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Perspectives on Language Structure and Language Change: Studies in honor of Henning Andersen
Edited by Lars Heltoft, Iván Igartua, Brian D. Joseph, Kirsten Jeppesen Kragh and Lene Schøsler
[Current Issues in Linguistic Theory 345] 2019
► pp. 205–231

Aspects of grammaticalization and reanalysis in the voice domain in the transition from Latin to early Italo-Romance

This article discusses some aspects of the grammaticalization and reanalysis of lexical verbs as passive auxiliaries and light verbs in the passage from Latin to (Italo-)Romance, focussing on (i) the diachronic relationship between auxiliarization and light verbs, (ii) the direction of the changes and (iii) the pertinacity to change of light verbs. The light verb uses of the verbs under investigation (COME, BECOME), both in Late Latin and in some early Italo-Romance vernaculars, exhibit a different type of decategorialization and desemanticization compared with auxiliaries, attested later than their auxiliary function.
Keywords: grammaticalization, reanalysis, voice, light verbs, auxiliaries
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Auxiliarization, light verb constructions and voice
    • 2.1Auxiliaries vs light verbs
      • 2.1.1Auxiliarization and changes in the argument structure of predicates
      • 2.1.2Light/vector/serial verbs and argument structure
  • 3.Light verbs and (passive) auxiliaries in Late Latin and early (Italo-)Romance
    • 3.1Fieri and its early Italo-Romance continuants
    • 3.2Venire in Late Latin and early Italo-Romance
  • 4.Origin of BECOME and COME as voice markers and light verbs
    • 4.1Light verb behaviour of the passive auxiliary essere ‘be’
  • 5.Auxiliaries, light verbs and change in the passage to Italo-Romance
  • 6.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Abbreviations
  • Notes
  • Old Italian sources
Published online: 18 June 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/cilt.345.09cen
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