Cover not available

In:History of Linguistics 2021: Selected papers from the 15th International Conference on the History of the Language Sciences (ICHoLS 15), Milan, 28 August – 1 September
Edited by Savina Raynaud, Maria Paola Tenchini and Enrica Galazzi
[Studies in the History of the Language Sciences 133] 2024
► pp. 179–197

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

Chapter 12
The relevance of B. Delbrück’s work on Indo-European syntax
(a century after his death)

 | Università degli Studi di Milano
Published online: 28 November 2024
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/sihols.133.12vai
Delbrück’s work on Indo-European syntax, particularly his contribution to the analysis of Vedic syntax, is still a useful tool for those wanting to deal with the study of Old Indian and Indo-European comparative syntax. Indeed, it is methodologically comparable with the recent analyses of the left periphery of the sentence. In fact, the notions of basic order of the major constituents of the sentence and of marked order are already present in Delbrück’s 1878 work, together with formal considerations that relate the variation of the order of constituents to the interface between the syntax and information structure of the sentence.
Article outline
  • 1.On PIE word order: Delbrück vs. Braune
  • 2.Non-configurational languages
  • 3.Configurationality and Indo-European
  • 4.The opposition between ‘traditionelle’ and ‘occasionelle Wortstellung’
  • 5.Examples of traditional and occasional order
  • 6.Looking for a VP in Sanskrit
  • 7.Clitics in Delbrück (1878)
  • 8.Verb-initial sentences due to textual cohesion
  • 9.Reception of Delbrück’s work in recent years
  • 10.The Occasionelle Wortstellung as a historical explanation
  • 11.Amplified sentences
  • 12.Occasionelle Stellung and Left Periphery
  • 13.Conclusions
  • Notes
  • References
References (26)
References
Benincà, Paola 2001. “The Position of Topic and Focus in the Left Periphery”. Current Studies in Italian Syntax Offered to Lorenzo Renzi edited by Guglielmo Cinque & Giampaolo Salvi, 39–64. Amsterdam: Elsevier-North Holland Academic Graphics. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Benincà, Paola & Nicola Munaro, eds. 2010. Mapping the Left Periphery. The cartography of syntactic structures, Vol. 5. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bernstein, Ludwig. 1897. The Order of Words in Old Norse Prose. New York: Knickerbocker Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Braune, Wilhelm. 1894. “Zur Lehre von der deutschen Wortstellung“. Forschungen zur deutschen Philologie. Festgabe für Rudolf Hildebrand zum 13. März 1894, 34–51. Leipzig: Verlag von Veit und Comp.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Delbrück, Berthold. 1878. Die altindische Wortfolge aus dem Çatapathabrāhmaṇa dargestellt. Halle: Verlag der Buchhandlung des Weisenhauses.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1900. Vergleichende Syntax der indogermanischen Sprachen, vol. III. Strassburg: Karl J. Trübner.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1907. “Die wortstellung im Beowulf von John Ries”. Anzeiger für deutsches Altertum und deutsche Literatur XXXI.65–76.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Devine, Andrew M. & Laurence D. Stephens. 2000. Discontinuous Syntax. Hyperbaton in Greek. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Dressler, Wolfgang. 1969. “Eine textsyntaktische Regel der idg. Wortstellung”. Zeitschrift für vergleichende Sprachforschung 83.1–25.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Gonda, Jan. 1959. “On Amplified Sentences and Similar Structures in the Veda”. Four Studies in the Language of the Veda, 7–69. ‘s-Gravenhage: Mouton & Co..Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Graßmann, Hermann. 1996. Wörterbuch zum Rig-Veda. 6., [überarbeitete und ergänzte Auflage von Maria Kozianka]. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hale, Kenneth. 1983. “Warlpiri and the Grammar of Non-Configurational Languages”. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory 1.5–47. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hale, Kenneth, Mary Laughren, & Jane Simpson. 1995. “Warlpiri”. Syntax. Ein internationales Handbuch zeitgenössischer Forschung. An International Handbook of Contemporary Research vol. II edited by Joachim Jacobs, Armin von Stechov, Wolfgang Sternefeld & Theo Vennemann, 1430–1451. Berlin & New York: de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hale, Mark. 1987. Studies in the Comparative Syntax of the Oldest Indo-Iranian Languages. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jamison, Stephanie W. 1997. “Delbrück, Vedic Textual Genres, and Syntactic Change”. Berthold Delbrück y la sintaxis indoeuropea hoy. Actas del Coloquio de la Indogermanische Gesellschaft. Madrid, 21–24 de septiembre de 1994 edited by Emilio Crespo & José Luis García Ramón, 239–251. Madrid & Wiesbaden: Ediciones De La UAM–Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Keydana, Götz. 2011. “Wackernagel in the Language of the Rigveda. A Reassessment”. Historische Sprachforschung / Historical Linguistics. 124.106–133. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Krisch, Thomas. 1997. “B. Delbrücks Arbeiten zur Wortstellung aus heutiger Sicht”. Berthold Delbrück y la sintaxis indoeuropea hoy. Actas del Coloquio de la Indogermanische Gesellschaft. Madrid, 21–24 de septiembre de 1994 edited by Emilio Crespo & José Luis García Ramón, 283–309. Madrid & Wiesbaden: Ediciones De La UAM–Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lehmann, Winfred P. (1993). Theoretical Bases of Indo-European Linguistics. Routledge: London & New York.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lühr, Rosemarie. 2017. Stressed and Unstressed Particles in Old Indic. Discourse particles edited by Klaus von Heusinger, Gereon Müller, Ingo Plag, Beatrice Primus, Elisabeth Stark & Richard Wiese, 281–303. Berlin & Boston: De Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
McCone, Kim. 1997. “Delbrück’s Model of PIE Word Order and the Celtic Evidence”. Berthold Delbrück y la sintaxis indoeuropea hoy. Actas del Coloquio de la Indogermanische Gesellschaft. Madrid, 21–24 de septiembre de 1994 edited by Emilio Crespo & José Luis García Ramón, 363–396. Madrid & Wiesbaden: Ediciones De La UAM–Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Meillet, Antoine & Joseph Vendryes. 1924. Traité de grammaire comparée des langue classiques. Paris: Honoré Champion.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Œrtel, Hans. 1926. The Syntax of Cases in the Narrative and Descriptive Prose of the Brāhmaṇas. The disjunct use of cases. Heidelberg: Carl Winter Universitätsbuchhandlung.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Reinöhl, Uta. 2016. Grammaticalization and the Rise of Configurationality in Indo-Aryan. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rizzi, Luigi. 1997. “The Fine Structure of the Left Periphery”. Elements of Grammar edited by Liliane Haegeman, 281–337. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2004. The Structure of CP and IP. The cartography of syntactic structures, Volume 2. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wackernagel, Jacob. 1892. “Über ein Gesetz der indogermanischen Wortstellung”. Indogermanische Forschungen 1.333–436. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue