Edited by Camille Denizot and Olga Spevak
[Studies in Language Companion Series 190] 2017
► pp. 235–256
The Latin enclitic particle -ne, which may be of an affirmative origin, is an optional focusing particle of polar questions, which in Latin can also occur without any particle. To analyse polar questions I have distinguished four groups of questions in the comedies of Plautus and Terence, according to pragmatic criteria. Both kinds of questions can occur in all groups, but questions without a particle have a stronger tendency to appear among those related to the speech situation, questions with a particle among those with a directive force. Moreover, as has often been observed, the particle -ne seems to be preferred in combination with certain host words. I have checked whether these are also frequent in the first position of interrogative sentences without -ne.