Cover not available

Article published In: Latin influence on the syntax of the languages of Europe:
Edited by Bert Cornillie and Bridget Drinka
[Belgian Journal of Linguistics 33] 2019
► pp. 210–250

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

Language contact and language borrowing?

Compound verb forms in the Old French translation of the Gospel of St. Mark

 | The University of Texas at Austin | Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics
Published online: 30 March 2020
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/bjl.00028.bau
Abstract
This study investigates the potential influence of Latin syntax on the development of analytic verb forms in a well-defined and concrete instance of language contact, the Old French translation of a Latin Gospel. The data show that the formation of verb forms in the Old French was remarkably independent from the Latin original. While the Old French text closely follows the narrative of the Latin Gospel, its usage of compound verb forms is not dictated by the source text, as reflected e.g. in the quasi-omnipresence of the relative sequence finite verb + pp, which – with a few exceptions – all trace back to a different structure in the Latin text. Engels (VerenigdeStaten) Another important innovative difference in the Old French is the widespread use of aveir ‘have’ as an auxiliary, unknown in Latin. The article examines in detail the relation between the verbal forms in the two texts, showing that the translation is in line with of grammar. The usage of compound verb forms in the Old French Gospel is therefore autonomous rather than contact stimulated, let alone contact induced. The results challenge Blatt, Franz. 1957. “Latin influence on European syntax.” Travaux du Cercle de Linguistique de Copenhague 111: 330–369.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar assumption identifying compound verb forms as a shared feature in European languages that should be ascribed to Latin influence.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Latin vs. Romance and linguistic borrowing
    • 2.1Franz Blatt and the influence of Latin syntax on European languages
  • 3.pp + finite verb in non-standard Latin and Old French
    • 3.1Background of the topic: Brace constructions in Old French
    • 3.2Latin findings: pp + finite verb in late texts and non-standard registers
    • 3.3Old French findings: Compound verb forms in Old French texts
    • 3.4Old French findings: The Old French rendering of the Psalms
  • 4.The Old French translation of the Gospel of St. Mark
    • 4.1The Old French Bible
    • 4.2‘Disappearing’ compound verb forms: Latin compound form > of non-compound form
    • 4.3‘Retained’ compound verb forms: Latin compound form > of compound form
    • 4.4‘Emerging’ compound verb forms: Latin non-compound form > of compound form
      • 4.4.1Latin synthetic passive > of compound verb form
      • 4.4.2Latin synthetic perfect form > of compound verb form
      • 4.4.3Latin ‘other’ > of compound verb form
    • 4.5‘Commentaries’ in the translation
  • 5.Discussion of findings and conclusions
    • 5.1Findings
    • 5.2Discussion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (43)
References
Adams, James N. 1977. “A typological approach to Latin word order.” Indogermanische Forschungen 811: 70–90.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2013. Social variation and the Latin language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bardy, Gustave. 1938. La latinisation de l’église de l’Occident. Amay: Prieuré bénédictin.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bauer, Brigitte L. M. 1995. The development of SVO patterning in Latin and French. Diachronic and psycholinguistic perspectives. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2000. Archaic syntax in Indo-European. The spread of transitivity in Latin and French. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2003. “The adverbial formation in mente in Vulgar and Late Latin. A problem in grammaticalization.” In Latin tardif-latin vulgaire VI, ed. by Leiwo Solin, and Hilla Halla-aho, 439–457. Hildesheim: Olms.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2006. ‘“Synthetic” vs. “analytic” in Romance: the importance of varieties.” In Historical Romance linguistics. Retrospective and perspective, ed. by Randy Gess, and Deborah Arteaga, 287–304. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2009. “Word Order.” In New perspectives on historical Latin syntax, ed. by Philip Baldi, and Pierluigi Cuzzolin, 241–316. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2010. “Forerunners of Romance -mente Adverbs in Latin Prose and Poetry.” In Colloquial and literary Latin, ed. by Eleanor Dickey, and Anna Chahoud, 339–353. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2016. Review article of James Adams’s Social variation and the Latin language. Folia linguistica historica 371: 315–326. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
2017. Nominal apposition in Indo-European. Its forms and functions, and its evolution in Latin-Romance. Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Forthcoming. “Finite Verb + Infinitive + Object in non-Standard Latin.” Latin vulgaire – latin tardif XII1.
In preparation a. “Brace constructions in the history of Latin-Romance.”
In preparation b. “Language sources and reconstructing dead languages: discrepancies and evolution in Old French grammar.”
Blatt, Franz. 1957. “Latin influence on European syntax.” Travaux du Cercle de Linguistique de Copenhague 111: 330–369.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Buridant, Claude. 2000. Grammaire nouvelle de l’ancien français. Paris: Sedes.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Drinka, Bridget. 2017. Language contact in Europe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ernout, Afred, and François Thomas. 1964 (1951). Syntaxe latine. 2nd edition. Paris: Klincksieck.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Harris, Martin. 1982. “The “past simple” and the “present perfect” in Romance.” In Studies in the Romance verb, ed. by Martin Harris, and Nigel Vincent, 42–70. London: Croom.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Herman, Jószef. 1990 (1954). “Recherches sur l’ordre des mots dans les plus anciens textes français en prose.” In Du latin aux langues romanes. Etudes de linguistique historique, ed. by Sandor Kiss, 234–288. Tübingen: Niemeyer.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1970. Le latin vulgaire. Paris: Presses Universitaires de France.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hewson, John, and Vit Bubenik. 2006. Tense and aspect in Indo-European languages. Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Higgleton, Elaine P. 1992. “Latin gospel exegesis and the gospel glosses in the thirteenth century Old French translation of the Bible.” Ph.D. dissertation, University of St. Andrews.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kabatek, Johannes. 2005. Die Bolognesische Renaissance und der Ausbau romanischer Sprachen. Juristische Diskurstraditionen und Sprachentwicklung in Sūdfrankreich und Spanien im 12. und 13. Jahrhundert. Tūbingen: Niemeyer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Klein, Jared. 1992. “On the independence of Gothic syntax, I. Interrogativity, Complex sentence types, tense, mood, and diathesis.” Journal of Indo-European Studies 201: 339–379.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Liechtenhan, Eduard (ed.) 1928. Anthimi De observatione ciborum. Leipzig: Teubner.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Marchello-Nizia, Christiane. 1979. Histoire de la langue française aux XIVe et XVe siècles. Paris: Dunod.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1999. Le français en diachronie: douze siècles d’évolution. Paris: Ophrys.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Meillet, Antoine, and Joseph Vendryes. 1924. Traité de grammaire comparée des langues classiques. Paris: Champion.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mohrmann, Christine. 1949. “Les origines de la latinité chrétienne à Rome.” Vigiliae christianae 31: 163–183. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1957. “Linguistic problems in the early Christian church.” Vigiliae christianae 111: 11–36. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Musurillo, Herbert (ed.). 1972. The acts of the christian martyrs. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Nestle, Erwin, Kurt Aland, and Barbara Aland (eds.). 1979 (1878). Novum testamentum graece et latine. 7th edition. Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelgesellschaft.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Panayotakis, Stelios. 2016. “Expressions of time in Early and Late Latin.” In Early and Late Latin, ed. by James Adams, and Nigel Vincent, 202–216. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pétré, Hélène (ed.). 1948. Ethérie, journal de voyage (Peregrinatio). Paris: Cerf.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Pountain, Chris. 2011. “Latin and the structure of written Romance.” In The Cambridge History of the Romance Languages. Vol 1. Structures, ed. by Martin Maiden, John- Charles Smith, and Adam Ledgeway, 606–659. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sneddon, Clive. 1978. “A critical edition of the four gospels in the thirteenth-century Old French translation of the Bible.” DPhil dissertation, University of Oxford.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. “On the creation of the Old French Bible.” Nottingham Medieval Studies 461: 25–44. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2011. “The Old French Bible. The first complete vernacular Bible in Western Europe.” In The practice of the Bible in the Middle Ages. Production, reception, and performance in Western Christianity, ed. by Susan Boynton, and Diane J. Reilly, 296–314. New York: Columbia University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tara, George. 2014. Les périphrases verbales avec habeo en latin tardif. Paris: L’Harmattan.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Thielmann, Philipp. 1885. “Habere mit dem Part. Perf. Pass.” Archiv für lateinische Lexikographie und Grammatik 21: 372–423, 509–549.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Thomason, Sarah, and Terrence Kaufman. 1991. Language contact, creolization, and genetic linguistics. Oakland, CA: University of California Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Väänäänen, Veikko. 1963. Introduction au latin vulgaire. Paris: Klincksieck.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue