Towards a Syntactic Typology of Old Italo-Romance

Verb Second in old Venetian, 2021

This study aims to add to a rich scholarship on the presence of a verb second constraint in old (Italo-)Romance that has been argued to cause V-to-C raising of both the finite verb and one or more constituents, provided we understand this constraint to be lax in these varieties (cf. Ledgeway 2007, 2008). In particular, it analyses a late 14 th century old Venetian text, corroborating the existence of this constraint within the variety. Within this study, it will be shown that the syntax of 14 th century Venetian is one in which we find the gradual loss of the V2 constraint. This will be shown through a range of phenomena present within the text, such as a loss of Informational Focus fronting, the weakening of subject pronouns, and the loss of scrambling to vP. All in all, this study aims to shed light on the syntax of 14 th century Venetian specifically, adding to a growing scholarship on what the incipient loss of the V2 constraint looks like within respective old Romance varieties.

Nordic Journal of Linguistics, 2014

2020

The aim of this contribution is to discuss three possible theoretical interpretations of grammaticalised structures in present-day Italo-Romance varieties. In particular, we discuss and analyse three diachronic case studies in relation to the generative view of grammaticalisation. The first case-study revolves around the expression of future tense and modality. This is discussed in the light of the assumption according to which grammaticalised elements result from merging elements in higher positions than their original merge positions within the lexical domain, giving rise to the upward directionality of the grammaticalisation process within the clause. The second case study challenges this view, by discussing irrealis complementisers as a case of a downward pathway of grammaticalization at the CP level. For our third case study, namely the development of (discontinuous) demonstrative structures from Latin to Romance, the rich Italo-Romance empirical evidence is analysed through the lens of a parametric account, in order to capture the role of the relevant semantic and syntactic features within the fine-grained architecture of the DP. It will be observed that the diachronic development of some functional categories in (Italo-)Romance results from cyclic pathways of grammaticalisation, as the same category might cyclically change from more synthetic to more analytic, and vice-versa.

Stylistic Fronting (SF) is an optional syntactic phenomenon whereby a lexical item that may belong to various syntactic categories fronts to a pre-finite V position, if no subject is merged in SpecIP. Literature reports that SF is productive in Icelandic and Old Scandinavian, and it is also attested in some Old Romance languages (Old Catalan, Old French). This paper presents a phase-based analysis of SF in Old Italian. In this language, SF has some previously undiscussed characteristics. A corpus study shows that Old Italian displays a root/non-root asymmetry in the typology of fronting items. In root clauses, nominal elements, such as nominal predicates with a special semantics, front more frequently than verbal elements (infinitives, past participles), which most frequently front in non-root clauses. Since fronting in root clauses is intrinsically ambiguous with topicalization and focalization, it is not considered SF, and is not extensively discussed in this paper. By contrast, I analyze as proper SF the fronting operation that occurs in non-root clauses, and I argue that this is a movement anchoring the event-structure (vP) semantic content to the context (FinP). This type of movement is possible only if vP is not a phase and no intervening agentive external argument is merged in SpecvP. The fronted material is pragmatically presupposed and interpreted as ‘Subject of Predication’. Pragmatics tests corroborate the argument.

Lingua

Nordic Journal of Linguistics, 2005

In this article we try to determine the diachronic origin of a few sentential particles attested in some North-Eastern Italian dialects on the basis of their syntactic properties. The particles we consider are associated to specific clause types and can only appear in matrix nondeclarative clauses; they generally occur in sentence final position, and only some of them can follow the wh-item in an interrogative clause. They display the typical properties of X°-elements, and can therefore be analyzed as functional heads of the CP layer; we present an analysis exploiting movement of the wh-item or of the whole clause to the specifier corresponding to the head occupied by the particle. The different distribution that characterizes the two main types of particles seems to depend on whether they derive etymologically from pronouns or from adverbs; the new properties developed in the grammaticalization process suggest that when an element is reanalysed as a functional category, it can further acquire the value of functional projections merged close to it in the structure.

This article presents findings of a syntactic study of two Old Sardinian legal documents. It is proposed that Old Sardinian had a verb-initial syntax, which at face value appears quite distinct from the verb-second (V2) syntax reported elsewhere in Old Romance. It is suggested, however, that this verb-initial order is derived by V-to-C movement, a feature which is inherited from late Latin and represents a synchronic point of continuity in the syntax of Old Romance varieties. Old Sardinian matrix clauses show evidence for a rich set of left peripheral projections to which subjects can raise, leading to an SVO/VSO alternation which is sensitive to the information structure of the subject constituent in question. There is no direct evidence for these discourse-related projections in the C-layer in embedded contexts, leading to a strict VSO word order and suggesting that Old Sardinian may have an impoverished embedded left periphery.

Probus

The aim of this contribution is to discuss three possible theoretical interpretations of grammaticalised structures in present-day Italo-Romance varieties. In particular, we discuss and analyse three diachronic case studies in relation to the generative view of grammaticalisation. The first case-study revolves around the expression of future tense and modality. This is discussed in the light of the assumption according to which grammaticalised elements result from merging elements in higher positions than their original merge positions within the lexical domain, giving rise to the upward directionality of the grammaticalisation process within the clause (Roberts, Ian G. and Anna Roussou, 2003, Syntactic change: A minimalist approach to grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press). The second case study challenges this view, by discussing irrealis complementisers as a case of a downward pathway of grammaticalization at the CP level. For our third case study, namely the ...