The Early English Impersonal Construction: An Analysis of Verbal and Constructional Meaning (Oxford Studies in the History of English)

__The Early English Impersonal Construction__ aims to demonstrate that an understanding of the functional and semantic aspects of impersonal verbs in Old and Middle English can shed light on questions that remain about these verbs today. The impersonal construction has been a topic of extensive research for over a hundred years. But three quandaries-their seemingly unsystematic development, the gradual loss of impersonal uses, and the difficulty of aligning this with structural changes in early English-have made explanations for their development unsatisfactory. Möhlig-Falke offers a detailed analysis of impersonal verbs within the framework of cognitive and constructional grammar. She focuses on the loss of the impersonal construction as a consequence of a redefinition of the grammatical categories of subject and object, and describes the diachronic development of impersonal verbs as a result of the complex interaction of verbal and constructional meaning. Her research comprises all verbs which are recorded in impersonal use in Old and Middle English, and takes account of their full range of syntactic uses. It is thus the most comprehensive investigation of the impersonal construction in early English available to date. Cover 1 Contents 8 List of Tables and Figures 12 Acknowledgments 14 List of Abbreviations 16 1. The Impersonal Construction in English 22 1.1 Introduction: Aims and Method 22 1.2 What Is Impersonal? Preliminary Notes on Terms and Terminology 24 1.3 The Development of Impersonal Expressions in English 33 1.4 Explanations for the Diachronic Development of Impersonal Expressions 35 1.4.1 Grammatical Causes of Loss: Changes Affecting the Relationship between Subject and Object 35 1.4.2 From Impersonal to Personal: What Motivates Language Change? 38 1.4.3 Verb Meaning and Constructional Meaning: Why Is a New Analysis Needed? 39 1.4.4 What Remains To Be Done? 41 1.5 A Cognitive-Functional Perspective on Language Change: Basic Assumptions 42 1.6 The Data 44 1.7 Structure of the Book 49 2. Functional Aspects of Old English Grammar 53 2.1 The Old English Nominal Cases 53 2.1.1 Transitivity and the Functions of the Nominal Cases 53 2.1.2 Nominal Case and Verbal Rection 58 2.2 Subject or Object? The First Argument in Impersonal Patterns 60 2.3 Old English Word Order and Information Structure 63 2.3.1 The Concepts of Topic and Focus 63 2.3.2 Verb-Second and the Syntactic Topicalization of Objects 65 2.4 The First Argument in Impersonal Patterns: A Grammatical Hybrid 66 3. Aspects of Verb Meaning and Constructional Meaning: Theory and Methodology 70 3.1 Verb Meaning 70 3.1.1 Conceptual Domains 72 3.1.2 Process Types and Frame Meaning 75 3.1.3 Argument Structure and Semantic Roles 79 3.1.4 Methodological Considerations 85 3.2 Constructional Meaning and the Issue of Perspective 87 3.2.1 Middle Voice and Middle Semantics 88 3.2.2 Subjectivity and Subjectification 91 3.3 Summary of Theory and Methodology 93 4. Semantic Analysis of Old English Verbs Capable of Impersonal Use 98 4.1 Selection of Verbs 98 4.2 Semantic Classification of Investigated Verbs 103 4.2.1 Verbs Used in the Expression of Spontaneous Events 106 4.2.2 Verbs Expressing Motion Processes 117 4.2.3 Verbs Expressing Relational Situations 120 4.3 Summary: Semantic Properties of Old English Impersonal Verbs 128 5. Investigation of the Impersonal Syntactic Uses of Old English Verbs 131 5.1 Frequencies of Impersonal Compared with Alternative Syntactic Uses 132 5.2 Impersonal Patterns 138 5.2.1 The First Argument in Impersonal Patterns in Main Clauses 139 5.2.2 The Second Argument in Impersonal Patterns in Main Clauses 147 5.2.3 Impersonal Subordinate Clause Patterns 162 5.2.4 Borderline Cases of Impersonal Patterns 165 5.3 Summary: Functional Properties of the Old English Impersonal Construction 167 6. A Comparison with Alternative Syntactic Constructions 173 6.1 Transitive and Intransitive Constructions 173 6.2 Formal Hit and Patterns Involving Extraposition 185 6.2.1 Hit-Extraposition 186 6.2.2 ÞÆT-Extraposition 192 6.3 The External Possessor Construction 197 6.4 The Infinitive of Obligation 204 6.5 Reflexive Patterns 206 6.6 Passive Constructions 212 6.7 Summary: Constructional Competition in Function and Use 216 7. The Diachronic Perspective: An Outlook to the Impersonal Construction in Middle and Early Modern English 222 7.1 The Development of Old English Impersonal Verbs in Middle and Early Modern English 222 7.2 The Extension of Impersonal Patterns in Middle English 227 7.3 The Impersonal Construction in Decline 232 7.3.1 Structural Developments in Early English 233 7.3.2 Competing Syntactic Constructions 236 7.3.3 Shifts of Meaning from Grammar to the Lexicon 244 8. Conclusion 248 8.1 Summary and Results 248 8.2 Research Agenda 254 9. Appendices 256 9.1 Appendix A: Tabular Overview of Frequencies of Syntactic Uses 256 9.2 Appendix B: Documentation of Old English Syntactic Patterns with References to the Textual Sources 268 10. Bibliography 542 11. Index 552 A 552 B 553 C 553 D 555 E 555 F 555 G 556 H 556 I 557 J 557 K 557 L 557 M 558 N 559 O 559 P 559 Q 560 R 560 S 561 T 563 U 564 V 564 W 564 Y 565 Z 565 This Title Demonstrate That An Understanding Of The Functional And Semantic Aspects Of Impersonal Verbs In Old And Middle English Can Shed Light On Questions That Remain About These Verbs Today. Ruth Möhlig-falke. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.