth

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century (Denison 1985). Yet the question of the relationship between the dummy verb, anaphoric do and the causative, and the gradual spread and generalisation of the dummy remain. So I have returned to the Malory corpus, with the aim of trying to get at the problem of the use of auxiliary do as part of "the style" of Malory's tales about Arthur, and through this, some understanding of the mechanisms of its spread.

3.1. The text My corpus comprises dialogue (40 000 words) and non-dialogue (70 000 words) from Books I, II, III, IV, VI and VII.' The separation of the text into these two "genres" of dialogue and non-dialogue is an application of the dynamic notion of style discussed in the last section — its application can range from the delineation of variants within a text to their delineation across (entirely different) texts. I used the Vinaver edition [1967] and have been guided by his division of the text into speech and non-speech through the specification of quotation marks. I have not used instances of indirect speech at all, though it does occur. The genres of dialogue and non-dialogue reflect or represent two linguistic varieties or text-types in the repertoire of one writer. Clearly, the two types do not correspond directly with speech and writing (e. g. in terms of Tieken's media). But they can, with caution, be treated as two categories which subsume distinct combinations of labels like media, mode, etc. Thus Malory's dialogue as a representation of speech (within the prose romance frame) can be treated as more oral than literate, more commentary than narrative, more interpersonal than informative, and more colloquial than formal. On the other hand, the non-dialogue can be expected to have features which in comparison, are more literate, more narrative and informative, and more formal. 2 The most pervasive element of the non-dialogue narrative part of my corpus is paratactic syntax — simple declarative sentences, or collocations of coordinate main clauses, expressing a sequence of actions, perceptions or facts. Other structural traits — repetition and ellipsis (together with anacolouthon and sequence of persons and tenses) dominate Malory's narrative style. The iconic matching of narrative with events represented is further preserved through the scarcity of periphrastic verb syntax (like the progressive — cf. Wright (forthcoming)) to background and foreground events. Dialogue appears to exhibit more range in terms of syntax (including interrogatives, imperatives, vocatives) and variation (in com-

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municative intent — tone) than the narrative. The characters are not individualised as personalities by their language — they are simply distinguished as types (knights and non-knights). The most notable features of the knights' speeches are their brevity, their tendency toward understatement, and their use of stock formulas. 3 But these characteristics do not mean that the dialogue is not "speechlike". The speech given to other characters (for instance, the language of Lady Lyonet, Sir Gareth's companion in Book VII) is far less restricted and rigid than that of the knights. There are also features which are associated with speech rather than writing. These happen too to be colloquial markers — intensifies, oaths and proverbs occur, as well as vocatives and the use of repetition. While the vocabulary of the actors in the tales does not generally vary, there is one very powerful indicator of the variability occurring in the dialogue, signalling shifts of tone, character. This is the complex social and emotional shifts in the use of the thou/you forms of the second person pronoun. 4

4. Uses of do Table 1 provides the relative frequency of do as a causative, as an anaphoric/substitute verb, and as an auxiliary "dummy" verb in the two genres of dialogue and narrative in Malory's Morte Darthur. I have distinguished between these guises of do using mainly formal linguistic criteria: Causative do has the syntactic properties of a main lexical verb, inflecting for tense, patterning with modal verbs and the perfect construction. It can (optionally) take a NP object, whose semantic role (CAUSEE) is assigned by the lexical content of do. The grammatical and semantic subcategorisation of causative do is represented as follows: NP AGENT

do [ + infl] CAUSE

NP' [ + obj] CAUSEE (optional)

s [pro'

V X] [infin] ACTIVITY

Anaphoric or substitute do has the syntactic properties of a main verb, inflecting for tense, and patterning with modals and the perfect. It has no distinct lexical content, but has its meaning supplied by the lexical content of its antecedent (the main verb it substitutes or replaces) in the

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immediately preceding or other closely contiguous clause (Halliday 1985: 300). These properties give it a cohesive function in text, contributing to the establishment of semantic structural relationships between clauses and clause complexes. 5 It frequently combines with so, to explicitly indicate ellipsis of clausal detail (following do): χ did so, or to conjoin the elliptical or substitute clause containing do with its antecedent clause: so do x, so χ did. Auxiliary (so-called dummy) do is a tense-carrier in interrogative and negative clauses in the absence of other auxiliary elements (modals, the perfect and the progressive constructions) in Present-day English (sometimes referred to as its "regulated" use — Barber 1976); and in declaratives too, in earlier stages of the language: declarative N P do V [infl]

interrogative do N P V? [infl]

negative N P do NEG V [infl] not never

I have included all these contexts for examination. Table 1: Frequency of do in Malory types of do

Dialogue 40 000 words

Non-Dialogue 70 000 words

do (causative: NP do NP V) do (anaphoric: N P V . . . N P do') do (auxiliary: NP do V)

1 32 5

1 33 8

4.1. Causative do Causative do occurs only twice in the entire corpus — once in the dialogue and once in the narrative. Because it is so infrequent, let's consider each instance. The dialogue use of causative do collocates with wete 'know'. The causative combines with a modal (myght) and the perfect in a complex verb phrase. There is an overt causee argument, the pronoun me. The whole could be paraphrased as 'you could have given me to know' or more idiomatically 'you could have let me know'. The modern idiom has its reflex in Malory. The most common causative in Malory is let(t)e, collocating most frequently with wete in the dialogue (the pattern let(t)e me/the wete occurs no fewer than eight times).

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(1)

'Also sistir, mesemyth ye myght have done me to wete of hys commynge, and than, if I had nat done well to hym, ye myght have blamed me.' (Book VII: 339: 1 9 - 2 5 )

The verb do here seems unambiguously causative, with the syntactic properties of a full lexical verb. The narrative instance (example (2)) of causative do is similarly unambiguous — in both semantic and syntactic terms. I quote the entire passage to illustrate how the content confirms a causative reading. (2)

And there he tolde how Arthure and the two kyngis had spedde at the gret batayle, and how hyt was ended, and tolde the namys of every kynge and knyght of worship that was there. And so Bloyse wrote the batayle worde by worde as Merlion tolde hym, how hit began and by whom, and in lyke wyse how hit was ended and who had the worst. And all the batayles that were done in Arthurs dayes, Merlion dud hys Mayster Bloyse wryte them. (Book I: 37:30 — 38:2)

The relationship between Merlin and Bloyse is explicitly described before its reference through the causative — Merlin dictating his account of the battle to Bloyse who writes it down. The combination of do and wryte is a common collocation in the fifteenth century, found in both Margaret Paston's letters and in the Book of Margery Kempe (cf. Wright 1990 for further discussion). The verb wryte collocates three times with the most common causative let(t)e in the narrative part of my corpus. 6 Both of these occurrences of what I have identified as causative do are unproblematic. 7 The other causatives let(t)e, make and cause are far more frequent (cf. Table 2), in both narrative and dialogue. Table 2. Total frequency of causatives in dialogue and narrative Causative verbs

Dialogue

do make cause let(t)e

1 6 12 35

1 33 1 68

TOTAL

54

103

Narrative

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4.2. Anaphoric do Overall, do occurs more frequently in Malory as an anaphoric or substitute verb than as a causative or auxiliary. Table 3 shows the frequency and distribution of anaphoric do in terms of the kinds of constructions it occurs in. Table 3. Frequency and distribution of anaphoric do: Dialogue (40 000 words)

Non-Dialogue (70 000 words)

NEGATIVE (never, not, no more) EVER did χ Do-so ( = thus) fx did so] So ( = also) Do [so did x/so χ did] Comparative [as/than χ did] Conditional [andjif χ did] Others

3 1 6 2 13 4 3

0 2 2 11 15 0 2

Total

32

32

I have grouped them according to their linguistic contexts. In the narrative part of the corpus, the largest group is made up of "comparative" structures, headed by as or by lexical indicators of comparison: (3)

a. But all men of worship seyde hit was myrry to be under such a chyfftayne that wolde putte hys person in adventure as other poure knyghtes ded. (54: 1 8 - 2 0 ) b. For there was no knyght that sir Gareth loved so well as he dud sir Launcelot ... (Book VII: 360: 2 9 - 3 0 ) c. And than the may den Lynet com to sir Bewmaynes and unarmed him and serched his woundis and staunched the blood, and in lyke wyse she dud to the Rede Knyght of the Rede Laundis. (Book VII: 326: 3 - 6 )

Each of these comparative clauses sets up a relation of contrast with the preceding clause, using the simple (paratactic) syntax of adjunction. The verb do combined with the comparative adjunct explicitly signals the extension of the reference introduced in the preceding clause. The fusion of comparison and anaphora contributes to textual cohesion, providing a means of supplying detail without full repetition. The effect of the sparse syntactic frame is to give prominence to the substance of the

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comparison. The second major grouping in terms of frequency is the combination of so + do ('also') e. g. and so the pore man dud (100: 17). An extended example is: (4)

'Ye sey well', seyde kynge Nentres. So seyde the Kynge with the Hondred Knyghtes; the same seyd kynge Carados and kynge Uryens; so seyde kynge Idres and kynge Brandegoris; so dud kyng Cradilmasse and the duke of Canbenet; the same seyd kynge Claryaunce, and so dud kynge Angwysshaunce ... (Book I: 35: 24 — 28)

This so do phrase forms part of the paratactic structure of the narrative. The function of so is essentially elaborative; it is a conjunction linking a clause complex with a clause which provides an extension of the action. Its own cohesive role in this passage is quite clear in its collocation with say. And combined with do, so provides a means of adding detail while avoiding repetition in a passage which is a loose concatenation of simple elliptical clauses by conjunction. So it has a textual, more specifically cohesive function in narrative. Anaphoric do in the so do phrase is exploited far less frequently in the dialogue (2 instances in 40 000 words). The substitute verb do does however, occur more frequently in negatives and conditionals in the dialogue than in the narrative. Dialogue also contains more instances of anaphoric do with following so than the narrative does. In this do so expression — paraphrased loosely as 'do thus' — so shares the anaphoric load significantly, overtly indicating ellipsis of clausal material while the substitute verb carries grammatical information relating to mood and tense. This is crucial for the recovery of the appropriate antecedent material. An example of the use of this expression is Lancelot's response to Arthur in the following: (5)

'Hit semyth by you', seyde kynge Arthure, 'that ye know his name andfrome whens he com'. Ί suppose I do so', seyde sir Launcelot, 'or ellys I wolde not have yeffyn hym the hyghe Order of Knyghthode ...' (Book VII: 326: 26-29)

The contexts of anaphoric do in the dialogue are slightly different from the narrative. In the dialogue for example, do is used to link the utterances of different characters. Apart from helping to set up a chain of reference (to a particular topic or theme), its use contributes to the presentation of the verbal interaction as cohesive dialogue, as conversational exchange

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rather than sequences of unrelated turns. In the narrative, anaphoric do is used to contribute to the cohesion of loosely (paratactically) linked elaborating and extending clauses. Effectively, its substitute role to mark the ellipsis of material helps to focus on the action, in a framework which has limited syntactic means for distinguishing between focussing action relative to detail. 4.3. Auxiliary do The dummy auxiliary do occurs infrequently in my corpus of Malory (cf. above Table 1). Elsewhere, I have argued that the occurrence of the dummy in narrative marked its development in a "resumptive" or "focussing" textual role in the narrative (Wright 1990). This is akin to the role accorded do by Dieter Stein in his (1985) treatment of sjth forms and do in sixteenth century prose. The instances I found of auxiliary do are not evenly distributed through the corpus, but tend to be bunched together. So no fewer than 8 of the total 13 instances occur in the longest tale, of Sir Gareth ('Bewmaynes'). 8 The remainder — one narrative (Book III) and two dialogues (Book IV) — occur earlier than the others. 4.3.1. Do in dialogue To seriously assess the status of the occurrences of auxiliary or "dummy" do I want to examine the discourse contexts in which they occur. That is, I consider the intra-linguistic factors, the internal "style", which provide the setting for the auxiliary do. The dialogue instances can all be interpreted as being marked in some way. I do not use this term in the sense of Rissanen — Kytö (1983), but in a manner following more traditional linguistic usage (cf. Lyons 1968: 79 ff.), where "[t]he intuition behind ... markedness ... is that, where we have an opposition between two or more members ..., it is often the case that one member ... is felt to be more usual, more normal, less specific than the other (in markedness terminology it is unmarked, the others marked)" (Comrie 1976: 111). Only one is used in a straightforward declarative affirmative mode (340: 17). It is used by a woman, and is a comment on her son's treatment at the hands of another knight: (6)

But I mervayle ... that sir Kay dud mok and scorne hym and gaff hym to name Bewmaynes; yet sir Kay ... named hym more ryghteously than he wende ... (Book VII: 340: 1 7 - 1 8 )

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The structure of this speech consists of the simple concatenation of propositions by conjunctions and complementisers. Yet it is emotive in tone. Its impact is partly achieved by the lexical doublet mak and scorne. The device of lexical repetition is a common strategy in fifteenth and sixteenth century writing for creating emphasis and attracting attention to a key point (see Field 1971: 77). However, the generally "flat" or simple cumulative conjunction of words does not provide a structural frame for distinguishing the doublet from any other conjoined phrases. In this context, the use of the dummy do could be construed as contributing to the prominence or focus of the doublet as an emphatic expression, by setting it apart from the following conjoined clause. The markedness of this instance lies in the tone characterising the utterance, providing a highly emotive frame. One instance is used in a negative assertion in a highly emotive speech, spoken also by a woman. This speech, like the previous one, also contains overt indicators of emphasis and heightened emotion. In addition to lexical repetition for prominence (com ... of jantyll bloode) and the adverbial doublet so fowle and shamfully, the speaker has the emotive oath A, Jesu! The fact that auxiliary do is embedded in structures characterised by these rhetorical elements suggests strongly that it is not intended to function solely as a syntactic operator, but as part of the rhetoric of emphasis, or to use Stein's term, intensity. (7)

A, Jesu! mervayle have I ... what maner a man ye be, for hit may never be other but that ye be com of jantyll bloode, for so fowle and shamfully dud never woman revyle a knyght as I have done you, and ever curteysly ye have suffyrde me, and that com never but of jantyll bloode ... (Book VII: 312: 3 2 - 3 6 ) 9

There is one instance of auxiliary do used in the interrogative. This was emended by Caxton, incidentally, who excised the do to provide the older (more formal and literary?): 'Ector knowest thow in thys countrey only adventures that ben here nyghe hand'. The version in the Winchester manuscript reads: (8)

Fayre felow ... doste thou know this contrey or ony adventures that bene nyghe here honde? (254: 32 — 33)

This question is used by a knight to talk to a common man. Note that the socially marked thou form of the second person pronoun is used, but

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it is not abusive — the knight uses a polite mode of address in the phrase fayre felow. The point of this observation is that it supports (albeit tentatively) the suggestion that the periphrastic question form reinforces the markedness of the speech situation. Since the auxiliary is used in rhetorically marked contexts in the dialogue (see further below), it is possible that use of do here reflects the knight's concern to express himself in the most explicit manner to his interlocutor who is clearly his social inferior. The two remaining uses of do in the dialogue are interesting. One occurs yet again in the speech of a woman, as part of a threat to Sir Lancelot that unless he gives up his sword, he will never see Guinevere again. The speaker is a wicked damsel: (9)

No ... and thou dyddeste leve that swerde quene Gwenyvere should thou never se (281: 1 — 2)

The emphatic tone of this utterance is registered in the rhetorical balance created by the verbs dyddeste and shold in the conditional and consequent clauses. The periphrastic expression shold thou never se is itself a strong expression, the force of the modal being highlighted by the do periphrasis which seems to carry the strength of the threatening tone of the conditional (certainly in metrical terms at least). Notice that the woman addresses Sir Lancelot as thou (twice), whereas he, ever the gentil knight, uses you exclusively. The use of thou for the second person could be interpreted as signalling the individuality of the speaker and her relationship with the knight. The remaining instance of auxiliary do seems to be closely related to the anaphoric do so expression (cf. above). Essentially, the speaker adds the lexical verb attende 'lie in wait' to a clause which has do serving an anaphoric function in a comparative clause. The infinitive clause following attende does not contain new information. There is some elaboration (distinguishing Sir Perys' victims from Terquyn's), and the repetition provides essentially contrastive emphasis. The inclusion of the paraphrase verb attende after (functionally anaphoric) do prevents the potential syntactic (and rhythmic) awkwardness which could result from the ellipsis (and consequent hiatus) of the lexical verb. The complex verb phrase immediately following this knight seems to have been added to make the substance of the contrast more explicit. The effect is to focus on the clause initial position of the verb do and the foregrounding of the agent the knight. Consequently, the activity ascribed to this knyght is emphasised in contrast to the agent in the comparative clause:

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(10) 'That is trouthe', seyde the damesell, for lyke as Terquyn wacched to dystresse good knyghtes, so dud this knyght attende ['lie in wait'] to destroy and dystress ladyes, damesels and jantyllwomen; and his name was sir Perys de Foreste Savage' (Book VI: 270: 9 — 13) Each occurrence of the auxiliary do identifies the dialogue as special or remarkable in some way — either signposting the speaker (a woman, not a knight), the emotive content of the utterance, or, on the linguistic level, the prominence of a sentence construction (negative, question). The speaker/hearer relationship might be construed as being particularly significant in accounting for the use of do. In each case, the relationship is unequal. The use of do in the question is addressed by a knight, but to a common man. Just as he adjusts the form of the second person pronoun, it is feasible to speculate that he adopts do for the same purpose — to speak in a plain register accommodating to his addressee. In the other cases, the speaker is a woman addressing a knight (in emotive language). It is not unreasonable to suggest that the use of the auxiliary do in the women's speeches contributes to their delineation as individual characters. Unlike Malory's knights who are cast as a type reflecting the qualities of ideal knighthood, his women are characters whose language is licensed, giving them variety of tone, formality and emotional range. Consequently, the occurrence of do in these marked emotive speeches seems to be rhetorically motivated. 4.3.2. Do in narrative In contrast with the speaker-oriented rhetorical function of do in dialogue, each of the uses of auxiliary do in the narrative has a particular discoursestructural role quite similar to the cohesive effect of the use of do as a substitute verb. (11) So they let their horsis renne, and there sir Gareth smote the deuke downe frome his horse: but the deuke lyghtly avoyded his horse and dressed his shylde and drew his swerde, and bade sir Gareth alyght and fyght with him. So he dud alyght, and they dud grete batayle togedyrs more than an houre, and eythir hurte other fülle sore. But at the laste sir Gareth gate the deuke to the erthe, and wolde have slayne hym; and than he yelded hym. (Book VII: 356: 20 — 25) In this dramatic narrative, do has a resumptive narrative function in the context of its combination with a lexical verb alyght 'dismount', which

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occurs in the preceding clause. The periphrasis occurs in a consequent clause, signalled by the consequential connective so. It signals the realisation of the action commanded by the duke. Rather than anticipating action, it refers back to what has already been mentioned, and construed like this, has a cohesive role in the narrative. Its effect is to affirm or highlight the completion of the action. Stein (p. c.) concurs, pointing out that this occurrence of do is peak-marking; but he suggests that the interpretation ascribing an elaborative function to its use here is a little ad hoc. The point, however, is that I do not claim to be stating a generalisation for the discourse function of the dummy verb. Instead, it is perfectly respectable to borrow from literary criticism in attempting to arrive at the impact of the verb in a (single) text. The next instance is rather similar: (12) Than sone aftir the lady and Merlyon departed. And by weyes he shewed hir many wondyrs, and so come into Cornuayle. And allwayes he lay aboute to have hir madynhode, and she was ever passynge wery of hym for cause he was a devyls son, and she cowde not be shyfte of hym by no meane. And so one a tyme Merlyon ded show hir in a roche whereas was a grete wondir and wrought by enchauntement that wente undir a grete stone. So by hir subtyle worchyng she made Merlyon to go undir that stone to latte hir wete of the mervayles there, but she wrought so there for hym that he come never oute for all the craufte he coude do, and so she departed and leffte Merlyon. (Book IV: 126: 1 6 - 2 8 ) . [Vinaver's reading of the do clause: Merlin showed her, in a rock, a great marvel which, wrought by enchantment, was underneath a great stone.] The verb shew is used twice in this passage; first as a simple preterit verb form, and then as an infinitive in construction with tense-carrying do. The question is why does do collocate with the second instance of shew? One possibility is that the author uses the periphrastic verbal construction to avoid repeating the same pattern exactly with temporal adverbial phrase + subject + shewed. But contrast the occurrence of shew as a simple verb form with the periphrasis in terms of their positions in the text as a narrative episode. The passage could be divided into background or scene-setting, and focus on the central event — the point of the story. The use of adverbials signals the preparation for the climax — how the lady tricks Merlin. The do periphrasis has a role in structuring the

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narrative: it signposts the resumption of the narrative after the background has been presented. The other instances are also resumptive in function: (13) And anone as he was com Merlion dud make kynge Arthure that sir Gawayne was sworne ['contrived with King Arthur that sir Gawain was sworn'] to telle of hys adventure, and how he slew the lady, and how he wolde gyff no mercy unto the knyght, wherethorow the lady was slayne. (Book III: 108: 2 5 - 2 9 ) The initial temporal adverbial phrase anone as he was com anticipates the consequence of Merlin's arrival. It prepares the setting for telling what happened next — and this telling is clearly marked in the combination do + make. There is an element of causation in the verbal group, but it is supplied by make not do. The last instances dealt with all occur in the long Book VII. The next extract (14) has two uses of do in the same episode. The collocation of do with defende occurs in an elaborative clause at the end of a descriptive passage. Again, in a passage which is built up by the simple addition of enhancing and extending phrases for its descriptive impact, the use of do with an activity (rather than a descriptive) verb brings the action into the foreground. So it distinguishes the setting as background for the activity. (14) And thus they endured tyll evynsonge, that there was none that behelde them myght know whethir was lyke to wynne the batayle. And theire armoure was so forhewyn that men myght se the nakyd placis they dud defende. And the Rede Knughte was a wyly knyght in fyghtyng, and that taught Bewmaynes to be wyse, but he abought hit full sore or he did asspye ['became more familiar with'] his fyghtynge. (Book VII: 323: 1 8 - 2 5 ) The effect of these instances of do is to highlight or focus the activity aspect of predominantly descriptive clauses. They also occur in consequent clauses introduced by emphatic phrases and vocabulary (so forhewyn 'so cut up'; abought hit full sore 'paid for it in full'). The first instance could represent a strategic avoidance of the arguably more complex pluperfect 'had defended (protected)' or obligative 'had to defend (protect)' structures. The last instance (15) is set in a narrative interlude between speeches at the end of a battle between Sir Gareth and Sir Gawain. It serves as a coda to the episode. The agent is separated from

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the activity described, by an explanatory clause identifying her. 10 The effect of the auxiliary is to emphatically link the activity with the (by now rather distant) agent. Consequently, it has a resumptive function in this sentence, signalling a return to the action. (15)

Than cam the lady Savyaige, that was the lady Lyonet that rode with sir Gareth so long; and there she dud staunche sir Gareth's woundis and sir Gawayne's. (Book VII: 357: 2 9 - 3 1 )

Of the seven instances of auxiliary do encountered in the narrative section of the Malory corpus, only one occurs with the emphatic negative adverbial never. (16) And so they cam in appon sir Gareth, and so with hir sperys they slewe his horse, and than they assayled hym hard. But whan he was on foote, there was none that he raught but he gaff hym such a buffette that he dud never recover. So he slew hem by one and one tyll they were but four; and there they fledde. (Book VII: 355: 1 —3) The combination of do and never matches the pattern exhibited in the only negative use of the auxiliary in the dialogue (cf. above). Do immediately precedes the adverb. Each of the narrative (or non-dialogue) uses of auxiliary do can be interpreted as serving the structure of active episodes. They either focus the action relative to its setting, or signpost the resumption of a particular activity or narrative. The idea of resumption, referring as it does both to previous as well as consequent active parts of an episode, can be viewed as an anaphoric relation. This needs elaboration. In the sense that the auxiliary links actions as sequential aspects of a narrative episode, it can be described as having a specifically cohesive role in narrative. This function seems quite similar to the role of do as a substitute or anaphoric verb — it refers back to previous action without necessitating the repetition of the lexical verb. Now the cohesive role is strengthened and altered if, in addition to conventionally signalling the continuity (or repetition) of previous action through the substitute (anaphoric) verb, the verb identifying the action is actually repeated. The effect is one of cohesive emphasis — or heightened anaphora. In the context of the undifferentiated syntactic expression of setting and action — through parataxis — the incidence of the auxiliary and the repeated verb result in a focussing effect. Implicit in this statement is the assertion that the auxiliary do in this text can be shown to be a stylistically

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motivated offshoot of a feature whose role is defined in terms of the properties of the text itself. That is, auxiliary do represents the stylistically motivated syntactic elaboration of a cohesive feature of paratactic narrative.

5. Discussion Anaphoric do is one of the midwives in the emergence and spread of the auxiliary do. Three different guises of the verb — causative, anaphoric and dummy — occur in the Malory text. This period in the fifteenth century (Denison's phase two in the grammaticalisation of the "nice" properties of dummy do) indicates a situation of sporadic and not always clearly differentiated usage. It is conceivable that the implicational shift from anaphoric to (effectively) dummy do in this text is only possible since the auxiliary has, by this stage, an independent existence. The question which then needs to be raised concerns, inevitably, the origin of the dummy verb, and what light my analysis sheds on it. Recently, Poussa (1990) and Tieken (1988) have argued that the emergence of the dummy verb involves its "destigmatisation" in spoken language, enabling its subsequent entry into written language and its grammaticalisation. This oral hypothesis does not contradict my account of its spread as an intensity marker through discourse. Indeed, a possible generalisation (which would need to be thoroughly tested) is that the conditions for the use of the dummy verb consist essentially of communicatively marked situations or media. Consequently, if children's language (Tieken 1988), and regional dialects (cf. Tieken) can be considered to constitute marked media, as for instance the women's utterances, nondeclarative sentence constructions, etc. in Malory clearly are, then it is feasible to concur that these situations and texts provide a context for the spread and generalisation of the verb. The most important point is that the mechanism by which it spreads is its function in identifying its discourse context as marked in intensity (emotional terms), in its social frame, or, more narrowly, as marked in linguistic structure. Implicit in the analysis I have presented here is the suggestion that the nascence of auxiliary do is linked with anaphoric do. The relationship between the uses of the auxiliary and the substitute verb has been described as being determined by two notions of style: a structural one at the textual level, and a rhetorical notion serving an expressive function at a local level within the text.

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These structural and rhetorical levels can be identified in two dominant aspects of the "style" of Malory. The first is the narrative structure — paratactic syntax in an iconic representation of the sequence of events. Anaphoric or substitute do is part of the syntactic arsenal for creating cohesion in a textual framework that is essentially loose (concatenated). When the auxiliary do occurs in this syntactic setting, it does so with the effect of a heightened anaphora — combining the referential anaphoric function with foregrounding or emphatic effect as a consequence of do + a lexical verb. The second stylistic aspect is more contingent or phenomenal. It subsumes the rhetorical resources for defining, individuating and focussing on characters and their responses. So the lexical highlighting observed in the dialogue together with the use of intensifiers and repetition all contribute to the distinction of characters from stereotypes in the work. Auxiliary do appears to occur just when these resources are being used. This co-occurrence strongly suggests that the dummy was marked to the extent that its incidence contributes to the emphasis created by the rhetoric of the dialogue. The relation between them can be extended to subsume a diachronic or derivational dimension. One aspect of the establishment of the auxiliary is perhaps the formal realisation of an "implicational shift" in the cohesive function of anaphoric do in highly marked (emphatic) local contexts. So the occurrence of the anaphoric, substitute do alone is supplanted by do plus a paraphrase or repeat of a lexical verb which has occurred as the effective antecedent of the activity that the anaphor marks. The motivation for this repeat of paraphrase is cohesive in origin; for instance, if the antecedent is too far away from the anaphor for the chain of reference to remain intact, it needs to be reinforced. One way of doing this is to repeat the antecedent material, by paraphrase, extension or even simple repetition, either in addition to or instead of the anaphoric do. When repetition occurs in the former case, the substitute function of do to mark ellipsis is lost, but cohesion is retained. In this new configuration, the combination of do and a lexical verb serves to enhance and elaborate reference, culminating in an emphatic effect. The marked element in the pattern is not the lexical verb, however, but the anaphor, since its cohesive function has been displaced. The function which it then acquires is an emphatic one. This speculative conclusion is a consequence of starting my analysis in the narrowest and most local contexts without a priori assumptions about origins. So far from starting a quantitative analysis on the assumption

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that auxiliary do develops exclusively out of a bleached causative do, I decided to look closely at the functional and formal roles of the different guises of do in the text itself. Although the dummy is available in the language as a grammatical resource during the fifteenth century, its function is neither textually clear nor grammatically established. Consequently, the other guises of the lexeme do impinge upon and shape the development of the auxiliary. So consideration of style as a dynamic strategy operating on a level within text (or "genre") can clear a path for principled speculation about syntactic change. The speculation I have indulged in is essentially local — concerning the functional similarity of anaphoric do and the auxiliary in both parts of the corpus. The basic functional similarity — cohesive in narrative, highlighting in dialogue — seems to justify the suggestion that a stylistically motivated elaboration of anaphoric do results in Malory's use of auxiliary do. Notes 1. I have left Book V, the tale of King Arthur and the Emperor Lucius, out of consideration in this paper. The main reason is that Malory has apparently adhered more consistently to his source, the English alliterative Μ orte Arthur, than to his others in the other tales. The consequence is sometimes a verse-like (and aberrant in the context of the tales as a group) use of auxiliary do as an alliterative device. 2. The distinction I make is also mainly in formal terms; the descriptive prose outside the dialogue is characterised by minimal verb syntax, and in expression, of stock phrases. The commentary passages, too, are marked by formulaic linguistic signposts. From his literary stylistic perspective, Field (1971) places Malory's prose work with the fifteenth century letter-writers and chroniclers, who are particularly uncomfortable in explanation, and only at ease with the simpler syntax and given structure which is possible in narrative. They tend to avoid elaborate participial constructions, suspended clauses and passages in apposition to the main structural units of a sentence (Field 1971: 34). And he comments that though this simplicity is not without its advantages, helping to add verisimilitude ... and giving a dignified pathos ... it is nevertheless a very limited style — unsuitable for reflecting the movement of a sophisticated mind, for organising complicated material, or delivering ironic judgements, and it is doomed to extinction by the proliferation of the printed word (Field 1971: 35). Finally, Malory was writing "lay prose", "helped only by the traditions of the spoken language, and not by those extra resources which accumulate in a tradition of written prose, and which were to come to dominate in a tradition of written prose" (Field 1971: 36).

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3. Stock formulas like lete ye wete, ye say sothe, that/hit is trouthe etc. are used predominantly by Malory's knights. Of 244 found in 910 pages of dialogue, only 29 were not used by knights. 4. For detailed discussion, cf. Dillon (1969). Perhaps predictably, Malory's knights tend to use the forms in a highly structured socially prescribed way, addressing one another (even adversaries), ladies and persons of higher rank than themselves with you. They use thou to address common men and persons of lower rank. The most consistent exemplar of this tendency is Sir Lancelot — the ideal knight. Other characters exhibit much more variation. Lady Lyonet, for instance, uses thou in abuse to address Sir Gareth, but changes her mode of address and her tone when she realises he is a true knight of noble character as well as courage. 5. Ellipsis (frequently including substitution) is a lexico-grammatical resource for creating cohesion in a text, among reference, conjunction and lexical cohesion, cf. Halliday (1985: 288) for elucidation. 6. In Wright (1990), I observed that the causatives make, let, and cause were far more frequent than do in Malory. In Book V, for which Vinaver provides Caxton's edited version parallel to the Winchester MS, Caxton has do where Malory consistently uses let(e) as causative (with variously epistemic and deontic readings). 7. It is tempting to speculate that the choice of do as a causative for use in the dialogue may have been motivated by a concern to convey the scolding, emphatic tone of Arthur's speech. Since it is infrequently used in the text as a whole, it might be marked relative to let(t)e. The narrative instance might be the chance consequence of the very common collocation used to describe the role of an amanuensis/secretary in the relation between an author and his/her text. 8. The source for Malory's tale of sir Gareth is not known — there has been speculation as to whether it constitutes all Malory's own work, or whether he made use of an unattested English source. The latter is more likely. 9. For discussion of do in this negative sentence, cf. Wright (1990). 10. The lady Savyaige is the same lady Lyonet who accompanied Sir Gareth when he was known as Bewmaynes (cf. Book VII).

References Barber, Charles 1976 Early Modern English. (The Language Library) London: Deutsch. Comrie, Bernard 1976 Aspect: an introduction to the study of verbal aspect and related problems. (Cambridge Textbooks in Linguistics). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Denison, David 1985 "The origins of periphrastic do: Ellegard and Visser reconsidered", in: Roger Eaton —Olga Fischer — Willem Koopman — Frederike van der Leek (eds.), Papers from the 4th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 41) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 45 — 60. Dillon, Bert 1969 "Formal and informal pronouns of address in Malory's Le Μ orte Darthur", Annuale Mediaevale 10: 94 — 103.

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Ellegärd, Alvar 1953 The auxiliary do: the establishment and regulations of its use in English. (Gothenburg Studies in English 2) Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell. Field, P. J. C. 1971 Romance and chronicle: a study of Malory's prose style. London: Barrie & Jenkins. Halliday, Michael Alexander Kirkwood 1985 An introduction to functional grammar. London: Arnold. Kytö, Merja —Matti Rissanen 1983 "The syntactic study of early American English: the variationist at the mercy of his corpus?", Neuphilologische Mitteilungen 84: 470 — 490. Lyons, John 1968 Introduction to theoretical linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Nevalainen, Terttu 1982 "A corpus of colloquial Early Modern English for a lexico-syntactic study: evidence for consistency and variation", in: Sven Jacobson (ed.), Papers from the Second Scandinavian Symposium on Syntactic Variation. Stockholm: Almqvist and Wiksell, 1 0 9 - 1 2 2 . Poussa, Patricia 1990 "A contact-universal origin for periphrastic do, with special consideration of OE — Celtic contact", in: Sylvia Adamson — Vivien A. Law —Nigel Vincent—Susan Wright (eds.), Papers from the 5th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 65) Amsterdam: Benjamins. Rissanen, Matti 1986 "Variation and the study of English historical syntax", in: David Sankoff (ed.), Diversity and diachrony. (Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 53) Amsterdam: Benjamins, 97 — 111. Stein, Dieter 1985 "Discourse markers in Early Modern English", in: Roger Eaton—Olga Fischer—Willem Koopman — Frederike van der Leek (eds.), Papers from the 4th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics. (Current Issues in Theoretical Linguistics 41), Amsterdam: Benjamins, 283 — 302. Tieken-Boon van Ostade, Ingrid 1985 "Do-support in the writings of Lady Mary Wortley Montagu: a change in progress", Folia Linguistica Historica 6: 127—151. 1987 The auxiliary do in eighteenth-century English. A sociohistorical-linguistic approach. (Geschiedenis van de Taalkunde 6) Dordrecht-Providence: Foris. 1988 "The origin and development of periphrastic auxiliary do: a case of destigmatisation", Dutch Working Papers in English Language and Linguistics 3: 1-30. Traugott, Elizabeth Closs — Suzanne Romaine 1985 "Some questions for the definition of "style" in socio-historical linguistics", Folia Linguistica Historica 6: 7 — 39. Vinaver, Eugene (ed.) 1967 The works of Sir Thomas Malory. Vols. 1—3. (2nd edition) Oxford: Clarendon Press.

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Wright, Susan M. 1990 "Discourse, style and the rise of periphrastic do in English", Folia Linguistica Historica 10/1. forthcoming "Grammaticalisation, textual function and style: the progressive in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle", in: Suzanne Romaine — Nigel Vincent (eds.), Grammaticalisation. Oxford: Blackwell.

Index of technical terms and topics

ability 246, 248, 2 6 6 - 2 6 8 , 275, 277, 283 n.29 accusative 160, 173 accusative with infinitive 157, 158, 160, 170, 171 acquisition, see: language acquisition active infinitive 5, 141 — 186 active verb 131 actuation 234, 281 n.6 adaptive rule 397 adjective: active in sense 155 adjective: passive in sense 155, 179, 186n.36 adjectival comparison 105 adposition 51, 52, 56, 57, 73, 74, 79, 82, 84, 87 adverb 4, 51, 56, 57, 77, 80, 82, 88, 91, 95, 98, 111, 2 0 4 - 2 0 9 , 2 2 1 - 2 2 9 , 248, 292, 294, 415, 416, 420, 430 adverbial 4, 52, 77, 78, 83, 84, 89, 91, 96, 107,111, 208, 210, 211,221 - 229, 281 n.5, 292, 4 0 9 - 4 3 6 adverbial genitive 224, 226, 227 adverbial scope 409 adverbial shift 4 0 9 - 4 3 6 adverb of time 4, 221 - 2 2 9 affixal negation 446, 459 agentive verb 277 Aktionsart 305, 307 ambiguity 3 7 1 - 3 7 4 , 380, 382, 383, 398, 404n.l0 analogy 3 8 9 - 3 9 4 , 399, 400, 405n.26, 28, 421 analytical structure 105, 106, 118 analytic construction 335 analyticity 310 analytic passive infinitive 142 analytic type 448 anaphora 126, 127, 135, 136, 138, 195, 198 anaphoric do 470, 473, 474, 4 7 7 - 4 7 9 , 481, 485-488 answer 3, 1 8 9 - 2 0 0 applied linguistics 109, 117 apposition 219 n.3

appropriate answer 192 arbitrary PRO 148,149,151,152, 157-161, 165-168, 170-172, 175, 181, 182, 184n.23, 185n.28 archaism 6 arrest of development 235, 281 n.10 aspect 305, 307, 323, 345, 350, 352, 363, 364 asyndetic coordination 219 n.3 asyndetic hypotaxis 370 asyndetic parataxis 369, 402 n.4 asyndetic subordination 219 n.3 aural perception 126 aural reception 126 AUX 6, 14, 18, 27 auxiliarisation 12, 14, 15, 17, 27 auxiliary (cf. also modal) 4—7, 13 — 16, 20, 21, 23, 26, 27, 210, 2 3 3 - 2 8 3 auxiliary-marking 185n.35 background grounding 133 — 135 bare infinitive 142, 159, 162, 163, 167, 182 fte/Aave-variation 343 — 353 binding properties 165 blend 420, 421, 431 borrowing 110, 145, 182 n.6 bounding properties 165 case 4, 51, 52, 58, 105, 113-116, 119n.7, 131, 133, 151, 160, 172, 173, 183n.l5, 221-229 case assignment 172, 173 case filter 172 case frame 131, 133 case grammar 52 case-marked NP 51, 53, 5 6 - 5 8 , 78, 80, 8 2 - 8 4 , 86, 87, 98, 99 case marking 172, 173 case relation 52, 53, 58, 79, 89 case syncretism 74, 99, 105 catastrophic change 355, 365 causation 131 causative constructions 158, 171

494

Index

causative do 469, 470, 4 7 2 - 4 7 6 , 486, 488, 489 n.6,7 change from above 303, 315 child language 335 circumstantial 4, 52, 53, 55, 73, 78, 79, 84, 86, 87, 89, 91, 93, 9 5 - 9 9 circumstantial adverb 52 clauses of reason 203 — 219 cliche 458 clitics 46, 47 n.4, 7 4 - 7 7 , 80, 88, 91, 95, 96, 98, 210, 211, 218, 386, 387, 398, 399, 404 n.22, 442 cliticisation 374, 387, 394, 400,404 n.22,452, 454 cohesion 475, 477-479,482,483, 4 8 5 - 4 8 8 , 489 n.5 coindexed PRO 148,151,152,160,161, 166, 171, 175, 180, 185n.26 collocation 440, 441, 448, 4 5 8 - 4 6 0 colonial lag 6, 235, 250, 255, 258, 260, 269, 270, 280 common case 224, 225, 228, 229 communicative strategy 108 comparative clause 265, 275 — 277 complement 209 complementarity 18, 19 complementiser 76, 167, 170, 211 complication 108, 118, 119n.3 compound noun 228 compound verb 56 conceptual frame 131 conceptualisor 244 conditional clause 191, 265, 275 conditionals 22 — 25 conjugation-class word 51 conjunct 204, 2 1 1 - 2 1 9 conjunction 4, 2 0 3 - 2 1 9 conservatism 235, 439, 440 contact assimilation 105 contact, see: language contact contact language 119n.6 contact phonology 119n.8 contact situations 119n.7 context study 129 contrast 18, 19, 22, 23, 25, 26 contrastivity 357, 362, 364 control, see: coindexed PRO conversational postulate 193

conversational situation 193 conversation analysis 191 coordination 2 0 3 - 2 1 9 , 373, 393, 402 n.4 coordinator 2 1 1 - 2 1 9 copy-correlatives 3 7 0 - 3 7 2 , 382, 383, 403 n.5 creole 105, 114, 115 creolisation 115, 363 dative 151, 160, 173, 183 n.15 declarative sentence 106, 109, 248, 272 declension-class word 51, 78 decliticisation 398, 399 definite article 226, 227, 229 deictics 105 delimitation of units 129 demonstrative 105, 217, 226, 227, 229 deneutralisation 19, 25 dependency 52, 58 desemanticisation 12, 15, 18, 19, 22, 24, 26, 245 dialect 305, 323, 334, 363, 364 dialect contact 119n.6 dialogue 4 7 3 - 4 7 6 , 478, 479, 481, 482, 487, 488, 489 n.7 dicitur use 25, 26 diphthongs 107 directional verb 53, 57 direct object reduplication 106 direct question 279 direct response 192 discourse 112, 311, 312, 469, 472, 479, 482, 483, 486 discourse analysis 3, 191 discourse strategy 446 discourse topic 322 disjunct 410 disjunctive question 189 distributional agent 347 — 351 rfo-periphrasis 18, 21, 281, 3 0 3 - 3 1 8 , 3 2 1 - 3 4 0 , 3 5 5 - 3 6 5 , 439, 469, 470, 472-489 do-support, see: c/o-periphrasis double negation 452, 453 drag chain 234 drift 105, 108, 118 dummy subject 5, 31—49

Technical terms and topics elaboration 118 ellipsis 16, 17, 73, 8 2 - 8 4 , 86, 88, 89, 91, 9 5 - 9 8 , 192, 194, 198, 214 embedding 105, 219 n.3 embraciation 106 emphasis 306, 322, 333, 338 emphatic do 480, 481, 485, 487 emphatic expression 356, 357, 360, 361 empty uses of do 358, 360, 361 end-focus 38 epistemic necessity 246, 248 epistemic possibility 246, 248 epistemic use 22 epithet adverb 413 epithetical 412, 413, 415, 416, 4 2 6 - 4 2 8 ethic dative 78, 79, 84, 99 evaluative adverb 410, 4 1 2 - 4 1 9 , 421, 424, 426, 428, 429, 431 - 4 3 3 , 4 3 5 n . 4 evocative poetry 139 exbraciation 117 existential be 31 existential it 32, 34, 35 existential sentence 5, 31—49, 454, 4 5 8 - 4 6 0 , 462, 464 n.9 existential there 31—49 Extended Standard Theory 49n.5, 143 extralinguistic knowledge 4 extraposition 39, 44, 3 7 5 - 3 7 8 , 381, 382, 389, 400, 404 n. 15 extraterritorial variety 235 final clause 26 — 28 finiteness 15, 17, 21, 23 fixed expression 440 focus 77 foreground grounding 133 — 135 fragmental style 446 frame 1 2 9 - 1 3 1 , 133 free variation 18, 19, 22, 23, 26 frequency 439 — 441 frequential 104 front-shifting 362 full verb 2 4 6 - 2 4 8 functional grammar 12, 13 functional sentence perspective 117 future 106 genre 470, 4 7 2 - 4 7 4 , 488 global pattern 117

495

government 292 grammar 127 grammaticalisation 6, 12 — 20, 26, 125, 126, 133, 355, 356, 362, 363, 365, 410, 486 grammatical relation 52 grounding 129, 1 3 1 - 1 3 6 group changes 104, 117 hedging 418 Helsinki Corpus 238, 239, 274, 282n.l6,17,19,20,21, 304, 308, 313, 317n.2, 321, 324, 329, 332, 336, 3 3 8 n . l , 339n.l5,16, 461, 462, 4 6 3 n . l hierarchical text processing 127 high-transitivity verb 131 hypersyntax 191 hypotaxis 4 , 1 0 5 , 2 0 3 - 219, 369, 370,402 n.4 hypotheticality 246, 248 iconicity 109 idiom 458 idiosyncratic changes 104, 106, 107, 117 imperative 183n.7 impersonal construction 24, 106, 151, 160, 162, 174, 182n.6, 440 impersonal verb 24, 106, 159—161 indefinite article 205 indeterminate possibility 246, 248 index of oddity 107 indirect question 191 indirect speech 212 indirect speech act 193 infinitive 106, 107, 141 — 186; see also: bare infinitive, ίο-infinitive, accusative and infinitive infinitive: active in sense 148, 149, 172, 183 n.12 infinitive: passivein sense 148,149,164,171, 172, 177, 183 n.12, 184n.25 infinitive after (pre)modals 143 — 146, 1 6 0 - 1 6 3 , 181 infinitive used as adverbial adjunct 157,160, 161, 166, 171, 180, 184n.23 infinitive used as object complement 159 infinitive used as subject 159, 166 infinitive used as subject complement 159, 162, 166

496

Index

infinitive used post-adjectivally 153, 156, 160, 164, 166, 171, 176, 177, 186n.36 infinitive used post-nominally 151, 160,161, 166, 168, 179, 180, 183n.l6 infinitive used predicatively 146, 156, 164 inflected infinitive 159 inflection 114 information structure 192 innovation 235 inseparable prefix, see: prefix, inseparable integrated style 446 intensifier 411, 414, 415, 422, 428, 432 intensity marker 4 interactive modal 117, 118 interlanguage 110, 115 interrogative 105, 107 intertextual variation 236 intonation 191 intransitive particle 51 intratextual variation 236 invariance 344 inversion 77, 2 0 5 - 2 0 9 , 359, 360, 362, 385, 387, 395, 398, 399, 415, 425, 426, 435 n.8 island 75 Lancaster —Oslo/Bergen Corpus 442 language acquisition 109,114, 116,117, 397 language change 5, 103, 1 0 7 - 1 0 9 , 117, 118 language change typology 103, 118, 119n.l language contact 5, 114, 116-118, 119n.5,7,8 language levels 119 Latin influence 1 4 3 - 1 4 5 , 1 4 7 - 1 4 9 , 158, 160, 162, 170, 177-179, 182, 182n.2, 183 n.17, 184n.24 left-right text processing 126 lexeme 291 lexical borrowing 145, 182n.6 lexical diffusion 6, 439—464 lexicalisation 1 2 - 1 5 , 57, 8 2 - 8 4 , 86, 88, 93, 95, 96, 98 lexical verb 447, 448, 450, 459 lexicon 109, 119n.4 linear text processing 126 literary stylistics 469, 470, 483 liturgical language 303 — 318 liturgical prose 5 locative 2 0 1 - 3 0 1

locative ablative 2 9 3 - 2 9 7 , 300 locative allative 2 9 3 - 3 0 0 locative be 31 locative elative 293, 294, 297, 299 locative illative 2 9 3 - 3 0 0 locative mediative 2 9 3 - 2 9 6 , 298 locative there 31, 47 n.2 London — Lund Corpus 442 long-distance anaphora 127, 135, 136 macrocontext 281 n.l macrolinguistics 118 main clause 5, 112, 113, 205, 208, 209 main verb 210, 215 mandative use 22, 26—28 manner adverb 410, 414, 418, 432 markedness 108, 109, 119 n.8, 471, 472, 4 7 9 - 4 8 2 , 486, 487 medium 6, 236, 280, 343 microcontext 244, 247, 281 n.l microlinguistics 118 mobilisation frame 131 modal 6, 7, 1 1 - 2 8 modal adverb 410, 412, 417, 418, 419, 424, 425, 429, 431, 435 n.3 modal auxiliary 6, 1 1 - 2 8 , 2 3 3 - 2 8 3 modality 211, 217, 410 modal particle 428, 429, 435 n. 10 modal system 345 mood 211, 217, 303, 305, 306 morphological change 103 morphology 1, 2, 105, 106, 114, 119n.7 morphosyntactic change 234, 459 morphosyntax 105, 118 move alpha 116 multiple negation 453 mutative intransitive 345 mutative verb 346 narrative 4 7 2 - 4 7 9 , 4 8 2 - 4 8 8 , 489 n.7 narrative poetry 137 narrative syntax 361 necessity 246, 248 negation 6, 107, 246, 2 5 5 - 2 5 8 , 279, 439-464 negative 107 negative polarity item 464 n.7

Technical terms and topics NEG-incorporation 443, 452 - 458, 460, 461, 463, 464 n.10,11; see also: no-negation NEG-raising 443 Neogrammarian law 439 neutral possibility (modal) 246, 267, 269-280 nexus question 189, 190, 200 "nice" form 14 — 21 non-dependent question 189 no-negation 440 — 464 non-affixal negation 446 — 459 notional syntactic paradigm 244 notional syntax 20, 21 not-negation 440 — 464 numeral 224, 228 object 5, 110, 112 obligatory PRO 165-167, 184n.26 obviative PRO 165, 184n.26 operand 51 operator 21, 51 optional PRO 165, 167, 184n.26 oral mode of expression 324, 330, 331 oral production 126 paradigm 344, 345 paradigmatic directionality 345 paradigmatic invariant 344 paradigmatic levelling 344 paramoion 361 parataxis 4, 105, 2 0 3 - 2 1 9 , 369, 370, 402 n.4, 473, 4 7 7 - 4 7 9 , 4 8 5 - 4 8 7 parison 361 participant 52, 53, 55, 73, 78, 81, 84, 8 7 - 9 6 , 99 participant relationship 274 particle 51, 56 passive 31, 35, 37, 266 passive imperative 183 n.7 passive infinitive 5, 141—186 passive marker 347 peak-marking 358 perfect 106 perfect marker 346, 347, 352 performance spectrum 345, 346, 350 periphrasis 6, 1 9 - 2 7 , 106, 355, 356 periphrastic form 106

497

periphrastic passive infinitive 142, 160, 164, 171 periphrastic subjunctive 264 permission 246, 248, 267, 268, 282 n.24 personal construction 106 phoneme 104 phonological change 103 phonology 1, 2, 104, 106, 107, 109, 118 phonotactics 309, 313, 315, 316 pidgin 105, 114 possibility 246, 267, 269 postposition 4, 51, 5 4 - 5 8 , 73, 77, 84, 86, 87, 91, 99 pragmatic discourse structures 126 pragmatics 189, 191, 192, 193, 420 pragmatic structure 38 prefix 4, 56, 57, 80, 8 2 - 8 4 , 86, 87, 93, 95, 96, 98 prefix, inseparable 4, 56, 98 prefix, separable 4, 56, 95, 98 preposition 4, 51, 5 3 - 7 5 , 77, 78, 8 0 - 8 2 , 84, 86, 87, 98, 99, 2 0 3 - 2 0 5 , 217, 221, 225, 2 2 7 - 2 2 9 , 291, 293, 420, 433 prepositional adverb 4, 56, 98 prepositional passive 440 prepositional phrase 4, 221 — 229 preposition stranding 96, 107 present subjunctive 190 prestige 119n.8 presupposition 189, 193, 199, 200 preterite-present 17 principle of end-focus 38 prior knowledge 129, 136, 137 PRO, see: arbitrary PRO, coindexed PRO, obligatory PRO, obviative PRO, optional PRO, proximate PRO proclitic 74, 75 production constraint 451 progressive form 329 prominence 127, 136 pronominalisation 125 pronominal reference 126, 127 pronoun 3, 7 4 - 7 8 , 80, 126, 133, 134 prosodic subordination 74, 75 prototypical question 192 proximate PRO 165, 184n.26, 185n.28 psycholinguistics 114, 118 punctual verb 131

498

Index

purpose 256, 264 push chain 234 question 3, 6, 1 8 9 - 2 0 0 , 3 5 5 - 3 5 7 , 362, 363 question-answer sequence 189 — 200 raising verb 16, 24 rankshift 420 reanalysis: motivation by surface structure 393 reanalysis of clitics 399 reanalysis of I N F L position 392 reanalysis of main clauses 394, 395 reanalysis of modals 392 reanalysis of OV to VO 392, 397 reanalysis of the base 397, 398 reanalysis of verb-second 369, 390, 391, 397, 398, 400 reanalysis of word order 368, 383 reanalysis on analogy from the subordinate clause 391 reanalysis to subject-verb syntax 380 reanalysis: triggering 388 recency principle 130 reference 3, 1 2 5 - 1 2 7 , 133 reference switch 133 referent 126, 127, 129, 130, 134, 1 3 6 - 1 3 8 , 138 n.l referential distance 127 referent identification 4, 126, 127, 129, 130, 134, 1 3 6 - 1 3 8 , 138 n.l referring devices 125 reflexive pronoun 78 register 192 regularity 439 relational syntactic paradigm 244 relative clause 275 — 277 relative pronoun 205 relative particle 204 relativisation 105 relativiser 105 relic construction 167, 175 Renaissance syntax 360, 361 reply 189 representative speech acts 361 Revised Extended Standard Theory 48 n.5 rhetoric 127, 470, 4 8 0 - 4 8 2 , 486, 487 rhetoric question 190, 362

right-left text processing 126, 136 root meaning 6, 233, 246 — 283 root possibility meaning 246, 248 — 280 salience 127, 136 schema 193 script 193 semantic change 234 semi-impersonal 166 semi-modal be 147, 150, 160, 161, 166, 171, 172, 183n.l2 sentence adverbial 409—436 sentence function 246 sentence type 246, 248, 264 separable prefix, see: prefix, separable serialisation 75, 76 sermon 308, 313, 315, 317n.2 setting 245, 281 n.l simplification 108, 116, 119n.5 social network 351 sociohistorical linguistics 469—472 socio-historical variation 233 — 235, 247, 280, 281 n.4 sociolinguistics 108, 114, 118 sound change 439 speaker comment 210, 211, 428, 430 speaker variable 351 speech 442, 444, 446 - 449, 451, 462 speech act adverbial 410, 412, 414, 415, 417, 418, 420, 426, 428, 435 n.3, 4 3 6 n . l 3 spoken language 309, 321 — 340 Sprachbund 114, 116, 119 n.7 standard language 355, 357, 362, 364 Stigmatisation 317, 335 style 2, 4,112,192, 300, 3 0 9 - 3 1 1 , 316, 343, 344, 360, 361, 446, 4 7 1 - 4 8 9 stylistics 3 subcategorisation 52, 53, 57, 84, 89, 95 subject 5, 52, 53, 73, 7 7 - 7 9 , 105, 109, 111, 112, 114, 117 subject assignment 52 subject control, see: coindexed P R O subjectivisation 362, 364, 365 subject disjunct 410, 417, 418, 421, 424, 425, 433 subject raising 46, 47 subject-verb concord 114 subjunctive 11, 2 2 - 2 7 , 211, 217, 218, 264

Technical terms and topics subordinate clause 6, 113 Subordination 5, 2 0 3 - 2 1 9 , 3 6 7 - 4 0 5 subordinator 203 — 219 substitute do 474, 475, 478, 479, 482, 485, 486 supra-syntax 191 surface syntax 440 syncretism 105, 224, 225, 227, 229 syndetic hypotaxis 402 n.4 syndetic parataxis 402 n.4 syndetic subordination 219 n.3 synsemantic change 352 synsemantic paradigm 345 synsemantic variation 344 syntactic borrowing 145, 182n.6 syntactic change 3 1 - 4 9 , 103, 104, 113, 119 n.4, 355 - 366, 439, 464, 469, 470,472, 488 syntacticisation 20, 23, 27, 125 syntactic paradigm 19, 20, 343 — 353 syntactic reanalysis 37 — 39 syntactic saliency 14, 15, 19, 20 syntactic target 43, 48, 49 n.5 syntactic variation 344 syntax 1 0 4 - 1 0 7 , 109, 110, 115, 119, 119n.l,4 syntaxeme 2 9 1 - 3 0 1 synthetic negation 447 synthetic structure 113, 118, 221, 223, 229, 335 synthetic type 448 systemic gap 146, 172, 185n.25 tangling 73, 74, 89, 91, 92 telic verb 131 textlinguistics 3, 112, 189, 191 text-processing 126, 127, 136 text-syntax 191 text-type 236, 2 3 8 - 2 4 4 , 251, 255, 324, 326, 3 2 8 - 3 3 0 , 343, 4 6 9 - 4 7 3 theme-rheme 193, 194, 198, 199 //lire-insertion 31—49 thematic role 184n.21, 185n.29 thematic role: agent 142, 146, 151, 153, 172, 183 n.8, 185n.29 thematic role: goal 160, 185n.29 thematic role: instrument 146, 183 n.8 thematic role: patient 153, 160

499

theta marking 173 time reference 246, 248 /o-infinitive 1 4 2 , 1 5 8 , 1 6 3 , 1 6 7 , 1 8 2 , 1 8 5 n . 3 5 topic 77, 1 2 7 - 1 2 9 topicalisation 385, 387, 390, 392, 398, 405 n.24,28, 415, 426 topic change 128 topic continuity 127, 129 tough-movement 156, 172, 173, 175, 176 trace 167 traditionalism 235 transfer 116 transitive particle 51 transitive verb 131 translation 115, 309, 311, 313, 316 transparency (of argument structure) 1 5 - 2 0 , 22, 24, 25 transparency principle 12 typological change 31—49 typology 5, 7, 103, 104 unidirectional paradigm 345 truth intensifier 4 1 2 - 4 1 4 , 416, 417, 419, 4 2 6 - 4 3 0 , 435 n.3, 435 universal changes 104, 105, 117 universal strategies 116 V-raising 381, 397, 404 n. 15; see also: verb raising V-Projection raising 404 n. 15 valency 4, 2 9 1 - 3 0 1 variant field 244, 247, 263 variant sameness 345 variation 5-7, 233-283, 303, 3 4 3 - 3 5 3 , 352 n.3,6 verb 131 verbal complement 5 verb-final order 33, 38, 39, 55, 99, 368, 3 7 4 - 3 7 6 , 3 8 0 - 3 8 3 , 3 8 9 - 3 9 1 , 395, 404 n. 17, 405 n.26,28 verb-fronting 378, 379, 392, 395, 397,

308,

369, 397, 398,

400, 403 n.9, 405n.28 verb-initial order 33, 35, 37, 40, 41, 4 4 - 4 6 , 385, 428 verb-last order 209, 218 verb-late order 375, 381, 382, 393

500

Index

verb-medial order 32, 33, 37, 38, 46 verb-prefix, see: prefix (inseparable, separable) verb-raising 1 6 7 - 1 7 0 , 185 n.31,33,34,35, 3 7 8 - 3 8 2 , 389, 394, 400, 404 n. 13, 405 n.29 verb-second order 5, 34, 37 — 47, 76, 206, 2 0 9 - 2 1 1 , 369, 375, 378, 379, 381, 382, 385, 3 8 7 - 4 0 0 , 403 n.9, 405n.24,26, 415, 424, 425 verb-third order 46, 381, 389, 391, 399, 400 vocabulary 119n.7 voice 246, 278 voice: dual voice 155, 178 volition 256, 264, 265, 275 vowel shift 106

weather verbs 16, 32, 41 word-formation 2 word order 4, 5, 7, 3 1 - 4 9 , 55, 56, 75, 103, 105, 107, 1 0 9 - 1 1 8 , 119n.3,8,9, 174, 181, 199, 2 0 5 - 2 1 9 , 3 6 7 - 4 0 5 , 419, 424 word order acquisition 116 word order change 31 - 4 9 , 56, 73, 103,105, 110, 113 word order typology 31—49 writing 442, 444, 446, 449, 451, 462 X-question 189, 190 y out thou 474, 480, 481, 489 n.4 zero-anaphora 127, 138

Index of names

Abraham, W. 79, 100 Adamson, S. 30, 188, 286, 319, 341, 365, 366, 490 jElfric 3, 26, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 44, 48, 143, 149, 151, 152, 154, 155, 157, 159, 162, 170, 173, 191, 193, 194, 197, 205, 206, 298, 336, 337, 340n.23, 369, 374, 375, 385, 386, 389, 403 n.7, 404 n. 18, 405n.22, 413, 414, 436, 453, 455, 456 Ahlqvist, A. 288 Aitchison, J. 182 n.6, 186, 458, 465 Akmajian, A. 30 Albery, J. 349 Alfred 26, 33, 35, 36, 37, 45, 49, 112, 141, 147, 148, 150, 154, 155, 156, 157, 159, 160, 168, 169, 170, 173, 298, 299, 336, 371, 374, 375, 385, 386, 394, 413, 414, 436, 453, 457 Allan, W. S. 12, 28 Allen, C. 55, 100 Allen, Η. E. 436 Allingham, M. 421 Altenberg, Β. 281 n.5, 284 Andersen, H. 286, 397, 405, 408 Anderson, J. M. 6, 11, 13, 14, 15, 20, 21, 24, 27, 28, 29, 50, 52, 53, 56, 73, 99n.l, 100n.l, 100, 229, 245, 285, 408, 463n.l Anderson, T. R. 16, 28 Andrew, S. O. 112, 120, 380, 381, 390, 402 n.4, 404 n.l6, 405 Antonsen, Ε. H. 407 Apollonius 413, 415, 436 Araki, K. 287 Arber, Ε. 284 Ard, J. 355, 365 Armin, R. 328 Arnold, E. 2 Ascham, R. 327 Asimov, I. 295, 296 Austen, J. 348, 351 Bacquet, P. 45, 49, 385, 391, 404n.l7, 405 n.24, 406

Baghdikian, S. 339 n.8, 340 Bahner, W. 120 Bailey, C.-J. N. 105, 108, 120 Banks 348 Barber, C. 475, 489 Barrett, C. R. 415, 437 Barrington, T. 270, 283 Baudouin de Courtenay, J. 119 n.6 Bauer, G. 1, 8 Baugh, A. C. 281 n.10, 285 Bean, M. C. 34, 46, 49, 56, 100, 375, 390, 391, 406, 415, 437 Beda 11 Behre, F. 282n.25, 285 Bennis, H. 101 Berners, Baron 371 Bessborough 348 Beukema, F. 188 Biber, D. 442, 461, 465 Binnick, R. I. 29 Binz, G. 158 Björk, L. 467 Blake, N. F. 285 Bliss, A. J. 136, 139 Bock, H. 142, 144, 147, 150, 151, 155, 157, 159, 163, 164, 165, 182n.6, 183n.l7, 184n.25, 186 Bock, K. J. 192, 200 Bokenham, O. 178 Bolinger, D. L. 125, 139, 410, 432, 434, 437 Boorde, A. 363, 364 Borinski, L. 360, 365 Boswell, J. 348 Bosworth, J. 57, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63, 71, 72, 80, 81, 82, 84, 87, 95, 96, 100, 285, 299, 301 n.l, 301 Boucicault, D. 349 Boyer, P. 284 Bradford, W. 243 Bradley, H. 287 Bradley, S. A. J. 132, 133, 138 n.6, 139 Brandl, A. 2

502

Index

Breivik, L. E. 5, 47 n. 1,2, 49, 415, 420, 437, 438, 453, 454, 455, 457, 460, 463 n.l, 464 n.10, 465 Brightman, F. E. 304, 318 Brinton, L. 14, 16, 17, 28, 364, 365 Bronte, C. 351 Brook, S. 313, 317, 318 Brorström, S. 19, 20, 30, 244, 280n.l, 281 n.5, 288, 343, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352 n.2, 353 n.8,13,14, 354 Brown, C. 127, 138 n.3, 139 Brown, G. 138 n.7, 139 Browne, T. 417, 418, 436 Browning, Ε. B. 417, 436 Bryant, F. E. 235, 285 Buchanan, R. 2 Bull, T. 438 Bulwer-Lytton, E. 349 Burness, E. 353 Burnet, G. 241 Csdmon 297, 298, 299, 370 Callaway, Μ. 142, 143, 144, 145, 147, 148, 150, 151, 152, 156, 157, 158, 159, 163, 182n.2, 3, 4, 183n.8,9,12, 184n.l9, 21,

Cibber, C. 348 Clark, C. 112, 113, 120, 229, 368 Clark, Ε. V. 126, 139 Clark, Η. H. 126, 139 Clark, J. W. 235, 288 Clahsen, H. 116, 120 Classen, Ε. 229 Clowes, W. 331 Coates, J. 234, 248, 267, 285 Cole, P. 121, 200 Coleridge, S. Τ. 35 Collins, Ν. 175 Colman, F. 4, 28n.l, 52, 56, 73, 74, 75, 77, 99 n.l, 100 Comrie, B. 479, 489 Cooper, J. F., Jr. 282n.23 Coopmans, R 188 Corum, C. 420, 437 Cotton, J. 242, 243 Coulthard, R. M. 192, 201 Coverte, R. 241, 267, 283, 331 Craigie, W. A. 287 Crooke, W. 283 Cross, J. E. 194, 195, 197, 200 Cumberland, R. 348

186

Campbell, A. 100, 224, 229, 285, 385, 404 n.17, 405 n.24, 406 Canale, W. M. 34, 39, 49, 381, 389, 390, 391, 392, 393, 394, 395, 397, 406 Carlson, L. 307, 318 Carlyle, J. W. 349 Carlyle, T. 349 Caron, B. R. 201 Carroll, L. 349 Caxton, W. 2, 38, 48, 355, 382, 396, 456, 480, 489 n.6 Centlivre, S. 348 Chafe, W. L. 138n.8, 139, 446, 465 Charles I 330 Chaucer, G. 143, 179, 204, 215, 332, 395, 398, 399, 420, 436, 455, 456, 457, 462, 463, 464 n.9, 10, 13 Cheng, C.-C. 439, 467 Chipman, Η. H. 138 n.2, 139 Chomsky, N. 143, 165, 166, 172, 184n.26, 27, 186 Christie, A. 293, 294

Dahl, Τ. 308, 309, 310, 311, 318, 339η.17, 340 Dahlstedt, A. 406 Danchev, A. 5, 100n.l, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 109, 110, 113, 115, 117, 118, 119 n.5,8, 120, 182 n.6, 186, 229 Darwin, E. 349 Davies, Η. H. 349 Davis, N. 49, 143, 186n.36, 186, 219, 332, 340 Davison, A. 29 Day, A. 359 Debusscher, G. 340 Delbrück, Β. 376 Deloney, Τ. 328, 331 Demers, R. 30 Denison, D. 28n.l, 51, 56, 57, lOOn.l, 100, 219n.l, 305, 307, 318, 323, 334, 340, 363, 365, 400 η. 1, 403 n.5, 405n.28, 440, 465, 469, 473, 486, 489 Deutschbein, Μ. 182 n.6, 186 Dickens, C. 349, 351, 352

Names Dierickx, J. 340 Dik, S. C. 12, 29, 52, 100 Diller, H.-J. 3, 126, 139 Dillon, B. 489 n.4, 489 Dimter, M. 281n.l3, 285 Dirven, R. 100, 101 Djackov, Μ. V. 105, 120 Dobbie, Ε. V. K. 128, 130, 131, 137, 140 Dobson, E. J. 204, 219n.5, 219 Donaldson, Ε. T. 135, 137, 139n.ll, 139 Downing, L. 265, 283, 284 Dressler, W. U. 200 Dryden, J. 346 Earle, J. 48, 297, 299, 300 Eaton, R. 188, 318, 319, 340, 342, 365, 366, 408, 489, 490 Eckman, F. R. 109, 120 Edward VI 241, 328 Einenkel, E. 230 Eliot, G. 349, 351 Elizabeth I 243, 272, 420, 436 Ellegärd, A. 285, 303, 304, 306, 309, 310, 318, 321, 324, 333, 334, 335, 337, 339 n. 15,17, 340, 341, 355, 361, 362, 363, 365, 366, 439, 440, 465, 472, 489, 490 Ellis, A. J. 281 n.10, 285 Elstad, K. 438 Elyot, T. 327, 331 Emonds, J. E. 384, 391, 393, 406 Engblom, V. 339n.l7, 341 Enkvist, Ν. E. 112, 120, 134, 139, 221 Erzgräber, W. 139 Essex, Earl of 241, 243, 328, 330 Evelyn, J. 241, 329 Evers, A. 185 n.31,33,35, 186 Faarlund, J. T. 406, 407 Fabyan, R. 241, 339 n. 12 Fakundiny, L. 96, 100 Falk, Η. 420, 422, 423, 435n.ll Fasold, R. 286 Ferguson, C. A. 119n.5, 121, 316, 318 Field, P. J. C. 480, 488 n.2, 490 Fielding, H. 348 Fiennes, C. 241, 242 Finegan, E. 461, 465 Firbas, J. 110, 117, 121, 124

Firth, J. R. 458, 465 Fischer, A. 200 Fischer, O. C. M. 5, 57, lOOn.l, 144, 183n.6, 186, 318, 319, 337, 338n.l, 342, 366, 440, 465, 489, 490 Fisher, J. 241, 317 n.2, 328, 331 Fisher, J. H. 398, 406 Fisiak, J. 49, 50, 110, 115, 120, 121, 123, 140, 186, 220, 230, 301, 406, 408, 438, 466 Fitzgerald, E. 349 Fitzgerald, F. S. 294, 296 Fitzjames, R. 332 Fjeldstad, A. 438 Fleischer, W. 422, 437 Fodor, J. A. 466 Foote, S. 348 Fowler, A. 281n.l3, 285 Fowles, J. 294, 295, 296 Fox, B. A. 126, 127, 138n.l, 139 Fox, S. 298

503

174, 340,

122, 407,

Francis, W. N. 450, 463 n.5, 465, 466 Frank, T. 308, 318 Franklin, J. 8 Fräser, B. 100 Fries, C. C. 192, 200 Fries, U. 3, 112, 121, 189, 192, 200, 219n.l Friis, P. C. 426, 428, 436 Fryer, J. 233, 241, 283 Fujimura, O. 30 Fujiwara, Y. 51, 100 Fumivall, F. J. 2 Galinsky, H. 289 Galsworthy, J. 349 Gardner, F. F. 406 Garmonsway, G. N. 193, 194, 200 Gascoigne, G. 359 Gaskell, E. 349 Gerard, J. 138 n.2, 139 Gerritsen, M. 34, 49, 105, 106, 110, 114, 115, 121, 390, 406 Gildersleeve, B. L. 79, 101 Givon, T. 46, 49, 105,114, 119n.8, 121,126, 127, 138 n.3,4, 139, 402 n.2 Görlach, Μ. 104, 114, 115, 121 Gollancz, I. 48 Goodluck, H. 341

504

Index

Googe, Β. 175 Goolden, P. 436 Goossens, L. 12, 13, 16, 17, 24, 25, 26, 29, 245, 281 n.7, 285 Gordon, Ε. V. 133 Gordon, M. 230 Gorrell, J. H. 27, 29 Gottweis, R. 230 Gower, J. 178 Gräf, A. 343, 353 Granville-Barker, H. 349 Green, G. M. 29 Greenbaum, S. 29, 101, 220, 288, 319, 410, 418, 437, 466 Greenberg, J. H. 55, 56, 77, 101, 107, 109, 121 Greene, R. 472 Greenough, J. B. 177, 186 Grein, C. W. M. 152, 187 Grice, H. P. 193, 200 Grenvik, O. 353n.l4, 353 Grundy, S. 349 Haider, H. 34, 49, 390, 392, 398, 406 Haiman, J. 31, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 47 n.5, 48n.5, 49, 109, 121, 366 Hainisch, Μ. 3 Hallett, P. E. 436 Halliday, Μ. A. K. 192, 200, 410, 437, 475, 489 n.5, 490 Hankin, St. J. 349 Hardy, T. 349 Hargrave, F. 284, 339n.l6 Harman, T. 358 Harner, F. E. 229 Harris, M. 21, 29, 30, 104, 118, 121, 285, 286, 288 Härtel, W. A. v. 2 Harweg, R. 133, 140 Hasan, R. 192, 200 Hatton, C. 265, 283 Hattori, S. 121 Hayes, S. 436 Hayward, J. 241 Hazlewood, C. H. 349 Healey, A. di Paolo 77, 101, 188 Heggelund, K. 422, 423, 424, 426, 431, 436n.l5, 437

Heilmann, L. 101 Heinzel, R. 2 Hellevik, A. 434, 437 Herget, W. 289 Herzfeld, G. 158 Herzl, T. 3, 9 Herzog, Μ. I. 280n.l, 281 n.6, 289 Heusler, A. 46, 49 Hewlett, Μ. H. 179 Hill, T. D. 194, 195, 197, 200 Hille, A. 438 Hiltunen, R. 397, 406 Hirose, T. 100 Hitchcock, Ε. V. 436 Hoadly, B. 348 Hoby, M. 241, 242, 363 Hock, Η. H. 104, 105, 107, 110, 113, 115, 116, 117, 118, 121, 367, 403 n.9, 406, 407 Hockey, S. 282n.20 Hoekstra, T. 172, 185n.34, 187 Hofland, Κ. 463 n.5, 465 Hogg, R. 452, 465 Holberg, L. 426, 429, 437 Holcroft, T. 348 Holm, G. 438 Honders, E. 109, 121 Hooker, R. 241, 317 n.2, 360 Hopkins, G. M. 349 Hopper, P. J. 131, 133, 135, 140 Houghton, S. 349 Hubbard, W. 243, 277, 283 Huddleston, R. D. 14, 21, 29 Hudson, R. 53, 101, 108, 110, 121 Huxley, A. 293, 294, 295, 296 Huxley, L. 436 Hyman, L. 105, 109, 117, 119n.8, 121 Hymes, D. 121 Ihalainen, O. 286, 305, 318, 335, 338 n.5, 341, 465, 466 Iida, H. 287 Inchbald, E. 348 Indreb0, G. 426, 437 Inoue, K. 121 Itkonen, E. 108, 115, 122 Jack, G. B. 452, 463 n.6, 465 Jacobsen, J. 230

Names Jacobson, S. 286, 319, 341, 366, 490 Jaeggli, Ο. Α. 185n.29, 187 Jahr, Ε. Η. 49 Jakobson, R. 108, 109 Jankowski, Μ. 282 η.22 Jelinek, Ε. 30 Jensen, J. Τ. 406 Jerrold, D. 349 Jespersen, O. 110, 111, 113, 114, 117, 122, 189, 190, 200, 227, 230, 413, 437, 439, 447, 452, 463 n.6, 465 Johannson, M. 400 n.l Johansson, S. 187, 188, 338n.3, 341, 438, 463 n.5, 465, 466 Johnson, C. 348 Johnson, O. 230 Johnson, S. 421, 436 Jones, C. 29, 50, 285, 408 Jones, H. A. 349 Jordan, R. 1, 8 Jucker, A. H. 4, 403 n.4 Kachru, Β. B. 201 Kahane, H. 201 Kahane, R. 201 Kahlas-Tarkka, L. 281 n.5, 285, 319, 341 Kakietek, P. 352 n.2, 353 Kakouriotis, A. 28 Karlberg, G. 406 Kastovsky, D. 1, 8, 29, 99n.l, 120,121,122, 123, 139, 140, 230, 402 n.l Kato, T. 187 Katz, J. J. 466 Kaye, G. 340n.23, 341 Keayne, R. 244, 265, 283 Kellner, A. 7 n . l , 8 Kellner, L. 1, 2, 3, 4, 7 n . l , 8, 11, 25, 28n.l, 29, 78, 99n.l, 101, 108, 115, 118, 119n.l,2, 122, 125, 126, 140, 317n.l,3, 318, 321, 338 n.4, 341, 352, 354, 367, 368, 369, 370, 371, 372, 383, 387, 394, 402n.l,3,4, 403n.4, 406 Kelly, H. 348 Kempe, M. 416, 476 Kennedy, A. G. 188 Kerkhof, J. 142, 187 Kiefer, F. 100 Kisbye, Τ. 234, 286

505

Kitagawa, C. 30 Kittredge, G. L. 177, 186 Kjellmer, G. 458, 463n.l,6, 464n.l2, 466 Klaeber, F. 135, 137, 139n.l0,ll, 140 Klein, C. 7 Klima, Ε. 441, 466 Klöpzig, W. 148, 149, 174, 187 Kniezsa, V. 4, 221, 225, 226, 228, 230 Knight, S. K. 242, 243, 281 n.15 Knyvett, T. 269, 284 Koerner, K. 286, 408 Kohonen, V. 38, 49, 368, 382, 407, 415, 438 Kolb, E. 200 Kondo, K. 287 Kooper, E. 407 Koopman, W. F. 168, 186, 187, 318, 319. 340, 342, 366, 376, 400n.l, 404n.l5, 22, 405 n.22, 407, 489, 490 Koster, J. 165, 166, 167, 185n.29,34, 187, 404n.l2, 407 Krapp, G. P. 128, 130, 131, 137, 140, 235, 281 n.8,10, 286 Kroch, A. S. 377, 378, 391, 407 Krohmer, W. 230 Krüger, G. 8 Kubouchi, T. 206, 208, 219 Kucera, H. 450, 463 n.5, 465, 466 Kühner, R. 183n.l4, 187 Kuhn, Η. 379, 390, 405n.26, 407 Kuhn, S. Μ. 187, 220 Kurath, Η. 187, 220 Kytö, Μ. 6, 240, 247, 281 η.2,3, 282 η.16,17,18,19, 283η.26, 27, 286, 317η.2, 318, 338η.1, 341, 353η.6, 354, 461, 463 η.1, 465, 466, 471, 479, 490 Labov, W. 108, 280η.1, 281 η.6, 289, 303, 318, 364, 366, 439, 463 η.1, 466, 471 LaBrum, R. 448, 452, 454, 463 η.6, 466 La Goly, Μ. W. 437 Lakoff, R. 105, 108, 122, 192, 201, 411 Langenfeit, G. 322, 341 Langland, W. 383 Lass, R. 107, 109, 122, 235, 281 n.9,11, 286, 287, 353 n.10, 354, 381, 407 Lassen, H. 437

506

Index

Latimer, Η. 241, 268, 284, 317 n.2, 328 Law, V. A. 286, 319, 341, 365, 490 Layamon 455 Leech, G. N. 29, 101, 220, 234, 266, 285, 287, 288, 319, 341, 466 Le Fanu, J. S. 418, 436 Legat, Η. 178 Lehmann, C. 12, 13, 29 Lehmann, W. P. 109, 289 Leinster, M. 296 Leith, D. 281 n . l l , 287 Leitner, G. 437 Leland, J. 241, 339 n. 12 Lemle, M. 315, 319 Lewis, L. 349 Lewis, R. E. 187 Li, C. N. 49, 50, 101, 103, 118, 119n.3,8, 121, 122, 123, 408 Liddell, M. 181 Lightfoot, D. W. 11, 14, 15, 29, 30, 38, 50, 182n.6, 187, 234, 281 n.7, 287, 367, 381, 392, 393, 407, 439, 440, 466 Limburg, Μ. 51, 101 Lindkvist, K.-G. 230 Lisle, A. 241, 242, 329 Livingstone, D. 349 Lodge, G. 79, 101 Lopasov, J. A. 106, 122 Lotheissen, F. 2 Lounsbury, T. R. 281 n.10, 287 Lowenberg, R 286 Lucas, P. J. 131, 140 Luick, Κ. 1, 2, 8 Lundskier-Nielsen, T. 219n.l Lust, B. 139, 140 Lydgate, J. 176 Lyons, J. 410, 438, 479, 490 Macaulay, R. K. S. 122 Machyn, H. 241, 328 MacLeish, A. 395, 398, 405n.28, 407 Macleod, N. 28, 100 Madox, R. 241 Mätzner, Ε. 343, 354 Mäher, P. 122 Malkiel, Υ. 289 Malory, Τ. 4, 143, 176, 333, 339η.18, 417, 436, 455, 470, 472, 473, 474, 475, 476,

477, 478, 479, 480, 481, 482, 483, 484, 485, 486, 487, 488, 488η.1,2, 489η.3,4,6,8 Mandeville, J. 178, 396 Manzini, Μ. R. 165, 187 Marchand, Η. 187 Marchese, L. 105, 122 Marriot, I. 282n.20 Martin, J. 282n.20 Martinet, Α. 107 Mayerthaler, W. 109, 122 McDavid, R. I., Jr. 287 McKnight, G. 46, 50, 407 Meid, W. 200 Meier, A. J. 7 Meier, Η. H. 162, 187 Meijs, W. 143, 187 Meillet, A. 12, 13, 29 Mencken, Η. L. 281 n.10, 287 Meredith, G. 2 Meurman-Solin, A. 239, 282n.l9 Michel of Northgate 455, 458 Middleton, T. 328 Miege, G. 343, 354 Miller, T. 48, 141, 187, 436 Milroy, J. 281 n.6, 287 Milroy, L. 281 n.6, 287 Milton, J. 241 Minkema, K. 282 n.23 Minkova, D. 5, 38, 110, 113, 123, 368, 372, 399, 404 n. 17, 408 Minor, J. 2 Mitchell, B. 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 32, 38, 45, 50, 54, 56, 57, 65, 78, 82, 90, 96, 101, 110, 111, 113, 122, 142, 144, 147, 148, 150, 158, 173, 182n.1,2, I83n.8,9,ll,12, 187, 189, 190, 191, 194, 201, 205, 206, 208, 219 n.2,6, 220, 221, 224, 225, 227, 228, 230, 333, 341, 368, 370, 372, 373, 374, 380, 385, 386, 388, 389, 391, 402 n.4, 403n.6,7,8, 404n.l6,17,20,21, 407, 452, 453, 464 n.8, 466 Mitford, M. R. 175 Moody, R. E. 284 Moortgat, M. 172, 185n.34, 187 Moravcsik, Ε. A. 109, 120 More, Τ. 38, 49, 175, 241, 242, 247, 282n.24, 284, 339 η.12, 417, 455, 456 Morgan, Ε. S. 236, 284, 287

Names Morgan, J. L. 29, 200 Morison, S. E. 237, 283, 287 Morohovskij, A. N. 397, 407 Morris, R. 8, 32, 48, 50, 404n.l9, 436 Morris, W. 2 Mosse, F. 230, 395, 396, 407 Mourelatos, A. P. D. 307, 319 Mowntayne 339 n. 12 Müller, F. 2 Mufwene, S. S. 319 Mukhin, A. M. 4, 291, 292, 301 Mulders, J. A. 180 Murray, J. A. H. 220, 287 Mustanoja, T. F. 224, 230, 234, 287, 438, 452, 466 Muysken, P. 116, 120 Nagucka, R. 22, 29, 191, 201 Nakamura, F. 352 n.2, 354 Nakano, H. 266, 287 Nakao, T. 100 Napier, A. S. 144 Naro, A. J. 315, 319 Nashe, T. 472 Nelson, H. 348 Nevalainen, T. 5, 239, 281 n.5, 282n.l9,21, 287, 304, 306, 311, 315, 317n.2, 318n.4, 319, 322, 330, 331, 338n.l, 341, 365, 366, 471, 490 Newmeyer, F. J. 16, 29 Nissenbaum, S. 284 Oates, T. 241, 268, 284, 329 Odenstedt, B. 28 Oehrle, R. 30 Offord, Μ. Y. 48 Olsen, J. E. Winn-Bell 192, 201 Olsson, Y. 285 Onions, C. T. 287 Orrm 161 Ortseifen, Κ. 289 Painter, W. 360 Palladius 181 Palmer, F. R. 13, 29, 410, 438, 465 Palmer, L. R. 183 n.l4, 188 Palsgrave, J. 323 Parris, S. 282n.23

507

Partridge, E. 235, 288 Pasicki, A. 51, 101, 111, 122 Paston 47, 49, 143, 186n.36, 332, 359, 455, 476 Pecock, R. 179, 180 Pemberton, C. 436 Penzl, H. 105 Pepys, S. 241, 307, 328, 329, 346 Peranteau, P. M. 30 Perlmutter, D. M. 39, 50 Person, G. 28 Pettie, G. 359, 361 Piercy, J. K. 236, 288 Pilch, H. 230 Pinero, A. W. 349 Pinney, J. 242 Pintzuk, S. 377, 378, 391, 400n.l, 407 Plank, F. 12, 13, 29, 100, 281 n.7, 288 Platzack, C. 353 n.l4, 354 Plummer, C. 48, 229 Pohl, F. 295 Poldauf, I. 447, 448, 466 Pope, J. C. 136, 140 Poussa, P. 317n.l, 319, 335, 341, 363, 366, 486, 490 Poutsma, H. 352n.l, 354 Prins, A. A. 115, 122 Prinzhorn, Μ. 49, 406 Quirk, R. 45, 50, 54, 101, 113, 122, 210, 211, 213, 218, 219, 219n.3,8, 220, 230, 234, 281 n.8, 288, 311, 319, 338 n.3, 342, 402 n.4, 408, 442, 456, 460, 466 Radden, G. 100, 101 Raleigh, W. 241, 328 Ramat, A. Giacalone 105, 115, 123 Ramat, P. 29, 30, 103, 245, 285, 286, 288 Rankin, H. F. 237, 288 Raumolin-Brunberg, H. 239, 281 n.4, 282 n.19,21, 287, 288, 317n.2, 319, 338n.l, 341, 353n.l3, 354 Reade, C. 349 Record, R. 327 Renoir, A. 464n.l3 Reynolds, F. 348 Ries, J. 375, 408

508

Index

Rissanen, Μ. 5, 6, 238, 280, 280 η. 1, 282 η.16,17,19, 286, 288, 303, 306, 309, 310, 311, 317 η.1,2, 318, 319, 321, 322, 339 η.9,11,17, 341, 342, 353 η.6, 354, 365, 366, 461, 463 π.1, 465, 466, 471, 479, 490 Rivers, Earl 180 Robbins, R. 436 Robertson, Τ. W. 349 Robinson, F. C. 54, 101, 170, 403 n.8, 407 Robinson, F. N. 436 Rogers, E. F. 284 Rohde, D. 440, 466 Rolle, R. 396, 416, 436 Romaine, S. 105,107, 123, 280, 280n.l, 288, 338 n.6, 342, 469, 471, 472, 490, 491 Roper, W. 339n.l2 Rose, C. D. 30 Rositzke, H. A. 53, 55, 57, 62, 63, 65, 66, 68, 69, 70, 71, 74, 84, 91, 101, 229 Ross, J. R. 13, 30 Ross, W. O. 436 Rossetti, D. G. 349 Rot, S. 408 Rudes, B. 105, 123 Rutman, D. B. 281 n.12, 288 Ruwet, N. 100 Ryden, M. 6, 19, 20, 28, 30, 244, 280n.l, 281 n.l,5, 288, 300, 301, 343, 345, 346, 347, 348, 349, 350, 351, 352 n.2, 353 n.6,7,8,13,14, 354, 466, 467 Rynell, A. 467 Salmon, V. 353 Saltonstall, E. W. 275, 284 Samarin, W. J. 318 Samuels, M. L. 280n.l, 289, 305, 307, 308, 319, 420, 430, 435n.l2, 438 Sanders, G. 104, 123 Sankoff, D. 286, 288, 490 Sapir, E. 108, 113 Schartmann, Ε. 7 Schaubert, Ε. v. 139n.10.ll, 140 Scheler, Μ. 158, 188 Schendl, Η. 100 n.l Schibsbye, Κ. 347, 354 Schiffrin, D. 286, 366 Schipper, J. 2 Schmidt, D. A. 395, 408

Schofield, B. 284 Schreiber, P. 411, 420, 438 Schuchardt, H. 119 n.6 Schwaner, I. 7 Schwartz, A. 113, 119n.9, 123 Scragg, D. G. 132, 140 Searle, A. 283 Seefranz-Montag, A. v. 106, 123 Seitz, K. 3 Selinker, L. 110, 123 Serebrennikov, B. A. 104, 123 Sewall, S. 242, 243, 265, 267, 284 Shakespeare, W. 3, 177, 215, 328 Shanklin, Μ. T. 462, 463, 463 n.l, 464n.7,9,10,13, 466 Shannon, A. 110, 123 Shaw, G. B. 349 Sheckley, R. 295, 296 Shepherd, G. 48, 208, 209, 215, 219 n.4, 220 Shores, D. L. 231, 402 n.4, 408 Silverberg, R. 295 Simak, C. D. 295 Simko, J. 110, 113, 123 Simon-Vandenbergen, A. M. 282 n.24, 283n.29, 289 Sinclair, J. McH. 192, 201 Sisam, K. 340n.l9 Skard, V. 435 n.9, 438 Skeat, W. W. 48, 299, 340n.l9, 436 Slobin, D. I. 108 Smith, A. H. 388, 404 n.l 1, 408 Smith, C. A. 394, 405n.28, 408 Smith, H. 241, 317 n.2 Smith, J. 298, 299 Snegireva, T. A. 45, 50 Somers, H. L. 292, 301 Spiro, R. J. 140 Standop, E. 27, 30 Starosta, S. 52, 101 Steele, R. 348 Steele, S. 27, 30 Steever, S. B. 319 Stegmann, Κ. 183 η. 14, 187 Stein, D. 5, 6,18, 306, 308, 309, 311, 317n.l, 319, 329, 339n.8, 17, 342, 355, 358, 365, 366, 469, 472, 479, 480, 483, 490 Stevenson, W. 328

Names Stockwell, R. P. 5, 30, 34, 38, 45, 47n.3, 50, lOOn.l, 103, 104, 105, 110, 111, 112, 113, 117, 122, 123, 219n.l, 368, 372, 390, 399, 404 n. 17, 405 n.25,27, 408, 415, 438 Stoffel, C. 410, 438 Stone, L. 240, 289 Storm, G. 436 Stout, H. S. 282n.23, 289 Stow, J. 241 Strang, Β. Μ. H. 174, 179, 188, 231 Stukeley, W. 348 Sundby, B. 438 Suzuki, S. 107, 123 Svartvik, J. 29, 101, 220, 288, 319, 338 n.3, 342, 442, 466 Sveen, K. 430, 437 Swan, T. 411, 412, 414, 415, 416, 417, 418, 419, 421, 425, 427, 433, 434n.l, 436n.l4, 438 Sweet, H. 49, 75, 76, 77, 102, 112, 123, 299, 385, 436 Swieczkowski, W. 408 Swift, J. 348 Sylvester, R. S. 284 Szwedek, A. 29, 120, 121, 122, 123, 139, 140, 230 Taft, A. I. 49 Tannen, D. 465 Tatlock, J. S. P. 188 Taylor, Jeremy 241, 317 n.2 Taylor. John 241, 331 Taylor, John 436 Taylor, T. 349 Tedeschi, P. J. 318, 319 Tellier, A. 26, 30 Thackeray, W. M. 23, 349 Thomas, Μ. H. 284 Thompson, Ε. M. 283 Thompson, S. A. 118,119n.3, 122,131,133, 135, 140 Thorpe, B. 297, 298, 299, 300, 370 Throckmorton, N. 241, 324, 325, 326 Tieken-Boon van Ostade, I. 281 n.5, 289, 306, 317n.l, 319, 324, 332, 335, 337, 338n.l,6, 340n.21, 342, 469, 471, 473, 486, 490 Tillotson, J. 241, 317 n.2

509

Tiusanen, R. 282n.l9 Tolkien, J. R. R. 215, 219, 220 Toller, Τ. N. 57, 58, 59, 61, 62, 63, 71, 72, 80, 81, 82, 84, 87, 95, 96,100, 285, 301 n.l. 301 Torkington, R. 241, 339n.l2 Torp, A. 420, 422, 423, 435 n.l 1, 438 Tottie, G. 6, 440, 441, 442, 443, 444, 445, 446, 453, 458, 459, 463, 463 n.4, 467 Traugott, Ε. C. 15, 30, 32, 50, 56, 101, 224, 231, 234, 245, 289, 305, 306, 320, 338 n.6, 342, 364, 366, 452, 467, 469, 471, 472, 490 Trevisa, J. de 178 Trudgill, P. 108, 123 Tyndale, W. 305, 313, 314, 315, 317 n.2 Udall, N. 328 Uhlig, C. 360, 365 Usk, T. 395 Vachek, J. 466 Valentin, P. 465 van der Gaaf, W. 142, 150, 161, 163, 164, 176, 177, 183 n.12, 184n.25, 186n.37, 188 van der Leek, F. C. 183 n.6, 186, 318. 319, 340, 342, 366, 440, 465, 489, 490 van der Meij, H. 192, 201 van der Steen, G. J. 143, 188 van der Wurff, W. 142, 153, 172, 173, 184 n.21,22, 188 van Dijk, T. A. 285 van Kemenade, A. 34, 38, 46, 47 n.4, 50, 75, 76, 77, 101, 168, 170, 185n.31, 188, 210, 220, 376, 377, 378, 379, 381, 384, 387, 390, 391, 395, 397, 398, 399, 403 n.9, 404n.l4, 22, 405n.22, 408 van Lessen Kloeke, W. U. S. 101 van Noppen, J. P. 340 van Riemsdijk, H. 185n.32, 188 Vendler, Z. 307 Venezky, R. L. 77, 101, 188 Vennemann, Τ. 30, 34, 39, 50, 51, 56, 101, 105, 108, 111, 113, 114, 123, 381, 382, 389, 390, 392, 393, 394, 395, 398, 400n.l, 405 n.25,27, 408 Verney 348 Viereck, W. 281 n.3, 289 Vinaver, E. 436, 473, 483, 489 n.6, 490

510

Index

Vincent, Ν. 20, 30, 287, 319, 341, 365, 491 Visser, F. Τ. 24, 30, 142, 143, 144, 147, 150, 152, 157, 158, 161, 175, 179, 181, 182 n.2, 183 n.7,10,16, 188, 234, 309, 318, 323, 334, 339n.l7, 340n.20, 342, 347, 354, 365, 489 Volk, S. 139

490, 148, 180, 289, 340,

Waerferth 154 Wakelin, M. 2 8 1 n . l l , 289 Walker, C. A. 319 Walker, J. 395, 407 Walsh, T. J. 286 Wang, W. S.-Y. 439, 467 Wanner, D. 74, 102 Warner, A. 12, 13, 16, 17, 24, 27, 30, 188 Wasow, T. 30 Webber, B. L. 126, 140 Weil, H. 116, 124 Weinreich, U. 280n.l, 281 n.6, 289 Weinstock, Η. 231 Weltens, Β. 338 η.5, 342 Wende, F. 54, 57, 59, 60, 61, 63, 64, 67, 96, 102 Wentworth 348 Wergeland, Η. 426, 429, 437 Werlich, Ε. 281 n.13, 289 Western, A. 283n.26, 289, 421, 429, 435n.l 1, 438 Whitehead, W. 348 Whitelock, D. 75, 76, 77, 102 Wiclif, J. 177, 178, 395, 398, 399

Wigglesworth, M. 242, 243, 248, 265, 283 n.28, 284 Wilde, O. 349 Williams, E. 165, 188 Winship, G. P. 281 n.l5 Winslow, Ο. E. 236, 289 Winthrop, J. 269, 281 n.l2, 284 Winthrop, W. 233, 270, 284 Wirth, J. R. 109, 120 Woodcock, Ε. C. 183n.l3, 188 Wordsworth, D. 349 Wordsworth, W. 349 Workman, S. K. 115, 124 Wrenn, C. L. 45, 50, 54, 101, 113, 122, 139n.l0,11, 140, 219, 230, 402n.4, 408 Wright, S. M. 4, 6, 18, 219 n.l, 235, 287, 317n.l, 319, 332, 333, 338n.l, 339n.8,18, 341, 342, 365, 469, 472, 473, 476, 479, 489 n.6,9, 490, 491 Wülfing, J. E. 226, 231 Wulfstan 334, 375 Wyatt, T. 458 Yamakawa, K. 371, 383, 384, 408 Yule, G. 138 n.7, 139 Yulikova, Ν. M. 4 Zaenen, A. 318, 319 Zeitlin, J. 142, 161, 162, 188 Zimmermann, R. 374, 403 n.9, 404 n.10, 408 Zuravljov, V. 109, 124 Zwicky, A. 101

m

Niels Davidsen-Nielsen

m Tense and Mood in English m

m

A Comparison with Danish 1990. X, 224 p a g e s . Cloth. ISBN 3 1 1 0 1 2 5 8 1 1

(Topics in English Linguistics 1]

m

m m m m m m m

This monograph deals with the grammatical realization of expressions of time and modality in English. Tense is interpreted as a broad category with eight members, the perfect and future constructions being included. Mood is assumed to comprise not only morphologically signalled constructions like the subjunctive and the imperative, but also syntactically signalled constructions with modal auxiliaries. This work has both an analytical and a descriptive objective. One of the purposes is to provide a descriptive basis on which reliable and efficient teaching material may be prepared. By contrasting English with Danish, a language in which the forms of expression of modality and time are relatively similar, important differences are brought to light.

m m m

mouton de gruyter

m

Berlin · New York

m

m m m m

m m m m

m m m

m m m m

Edgar C. Polome (Editor)

Research Guide on Language Change

1990.15.5 x 23.0 cm. Approx. 470 pages. Cloth. ISBN 3110120461 (Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs 48)

This collection of 33 invited papers presents a comprehensive survey of the present state of research on the various aspects of language change, focusing on methodology and on various theoretical models. The differenttypes oflanguage change-phonological, morphological, syntactic, and lexical - are examined, as well as the topics of language families, contact linguistics, creolization, bi- and multilingualism and similar contexts of changes. This assessment of the different fields of study provides an introduction to the subject and the presentation is illustrated with numerous examples, mainly from Western languages. Not only are those areas of research which have been explored indicated, but those which need further investigation are also described.

Leiv Egil Breivik · Ernst Hakon Jahr (Editors)

Language Change

Contributions to the Study of Its Causes

1989.15.5 x 23 cm. VIII, 281 pages. Cloth. ISBN 3 110119951 (Trends in Linguistics. Studies and Monographs 43)

This collection of 11 papers reflects the recent upsurge of interest in historical linguistics, delving into the complex causes not only of phonological change, but of language change in general. This work draws on the developments and expansion of disciplines such as sociolinguistics, language contact research, communication theory, child language and creole studies, together with innovations in the study of language-internal developments as well as in the study of language universale and linguistics typology. Data are drawn from a variety of languages and language types but all focus on the causes of language change.

mouton de gruyter

Berlin · New York