Manner of motion verbs in Latin

Abstract

In this talk I present the theoretical premises, methodology, corpus, and preliminary results of an ongoing research carried on with Egle Mocciaro (University of Palermo) and Claudio Iacobini (University of Salerno) on the encoding of motion expression in Latin. Some data concerning manner of motion expression in Classical Latin are presented and commented. o Main aim: • to make a first approach towards the manner-of-motion encoding strategies in Latin o Outline: 1. Overview of the main proposals about the typology of motion event encoding • Talmy’s classification of motion event lexicalization patterns • Definitions of the manner component in motion encoding • Connection between manner saliency and Satellite-framed languages • Variationist objections to Talmy’s bipartite typology 2. Manner of motion encoding in Latin • Previous studies • Corpus • Data 3. Conclusions: high-manner-salient <> Satellite-Framed? o the data here presented clearly indicates the presence in Latin of non-prototypically satellite-framed strategies:  relative scarcity of manner verbs  their non directional use  the frequent omission of manner of motion expression  the encoding of manner by using adverbs, bare cases and, finally, present participle constructions o the Satellite-framed character of Latin could be simply presumed on the basis of the presence of derivational prefixes that differentiate a ‘Latin type’ from a Romance one (trans-eo Romam vs. It. ‘attraverso Roma’). o the acknowledged connection between Satellite-framed languages and high-Manner-salience necessarily needs to be re-discussed also in the light of these results. References Baldi Philip, 2006. Towards a history of the manner of motion parameter in Greek and Indo-European. In: Pierluigi Cuzzolin & Maria Napoli (eds.), Fonologia e tipologia lessicale nella storia della lingua greca, Atti del VI Incontro Internazionale di Linguistica Greca (Bergamo, settembre 2005). Milano: Franco Angeli: 13-31. Beavers John, Beth Levin & Shiao Wei Tham, 2010. The Typology of Motion Expression Revisited. Journal of Linguistics, 46, 3: 331-377. Berman Ruth A. & Slobin Dan Isaac, 1994. Relating events in narrative: A crosslinguistic developmental study, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Hillsdale, NJ. Brucale Luisa & Mocciaro Egle, 2011. Continuity and discontinuity in the semantics of the Latin preposition per: a cognitive hypothesis. In STUF. Linguistic typology and language universals (Sprachtypologie und Universalienforschung), 64/ 2, special issue edited by J. Helmbrecht and E. Verhoeven, 148-169. Brucale Luisa & Mocciaro Egle, 2010. A cognitive grammar account of the Latin preverb per-: a path towards abstractness. Paper presented at the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea, Vilnius, September 2-6, 2010. Brucale Luisa, Iacobini Claudio, Mocciaro Egle, 2011. Typological change in the expression of motion events from Latin to Romance languages. Paper presented at 44th Annual Meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea, 8-11 September 2011, Universidad de la Rioja, Logroño, Spain. Cardini Filippo E., 2008. Manner of motion saliency: An inquiry into Italian. Cognitive Linguistics 19/4, 533–569 Croft William, Jóhanna Barðdal, Willem Hollmann, Violeta Sotirova, Chiaki Taoka 2010. Revising Talmy’s typological classification of complex event constructions. In: Boas H. C., (ed.), Contrastive Studies in Construction Grammar. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, 201-235. Filipovič Luna, 2007. Talking about Motion: A Crosslinguistic Investigation of Lexicalization Patterns. Amsterdam - Philadelphia: John Benjamins. Hyman Malcolm D., 2003. Greek and Roman Grammarians on Motion Verbs and Place Adverbials. Web article available at: archimedes.fas.harvard.edu/mdh/motion.pdf. Levin Beth, John Beavers & Shiao Wei Tham. 2009. Manner of motion roots across languages: Same or different?, Conference held at the work