Gerund and gerundive in Latin

• Published in: Diachronica
• Main Author: Miller, D. Gary
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: John Benjamins Publishing Company 2000
• Subjects: greenlandic
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1075/dia.17.2.03mil; http://www.jbe-platform.com/deliver/fulltext/dia.17.2.03mil.pdf

SUMMARY The Latin gerundive has three distinctive properties: (i) agreement with thematic object; (ii) ungrammaticality of lexical thematic subject; and (iii) inability to take both a specifier (determiner) and a complement while infinitives can have both. A case- theoretic account within the Minimalist framework of Chomsky (1995) explains all three of these properties at once. The oldest documents in Italic and Latin support the hypothesis that the gerundive is older than the gerund + acc object. The most frequent exception to obligatory agreement into the Classical Period involves a gerundial with multiple objects, where the gender/number mismatch blocked standard agreement. Furthermore, agreement (motivated by gender conflict) with the nearest masculine or neuter D/NP was perceptually equivalent to a gerund + acc object. These two cues, in conjunction with the increase in impersonals in - um and possible word order changes, were deterministic triggers for the Latin change that introduced gerund + acc object. As a parameter setting in Italic, as in West Greenlandic, non-structural case assigned to a clause blocked checking of structural case within. In Italic, this forced the thematic object to raise for case, prompting the erroneous notion that the gerundive is passive, but there is never a change in valence. The (Proto-)Latin change was for PRO to accommodate non- structural case (from a non-overt assigner) to license structural object case checking, whence the gerund with acc object. RÉSUMÉ Le gérondif latin se distingue par trois caractéristiques: (i) son accord avec son objet thématique (ii) le statut non-grammatical de son sujet thématique (iii) l’incapacité de permettre un déterminant ainsi qu’un complément, alor les constructions infinitives peuvent accepter les deux. Un explication tiré de la “cas-théorie” selon le programme minimalist de Chomsky regroupe d’un coup ces trois caractéristiques. Les documents les plus anciens de l’italique et du latin soutiennent l’hypotèse que le gérondif prédate la ...