Cover not available

In:Proto-Indo-European Syntax and its Development
Edited by Leonid Kulikov and Nikolaos Lavidas
[Benjamins Current Topics 75] 2015
► pp. 7–27

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload Book PDF
authorization required

Reconstructing Proto-Indo-European categories

The reflexive and the middle in Hittite and in the Proto-language

 | University of Verona & University of Würzburg
Published online: 16 July 2015
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/bct.75.02cot
Starting from the analysis of constructions employed to express the category of reflexive in Hittite, encoded both by the verbal ending set of the middle and by the pronominal marker -za with both active and middle verbal forms, we present a typological parallelism with the Baltic languages that has consistently developed, from a pronominal, a verbal strategy to mark reflexivity. It is also shown that a development regarding the ways of encoding reflexivity involve other Indo-European languages as well.
The Anatolian languages attest the reflexes of the original set of endings referring to the semantic categories of Reflexive, Middle and “Resultative”, while the other Indo-European languages attest an innovated “mixed morphology” for the category of Middle and Reflexive as opposed to the proper endings of the historical perfect. Within such a theoretical framework, the development of alternative strategies, using pronominal devices or particles, aims to disambiguate a wide polysemous ending set. A ‘Wackernagel’ (2P) particle in Hittite, namely -z, is particularly active in disambiguating reflexivity. Lithuanian -si, an original pronoun that developed at first into a 2P particle and subsequently into a verbal suffix, extends its functional field and takes over the place of the original middle, as in other Baltic and Slavonic languages.
References (43)
Archi, Alfonso. 1993. Kamrušepa and the Sheep of the Sun-God. Orientalia Nova Series 62.404–409.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Benedetti, Benedetto. 1981. Sul simbolismo del “legare” e del “tessere”. Studi e Ricerche 1.7–18.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Benedetti, Marina. 2005. Dispersioni formali del medio indoeuropeo. Acquisizione e mutamento di categorie linguistiche. Atti del Convegno della Società Italiana di Glottologia (Perugia, 23–25 ottobre 2003) ed. by Lidia Costamagna & Stefania Giannini, 95–119. Roma: Il Calamo.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Boley, Jacqueline. 1993. The Hittite Particle -z/-za. (= Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft, 79.) Innsbruck: Innsbrucker Beiträge zur Sprachwissenschaft.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
CHD. Güterbock, et al., eds., (1980–2005).
Clackson, James. 2007. Indo-European Linguistics: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cotticelli Kurras, Paola & Alfredo Rizza. 2011. Die hethitische Partikel -z(a) im Licht neuer theoretischer Ansätze. Indogermanistik und Linguistik in Dialog, XIII: Akten der Fachtagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft, vom 21. bis 28. September 2008 in Salzburg ed. by Thomas Krisch & Thomas Lindner, 120–130. Wiesbaden: Reichert.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dixon, Robert M.W. 1994. Ergativity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Friedrich, Johannes. 1930. Die hethitischen Bruchstücke des Gilgameš-Epos. Zeitschrift für Assyriologie und verwandte Gebiete N.F. 39.1–82. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Friedrich, Johannes, Annelies Kammenhuber, Paola Cotticelli-Kurras, & Albertine Hagenbuchner-Dresel, et al. 1975ff. Hethitisches Wörterbuch: Zweite, völlig neubearbeitete Auflage auf der Grundlage der edierten hethitischen Texte. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Geniušienė, Emma. 1987. The Typology of Reflexives. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Güterbock, Hans G., Harry A. Hoffner & Theo P.J. van den Hout, eds. 1980–2005. Hittite Dictionary of the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. Chicago: The Oriental Institute.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hackstein, Olav. 2003. Reflexivpronomina, Präverbien und Lokalpartikel in indogermanischen Sprachen. Tocharian and Indo-European Studies 10.69–95.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haspelmath, Martin. 2003. The Geometry of Grammatical Meaning: Semantic Maps and Cross-Linguistic Comparison. The New Psychology of Language Vol. 2 ed. by Michael Tomasello, 211–242. Mahwah, NJ: Erlbaum.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hock, Hans H. 2006. Reflexivization in the Rig-Veda (and beyond). Themes and Tasks in Old and Middle Indo-Aryan Linguistics, Papers of the 2004 World Sanskrit Conference, Vol. 5 ed. by Bertil Tikkanen & Heinrich Hettrich, 19–44. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hoffner, Harry A. Jr., & Harold C. Melchert. 2008. A Grammar of the Hittite Language. Part I: Reference Grammar. Winona Lake: Eisenbrauns.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
HW2. Friedrich, et al., eds., (1975ff.)Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jasanoff, Jay. 2003. Hittite and the Indo-European Verb. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Josephson, Folke. 2003. The Hittite Reflexive Construction in a Typological Perspective. Language in Time and Space: A Festschrift for Werner Winter on the Occasion of his 80th Birthday ed. by Brigitte L.M. Bauer & Georges-Jean Pinault, 211–232. Berlin: de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kazenin, Konstantin I. 2001. Verbal Reflexives and the Middle Voice. Language Typology and Language Universals: An International Handbook ed. by Martin Haspelmath, 916–927. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kemmer, Susanne. 1993. The Middle Voice. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
König, Eckard & Volker Gast, eds. 2002. Reflexives and Intensifiers: The Use of Self-Forms in English. Special Issue of Zeitschrift für Anglistik und Amerikanistik 50:3.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Laroche, Emmanuel. 1971. Catalogue des textes hittites. Paris: Klincksieck.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lazzeroni, Romano. 1990. La diatesi come categoria linguistica: studio sul medio indoeuropeo. Studi e saggi linguistici 30.1–22.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Luraghi, Silvia. 2010. Transitivity, Intransitivity and Diathesis in Hittite. Indo-evropejskoe jazykoznanie i klassicheskaja filologija 14.133–154.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Meid, Wolfgang. 1975. Probleme der räumlichen und zeitlichen Gliederung des Indogermanischen. Flexion und Wortbildung: Akten der V. Fachtagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft, Regensburg, 9–14.9.1973 ed. by Helmut Rix, 204–219. Wiesbaden: Reichert.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Meiser, Gerhard. 2009. Zur Typologie des urindogermanischen Mediums. Protolanguage and Prehistory: Akten der Fachtagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft, vom 11. bis 15. Oktober 2004 in Krakau ed. by Rosemarie Lühr & Sabine Ziegler, 318–334. Wiesbaden: Reichert.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Neu, Erich. 1968. Interpretation der hethitischen mediopassiven Verbalformen. (= Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten, 5.) Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1976. Zur Rekonstruktion des indogermanischen Verbalsystems. Studies in Greek, Italic, and Indo-European Linguistics Offered to L.R. Palmer ed. by Anna Morpurgo Davies & Wolfgang Meid, 239–254. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1985. Das frühindogermanische Diathesensystem. Funktion und Geschichte. Grammatische Kategorien: Funktion und Geschichte. Akten der VII. Fachtagung der Indogermanischen Gesellschaft, Berlin, 20–25. Februar 1983 ed. by Bernfried Schlerath & Veronica Rittner, 275–296. Wiesbaden: Reichert.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nevis, Joel A. & Brian D. Joseph. 1992. Wackernagel Affixes: Evidence from Balto-Slavic. Yearbook of Morphology 1992.93–111.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Orel, Vladimir. 2000. A Concise Historical Grammar of the Albanian Language: Reconstruction of Proto-Albanian. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Parina, Elena. 2007. Reflexivpronomina im Mittelkymrischen. Kelten-Einfälle an der Donau: Akten des Vierten Symposiums deutschsprachiger Keltologinnen und Keltologen; philologische, historische, archäologische Evidenzen. Konrad Spindler (1939–2005) zum Gedenken (Linz/Donau, 17–21. Juli 2005) (= Philosophisch-Historische Klasse, 345) ed. by Helmut Birkhan, 390–396. Wien: Akademie der Wissenschaften in Wien.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Petit, Daniel. 1999. *su̯e- en grec ancien: la famille du pronom réfléchi. Leuven: Peeters.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2010. Untersuchungen zu den baltischen Sprachen. Leiden: Brill. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Puddu, Nicoletta. 2005. Riflessivi e intensificatori: greco, latino e le altre lingue indoeuropee. Pisa: ETS.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Puhvel, Jaan. 1984ff. Hittite Etymological Dictionary. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Safir, Ken. 2004. The Syntax of Anaphora. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
TDIR = Typological Database of Intensifiers and Reflexives. Available at [URL].
Yakubovich, Ilya. 2010. Sociolinguistics of the Luvian Language. Leiden: Brill.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (1)

Cited by one other publication

[no author supplied]
2025. La riflessività nelle lingue anatoliche [Studia Asiana, 15], DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 11 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue