Willi Andreas. Origins of the Greek verb

Cambridge University Press, 2018. — ISBN: 9781107195554.Situated at the crossroads of comparative philology, classics, and general historical linguistics, this study is the first ever attempt to outline in full the developments which led from the remotest recoverable stages of the Indo-European proto-language to the complex verbal system encountered in Homer and other early Greek texts. By combining the methods of comparative and internal reconstruction with a careful examination of large collections of primary data and insights gained from the study of language change and linguistic typology, Andreas Willi uncovers the deeper reasons behind many surface irregularities and offers a new understanding of how categories such as aspect, tense, and voice interact. Drawing upon evidence from all major branches of Indo-European, and providing exhaustive critical coverage of scholarly debate on the most controversial issues, this book will be an essential reference tool for anyone seeking orientation in this burgeoning but increasingly fragmented area of linguistic
researchList of Figures page
List of TablesAbbreviations and Conventions xxvii
The Greek Verbal SystemVariety and Economy in the Verbal System of Ancient Greek
Verbal Endings
Overview
Athematic Endings: Active
Athematic Endings: Middle
Thematic Endings: Active and Middle
Perfect Endings
Modal Stem Markers
Subjunctive
Optative
‘Tense’ Stems
Overview
Aorist Stems
Present Stems
Perfect Stems
Future and Future Perfect Stems
Non-finite Forms
Participles and Verbal Adjectives
Infinitives
Approaching Prehistory
Comparative (External) Observations
The Anatolian Challenge
Systemic (Internal) Observations
From Greek to Proto-Indo-EuropeanCompeting Theories
The ‘Hoffmann–Strunk Model’
Hoffmann’s Graeco-Aryan Premise
Root Formations and Root (A)telicity
Radical or Phrasal Telicity?
Characterised Stems and Aktionsarten
Strunk on the Genesis of Tense and Aspect
A Special Role for the s-Aorist?
Cowgill’s Model and ‘Proto-Indo-Hittite’
Positioning Anatolian
Cowgill on the Hittite ḫi-Conjugation
Cowgill’s ‘Nominal Verbs’ and PIE Aspect
Some Obstacles
Assessment
Early Aspect I: Jasanoff on the ‘Proto-Middle’
Jasanoff against Cowgill
The ‘Proto-Middle’
Jasanoff’s ‘h2e-Conjugation’
Reconstructive Aims and Ideologies
Early Aspect II: Kuryłowicz’s Framework
Telic Verbs and Aspectual Shifts
Shortcomings of Kuryłowicz’s ModelThe Reduplicated Aorist
Searching for Early PerfectivesEliminating the s-Aorist
Eliminating the Thematic Aorist
The Reduplicated Aorist as the Earliest Perfective Type?
Greek Reduplicated Aorists: Data and Analysis
Arrangement of the Data Survey
General Observations
Greek Data
Root Structure
Thematic Stem Structure
Reduplication Vocalism and ‘Attic’ Reduplication
Full ‘Attic’ Reduplication Patterns (*HeC- Roots)
Full ‘Attic’ Reduplication in the Perfect
Partial ‘Attic’ Reduplication Patterns (*HCeC- Roots)
The Reduplicated Aorist as a Relic Category
The Reduplicated Aorist in Indo-Iranian
Inherited Reduplicated Aorists
Causative Reduplicated Aorists in Sanskrit
Leumann’s Theory
Inheritance and Innovation in the Causative Aorist
Non-causative Reduplicated Aorists in Sanskrit
Reduplicated Aorists and Pluperfects
Athematic Reduplicated Aorists?
Synopsis
Reduplicated Aorists in the West (Italic and Celtic)?
Problems of Identification
Theoretical Backing for a Formal Merger
Latin Long-Vowel Perfects
The Tocharian Reduplicated Preterite
Reduplicated and Long-Vocalic Causative Preterites
The Reduplication Vowel
Non-causative Cognate Formations?
Malzahn’s Theory
An Alternative Proposal
Implications
The Reduplicated Aorist in Proto-Indo-European
Distributional Arguments for an Archaism
Lexical Illustrations
Kuryłowicz’s ‘Fourth Law of Analogy’
Scalar (Semantic) Transitivity
Factitivity, High Transitivity, and the Reduplicated Aorist
Excursus on PIE Thematicity and Ablaut
The Reduplicated Aorist as a Thematic Category
Origins of the Thematic Vowel: Phonetics and Phonology
Secondary Thematisation and the Reduplicated Aorist
Reconsidering Long-Vowel Preterites
and ‘Acrostatic’ Presents
Notes on PIE Ablaut
Operational Ablaut in the Reduplicated AoristThe Reduplicated Present
Theoretical ConsiderationsReduplication and Iteration
Sources of Imperfectives
Plurality Types, Nominal and Verbal Aspect
PIE Reduplication from Verbal Collectives?
Perfective vs. Imperfective Reduplication: Stemmatic Models
Reduplicated Presents as Secondary Imperfectives?
Hittite Reduplicated Stems
Preliminary Remark
Classification of Hittite Reduplicated Verbs
Analysis of Group (i)
Analysis of Group (ii)
Formal Analysis of Group (iii)
Semantic Analysis of Group (iii)
Atelic Iteration and Bounding
Greek Reduplicated Presents
Reduplicated Presents without Suffix
Reduplicated Presents with Suffix *-i̯e/o
Presents with ‘Full’ Reduplication and Suffix *-i̯e/o
Formal Reconstruction
Overview
Problems of (A)thematicity
Thematic Primacy
Indo-Iranian Athematisation
Problems of Root Vocalism
Conflicting Analogies
Problems of Reduplication Vocalism
From e-Reduplication to i-Reduplication
Semantic Analysis: Vedic and Greek
Vendryes on the Thematic Reduplicated Presents
Reduplicated Presents in Vedic Polymorphic Systems
Polymorphic Reduplicated Presents and Verbal Voice
The Case of bíbharti
Greek ἔχω/ἴσχω, μένω/μίμνω, νέομαι/νίσομαι
Greek Reduplicated Presents without Polymorphic Partners
Factitivity and High Transitivity among Reduplicated Presents
Intermediate Summary
PIE Thematic Presents: Genesis and Distribution
PIE *CeC-o ‘Statives’
PIE *CeC-o as a Nominal Form
Watkins on the Thematic Root Presents
Phonological Adjustments
Morphological Adjustments
Hittite Correspondents to PIE Thematic Root Presents
Hittite and PIE Reduplicated Presents
A Semantic Query
Schematic Summary
Inferior Alternatives to Watkins’s Model
Thematic Root Presents and the Middle Voice
Systemic Consequences I: The Subjunctive
Thematic vs. Athematic Root Presents
Thematic Indicatives to Subjunctives
Semantic Evolution of the Subjunctive
Long-Vowel Subjunctives
Systemic Consequences II: Reduplicated Presents
Thematic Presents and Athematic Root Aorists
Reduplicated Presents as Imperfective Gap-Fillers
Perfective and Imperfective Stem Selections
Root-Aorist Subjunctives and ‘New’ Reduplicated PresentsThe PerfectDivergent Views on Perfect Reduplication
Reduplicated Roots or Reduplicated Stems?
Formal Prehistory of the Greek Perfect
Perfect, Middle, and ḫi-Conjugation Endings
Perfect Stems with Ablauting o-Grade
Non-ablauting o-Grade Perfect Stems
Perfect Stems to *HeC- Roots
Long-Vowel Perfects
Further Developments and Results of the Perfect-Stem Survey
Middle Perfects
The Pluperfect
Pluperfects as Pivot Forms
PIE Pluperfects?
Early Active Pluperfects
Later Pluperfects
Semantics of the Perfect in Greek and Proto-Indo-European
Wackernagel’s Taxonomy
Chantraine’s Classification of Homeric Perfects
Reconsidering Wackernagel’s Taxonomy: ‘Continuous’ Perfects
Perfects of ‘Lasting Effect’
The PIE Perfect as a ‘Nactostatic’ Category?
The Problem of Root (A)telicity
Intensive Perfects
‘Lexicalised Perfecto-Presents’
Evolutionary Sequences
‘Perfecto-Presents’ in the Evolutionary Sequence
A Slavic Comparandum
A Japanese Comparandum
A Form/Function Analysis of the PIE Perfect
Kuryłowicz’s Verbal Adjective
Cowgill’s Agentive Nominal
Accentual Matters
Reduplication and Perfect Semantics
*CóC-e Imperfectives I: PIE u̯ói̯de
*CóC-e Imperfectives II: Anatolian
*CóC-e Imperfectives III: Germanic and Baltic
Jasanoff’s ‘h2e-Conjugation’ Root Presents Reconsidered
–5.39 Related Formations I: *CoC-éi̯e/o- ‘Iterative-Causatives’
The Formal Type
Greek Evidence
Semantic Variation
Iteratives to Factitives?
Denominal Iteratives and Factitives
Relative Chronology
Related Formations II: Zero-Grade Statives
*CoC-é and *CéC-o
Agentivity and Accent
Zero-Grade Statives
Related Formations III: *CC-éi̯e/o- ‘Iteratives’
Greek Evidence
Problems of Identification
PIE *CC-éi̯e/o- Presents: Form
PIE *CC-éi̯e/o- Presents: Function
Relative Chronology
The Constitution of a ‘Nominal-Verb’/Perfect Paradigm
Singular
Plural: Preliminary Observations
Plural: A Developmental ScenarioThe Thematic AoristRevisiting Kuryłowicz’s Aorist Chain
–6.10 Theories on the Origin of the Thematic Aorist
Kuryłowicz: Another Shifted Imperfective
Distributional Counter-Indications
Cardona: A Thematised Root Aorist
Ablaut Inconsistencies in Indo-Iranian
Lack of Pivot Forms in Greek
Problems of Reconstructive Economy
The Evidence of *(h1e-)u̯id-e-t
Root Aorists and Thematic Aorists as Synchronic Competitors?
Argumentative Agenda
The Fate of PIE Root Aorists in Greek
Fully Preserved Root Aorists to *CeH- Roots
κ-Aorists
ially Preserved Root Aorists: Patterns of Innovation
Assessment
Aorists to *CeRH- Roots: Preliminary Remarks
Grouping the Data
Analysis of Group (i)
Analysis of Group (vii)
Inconsistencies with Roots in *-h2- and *-h
Inconsistencies with Roots in *-h
A New Scenario
Preferential Selections
The Thematic Aorist in the PIE Verbal System
A Functional Query
Reduplication and *h1e-Prefixation
Reduplicated Aorists to Thematic Aorists
Implications for the Augment
Reduplication, Augmentation, and Laryngeal Loss
–6.29 The Sanskrit Class VI (tudáti) Presents
Greek ‘tudáti Presents’?
The Genesis of tudáti PresentsThe AugmentThe Communis Opinio
The Augment in Homer
Wackernagel’s Position
Wortumfang
Augmentation in Compound Verbs
Augmentation and Aorist Types
Augmentation and Iteratives in -σκε/ο
‘Drewitt’s Rule’
Functional Tendencies
Histoire, discours, and the Augment
Bakker’s ‘Immediacy’
Theories on the Origin of the Augment
The Handbook Doctrine
Watkins’s Sentence Connector
An Emphatic Particle?
Intermediate Summary
Homeric Augmentation and Perfectivity
Reassessing the Data
Unaugmented Modal Forms
Augmented and Perfective Imperfects
Homeric Illustrations
Typological Support
The Augment in Mycenaean
General Situation
Earlier Explanations
Implicational Neutrality
The Augment in Phrygian, Armenian, and Iranian
Phrygian
Armenian
Old Persian
Augmented Aorists in Avestan
Augmented Imperfects in Avestan
The Augment in Vedic
Functions of the Vedic Injunctive
Hoffmann on the Vedic Augment
Hoffmann’s ‘Memorative’
The Injunctive Paradox
On (Re-)reading the Vedic Injunctive
Vedic Illustrations
Vedic and Early Greek Augmentation
The ‘Aoristic Drift’
Counter-Evidence from the History of Sanskrit?
The ‘Aoristic Drift’ in Old Indic DiachronyThe s-AoristA Mysterious Type
The Greek s-Aorist
The Creation of an Alphathematic Paradigm
Root Aorists to s-Aorists
i̯-Presents and s-Aorists
Root Presents and s-Aorists
Alternative Patterns
The s-Aorist and High Transitivity: Theoretical Considerations
Functional Differentiation among Aorist Types
Factitive s-Aorists
Supporting Evidence
Reduplicated Aorists to s-Aorists
The Greek s-Future
The Aorist-Subjunctive Theory
The Desiderative Theory
Assessment
Greek Middle Futures as Support for the Desiderative Theory?
A Morphological Hypothesis
Data Check
Asigmatic Middle Futures: πῑ́ομαι
βε(ί)ομαι and ἔδομαι
s-Aorists in Italic, Celtic, Slavic, and Baltic
Italic
Celtic
Slavic
Baltic
The s-Aorist in Indo-Iranian
Medial Primacy in the s-Aorist?
On Aorist-Stem Distribution
Secondary Developments
Independent s-Subjunctives
Tocharian s-Formations
s-Subjunctives and s-Presents: Overview
Diachronic Interpretation
s-Preterites
Hittite Comparanda
s-Endings: 3sg
s-Endings: 2sg
Root Presents to s-Enlarged Roots
Systemic Placement
The Semantics of s-Enlarged Roots
Hittite Fientives in -ešš
–8.45 Presents in *-sk̑e/o
PIE *-sk̑e/o- as a Composite Suffix
A Problem of Root Vocalism
k-Enlarged Roots, k-Presents, and Thematic Root Presents
Middle Presents in *-sk̑e/o
The Presents in *-sk̑e/o- as Secondary Imperfectives
On the Aktionsart Values of *-sk̑e/o
Greek Unreduplicated Presents in *-sk̑e/o
Greek Reduplicated Presents in *-sk̑e/o
Reduplicated Presents in *-sk̑e/o- outside Greek
Ablaut in the PIE s-Aorist
Regular s-Aorist Vocalism in Greek and Indo-Iranian
Lengthened-Grade Evidence outside Indo-Iranian
The s-Aorist as an ‘Acrostatic’ Type?
Theories of ‘Aufstufung’
‘Acrostatic’ Presents vs. s-Aorists
Monosyllabic Lengthening?
Szemerényi’s Law and the s-Aorist
Whence the s-Aorist?
An Action Noun Turned Verbal?
An Agent Noun Turned Verbal?From Proto-Indo-European to Pre-Proto-Indo-EuropeanUhlenbeck’s Ergative Hypothesis
Outline
On Studying ‘Pre-Proto-Indo-European’
Pre-PIE Nominal Ergativity after Uhlenbeck
Van Wijk on Genitives, Impersonal Verbs, and Pronouns
Pedersen on Ergative → Accusative Alignment Change
Vaillant on Nominal Gender and Directional *-m
Martinet on Markedness
Split Ergativity and the Animacy Hierarchy
Pre-PIE ‘Split Ergativity’ or ‘Split Accusativity’?
Shortcomings of the ‘Split-Accusative’ Hypothesis
Countering Animacy-Based Objections to the Ergative Theory
Early Views on Pre-PIE Ergativity and the Verb
Vaillant’s ‘Pseudo-Transitive Inflection’
Critique
Pedersen’s Alternative
Pre-Proto-Indo-European as an ‘Active’ (‘Split-S’) Language?
Beginnings of the ‘Active Hypothesis’
The Classical ‘Active Hypothesis’
Assessment I: Minor Evidence
Assessment II: ‘Active’ vs. ‘Inactive’ Verbs?
‘Split-S’ vs. ‘Fluid-S’
The Emergence of Verbal Voice
Pathways for an Ergative → Accusative Alignment Change
Extension of A Marking
Passives and Antipassives
Reanalysis of Antipassives
Antipassives and Nominal Inflection
Pre-PIE Antipassives and Verbal Inflection
Ergativity and Tense/Aspect Categories
General Principles
Implications for (Pre-)Proto-Indo-European
Reconsidering the Origin of the s-Aorist
From Pronouns to Personal Endings
Zero-Endings and Full Endings in the 3sg
Spreading 3sg. *-t and the Genesis of Suffixal *-s
AssessmentFrom Pre-Proto-Indo-European back to GreekA Gap to be Filled
Outline
More on Verbal Endings
Singular Endings: Recapitulation
Remodellings of the h2-Series 1sg. and 2sg
The 1 pl. Endings
The 2 pl. Endings
1 pl./2 pl. Endings: Summary
3 pl. Endings: Preliminary Remarks
The Participial Connection
Anatolian and Pre-PIE Participial Orientation
From Participles to 3pl. Forms
iciples and *CéC-o ‘Statives’
Endings of the m-Series and h2-Series: General Summary
Composite Middle Endings
Categorial Histories
Introductory Remark
Root Aorists: Active
Root Aorists: Middle
Root Presents (Athematic): Active
Root Presents (Athematic): Middle
Reduplicated Aorists
Thematic Aorists and Zero-Graded Thematic Presents (tudáti)
s-Aorists
s-Presents
Thematic Root Presents: Active
Thematic Root Presents: Middle
Reduplicated Presents (Thematic)
Reduplicated Presents (Athematic)
Presents in *-sk̑e/o
Excursus: Hittite Imperfectives in -šša
Perfects (and ‘Nominal Verbs’)
‘Iterative-Causative’ Presents
Origin and Functions of the i̯-Present
Imperfectivising *-i̯e/o
The Basic Formal Type
i̯-Presents and (In)transitivity
The i̯-Presents as Pre-PIE Antipassives?
On Denominal i̯-Presents
Antipassives and Relativisation
Suffixal *-i̯e/o- and Relative *i̯e/o
Paradigm Constitution
Alignment Change and PIE Aspectual Shifts
Building Blocks of the Pre-PIE Verbal System
New Perfectives through Alignment ChangeEpilogueIndex of Forms
General Index