Indefinites between Latin and Romance (Oxford Studies in Diachronic and Historical Linguistics)

This book investigates the syntactic and semantic development of a selection of indefinite pronouns and determiners (such as aliquis 'some', nullus 'no', and nemo 'no one') between Latin and the Romance languages. Although these elements have undergone significant diachronic change since the Classical Latin period, the modern Romance languages show a remarkable degree of similarity in the way their systems of indefinites have evolved and are structured today. In this volume, Chiara Gianollo draws on data from Classical and Late Latin texts, and from electronic corpora of the early stages of various Romance languages, to propose a new account of these similarities. The focus is primarily on Late Latin: at this stage, the grammar of indefinites already shows a number of changes, which are homogeneously transmitted to the daughter languages, leading to parallelism in the various emerging Romance systems. The volume demonstrates the value of using methods and models from synchronic theoretical linguistics for investigating diachronic phenomena, as well as the importance of diachronic research in understanding the nature of crosslinguistic variation and language change. Cover 1 Indefinites between Latin and Romance 4 Copyright 5 Contents 6 Series preface 10 Preface 12 Acknowledgments 14 List of abbreviations 16 1: The grammar of indefinitesFunctions, variation, and change 18 1.1 Aim and scope of this work 18 1.2 Overview of the chapters 21 1.3 Indefinites: working definitions 22 1.4 The functional space of indefinites 25 1.4.1 Haspelmath’s (1997) semantic map 25 1.4.1.1 Functions 25 1.4.1.2 Series 27 1.4.1.3 Diachronic generalizations 28 1.4.2 Semantic map for Latin indefinites 28 1.4.3 From Latin to Romance: the case studies 31 1.5 Dimensions of variation and change 33 1.5.1 A research program 33 1.5.2 The classes investigated in this work 35 1.5.2.1 Epistemic indefinites 35 1.5.2.2 Indefinites in the scope of negation 37 1.5.3 Constraints on domains of quantification 40 1.5.4 Indefinites and the systematicity of semantic change 43 1.5.4.1 Cycles and directionality 44 1.5.4.2 Mechanisms of semantic change 47 1.6 Corpora, methods, and periodization 49 1.6.1 Corpora and methods for data collection 49 1.6.2 Periodization for Latin 51 2: Specific and epistemic indefinites in Latin 54 2.1 ntroduction 54 2.1.1 Topics and aims 54 2.1.2 Roadmap 55 2.2 The contexts of quidam, aliquis, and quis 56 2.3 Specificity and Latin indefinites 61 2.3.1 Notions of specificity 61 2.3.2 Is aliquis really specific? 63 2.3.3 Taking stock 65 2.4 Quidam 66 2.4.1 Uses of quidam in Classical Latin 67 2.4.2 Quidam in Late Latin 70 2.4.2.1 Contexts of use 70 2.4.2.2 Competition with certus and unus 72 2.5 Latin aliquis and the class of epistemic indefinites 75 2.5.1 Epistemic indefinites 76 2.5.2 The anti-singleton constraint 78 2.5.3 Dependent licensing 79 2.5.4 The ignorance implicature 80 2.5.5 Epistemic indefinites and negation 82 2.5.6 Crosslinguistic variation with epistemic indefinites 83 2.6 Classical Latin aliquis 86 2.6.1 Etymological remarks 86 2.6.2 Prototypical ‘realis’ contexts 87 2.6.3 Generic environments 88 2.6.4 Modalized environments 89 2.6.5 Negation and other downward-entailing contexts 92 2.6.6 Protasis of conditional 95 2.6.7 Scalar uses 96 2.6.8 Interim summary: aliquis as an epistemic indefinite 97 2.7 Aliquis in Late Latin 98 2.7.1 Aliquis and negation in Late Latin 98 2.7.2 Combination with unus 102 2.8 Conclusions and outlook 104 3: Aliquis from Latin to Romance 105 3.1 Introduction 105 3.1.1 Topics and aims 105 3.1.2 Roadmap 106 3.2 The Quantifier Cycle 107 3.3 The Romance continuations of aliquis 109 3.3.1 Latin aliquis and the Quantifier Cycle 109 3.3.2 The continuations of aliquis: a synchronic overview 111 3.3.3 Spanish 115 3.3.4 Portuguese 117 3.3.5 Catalan 119 3.3.6 French 120 3.3.7 Italian 123 3.3.8 Asymmetry and divergence between singular and plural 125 3.4 Diachronic developments 128 3.4.1 Overview 128 3.4.2 A closer look at Old French 129 3.4.3 A closer look at Old Italian 133 3.4.4 Inversion 136 3.5 Inversion as focalization in the Determiner Phrase 140 3.5.1 A distributional generalization 141 3.5.2 The syntax of DP-internal inversion 142 3.6 The semantic role of focus 146 3.6.1 Scalar focus and NPIs 146 3.6.2 Loss of emphasis: a comparison with Jespersen’s Cycle 149 3.7 Conclusions 152 4: Indefinites and negation in the history of Latin 154 4.1 Introduction 154 4.1.1 Topics and aims 154 4.1.2 Roadmap 156 4.2 The Latin negation system in light of Romance 157 4.2.1 Position of negative markers 157 4.2.2 Lexical renewal in indefinites interacting with negation 158 4.2.3 Research questions and hypothesis 160 4.3 The Classical Latin negation system: a first overview 161 4.3.1 A Double Negation system 161 4.3.2 Negative markers 163 4.3.3 Negative indefinites 164 4.4 Negation systems: theoretical backgrounds 167 4.4.1 The interpretation of negation 167 4.4.1.1 Sentential negation and constituent negation 167 4.4.1.2 Negation and focus 169 4.4.1.3 Denials 170 4.4.3 Types of negation systems 172 4.4.2.1 A feature-based typology 172 4.4.2.2 The syntactic status of negative markers 174 4.4.2.3 Indefinites interacting with negation 176 4.5 The analysis adopted here 179 4.5.1 Negative indefinites 179 4.5.2 n-words 181 4.5.3 The negative marker 184 4.6 Latin negation system and Jespersen’s Cycle 188 4.6.1 Jespersen’s Cycle 188 4.6.1.1 Typological and diachronic predictions 188 4.6.1.2 The triggers 191 4.6.1.3 A generative model of Jespersen’s Cycle 192 4.6.2 Grammaticalization of the Latin negative marker n ̄on 193 4.6.2.1 Traces of n ̆e (Stage I of Jespersen’s Cycle) 194 4.6.2.2 The rise of noenum (Stage II of Jespersen’s Cycle) 195 4.6.3 The syntax of n ̄on: position in the clause 197 4.6.4 The phrasal status of Classical Latin n ̄on (Jespersen’s Cycle, Stage III) 200 4.6.4.1 Syntactic autonomy 201 4.6.4.2 ‘Why no(t)?’ test 203 4.6.5 Emphatic negation 205 4.6.6 Interim summary 208 4.7 The negation system in Late Latin 208 4.7.1 Late Latin: a ‘concealed non-strict NC language’? 208 4.7.2 The development of n ̄on in Late Latin: a new Stage I of Jespersen’s Cycle? 209 4.7.3 OV order with negative indefinites 209 4.7.4 Analysis 212 4.7.4.1 Object movement with negative indefinites 212 4.7.4.2 The activation ofNegP and its consequences for indefinites 213 4.7.4.3 Implications for theoretical models 216 4.8 Conclusions 217 5: Developments in negative and polarity-sensitive contexts from Latin to Romance 219 5.1 Introduction 219 5.1.1 Topics and aims 219 5.1.2 Roadmap 221 5.2 The situation in Early Romance 221 5.2.1 Diachronic puzzles with Romance n-words 221 5.2.2 Old French 224 5.2.3 Old Italian 231 5.2.4 Conclusions 239 5.3 The grammaticalization of nec-words 239 5.3.1 The issue 239 5.3.2 Etymological remarks 242 5.3.2.1 The negative particle 242 5.3.2.2 The inanimate pronoun 244 5.4 Syntax and semantics of Latin nec 245 5.4.1 The form 245 5.4.2 Functions from Classical to Late Latin 246 5.4.2.1 Discourse-structuring particle 246 5.4.2.2 Correlative particle 248 5.4.2.3 Stand-alone focus particle 253 5.4.3 Semantic analysis 256 5.4.3.1 Basic ingredients and scope relations 256 5.4.2.3 Correlative and non-correlative focus-sensitive uses 257 5.4.3.3 The scalar reading 259 5.4.4 Syntactic analysis 263 5.4.4.1 The internal structure of nec 264 5.4.4.2 Comparison with ne...quidem 266 5.4.5 Conclusions 267 5.5 From nec-words to n-words 268 5.5.1 The internal syntax of nec-words 268 5.5.2 Focus particles and polarity sensitivity 271 5.5.3 Nec unus 273 5.5.4 Nec ipse unus 277 5.5.5 Loss of emphasis with nec-words 278 5.5.6 Summary and outlook 280 5.6 Redundant uses of nec and the rise of Negative Concord 280 5.6.1 The redundant uses 281 5.6.2 The analysis 285 5.6.2.1 Focus Concord 285 5.6.2.2 From Focus Concord to Negative Concord 287 5.6.2.3 A note on redundancy with correlative nec 290 5.6.2.4 Summary and outlook 293 5.7 Concord and polarity-sensitive uses: a unification? 295 5.7.1 NPIs or n-words? 295 5.7.2 Optional strict Negative Concord in Old Italian 299 5.8 Conclusions 304 6: Conclusions 306 References 310 Index 334 Cover Indefinites between Latin and Romance Copyright Contents Series preface Preface Acknowledgments List of abbreviations 1: The grammar of indefinitesFunctions, variation, and change 1.1 Aim and scope of this work 1.2 Overview of the chapters 1.3 Indefinites: working definitions 1.4 The functional space of indefinites 1.4.1 Haspelmath’s (1997) semantic map 1.4.1.1 Functions 1.4.1.2 Series 1.4.1.3 Diachronic generalizations 1.4.2 Semantic map for Latin indefinites 1.4.3 From Latin to Romance: the case studies 1.5 Dimensions of variation and change 1.5.1 A research program 1.5.2 The classes investigated in this work 1.5.2.1 Epistemic indefinites 1.5.2.2 Indefinites in the scope of negation 1.5.3 Constraints on domains of quantification 1.5.4 Indefinites and the systematicity of semantic change 1.5.4.1 Cycles and directionality 1.5.4.2 Mechanisms of semantic change 1.6 Corpora, methods, and periodization 1.6.1 Corpora and methods for data collection 1.6.2 Periodization for Latin 2: Specific and epistemic indefinites in Latin 2.1 ntroduction 2.1.1 Topics and aims 2.1.2 Roadmap 2.2 The contexts of quidam, aliquis, and quis 2.3 Specificity and Latin indefinites 2.3.1 Notions of specificity 2.3.2 Is aliquis really specific? 2.3.3 Taking stock 2.4 Quidam 2.4.1 Uses of quidam in Classical Latin 2.4.2 Quidam in Late Latin 2.4.2.1 Contexts of use 2.4.2.2 Competition with certus and unus 2.5 Latin aliquis and the class of epistemic indefinites 2.5.1 Epistemic indefinites 2.5.2 The anti-singleton constraint 2.5.3 Dependent licensing 2.5.4 The ignorance implicature 2.5.5 Epistemic indefinites and negation 2.5.6 Crosslinguistic variation with epistemic indefinites 2.6 Classical Latin aliquis 2.6.1 Etymological remarks 2.6.2 Prototypical ‘realis’ contexts 2.6.3 Generic environments 2.6.4 Modalized environments 2.6.5 Negation and other downward-entailing contexts 2.6.6 Protasis of conditional 2.6.7 Scalar uses 2.6.8 Interim summary: aliquis as an epistemic indefinite 2.7 Aliquis in Late Latin 2.7.1 Aliquis and negation in Late Latin 2.7.2 Combination with unus 2.8 Conclusions and outlook 3: Aliquis from Latin to Romance 3.1 Introduction 3.1.1 Topics and aims 3.1.2 Roadmap 3.2 The Quantifier Cycle 3.3 The Romance continuations of aliquis 3.3.1 Latin aliquis and the Quantifier Cycle 3.3.2 The continuations of aliquis: a synchronic overview 3.3.3 Spanish 3.3.4 Portuguese 3.3.5 Catalan 3.3.6 French 3.3.7 Italian 3.3.8 Asymmetry and divergence between singular and plural 3.4 Diachronic developments 3.4.1 Overview 3.4.2 A closer look at Old French 3.4.3 A closer look at Old Italian 3.4.4 Inversion 3.5 Inversion as focalization in the Determiner Phrase 3.5.1 A distributional generalization 3.5.2 The syntax of DP-internal inversion 3.6 The semantic role of focus 3.6.1 Scalar focus and NPIs 3.6.2 Loss of emphasis: a comparison with Jespersen’s Cycle 3.7 Conclusions 4: Indefinites and negation in the history of Latin 4.1 Introduction 4.1.1 Topics and aims 4.1.2 Roadmap 4.2 The Latin negation system in light of Romance 4.2.1 Position of negative markers 4.2.2 Lexical renewal in indefinites interacting with negation 4.2.3 Research questions and hypothesis 4.3 The Classical Latin negation system: a first overview 4.3.1 A Double Negation system 4.3.2 Negative markers 4.3.3 Negative indefinites 4.4 Negation systems: theoretical backgrounds 4.4.1 The interpretation of negation 4.4.1.1 Sentential negation and constituent negation 4.4.1.2 Negation and focus 4.4.1.3 Denials 4.4.3 Types of negation systems 4.4.2.1 A feature-based typology 4.4.2.2 The syntactic status of negative markers 4.4.2.3 Indefinites interacting with negation 4.5 The analysis adopted here 4.5.1 Negative indefinites 4.5.2 n-words 4.5.3 The negative marker 4.6 Latin negation system and Jespersen’s Cycle 4.6.1 Jespersen’s Cycle 4.6.1.1 Typological and diachronic predictions 4.6.1.2 The triggers 4.6.1.3 A generative model of Jespersen’s Cycle 4.6.2 Grammaticalization of the Latin negative marker n ̄on 4.6.2.1 Traces of n ̆e (Stage I of Jespersen’s Cycle) 4.6.2.2 The rise of noenum (Stage II of Jespersen’s Cycle) 4.6.3 The syntax of n ̄on: position in the clause 4.6.4 The phrasal status of Classical Latin n ̄on (Jespersen’s Cycle, Stage III) 4.6.4.1 Syntactic autonomy 4.6.4.2 ‘Why no(t)?’ test 4.6.5 Emphatic negation 4.6.6 Interim summary 4.7 The negation system in Late Latin 4.7.1 Late Latin: a ‘concealed non-strict NC language’? 4.7.2 The development of n ̄on in Late Latin: a new Stage I of Jespersen’s Cycle? 4.7.3 OV order with negative indefinites 4.7.4 Analysis 4.7.4.1 Object movement with negative indefinites 4.7.4.2 The activation ofNegP and its consequences for indefinites 4.7.4.3 Implications for theoretical models 4.8 Conclusions 5: Developments in negative and polarity-sensitive contexts from Latin to Romance 5.1 Introduction 5.1.1 Topics and aims 5.1.2 Roadmap 5.2 The situation in Early Romance 5.2.1 Diachronic puzzles with Romance n-words 5.2.2 Old French 5.2.3 Old Italian 5.2.4 Conclusions 5.3 The grammaticalization of nec-words 5.3.1 The issue 5.3.2 Etymological remarks 5.3.2.1 The negative particle 5.3.2.2 The inanimate pronoun 5.4 Syntax and semantics of Latin n ̆ec 5.4.1 The form 5.4.2 Functions from Classical to Late Latin 5.4.2.1 Discourse-structuring particle 5.4.2.2 Correlative particle 5.4.2.3 Stand-alone focus particle 5.4.3 Semantic analysis 5.4.3.1 Basic ingredients and scope relations 5.4.2.3 Correlative and non-correlative focus-sensitive uses 5.4.3.3 The scalar reading 5.4.4 Syntactic analysis 5.4.4.1 The internal structure of n ̆ec 5.4.4.2 Comparison with ne...quidem 5.4.5 Conclusions 5.5 From nec-words to n-words 5.5.1 The internal syntax of nec-words 5.5.2 Focus particles and polarity sensitivity 5.5.3 N ̆ec unus 5.5.4 N ̆ec ipse unus 5.5.5 Loss of emphasis with nec-words 5.5.6 Summary and outlook 5.6 Redundant uses of n ̆ec and the rise of Negative Concord 5.6.1 The redundant uses 5.6.2 The analysis 5.6.2.1 Focus Concord 5.6.2.2 From Focus Concord to Negative Concord 5.6.2.3 A note on redundancy with correlative n ̆ec 5.6.2.4 Summary and outlook 5.7 Concord and polarity-sensitive uses: a unification? 5.7.1 NPIs or n-words? 5.7.2 Optional strict Negative Concord in Old Italian 5.8 Conclusions 6: Conclusions References Index