Cover not available
Part of
Grammaticalization meets Construction Grammar
Edited by Evie Coussé, Peter Andersson and Joel Olofsson
[Constructional Approaches to Language 21] 2018
► pp. 277–311

A Radical Construction Grammar approach to construction split in the diachrony of the spatial particles of Ancient Greek

Some theoretical preliminaries

Within the context of a Radical Construction Grammar approach to grammaticalization, this paper presents construction split as a model of the diachrony of spatial particle constructions from Proto-Indo-European to Ancient Greek, accounting for the behaviour of Greek preposition and prefix constructions. The paper discusses some theoretical preliminaries for the RCG approach and for long-term construction developments, with special reference to phenomena in Ancient Greek. An argument is made for central tenets of RCG: there is no structure external to language-specific constructions; language change is fundamentally a matter of degree and ultimately dependent on the pragmatics of discourse; constructions are defined in terms of cues. This is framed in a conceptual discussion on the complementarity of grammaticalization and construction perspectives.

Keywords: Radical Construction Grammar, grammaticalization, utterance selection, construction split, Articulatory Phonology, Ancient Greek, spatial particles
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.A RCG approach to the units of grammatical change
    • 2.1Utterances as constructions, constructions as cues
    • 2.2Deconstructing syntactic relations: Adjacency, agreement, linear order
  • 3.Construction split
    • 3.1Preliminaries
    • 3.2Some phonological underpinnings of grammaticalization
    • 3.3A grammaticalization mechanism for split
    • 3.4Split of adpositions and affixes
  • 4. The diachrony of the spatial particle constructions in Ancient Greek
    • 4.1Spatial particles in Proto-Indo-European
    • 4.2Construction developments in Ancient Greek
    • 4.3Grammaticalization of aspectuality in discourse
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 23 May 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cal.21.c10
References
Bakker, E. J.
(2010) Pragmatics: Speech and Text. In E. J. Bakker (Ed.), A Companion to the Ancient Greek Language (pp. 151–67). Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bock, J. K.
(1982) Toward a cognitive psychology of syntax: Information processing contributions to sentence formulation. Psychological Review, 89(1), 1–47. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Booij, G., & van Kemenade, A.
(Eds.) (2003) Yearbook of Morphology 2003: Preverbs. New York: Kluwer Academic. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bolinger, D. L.
(1961) Generality, Gradience, and the All-or-None. ‘s-Gravenhage: Mouton.Google Scholar
Brinton, L. J.
(1988) The development of English aspectual systems: aspectualizers and post-verbal particles. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Browman, C. P., & Goldstein, L.
(1992) Articulatory phonology: An overview. Phonetica, 49(3–4), 155–180. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brunel, J.
(1939) L’aspect verbal et l’emploi des préverbes en grec, particulièrement en Attique. Paris: Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Bubenik, V.
(2007) On the evolution of the Greek prepositional system from Proto-Indo-European local adverbs and adpositions. In G. K. Giannakis et al. (Eds.), Proceedings of the 8th International Conference of Greek Linguistics. University of Ioannina.Google Scholar
Bybee, J., & Hopper, P. J.
(Eds.) (2001) Frequency and the emergence of linguistic structure. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bybee, J.
(2004) Phonology and language use. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
(2007) Frequency of use and the organization of language. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2010) Language, usage and cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chantraine, P.
(1953) Grammaire homérique. Tome II: syntaxe. Paris: Klincksieck.Google Scholar
Chatterjee, R.
(1982) On Cross-Linguistic Categories and Related Problems. In P. J. Hopper (Ed.), Tense-Aspect: Between Semantics & Pragmatics (pp. 335–345). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Croft, W.
(2000) Explaining language change: An evolutionary approach. Harlow: Longman.Google Scholar
(2001) Radical construction grammar: Syntactic theory in typological perspective. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2005) Logical and typological arguments for Radical Construction Grammar. In J.-O. Östman, & M. Fried (Eds.), Construction Grammars: Cognitive grounding and theoretical extensions (pp. 273–314). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
manuscript) Exemplar semantics. Draft, September 2007. Retrieved on 9 October 2017 from [URL]
(2008) On iconicity of distance. Cognitive Linguistics, 19(1), 49–57. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Croft, W., & Cruse, D. A.
(2004) Cognitive linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cummins, F.
(2011) Coordination, not control, is central to movement. In A. Esposito et al. (Eds.), Toward Autonomous, Adaptive, and Context-Aware Multimodal Interfaces. Theoretical and Practical Issues (pp. 243–255). Berlin/Heidelberg: Springer. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Debrunner, E., & Schwyzer, A.
(1950) Griechische Grammatik. Bd. II: Syntax und syntaktische Stilistik. München: Beck’sche Verlagsbuchhandlung.Google Scholar
Delbrück, B.
(1893) Vergleichende Syntax der indogermanischen Sprachen, Erster Theil. Strassburg: Trübner.Google Scholar
Denniston, J. D.
(1952) Greek Prose Style. Oxford: Clarendon.Google Scholar
Dik, H.
(1995) Word order in Ancient Greek: A pragmatic account of word order variation in Herodotus. Amsterdam: Gieben.Google Scholar
Dover, K. J.
(1960) Greek word order. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Dunkel, G. E.
(2014) Lexikon der indogermanischen Partikeln und Pronominalstämme. Heidelberg: Winter.Google Scholar
Fenk-Oczlon, G.
(2001) Familiarity, information flow, and linguistic form. In J. Bybee, & P. J. Hopper (Eds.), Frequency and the emergence of linguistic structure (pp. 432–448). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fischer, A.
(1999) What, if Anything, is Phonological Iconicity? In M. Nänny, & O. Fischer (Eds.), Form miming meaning (pp. 125–134). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fischer, O.
(1999) On the Role Played by Iconicity in Grammaticalisation Processes. In M. Nänny, & O. Fischer (Eds.), Form miming meaning (pp. 251–284). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fleischman, S.
(1990) Tense and Narrativity: From Medieval Performance to Modern Fiction. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Givón, T.
(1979) On understanding grammar. New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
(1988) The pragmatics of word order: Predictability, importance and attention. In M. Hammond, E. A. Moravcsik, & J. Wirth (Eds.), Studies in Syntactic Typology (pp. 243–284). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1989) Mind, code and context: Essays in pragmatics. Hillsdale, N.J.: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.Google Scholar
(1991) Isomorphism in the grammatical code: cognitive and biological considerations. Studies in language, 15(1), 85–114. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1995) Isomorphism in the grammatical code. In R. Simone (Ed.), Iconicity in language (pp. 47–76). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2001) Syntax: an introduction. Volume 1. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Goldberg, A. E.
(1995) Constructions: A Construction Grammar Approach to Argument Structure. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
(2006) Constructions at work: The nature of generalization in language. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gonda, J.
(1948) Quelques observations sur l’emploi de verbe simple ‘au lieu d’un composé’ etc. dans la langue sanskrite. Acta Orientalia, 20, 167–205.Google Scholar
Harris, A.
(1981) Georgian Syntax: A Study in Relational Grammar. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Haspelmath, M.
(1998) Does grammaticalization need reanalysis? Studies in language, 22(2), 315–351. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2008a) Frequency vs. iconicity in explaining grammatical asymmetries. Cognitive Linguistics, 19(1), 1–33. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2008b) Reply to Haiman and Croft. Cognitive Linguistics, 19(1), 59–66. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2010) Framework-free grammatical theory. In B. Heine, & H. Narrog (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Analysis (pp. 341–365). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Heine, B., Claudi, U., & Hünnemeyer, F.
(1991) Grammaticalization: A conceptual framework. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Heine, B., & Reh, M.
(1984) Grammaticalization and reanalysis in African languages. Hamburg: Buske.Google Scholar
Hessinger, J. J.
(1978) The syntactic and semantic status of prepositions in Greek. Classical Philology, 73(3), 211–223. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hirsch, E. D.
(1967) Validity in interpretation. New Haven: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Holmes, J., & Hudson, R.
(2005) Constructions in word grammar. In J.-O. Östman, & M. Fried (Eds.), Construction Grammars: Cognitive grounding and theoretical extensions (pp. 243–272). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hopper, P. J.
(1979a) Some observations on the typology of focus and aspect in narrative language. Studies in Language Groningen, 3(1), 37–64. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1979b) Aspect and Foregrounding in Discourse in Discourse and Syntax. In T. Givón (Ed.), Syntax and Semantics, Volume 12: Discourse and syntax (pp. 213–241). New York: Academic Press.Google Scholar
(Ed.) (1982) Tense-aspect: between semantics & pragmatics. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1991) On some principles of grammaticization. In E. C. Traugott, & B. Heine (Eds.), Approaches to grammaticalization, Volume 1 (pp. 17–35). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1994) Phonogenesis. In W. Pagliuca (Ed.), Perspectives on Grammaticalization (pp. 29–45). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(1998) Emergent grammar. In M. Tomasello (Ed.), The new psychology of language: Cognitive and functional approaches to language structure (pp. 155–75). Mahwah, N.J.: Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Hopper, P. J., & Traugott, E. C.
(1993) Grammaticalization. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Horrocks, G. C.
(1981) Space and time in Homer. Prepositional and adverbial particles in the Greek epic. Salem, NH: Ayer Company.Google Scholar
Houde, J. F., & Jordan, M. I.
(2002) Sensorimotor Adaptation of Speech I: Compensation and Adaptation. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 45(2), 295–310. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Imo, W.
(2007) Der Zwang zur Kategorienbildung: Probleme der Anwendung der Construction Grammar bei der Analyse gesprochener Sprache. Gesprächsforschung–Online-Zeitschrift zur verbalen Interaktion, 8, 22–45.Google Scholar
Janda, L., Endresen, A., Kuznetsova, J., Lyashevskaya, O., Makarova, A., Nesset, T., & Sokolova, S.
(2013) Why Russian aspectual prefixes aren’t empty: prefixes as verb classifiers. Bloomington, Indiana: Slavica Publishers.Google Scholar
Johnson, K.
(2001) Spoken language variability: Implications for modeling speech perception. In R. Smits, J. Kingston, T. M. Nearey, & R. Zondervan (Eds.), Proceedings of the Workshop on Speech Recognition as Pattern Classification (SPRAAC). Nijmegen: Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics. Retrieved on 9 October 9 2017 from [URL]
(2007) Decisions and mechanisms in exemplar-based phonology. In S. Maria-Josep, P. Speeter Beddor, & M. Ohala (Eds.), Experimental approaches to phonology (pp. 25–40). Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Krug, M. G.
(2001) Frequency, iconicity, categorization: Evidence from emerging modals. In J. Bybee, & P. J. Hopper (Eds.), Frequency and the emergence of linguistic structure (pp. 309–335). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kuningas, J., & Leino, J.
(2006) Word orders and construction grammar. In M. Suominen et al. (Eds.), A Man of Measure: Festschrift in Honour of Fred Karlsson on his 60th Birthday (pp. 301–309). Turku: Linguistic Association of Finland.Google Scholar
Ladefoged, P.
(1990) Some reflections on the IPA. UCLA Working Papers in Phonetics, 74, 61–76.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G.
(1987) Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind. Chicago: University of Chicago. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lewis, D. M.
(2011) A discourse-constructional approach to the emergence of discourse markers in English. Linguistics, 49(2), 415–443. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lichtenberk, F.
(1991) Semantic change and heterosemy in grammaticalization. Language, 67(3), 475–509. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lindblom, B.
(1990) Explaining phonetic variation: A sketch of the H&H theory. In W. J. Hardcastle & A. Marchal (Eds.), Speech production and speech modelling (pp. 403–439). Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Lindblom, B., Guion, S., Hura, S., Moon, S. J., & Willerman, R.
(1995) Is sound change adaptive? Rivista di linguistica, 7, 5–36.Google Scholar
Lorenz, D.
(2012) On-going change in English modality: Emancipation through frequency. Zeitschrift für Literaturwissenschaft und Linguistik, 169(43), 33–48.Google Scholar
(2013) From reduction to emancipation: is gonna a word? In H. Hasselgård, J. Ebeling, & S. Oksefjell Ebeling (Eds.), Corpus Perspectives on Patterns of Lexis (pp. 133–152). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Macdonell, A. A.
(1916) A Vedic grammar for students. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Marin, S., & Pouplier, M.
(2010) Temporal organization of complex onsets and codas in American English: Testing the predictions of a gestural coupling model. Motor Control, 14(3), 380–407.DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Marslen-Wilson, W.
(1987) Functional parallelism in spoken word recognition. Cognition, 25, 71–102. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Matić, D.
(2003) Topic, focus, and discourse structure: Ancient Greek word order. Studies in Language, 27(3), 573–633. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Melchert, H. C.
(2009) Local Adverbs in Hittite: Synchrony and Diachrony. Language and Linguistics Compass, 3(2), 607–620. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Morton, K.
(1992) Pragmatic phonetics. Advances in Speech, Hearing and Language Processing, 2, 17–53.Google Scholar
Ohala, J. J.
(1990) There is no interface between phonology and phonetics: a personal view. Journal of phonetics, 18(2), 153–172.Google Scholar
Rousseau, A.
(1995) Les préverbes dans les langues dʹEurope: introduction à lʹétude de la préverbation. Villeneuve d’Ascq: Presses universitaires du Septentrion.Google Scholar
Smith, R., Baker, R., & Hawkins, S.
(2012) Phonetic detail that distinguishes prefixed from pseudo-prefixed words. Journal of Phonetics, 40(5), 689–705. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Tatham, M.
(1990) Cognitive phonetics. Advances in Speech, Hearing and Language Processing, 1, 193–218.Google Scholar
Tatham, M, & Morton, K.
(2006) Speech production and perception. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Traugott, E. C., & Trousdale, G.
(2013) Constructionalization and constructional changes. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Thelin, N. B.
(Ed.) (1990) Verbal aspect in discourse. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Vamling, K.
(1989) Complementation in Georgian. Lund: Lund University Press.Google Scholar
Vihman, M., & Croft, W.
(2007) Phonological development: Toward a “radical” templatic phonology. Linguistics, 45(4), 683–725. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Viti, C.
(2008a) From space words to transitive markers: the case of ancient Greek en ‘in’. Transactions of the Philological Society, 106, 375–413. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2008b) Coding spatial relations in Homeric Greek: preverbs vs. prepositions. Historische Sprachforschung, 121, 114–161.Google Scholar
Watkins, C.
(1963) Preliminaries to a historical and comparative analysis of the syntax of the Old Irish verb. Celtica, 6, 1–49.Google Scholar
(1967) An Indo-European Construction in Greek and Latin. Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, 71, 115–119. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
West, M. L.
(2011) The making of the Iliad. Oxford: Oxford University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by

Cited by 2 other publications

Lorenz, David
2020. Converging variations and the emergence of horizontal links. In Nodes and Networks in Diachronic Construction Grammar [Constructional Approaches to Language, 27], ► pp. 244 ff. DOI logo
Schneider, Stefan
2023. Construct types in language change. Journal of Historical Linguistics DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 22 april 2024. 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.