Argument structure, conceptual metaphor and semantic change
How to succeed in Indo-European without really trying
Cynthia A. Johnson | Ghent University
Peter Alexander Kerkhof | Ghent University/Leiden University
Leonid Kulikov | Ghent University
Esther Le Mair | Ghent University/Aberystwyth University
In contrast to grammaticalization studies of lexical verbs changing into auxiliaries, the realm of semantic changes associated with lexical verbs is an understudied area of historical semantics. We concentrate on the emergence of verbs of success from more semantically concrete verbs, uncovering six conceptual metaphors which all co-occur with non-canonical encoding of subjects in Indo-European. Careful scrutiny of the relevant data reveals a semantic development most certainly inherited from Indo-European; hence, we reconstruct a
Keywords: Germanic, conceptual metaphors, Indo-European, oblique subject construction, syntactic reconstruction, verbal semantics, success verbs, argument structure, semantic change
Published online: 18 December 2019
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.00014.bar
https://doi.org/10.1075/dia.00014.bar
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