Paul Widmer

Agreement from a diachronic perspective

The contents of the present volume will enhance our understanding of the diachrony of agreement systems and provide a useful starting point for future studies on this both fascinating and intricate field of research.

Vedische exozentrische Komposita mit drei Relationen

In this paper it is suggested that a large subset of Vedic exocentric nominal compounds can best be described by focusing on two semantosyntactic relationships that exist in addition to the first one, viz. the modificative relation an exocentric compound bears to the head noun: A second, external relation which establishes a link between one single member of the compound and the noun the compound modifies as a whole, and a third, internal relation which combines the two members of a compound to form a semantosyntactic unit. For both, internal and external relations, a distinct set of three preferred readings is established which provides a semantosyntactic framework for interpreting these compounds. It is emphasized that a correct interpretation always depends not only on these sets of possible readings, but, most importantly, on the semantics of the compound members and the modified noun as well as on the pragmatics and the context the syntagm occurs in.

Decoding Middle Welsh clauses or “Avoid Ambiguity”

Abstract Middle Welsh is a language with a restricted set of morphosyntactic distinctions for grammatical relations and with relatively free word order in positive main declarative causes. However, syntactic ambiguity rarely, if ever, arises in natural texts. The present article shows in a corpus-based study how syntactic ambiguity is prevented and how morphological features interact with two referential properties, namely animacy and accessibility, in order to successfully identify grammatical relations in Middle Welsh. Further lower-tier factors are the semantics of the verb and the wider narrative context. The article complements recent insights suggesting that subject-verb agreement is not only determined by wordorder patterns, but also by referential properties of subjects.

Satzspaltung im Avestischen und Altpersischen (mit einem Ausblick auf das Mittelpersische)

This paper investigates the formal and functional properties of cleft sentences in Avestan and Old Persian, a construction whose existence has not been recognised in these languages hitherto. In Avestan, cleft sentences mainly function as focussing device, whereas in Old Persian, their principal function consists in the structuring of information on a text level. It is, furthermore, pointed to the fact that the usage of cleft sentences increases considerably in Middle Persian where this construction developed a much wider range of formal and functional properties as compared to the older stages of Iranian.

Mykenisch ru-wa-ni-jo ,luwier'

Abstract Myk. ru-wa-ni-jo ist einmal bezeugt (CoMIK III, 278): Nach Olivier (in Bennett et al. 1989, 231) handelt sich wahrscheinlich um einen Eigennamen („hapax, vraisemblablement anthroponyme“), eine Auffassung, die vom Kontext zumindest nicht ausgeschlossen wird (Zustimmung bei Aura Jorro 1985–93 II, 272). Eine Deutung für diesen Namen ist bisher nicht vorgeschlagen worden.