On Koopman's Generalisation. Remarks
on verb clusters in Old Frisian and Old English
door
1. Introduction[1]
In this article I would like to
investigate the validity of what I will refer to as Koopman’s Generalisation
for Old Frisian, a generalisation saying that head-final verb clusters are not
broken up. I will categorise verb order in the verbal cluster with the help of
numbers. To illustrate, consider the following example sentences from Modern
Dutch and Modern Frisian:
(1a) Modern Dutch
omdat ze de volgorde wilden-1 vastleggen-2 verb order: 12
because they the order wanted-1
fix-2
‘because they wanted to fix the
order’
(1b) Modern Frisian
om’t se de folchoarder fêstlizze-2 woenen-1 verb order: 21
because they the order fix-2
wanted-1
‘because they wanted to fix the
order’
The numbers express
selection restrictions. “Willen” selects “vastleggen”, and not vice versa,
hence “willen” is assigned a number that is exactly 1 less than “vastleggen”.
In this way, we can classify verb orders in the verb phrase. See the following
examples of verb phrases consisting of three verbs:
(2a) Modern Dutch
wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet geselecteerd-3 mocht-1 worden-2 order: 312
who knows why Huntelaar not selected
might be
‘who knows why Huntelaar was not
allowed to be selected’
(2b) Modern Frisian
wa wit wêrom’t Huntelaar net selektearre-3 wurde-2 mocht-1 order: 321
who knows why Huntelaar not selected
might be
Thus the numbers reflect
selection (and c-command) relations. For the sake of simplicity, I will
restrict myself in this article to verb clusters of which the matrix verb is a
perfect participle.
If there are three
verbs, then logically speaking six orders are possible. I will illustrate this
with the example (2a) from Modern Dutch:
3 12 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet geselecteerd-3 mocht-1 worden-2
3 21 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet geselecteerd-3 worden-2 mocht-1 *
2 13 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet worden-2 mocht-1 geselecteerd-3 *
2 31 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet worden-2 geselecteerd-3 mocht-1 *
1 23 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet mocht-1 worden-2 geselecteerd-3
1 32 wie weet waarom Huntelaar niet mocht-1 geselecteerd-3 worden-2
Of the six possible
orders, only 312 and 123 are fully acceptable in Modern Dutch.[2]
The orders 321, 213 and 231 are
unacceptable, as indicated by the asterisks following the sentences. In
contrast, the only order to be acceptable in Modern Frisian is 321.[3]
This much being said, we are now in a position to investigate verb order in the
verb phrase in Old English and Old Frisian.
2. Koopman’s Generalisation
introduced and refined
Koopman (1990: 38-74) investigated
the word order of the verbs in the verb phrase in Old English on the basis of
the concordance of Healey & Venezky (1980); on Old English syntax, see
Mitchell (1985), Fischer, Van Kemenade, Koopman & Van der Wurff (2000). All
in all, clusters of three verbs turned out to have one of the following three
formats in Old English:
(3a) V1 = modal, V2 = have, V3 =
Past Participle (e.g. ‘wolde habban genumen’)
(3b) V1 = modal, V2 = be, V3 =
Present Participle (e.g. ‘wolde beon nimende’)
(3c) V1 = modal, V2 = beon,
weoardhan, wesan, V3 = Past Participle
(e.g. ‘wolde beon genumen’).
Koopman limits himself
to verb clusters of the (3c)-type, though he claims that the other two types do
not differ in their relevant properties as far as word order is concerned. Neither does he
study verb clusters involving the infinitival marker ‘to’ (on the infinitival
marker ‘to’ in Old English, see Los 2000).
Koopman arrived at a
remarkable generalisation in the course of his research. He first noted that
verb order was quite free in Old English. Consider the following example
sentences from Koopman:
Old
English
(4)
thaet cristes dheowdom ne sceal beon geneadad 1
23
that
Christ’s service not may be forced
‘that
Christ’s service may not be forced’
(5)
thaet thaet festen sceolde abrocven bion 1
32
that
that fortress should destroyed be
‘that
that fortress was to be destroyed’
(6)
thaet heo haligra gemeted beon meahte 3
21
thaet
it holier considered be could
‘that
it could be considered holier’
All three orders are frequent in Old English,
relatively speaking. Then there are two more orders possible, although they are
represented by a handful of examples only.
(7)
aer hit geended mehte beon 3
12 (8 examples only)
before
it ended could be
‘before
it could be ended’
(8)
& swa dheah ... heo beon maeg ongyten sodh martyr 2 13 (5 examples
only)
and
nevertheless ... he be can considered true martyr
‘and
nevertheless he can be considered a true martyr’
The order 23 1 is absent in Old English. Koopman
concludes, basing himself in part on arguments from interlinear glosses (which
avoid that order when it occurs in the Latin text), that it must have been
unacceptable in Old English.[4]
However that may be, Koopman makes another observation on these word orders,
which is what interests us here.
As is well known, verb clusters may be broken up
by non-verbal material. To exemplify, the verb cluster in Dutch may be broken
up by a verbal particle (Bennis 1992: 39):
(9) dat hij dat probleem
that he that problem
(a) op moet hebben
willen kunnen lossen
up
must-1 have-2 wanted-3 can-4 solve-5
(b) moet op hebben
willen kunnen lossen
(c) moet hebben op
willen kunnen lossen
(d) moet hebben willen op
kunnen lossen
(e) moet hebben willen
kunnen op lossen
(up)
must (up) have (up) want (up) could (up) solve
‘that
he must have wanted to be able to solve that problem’
For some speakers, (b, c and d) are less
acceptable than (a) and (e). Standard Dutch allows only particles to break up
the cluster. Modern West-Flemish dialects allow all sorts of non-verbal
material to break up the verb cluster (Haegeman 1992). Koopman investigated
whether the Old English verb cluster could be broken up or not. It turns out
that the order 123 could be broken up in Old English, much the same as in
Modern West Flemish:
(10)
Old English 123
(a)
thaet he eft mage aet sumon saele beon geclaensod 1 X 2 3
that
he afterwards may at some time be purified
‘that
he may afterwards be purified at some time’
(b)
thaet hi ne sceoldon beon to swidhe afyrhte 1
2 X 3
that
they not might be too strongly terrified
‘that
they might not be too terrified’
Notice that the break-up may occur either
between 1 and 2, or between 2 and 3. Consider next the break-up possibilities
for the cluster 132:
(11)
thaet
he moste sumum rican menn to bearne geteald beon 1 X 3 2
that
he might some powerful man as child accounted be
‘that
he might be accounted the child of some powerful man’
Break-up only occurs between 1 and 32, but never
between 3 and 2. The order 321 is never
broken up. The rare order 312 is not broken up either.[5]
The other rare order, 213, is represented with 5 examples, four of which are
broken up. An example is given below:
(12)
2 1 X 3
thaet
dhu wurdhan scealt mid urum swurdum ofslagen mid him
that
you become must with our swords killed with him
‘that
you must be killed with our swords together with him’
The
break occurs between 1 and 3, never between 2 and 1. The following table
summarises where the break-up may occur in Old English:
(13)
|
Break-up |
No break-up |
|
1 X 2 |
21 |
|
2 X 3 |
32 |
|
1 X 3 |
(31) |
This table sums up all the facts presented by
Koopman.[6]
It is clear from the table what the generalisation is. We make Koopman’s
generalisation explicit, as below:
Note that break-up possibilities for 31 can
hardly be tested, since the order 231 does not occur at all, and the order 312
is rare. The order 312 is represented with only 8 examples, but it never
exhibits break-up, neither between 3 and 1 nor between 1 and 2. Given the
table, we might expect break-up to occur only between 1 and 2. The facts from
Modern Dutch cited in (9) provide further support for (our version of)
Koopman’s Generalisation.[7]
There is one, and only one, systematic
exception to the claim that a head-final order (or, descending) cannot be
broken up: the negative particle ‘ne’ can be found in such a cluster. A study
of negation is outside the scope of this paper (compare also note 9).
3.
Verb-verb order in Old Frisian
We
will go on to show that Old Frisian verb clusters are in line with the version
of Koopman’s Generalisation proposed here. Bor’s (1971: 52-66) chapter on verb
clusters is almost exclusively concerned with verb clusters of two verbs. His
grammar is based on Skeltana Riucht, a text of
less than 900 lines. Interestingly, clusters of two verbs tend to be
(14) dat dae schelten ...
unden bannes bigonnen habbe schillet 321
that
the sheriff ... with the court session begun have shall
‘that
the sheriff will have begun the court session’
De
Haan (2001: 627), in his overview of Old Frisian syntax, draws attention to a
relevant observation of Van der Meer. Van der Meer (1990) studied a small
number of text from Jus Municipale Frisonum
(Buma & Ebel 1977). Although he limited himself to verb clusters of two
verbs, he did also study the break-up effects. He notes (Van der Meer 1990:
321, 325) that the order 2 X 1 is systematically absent, but his theoretical
bias prevents him from ascribing due importance to that fact. All in all, Van
der Meer may be said to have noticed the validity of what we refer to as
Koopman's generalisation for two-verb clusters. Unfortunately, no tagged corpus
of Old Frisian is available for research on the internet. However, part of the
Old Frisian texts is available in an untagged format on the site of the
‘Deutsches Rechtswörterbuch’
(http://www.rzuser.uni-heidelberg.de/~cd2/drw/frameset.htm). This text archive
is the largest Old Frisian text archive currently accessible on the world-wide
web. It contains the following Old Frisian texts, based on the edition of Buma
& Ebel (1963-77):
·
Brokmer
Recht
·
Emsiger
Recht
·
Fivelgo
Recht
·
Hunsingo
Recht
·
Rüstringer
Recht
·
Westerlauwers
Recht
I collected some 60 2-verb sentences with the
modal mota (‘must’) or willa (‘want’). The variation I
encountered is equivalent to what Bor and Van der Meer reported for Old
Frisian. Thus I found the following three types:[8]
(15)
12
(a)
dat hi onder dae swirde mote thinghia
that
he under the sword may prosecute
‘that
he is allowed to prosecute under the sword’
[dass er sich unter dem
Schwerte ausbedingen darf,]
(WesterlauwersR.
I 398 [8])
(b)
hit ne se thet <hit on reddian ondert den se iefta thet> ti clagere then
forma eth wille layna.
it
NEG be that it in sheriff’s presence done be or that the plaintiff the first
oath wants reject
‘unless
it is done in the sheriff's presence or if the plaintiff wants to reject the
first oath’
[es sei denn, daß es [die
Tat] in Gegenwart der Redjeven verübt sei oder der Kläger den ersten Eid (des
Beklagten ohne dessen Widerrede) ablehnen wolle.]
(FivelgoR.
198 [19])
(16)
21
(a)
soe di fria Fresa ti stride thinghie wille ende dy oera da vta habba
wille,
if
the free Frisian to battle prosecute wants and the other the non-residence have
wants
‘If
the free Frisian wants to prosecute to a twosome battle and the other claims
non-residence’
[Wenn der freie Friese
auf einen Zweikampf klagen will und der andere die Einrede der
Nichtansässigkeit erheben möchte]
(WesterlauwersR.
I 100 [47]
(b)
Ac ne skel thi side nawet wese, thetter enge quade liude ange mon ruogia
mota
also
NEG shall the custom nought be, that any evil people any man sue may
befta tha hellega sinetha.
without the holy court of justice
‘In
addition, the custom will be abolished whereby any evil people may prosecute
anybody without the cooperation of the holy court of justice’.
[Ferner soll die Sitte
abgeschafft sein, dass irgendwelche böse Leute jemanden ohne Mitwirkung des
heiligen Sendgerichtes anklagen dürfen.]
(17)
1X2
(a)
Alder feder and moder hira dochter .... and hia ther thenne wille mit
vnriuchte onspreka,
if
father and mother their daughter .. and they it [her property] want with
unjustice confiscate
‘if father and mother their daughter .. and they
unjustly want to confiscate it’
[Wenn Vater und Mutter ihre Tochter ... und sie dann das (Gut der Tochter) zu Unrecht anfordern wollen]
(EmsigerR.
32 [4])
(b)
Sa ist alra Brocmonna kere, thet ma nene freta ne mote thene liudafrethe
vriewa;
So ist aller Brokmänner
Küre, dass man keinem Friedlosen das dem Volke gebührende Friedensgeld erlassen
darf;
(BrokmerR.
78 par 123 (= Rq. par 133))
The order 2X1 does not occur at all, which supports
Koopman's Generalisation for Old Frisian.[9]
Consider also the frequency of the three orders in embedded clauses in my
mini-corpus:
(18)
Embedded clauses
(a)
order 21 26 occurrences
(b)
order 12 6 occurrences
(c)
order 1x2 4 occurrences
This is in keeping with Bor's research findings
about Skeltana Riucht. Bor also found that the order 21 was by far
the most common. Comparison of Old English with Old Frisian thus yields two
results:
We may wonder why there should be this
difference between Old Frisian and Old English. It is generally assumed that
the Indo-European ancestral language was head-final. If correct, then some
outside factor (for example, language contact) must be held responsible for the
head-initial bias of Old English as far as verb clusters are concerned.
Clusters
of three verbs in Old English, and presumbly in Old Frisian as well, always
begin with a modal. In contrast, Modern Dutch and Modern Frisian normally
feature three-verb clusters beginning with the counterpart of to have or to be.
An example of the former is given below:
(19a)
Omdat hij had willen komen 123
because
he had want-Inf come
‘because
he had wanted to come’
(19b) Omdat er komme wold
hie 321
because
he come want-PfP had
‘because
he had wanted to come’
(19c)
V1 = have / be, V2 = modal, V3 = main verb
Note
that Modern Dutch, like Modern German, exhibit the IPP-effect
(Infinitivus-pro-Participio), with a so-called ‘Ersatzinfinitiv’
(replacement infinitive) where one would have expected a past participle.
Modern Frisian does not have the IPP-effect.
Interestingly, three word clusters beginning with
a finite form of ‘have’ or ‘be’ are radically absent from Old English.
Correspondingly, the IPP-effect is (trivially) absent from Old English as well.
Thus we have two types of clusters:
(20a)
A-construction: 1 = have/be, 2 = modal, 3 = main: Modern Dutch, Modern German
(20b)
B-construction: 1 = modal, 2 = have/be, 3 = main: Old English, Old and Middle
Frisian, Modern English
I will follow Jarich Hoekstra (1997: 47) in referring
to the type exemplified in (19) as the A-construction. The B-construction is
exemplified by Koopman’s Old English examples, and by Modern English examples
like “he could have come”.
The A-construction crucially depends on the
presence of modal infinitives. Modern English does not have modal infinitives
(*to can, *to must, and so on). Correspondingly, it does not have the
A-construction. The B-construction does not depend on the presence of modal
infinitives. Finite forms of modals, which do exist in Modern English, suffice
to build a B-construction of three verbs. Old English is like Modern English in
only exhibiting the B-construction. We may thus wonder whether Old English had
modal infinitives.
In Frisian, the B-construction gradually went
out of use in the 20th century. Jarich Hoekstra (1990, 1997) shows that it was
still common in the 19th century. Old Frisian, like Old English, exclusively
features the B-construction. Did Old Frisian have modal infinitives at all? Buma’s (1996) dictionary on the manuscript Jus
does not contain any infinitival form of the modal auxiliary ‘motan’. We may
now wonder to what extent Old English and Old Frisian had modal infinitives.
And what was the role of the (disappearance of the) subjunctive? For future
research, we note the task of investigating the syntax and semantics of the
modal infinitive in Old Frisian in relation to the subjunctive; these questions
are outside the scope of this paper, though we consider it useful to have
formulated them.
5.
Conclusion
The
following is the central conclusion of our paper:
Head-initial verb clusters can in principle be
broken up, whereas head-final verb cluster cannot be broken up (but see note
9). This generalisation covers facts of Old English, Old Frisian, Modern
English, Modern Dutch and Modern Frisian. Interestingly, when I investigated
the wild variation in verb clusters in the present-day dialects of Dutch
(Hoekstra 1997), I noted that Koopman’s generalisation was also supported in
those dialects. Thus we seem to witness an asymmetry between head-final and
head-initial verb clusters, in accordance with Kayne’s asymmetry hypothesis
(Kayne 1994), as implemented in Hoekstra (1997). I would like to round up with
some bold claims which have the status of research questions:
References
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[1] I would like to thank for comments
and discussion:
[2]
This sentence (order 132) is ungrammatical for some speakers of Dutch from The
Netherlands, although it is generally acceptable for speakers of Dutch from
[3] By “Modern Frisian”, we mean the
variety of Frisian such as it is spoken by older native speakers of Frisian.
This is also the type of Frisian that is described in grammars like for example
Tiersma (1985). In so-called Interference Frisian (Wolf 1987), much more
variation is encountered, due to imperfect language acquisition of Frisian, and
subsequent interference from Dutch.
[4]
Koopman considers the orders 3 12 (8 examples) and 2 13 (5 examples) to have
been acceptable in Old English. He then construes a grammatical theory in which
those orders are marked, in the sense that they require the application of
marked rules of grammar. We would like to present a speculation here, and
suggest that the marginal orders are the result of language contact between Old
English and Latin. That is, some monks, who were particularly fluent in Latin,
would be bilingual. As is well-known from language contact theory (Van Coetsem
1988), bilingual speakers do not keep their grammar separate; instead, the
grammars start acting upon one another, causing changes. It is also well-known
that such changes lead to the creation of sentences which may be unacceptable
in either of the original grammars. To exemplify, the effect of Modern Dutch
grammar on Modern Frisian grammar is such that sentences are created in
so-called Interference Frisian which is are acceptable neither in Dutch nor in
Frisian (see Wolf, Reitsma). Pursuing this speculation is beyond the scope of
this article. Note though, if correct, it might well explain the existence of
those marginal word orders.
[5]
Given the generalisation to be proposed, we would expect that break-up in the
order 312, if it occurred, would occur between 1 and 2, but not between 3 and
1. It is possible that 31 must be excluded from the scope of the
generalisation, as there is no selection relation between 3 and 1 (only between
1 and 2, and 2 and 3).
[6]
Particles are not ideal for testing break-up possibilities, since they obey a
mysterious restriction, namely, they may not occur to the right of the matrix
verb, that is, they are never extraposed. On the whole, it seems that even in
Flemish clusters, which are heavily broken up, the relative word order
restrictions of the matrix verb and its dependents (direct object NP, indirect
object NP, particle, and so on) is always respected. I fail to see how
syntactic theory can capture this generalisation (assuming it to be correct).
[7] Koopman is not explicit about the
scope of his generalisation. He notes that the order 321 is never broken up,
but he does not extend this generalisation to the other orders, where they are
valid for the sequence
[8]
The German translations are from Buma & Ebel (1963-1977). They can also be
found in the database of the Deutsches Rechtswörterbuch.
[9] Unless X is the negative marker
‘ne’. It would be interesting to study this negative marker in its own right
(see Bor 1990 on Old Frisian), and to compare Old Frisian and Old English on
this point.