(70) **Pulta-nd-o** *pedibus* *paene* *confregi* *has=ce* [...] *fores*
kick-GER-ABL foot.ABL.M.PL almost break.PST.1SG DEM.ACC.F.PL=DEM door.ACC.F.PL
'I almost broke these doors here by kicking (on them) by my feet.' (Plaut. *Most*. 453)

(71) *Scolymus* [...] *ab* *his* *distat*, *quod*
edible_thistle.NOM.M.SG from DEM.ABL.N.PL be_different.PRS.3SG insofar_as
*radix* *eius* *vesce-nd-o* *est* *decocta*.
root.NOM.F.SG its.GEN.M.SG eat-GER-ABL be.PRS.3SG boil.PTCP.PST.NOM.F.SG
'Edible thistle differs from these, insofar as its root is boiled in order to eat (it).' (Plin. *nat*. 21.96)

The syntactic and semantic optionality of the gerund phrases in (70) and (71) is apparent from the fact that they can be omitted without affecting the grammaticality or core meaning of the sentence, as shown for these examples in respectively (72) and (73).

(72) *Paene* *confregi* *has=ce* *fores*.
almost break.PST.1SG DEM.ACC.F.PL=DEM door.ACC.F.PL
'I almost broke these doors here.' (adapted from Plaut. *Most*. 453)

(73) *Scolymus* *ab* *his* *distat*, *quod* *radix*
edible_thistle.NOM.M.SG from DEM.ABL.N.PL be_different.PRS.3SG insofar_as root.NOM.F.SG
*eius* *est* *decocta*.
its.GEN.M.SG be.PRS.3SG boil.PTCP.PST.NOM.F.SG
'Edible thistle differs from these, insofar as its root is boiled.' (adapted from Plin. *nat*. 21.96)

Like the first three types of gerunds, adjunct gerunds may be marked in various ways. They may moreover be bare or prepositional. The bare markings include the genitive, the dative, and the ablative, and are assigned on the basis of the semantic value of the gerund (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 740-741, 746-753; Aalto 1949: 60-70; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266-268; Palmer 1964: 323-324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 376-380; Menge et al. 2000: 740-741; Pinkster 2021: §16.100-§16.101, §16.104). The bare dative (e.g. *vescendo* 'to eat' (71)) and genitive (e.g. *adsentandi* 'to flatter' (74)) forms mostly have a purpose value, and are as such in competition with each other (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 742; Aalto 1949: 60-64; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 376-377; Pinkster 2021: §16.100).

(74) *Vereor* *coram* *in os* *te* *laudare* *amplius*, / *ne*
fear.PRS.1SG openly in face.ACC.N.SG you.ACC.M.SG praise.INF.PRS more lest
*id* **adsenta-nd-i** *mage* *quam quo* *habeam*
DEM.ACC.N.SG flatter-GER-GEN more than REL.ABL.N.SG hold.SBJV.PRS.1SG
*gratum* *facere* *existumes*.
grateful.ACC.N.SG do.INF.PRS mean.SBJV.PRS.2SG
'I fear to openly praise you more in your face, lest you mean that I do it more to flatter than I hold (it) as being grateful.' (Ter. Ad. 269-270)
As to the bare ablative forms, they mostly express the manner of the main state of affairs, the means by which it is realised, or the state of affairs by which it is unintentionally brought about (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 751-752; Lyer 1932: 223-226, 382-384; Aalto 1949: 65-68; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266; Palmer 1964: 324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379; Vester 1983: 101-120; Kooreman 1989: 221; Menge *et al.* 2000: 740-741; Adams 2013: 725; Pinkster 2021: §16.101). Clear examples are *pultando* *pedibus* 'by kicking by my feet' (70) and *recitando* 'by reciting' (75).

(75) *In hoc* *ita commemorare* *conveniet* [...] *id*
in DEM.ABL.N.SG so recall.INF.PRS be Appropriate.FUT.3SG DEM.ACC.N.SG
*quod* *scriptum* est *recita-nd-o* [...].
REL.NOM.N.SG write.PTCP.PST.NOM.N.SG be.PRS.3SG recite-GER-ABL

‘So in this it will be appropriate to recall what is written by reciting (it).’ (Cic. *Vatin.* 6)

In view of the competition between the gerund and the present participle, to be explored in detail in §1.4, it is important to add that bare ablative gerunds sometimes express the default semantic value of adjunct present participles. This is a temporal value of simultaneity, consisting of denoting a state of affairs concomitant or partly overlapping with the main state of affairs (Marouzeau 1910: 79; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 751-752; Lyer 1932: 384-389; Aalto 1949: 65-66, 68-70; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266-267; Palmer 1964: 324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379-380; Vester 1983: 101-121, 134-135; Menge *et al.* 2009: 740-741; Adams 2013: 725-740; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-103; Pinkster 2021: §21.14).<fnref n="31" /> Witness *ornando* ‘cheering’ and *celebrando* ‘celebrating’ (76), which express the circumstances accompanying the motion expressed by the main verb *prosquebantur* ‘they accompanied’ (they could as such be replaced by the nominative present participles *ornantes* ‘cheering’ and *celebrantes* ‘celebrating’).

(76) [...] *vestrum* *egressum* *orna-nd-o* *atque celebra-nd-o* [...] *prosquebantur*.
your.ACC.N.SG departure.ACC.N.SG cheer-GER-ABL and celebrate-GER-ABL escort.PST.3PL
‘They escorted your departure while cheering and celebrating.’ (Cic. *Pis.* 3)

In Classical Latin, adjunct bare ablative gerunds with a semantic value other than manner, instrument, or cause are rare, but clear instances are found from the earliest texts onward (Marouzeau 1910: 79; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 752-753; Aalto 1949: 65; Palmer 1964: 324; Adams 2013: 725; Vincent 2016: 45; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-103; Pinkster 2021: §21.14).<fnref n="32" /> Many authors consider this use of the gerund characteristic of substandard varieties (Riemann 1886⁷: 514; Löfstedt 1911: 159; Lyer

<footnote n="31">³¹ In the literature, this type of gerunds are sometimes qualified as ‘modal’ or ‘circumstantial’ (e.g. Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 752; Lyer 1932: 384; Aalto 1949: 68-69; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379). Another description that is often used is ‘semantically weakened’ (e.g. Adams 2013: 725-740).</footnote>

<footnote n="32">³² For an overview of the different semantic values of adjunct bare ablative gerunds in a corpus of Classical Latin texts, see Vester (1983: 101-121). For a diachronic overview, see Kooreman (1989) and Adams (2013: 725-740). A quantitative and diachronic study of these values in a corpus of technical texts is conducted by Galdi & Vangaever (2019: 100-103). As is well known, for some bare ablative gerunds it is difficult to determine whether or not they have a manner/instrumental/causal value (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379; Adams 2013: 725-740).</footnote>
1932: 397; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379-380; Kooreman 1989: 220, 222-223; Burton 2000: 187; Maltby 2002: 220), but it has been repeatedly and unambiguously shown that it also occurs in standard varieties (Marouzeau 1910: 79; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 752-753; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 267; Tränkle 1960: 14; Fedeli 1980: 72-73; Wackernagel & Langslow 2009: 352; Haverling 2010: 369; Adams 2013: 725-740; Vangaever 2018: 12-14; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-103, 106-107; Pinkster 2021: §21.14).<fnref n="33" />

When governed by a preposition, adjunct gerunds stand in the accusative, the genitive, or the ablative (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 731-732, 753-754; Aalto 1949: Ch. 4; Palmer 1964: 322-324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 376-380; Menge *et al.* 2000: 737; Pinkster 2021: §16.100, §16.102-§16.104). The accusative forms are mostly introduced by *ad* ‘to’, which contributes a final meaning to the adjunct phrase (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 731-732, 749-750; Aalto 1949: 86-87; Menge *et al.* 2000: 737; Pinkster 2021: §16.100). This type of phrases, illustrated by *ad restinguendum* ‘to extinguish’ (77), compete with both dative and bare genitive adjunct phrases (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 742; Aalto 1949: 87; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266; Pinkster 2021: §16.100).<fnref n="34" />

(77) [...] *ut [...] omnis [...] multitudo ad restingue-nd-um concurreret.*
that all.NOM.F.SG crowd.NOM.F.SG to extinguish-GER-ACC assemble.SBJV.PST.3SG
‘(...) that the whole crowd assembled to extinguish (the fire).’ (Caes. *Gall.* 7.24.5)

The genitive is assigned by the prepositions *causa* ‘for the sake of’ and *gratia* ‘for the sake of’, which may also endow the gerund clause with a final meaning (Pinkster 2021: §16.100). Classical Latin thus has four types of gerund phrases capable of having a final value. These phrases compete with each other, but also with other types of non-finite VPs (see *infra*). However, prepositional genitive gerunds can also express the reason (or motive) of the main state of affairs (Pinkster 2021: §16.103). Witness (78), where *non recitandi causa sed recognoscendi* ‘not for the sake of reciting in public, but for the sake of revising’ explains why the subject of *defendebat* ‘he said in his defence’ read his account book.<fnref n="35" />

(78) [...] *defendebat* [...] *non se* **recita-nd-i** causa legisse,
defend.PST.3SG NEG REFL.ACC.M.SG recite-GER-GEN for_the_sake_of read.INF.PST
*sed recognosce-nd-i*.
but revise-GER-GEN
‘He said in his defence (lit. ‘defended himself’) that he had not read (it) for the sake of reciting (it)
(in public), but for the sake of revising (it).’ (Cic. *Vatin.* 5.12)

<footnote n="33">³³ For a critical and detailed discussion, see Adams (2013: 725-740).</footnote>

<footnote n="34">³⁴ According to Aalto (1949: 63), prepositional accusative gerunds are preferred over dative gerunds in purpose adjuncts, especially in substandard varieties (see also Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266).</footnote>

<footnote n="35">³⁵ As stated by Pinkster (2015: 909), “[R]eason adjuncts are the counterpart of purpose adjuncts”. However, it is often difficult to determine whether an adjunct expresses the reason or the purpose of the main state of affairs.</footnote>
Finally, the ablative gerund is mostly introduced by *in* ‘in’, which usually has a temporal value (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 753; Aalto 1949: 71-72; Pinkster 2021: §16.102). In (79), *in struendo* ‘in building’ situates the state of affairs designated by *reliquerunt* ‘they left’ in time by expressing the temporal frame within which it is realised.

(79) [...] *fenestras=que* [...] *ad tormenta* mittenda in strue-nd-o
opening.ACC.F.PL=and to missile.ACC.N.PL throw.GERV.ACC.N.PL in build-GER-ABL
*reliquerunt*.
leave.PST.3PL

‘While building, they left openings for the use of catapults (lit. ‘for missiles that needed to be thrown’).’ (Caes. *civ.* 2.9.9)

A few remarks should also be made about the information-structural value of adjunct gerunds. From the point of view of information structure, adjuncts can be described as constituents “expanding the prototypical rheme” of a sentence without however being necessarily rhematic themselves (Haug 2012: 294). The prototypical rheme of a sentence is defined by Haug (2012: 294) as the part of the sentence denoting a simple event expressed by a verb and its non-subject arguments. Hence, it more or less corresponds to what Lambrecht (1994: 213) calls ‘focus’, *i.e.* “the semantic component of a pragmatically structured proposition whereby the assertion differs from the presupposition”. According to Haug (2012: 294-303), adjuncts may expand the rheme of the sentence in three possible ways. However, only two of these options have been retrieved for adjunct gerunds (Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 110-111).

On the one hand, adjunct gerunds may expand the rheme of the sentence by presenting the state of affairs denoted by the main verb and its non-subject arguments with a higher degree of granularity (Haug 2012: 295-299). That is to say, by “zooming in” on this state of affairs and representing parts of it with greater granularity (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 7). Examples of this type of adjuncts are the manner/instrumental phrases *pultando pedibus* ‘by kicking by my feet’ (70) and *recitando* ‘by reciting’ (75), as well as the coordinated forms *ornando* ‘cheering’ and *celebrando* ‘celebrating’ (76), which specify the circumstances accompanying the main state of affairs. This type of adjuncts are referred to by Haug (2012: 295-299) as ‘elaborating adjuncts’. They correspond to what Dik (1997: 51) calls ‘predicate (or σ1) satellites’ within the theoretical framework of Functional Grammar (see also Kooreman 1989: 225-226). An example of an elaborating adjunct in Modern English is the adverb *carefully* (80).

(80) *John was writing a letter carefully.* (Dik 1997: 51)

Although they are semantically (and pragmatically) tightly connected to the core predication, *i.e.* the combination of the main verb and its arguments (*cf.* Dik 1997: 51), elaborating adjunct gerunds are
syntactically unconstrained. Indeed, they can combine with all types of main verbs: transitive as well as intransitive ones and, within the latter group, unaccusative as well as unergative ones. From a semantic point of view, elaborating adjuncts always express the manner of the main state of affairs, the means (or instrument) by which it is realised, or a state of affairs co-occurring with it (Haug 2012: 304; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 109; see also Kooreman 1989: 225-226). The use of elaborating adjuncts can in a certain sense be conceived of as a communicative strategy compensating for the lack of a single verb whose meaning alone corresponds to that of the core predication and the elaborating adjunct taken together (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 1; Haug 2012: 295; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 109). In Classical Latin, adjunct gerunds often serve as elaborating adjuncts, especially the bare ablative ones (Vester 1983: 144-145; Kooreman 1989: 225-226; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 110-111).

On the other hand, adjunct gerunds may expand the rheme of the sentence by anchoring the state of affairs denoted by the extended predication, *viz.* the combination of the core predication and possibly one or more elaborating adjunct(s) (cf. Dik 1997: 51-52), in time or space or by relating it to another, often known, state of affairs (Haug 2012: 299-301). That is, they “zoom out” on the main state of affairs by presenting it in a more comprehensive setting (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 7). A clear example of this type of adjuncts is the prepositional ablative phrase *in struendo* ‘in building’ (79), since it locates the state of affairs denoted by *reliquerunt* ‘they left’ in time. This second type of adjuncts are labelled ‘framing adjuncts’ by Haug (2012: 299-301). They correspond to Dik’s (1997: 51-52) group of ‘predication (or σ2) satellites’ (see also Kooreman 1989: 225-226). A Modern English example of a framing adjunct is the PP *in the library* (81), which situates main the state of affairs in a spatial setting.

(81) *John is carefully writing a letter in the library.* (Dik 1997: 52)

From a semantic point of view, framing adjuncts often have a temporal value, but they can also express a cause, condition, concession, and so on (Haug 2012: 304; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 109).<fnref n="36" /> In Classical Latin, these values are not often expressed by adjunct gerunds, at least not by bare ablative adjuncts, and hence framing gerunds are less frequent than elaborating ones (Vester 1983: 144-145; Kooreman 1989: 225-226; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 110-111).<fnref n="37" />

The final aspect of adjunct gerunds to be examined is their competition with non-finite verb forms other than the present participle. Like adnominal, verb complement, and adjective complement gerunds, adjunct gerunds sometimes compete with infinitives (Aalto 1949: 63; Palmer 1964: 319; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 344-345, 378-379; Fruyt 1996: 45; Pinkster 2021: §16.86). However, this domain of competition is restricted to purpose adjuncts combined with a verb denoting a transfer or movement,

<footnote n="36">³⁶ Framing adjuncts include the so-called ‘frame-setters’ or ‘scene-setters’ (Chafe 1984; Dik 1997: 51-52, Diessel: 459-460). These constituents provide the orientation for the subsequent discourse or additional information about the preceding one.</footnote>

<footnote n="37">³⁷ Focusing on bare ablative gerunds in technical literature between the 2nd c. BC and the 1st c. AD, Galdi & Vangaever (2019: 110-111) show that 84% have an elaborating function, while only 16% serve a framing function. This is in line with Kooreman’s (1989: 225-226) claim that, in Classical Latin, bare ablative adjunct gerunds belong to a high content-level of the clause.</footnote>
since this is the only type of adjuncts in which the infinitive may occur, at least in Classical Latin (Aalto
1949: 63; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 260-261; Palmer 1964: 319; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 344-345,
378-379; Scherer 1975: 84; Pinkster 2021: §16.86).<fnref n="38" /> In (82), the infinitive clause *bibere usque plenis
cantharis* ‘to drink from full goblets’ expresses the purpose of the (imperative) verb *da* ‘give’.

(82) *Age, circumfer mulsum, bibere*
*go.IMP.PRS.2SG pass_around.IMP.PRS.2SG honeyed_wine.ACC.N.SG drink.INF.PRS*
*da usque plenis cantharis.*
*give.IMP.PRS.2SG continuously full.ABL.M.PL goblet.ABL.M.PL*
‘Go, pass the honeyed wine around, give (it to us) so that we can drink continuously from full goblets.’
(Plaut. *Persa* 821)

Purpose adjunct infinitives have been attested from the earliest period onward. They are more frequent in substandard than in standard varieties, but even in substandard varieties they are less common than their gerund counterparts (Palmer 1964: 318; Pinkster 2021: §16.86). Note that purpose adjunct gerunds and infinitives do not only compete with each other, but also with the accusative (or first) supine (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 260-262; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 344-345, 378-381; Stempel 1994: 236; Pinkster 2021: §16.86, §16.106, §16.112). This adjunct use is the dominant use of the accusative supine, though it gradually loses ground in favour of the infinitive, the gerund, and NPs including a personal gerundive (Pinkster 2021: §16.112). in (83), the supine phrase is *questum iniurias* ‘to complain about the injustice’ expresses the purpose of the motion verb *venerunt* ‘they came’.

(83) [...] legati ab Roma venerunt **questum** iniurias [...].
envoy.NOM.M.PL from Rome.ABL.F.SG come.PST.3PL complain.SUP.ACC injustice.ACC.F.PL
‘The envoys came from Rome to complain about the injustice.’ (Liv. 3.25.6)

Finally, adjunct gerunds are also in competition with NPs containing a personal gerundive. As per usual,
the latter are preferred over gerund phrases with an explicit direct object, especially in standard varieties
(Ernout & Thomas 1951: 265-266; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 377-379; Menge et al. 2000: 737-741;
Pinkster 2021: §16.106). Gerund clauses like *vitando imbres et aestus* ‘to evade rain and heat’ (84) are
thus less common than NPs such as *oneri ferendo* ‘to carry loads’ (85).

(84) [...] *vitando=que imbres et aestus tegebant harundinibus*
*evade-GER-DAT=and rain.ACC.M.PL and heat.ACC.M.PL cover.PST.3SG reed.ABL.F.PL
*et fronde.*
*and foliage.ABL.M.SG*
‘And they covered (the houses) with reeds and leaves in order to evade the rain and the heat.’ (Vitr.
2.1.3)

<footnote n="38">³⁸ Over time, the range of verbs allowing a purpose adjunct infinitive phrase gradually extends, especially in Late Latin (Pinkster 2021: §16.86).</footnote>
(85) [...] *ea* non potest in structura oneri
DEM.NOM.F.SG NEG be_able.PRS.3SG in masonry.ABL.F.SG load.DAT.N.SG
***fere-nd-o*** esse firma [...].
carry.GERV.DAT.N.SG be.INF.PRS firm.NOM.F.SG

'It (the brickwork) cannot be firm in the masonry so as to carry loads (lit. 'for the loads that need to be carried').' (Vitr. 2.8.19)

1.2.2.2.6. External syntactic profile of the gerund

The preceding sections have shown that the external syntax of the gerund in Classical Latin is diverse: it can occur in adnominal phrases, verb complements, adjective complements, adverb complements, and adjuncts. Although it is well known that these uses are not equally frequent, no corpus studies have been performed in order to quantify their exact relative frequency. In order to fill this gap and to provide a point of comparison for the empirical investigation of Late Latin to be carried out in the second part of this study, I conducted a quantitative study of the external syntax of the gerund in a Classical Latin corpus at the beginning of my doctoral research (Vangaever 2018). The corpus of this study contains all Caesarian and Ciceronian texts included in the LASLA database (see Appendix 2), and its results are based on the total number of 1 273 gerunds occurring in them.<fnref n="39" /> Admittedly, the language used in these texts is not representative of Classical Latin as a whole. However, the external syntax of the gerund is relatively stable in this period, and hence this is less problematic here. All texts of the LASLA database are morphosyntactically annotated. Hence, all gerunds used in the Caesarian and Ciceronian sub-corpora have been selected automatically, using the highly user-friendly interface. The 1 273 forms extracted have been manually annotated for several parameters, among which their syntactic use and case form are most relevant here. Before presenting the frequency of the distinct uses of the gerund in this Classical Latin corpus, two rectifications of my 2018 qualitative analysis should be made.

(i) The Ciceronian texts contain three instances of the form *solvendo* ‘to pay’ combined with the verb *esse* ‘to be’ (86). In Vangaever (2018: 20-21), these forms are analysed as the main verb of a progressive construction, while they actually act as the complement of the verb *esse* ‘to be capable of’, used in this regard as a modal instead of an existential verb (Pinkster 2021: §15.137).

(86) [...] *occultat* suum gaudium, ne videatur non
conceal.PRS.3SG his.ACC.N.SG joy.ACC.N.SG lest see.SBJV.PRS.PASS.3SG NEG
***fuisse*** **solve-nd-o.**
be.INF.PST pay-GER-ABL

‘He conceals his joy, lest he be considered insolvent.’ (Cic. *off*. 2.79)

<footnote n="39">³⁹ The texts included in the LASLA database are part of the section *Opera Latina*. The inventory of these texts is listed at http://cipl93.philo.ulg.ac.be/OperaLatina/users/MainInterface.aspx. Access to this section is free upon registration.</footnote>
However, the combination of *solvendo* ‘to pay’ and *esse* ‘to be capable of’ can also be analysed as a more or less lexicalised verbal expression (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 376-377; Risch 1984: 134; Scherer 1975: 90; Menge *et al.* 2000: 743). This explains its presence in most Latin dictionaries (e.g. Gaffiot 1934: 1456). Lexicalised verbal expressions will be discarded from the dataset of this thesis (see §3.4), and hence the three combinations of *solvendo* ‘to pay’ and *esse* ‘to be solvent’ will be excluded from the results that will be reported here.<fnref n="40" />

(ii) The second rectification concerns the form *consulendo* ‘consulting’ (87), also analysed as the main verb of a progressive construction in Vangaever (2018: 19). However, it should be taken as an adjunct form, expressing the circumstances under which a consul should meet a number of qualities. This form has been retained in the results that will be reported here, but with another analysis.

(87) *Animo consulem esse oportet, consilio,*
spirit.ABL.M.SG consul.ACC.M.SG be.INF.PRS be_necessary.PRS.3SG diplomacy.ABL.N.SG
*fide, gravitate, vigilantia, cura* [...] *rei*
honour.ABL.F.SG dignity.ABL.F.SG vigilance.ABL.F.SG devotion.ABL.F.SG state.DAT.F.SG
*publicae consule-nd-o.*
public.DAT.F.SG take_care-GER-ABL

‘It is necessary that a consul is with spirit, diplomacy, honour, dignity, vigilance, and devotion when taking care of the republic.’ (Cic. *Pis.* 23)

In view of these rectifications, the number of forms on which the quantitative analysis of the external syntax of the gerund in Classical Latin should be based is 1 270 instead of 1 273. This number does not include forms used as the main verb of a progressive construction, which is in line with the widely accepted view that the gerund acquires this use only in Late Latin (Aalto 1949: 75-76; Väänänen 1963³: 141; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 380; Haverling 2010: 497; see §2.1.1.2.2.3). In this dissertation, the quantitative results reported in Vangaever (2018) will be adjusted in view of these two rectifications. However, due to the large size of the original dataset, this adjustment has a negligible impact on the overall trends.

The adjusted inventory and relative frequency of the different uses of the gerund in this Classical Latin corpus is given in Figure 1.1. This figure presents what will hereafter be referred to as ‘the external syntactic (or distributional) profile of the Classical Latin gerund’.

<footnote n="40">⁴⁰ According to Pinkster (2021: §15.137), the expression *solvendo esse* ‘to be solvent’ is fully lexicalised only in Late Latin. This might well be, but it undoubtedly has at least some degree of lexicalisation already in the Classical period. Hence, it might already at this stage of the language be analysed not compositionally, but as a single, multi-word lexeme. Anyhow, the exclusion of these three forms does not have any impact on the obtained frequency tendencies.</footnote>
<figure><img src="image_7.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.1.** External syntactic profile of the gerund in Classical Latin (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>

As shown by Figure 1.1, the Classical Latin gerund mostly occurs in adnominal phrases (60%). It is also often used in adjuncts (24%), whereas it is relatively rare in both adjective complements (10%) and verb complements (7%). The absence of adverb complement gerunds confirms their extreme rareness in this period (cf. Pinkster 2021: §17.35).

However, a distinction should be made between the different case forms of the gerund. As shown by Figure 1.2, adnominal gerunds are dominant only in the genitive (99%). In the ablative case, it is the adjunct use that prevails (75%). The external syntax of the gerund is most diverse in the accusative: the four uses each represent between 21% and 30%. The extremely low number of dative forms (n=3) does not allow drawing a firm conclusion for them.

<figure><img src="image_8.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.2.** External syntactic profile of the gerund in Classical Latin per case form (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>
### 1.2.3. Morphosyntactic profile of the gerund

Having explored the morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund, I will now establish its morphosyntactic profile. This profile will be obtained by mapping the external syntactic profile of the gerund on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin. In this mapping, the morphological properties of the gerund will also be taken into account. As seen in §1.2.1, these properties combine verbal and nominal features.

Depending on their syntactic use, gerunds can be divided in two groups: adnominal, verb complement, adjective complement, and adverb complement gerunds have a function characteristic of a noun, while adjunct gerunds have the prototypical function of an adverb (cf. Haspelmath 1995: 4; Nedjalkov 1998: 421-422; Ylikoski 2003: 228). Depending on whether the gerund has the external syntax of a noun or an adverb, a distinction can thus be made between respectively ‘nominal gerunds’ and ‘adverbial gerunds’. This distinction has not been made in the grammatical tradition of (Classical) Latin, but will be used throughout this thesis in order to facilitate the description and analysis of (the evolution of) the gerund.<fnref n="41" /> The mapping of the different uses of the gerund on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin is synthesised in Table 1.4.

<table><caption>**Table 1.4.** Mapping of the uses of the gerund on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Morphosyntactic category</th><th>Use of the gerund</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="4">Noun</td><td>Adnominal</td></tr><tr><td>Verb complement</td></tr><tr><td>Adjective complement</td></tr><tr><td>Adverb complement</td></tr><tr><td>Adverb</td><td>Adjunct</td></tr></tbody></table>

The morphosyntactic profile of the gerund can be established by calculating the proportion of nominal and adverbial gerunds in a given corpus. Based on its external syntactic profile in Figure 1.1, the morphosyntactic profile of the Classical Latin gerund is presented in Figure 1.3.

<footnote n="41">⁴¹ The term ‘nominal gerund’ may not be equated with how it is used in English linguistics. As noted in §1.2.2.1.2, in English linguistics this term is used to refer to gerunds with nominal *internal* instead of *external* syntax.</footnote>
<figure><img src="image_9.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.3.** Morphosyntactic profile of the gerund in Classical Latin (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>

In Classical Latin, the gerund appears to have nominal external syntax about three times as often as adverbial external syntax. In other words, the adverbial gerund is heavily outnumbered by the nominal gerund. However, a distinction needs again to be made between the different cases of the gerund: the nominal gerund dominates in the accusative, the genitive, and the dative, while the adverbial gerund prevails in the ablative (Figure 1.4).

<figure><img src="image_10.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.4.** Morphosyntactic profile of the gerund in Classical Latin per case form (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>

### 1.2.4. Typological profile of the gerund

The final step in describing the use of the gerund in Classical Latin is to define its typological profile. This profile is obtained by mapping the morphosyntactic profile of the gerund on Haspelmath's (1995:
4) typology of non-finite verb forms. According to this author, a distinction can be made between three cross-linguistically recurrent types of non-finite verb forms: (i) masdars, *i.e.* forms with nominal external syntax; (ii) converbs, *i.e.* forms showing adverbial external syntax; and (iii) participles, *i.e.* forms having adjectival external syntax.<fnref n="42" /> In this typology, the Classical Latin nominal gerund falls under the masdar type and the adverbial gerund under the converb type. Since it can have the external syntax of the prototypical members of two distinct categories, the Classical Latin gerund qualifies as a ‘bi-functional category of non-finite verb forms’ (*cf*. Nedjalkov 1995: 104-105).

In view of the results shown in Figure 1.3, the Classical Latin gerund is strongly associated with the masdar type (76%), while its link with the converb type is relatively weak (24%). This result is in line with the traditional description of the gerund as a ‘verbal noun’, *viz.* a type of non-finite verb forms performing in the first place “*die Funktion eines Verbalsubst.*” (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 369; see also Pinkster 2015: 58). In this way, the Classical Latin gerund behaves more like the English gerund than as its Romance successors (Haspelmath 1995: 45; see also Vincent 2016: 37, 46). This is exactly what makes its evolution from Latin to Romance so interesting.

It is important to emphasise that Haspelmath's (1995: 4) typology of non-finite verb forms is handled here as a comparative tool, that is, as a set of language-independent comparative concepts serving to describe the use of the gerund in Classical Latin in a grammatically unbiased way (Haspelmath 2010: 665; Lehmann 2018a: 33).<fnref n="43" /> Admittedly, this approach is less relevant for the description of the Classical Latin gerund alone. However, it will become highly relevant for the description of its evolution in Late Latin and in the transition from Late Latin to Old French (or Romance in general) in Chapter 2. The labels 'masdar', 'converb', and 'participle' are thus meant as purely functional labels, *i.e.* deprived of any kind of formal and language-specific content (Haspelmath 2010: 665; Lehmann 2018a: 33). Despite its strong link with Haspelmath's (1995: 4) masdar type of non-finite verb forms, the Classical Latin gerund can therefore not be analysed as a masdar. Put differently, it cannot be asserted that it *is* a masdar. The Classical Latin gerund *is* nothing but the Classical Latin gerund, *viz.* a language-specific category of non-finite verb forms with a unique set of morphological and syntactic properties and an equally unique morphosyntactic profile.

<footnote n="42">⁴² A similar typology is proposed by Nedjalkov (1998: 421-422). The main difference with Haspelmath's (1995: 4) typology is of a terminological order: while Haspelmath uses the term 'masdar' for non-finite verb forms displaying nominal external syntax, Nedjalkov uses the term 'infinitive'. The term 'masdar' comes from Arabic linguistics (Haspelmath 1995: 48), whereas the term 'converb' comes from Altaic linguistics (Haspelmath 1995: 46; Ylikoski 2003: 189). The label 'converb' is coined by Ramstedt (1903: 55) for the description of Khalkha Mongolian, and used later for the description of other Altaic languages, such as Turkic (e.g. von Gabain 1941; Krueger 1962), Mongolian (e.g. Hangin 1968), and Tungusic (e.g. Benzing 1955) (Haspelmath 1995: 46). Nedjalkov & Nedjalkov (1987) introduced this term in the typological literature, where it has rapidly spread and now belongs to the core terminology in the domain of non-finite verb forms (Haspelmath 1995: 46). In descriptive linguistics outside the Altaic family, the term 'converb' has been used only rarely.</footnote>

<footnote n="43">⁴³ This approach also paves the way for a grammatically unbiased comparison of the use of the gerund in the different Romance languages, both from a diachronic and a synchronic point of view. Given the large variation of the use of the gerund in these languages and given also the differences with its use in Latin, the need for a metalinguistically unbiased approach is great. This is apparent from the discussions held by, e.g., Haspelmath (1995: 2-3, 45) and Halmøy (2003: 11-21).</footnote>
1.2.5. Competition with non-finite verb forms other than the present participle

This final section about the gerund in Classical Latin will synthesise its competition with the various types of non-finite verb forms other than the present participle. Its competition with the present participle will be discussed separately at the end of this chapter (§1.4).

As seen throughout §1.2.2.2, the gerund competes with the infinitive in most of its uses, namely in adnominal phrases, verb complements, adjective complements, and adjuncts. However, the competition between the two forms is weak, especially in standard varieties. Indeed, the gerund prevails in adnominal phrases, adjective complements, and adjuncts, whereas the infinitive dominates in verb complements. Thus, the two forms are specialised in different syntactic uses. This suggests in fact that they are more in complementary distribution than in functional competition (cf. Pinkster 2015: 58). This lines up with the view of the gerund as the suppletive form of the infinitive, viz. the form taken by the infinitive in the prepositional accusative, the bare and the prepositional genitive, the dative, and the bare and the prepositional ablative.

However, the functional competition between the gerund and the infinitive is not only weak, it is also practically restricted to the accusative, the genitive, and the dative gerunds. Two reasons can be put forward. First, the ablative gerund only rarely occurs in adnominal phrases, verb complements, and adjective complements, while these are the dominant uses of both accusative, genitive, and dative gerunds and infinitives (see Figure 1.2). And second, contrary to the accusative, the genitive, and the dative gerunds, the ablative gerund does not occur in purpose adjuncts, i.e. the only type of adjuncts in which the infinitive can be used. The conclusion to be drawn is that the complementary distribution between the gerund and the infinitive applies more to the ablative gerund than to the accusative, the genitive, and the dative gerunds, and that, incidentally, the competition between the gerund and the infinitive concerns the latter more than the former. This difference between the ablative gerund and the other types of gerunds plays a fundamental role in the evolution of the gerund from Late Latin to Old French (or Romance in general), as we will see in §2.1.1.

As pointed out in §1.2.2.2, the gerund also competes with various types of NPs including a personal gerundive. This competition involves the same uses as those subject to competition between the gerund and the infinitive, but since the personal gerundive is an adjectival form that agrees with an explicit noun in case, gender, and number, NPs containing this form only compete with gerund phrases comprising an explicit direct object (Menge *et al.* 2000: 737). Globally speaking, NPs with a personal gerundive are preferred over this type of gerund constituents. This also explains why, at this stage of the language, gerund phrases have a low mean degree of internal syntactic complexity.
The final type of non-finite verb forms that may compete with the gerund is the supine. This
competition is confined to purpose adjuncts, and is thus restricted to accusative, genitive, and dative
gerunds. Already in Classical Latin, the supine is gradually replaced in purpose adjunct by infinitives,
gerunds, and NPs with a personal gerundive. This replacement is set forth more markedly in Late Latin.

Apart from infinitives, supines, present participles, and NPs with a personal gerundive, gerunds
may also compete with abstract deverbal NPs (Bauer 1993; Pinkster 2015: 59) and with finite clauses
(Menge et al. 2000: 747-748; Pinkster 2021: §16.100). An example of competition between the gerund
and abstract deverbal NPs is in adnominal phrases. Compare (88) and (89): in (88), the adnominal
argument of *cupiditas* ‘desire’ is instantiated by the gerund clause *inimicos ulciscendi* ‘to avenge their
enemies’, while in (89), it is realised by the abstract noun *ultionis* ‘of vengeance’ (Pinkster 2015: 59).

(88) [...] *qui* [...] *cupiditate* inimicos ulcisce-nd-i arderent [...].
REL.NOM.M.PL desire.ABL.F.SG enemy.ACC.M.PL avenge-GER-GEN burn.SBJV.PST.3PL
‘(...) who burned with the desire to avenge their enemies.’ (Liv. 29.6.7)

(89) *Hos* [...] ***ultionis*** *cupiditas* ad virtutem *accendit*.
DEM.ACC.M.PL vengeance.GEN.F.SG desire.NOM.F.SG to bravery.ACC.N.SG incite.PRS.3SG
‘The desire for vengeance incited them to bravery.’ (Tac. *hist*. 2.77.3)

One of the areas of competition between gerund phrases and finite clauses are purpose adjuncts (Steele 1898; Menge *et al.* 2000: 747-748; Pinkster 2021: §16.100). Compare, for instance, the gerund clauses in (71/74/77) with the finite clause *ut fidibus cantarem seni* ‘to play the lyre for an old man’ (90).

(90) [...] *veni* ut fidibus *cantarem* seni [...].
come.PST.1SG in_order_to lyre.ABL.F.PL play.SBJV.PST.1SG old_man.DAT.M.SG
‘I came in order to play the lyre for an old man.’ (Plaut. *Epid*. 500)

Abstract deverbal NPs and finite clauses play also a role in the evolution of the gerund from Late Latin to Old French, but this role is less significant than that of NPs with a personal gerundive and especially of infinitives and present participles. Hence, they will be given less attention in this study.

1.3. The present participle

After having explored the morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund in Classical Latin, I will proceed in this section to the analysis of the present participle. As for the gerund, attention will be paid to the morphological (§1.3.1) and syntactic (§1.3.2) properties of the present participle. On the basis of these properties, I will then establish its morphosyntactic (§1.3.3) and typological (§1.3.4) profiles. The functional competition between the gerund and the present participle will be touched upon in §1.3.2, but discussed in more detail in §1.4.
### 1.3.1. Morphological properties of the present participle

From a morphological perspective, the present participle combines verbal and adjectival properties: it is verbal by being built on the present stem of a verb, which ends in -a, -e, or -ie depending on its conjugational class, and adjectival in that it has one of the endings of the third declension adjectives (Marouzeau 1910: 2-4; Eklund 1970: 12; Meiser 1998²: 226; Pinkster 2015: 53, 59-60). This ending is not attached directly to the verb stem, but through the inflectional infix -nt-. The present participle is marked for the adjectival categories of case, gender, and number, but not for the verbal categories of person, number, tense, and mood (Pinkster 2015: 50, 60).

Like regular adjectives, the present participle inflects for case, gender, and number through agreement with a noun (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 755; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 383; Pinkster 2015: 60-61). For instance, *ingravescens* ‘worsening’ (91) and *exeuntem* ‘coming out’ (92) agree with respectively the nominative masculine singular noun *morbus* ‘illness’ and the accusative masculine singular pronoun *me* ‘me’.

(91) [...] non illum [...] morbus *ingravesce-ns* retardavit [...]. NEG DEM.ACC.M.SG illness.NOM.M.SG worsen-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG hold_back.PST.3SG ‘His worsening illness did not hold him back’ (Cic. *Phil.* 9.2)

(92) *Hic, exeu-nt-em* me *unde aspexisti modo.* here come_out-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG I.ACC.M.SG from see.PST.2SG just ‘Here, where you just saw me coming out from.’ (Plaut. *Bacch.* 204)

The morphology of the present participle is illustrated for the verb *cantare* ‘to sing’ in Table 1.5.

<table><caption>**Table 1.51.** Morphology of the present participle in Classical Latin (illustrated for the verb *cantare* ‘to sing’)</caption><thead><tr><th>Case form</th><th>Number</th><th>Masculine</th><th>Feminine</th><th>Neuter</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="2">Nominative</td><td>Singular</td><td>canta-ns</td><td>canta-ns</td><td>canta-ns</td></tr><tr><td>Plural</td><td>canta-nt-es</td><td>canta-nt-es</td><td>canta-nt-ia</td></tr><tr><td rowspan="2">Accusative</td><td>Singular</td><td>canta-nt-em</td><td>canta-nt-em</td><td>canta-ns</td></tr><tr><td>Plural</td><td>canta-nt-es/is</td><td>canta-nt-es/is</td><td>canta-nt-ia</td></tr><tr><td rowspan="2">Genitive</td><td>Singular</td><td>canta-nt-is</td><td>canta-nt-is</td><td>canta-nt-is</td></tr><tr><td>Plural</td><td>canta-nt-ium</td><td>canta-nt-ium</td><td>canta-nt-ium</td></tr><tr><td rowspan="2">Dative</td><td>Singular</td><td>canta-nt-i</td><td>canta-nt-i</td><td>canta-nt-i</td></tr><tr><td>Plural</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td></tr><tr><td rowspan="2">Ablative</td><td>Singular</td><td>canta-nt-i/e</td><td>canta-nt-i/e</td><td>canta-nt-ile</td></tr><tr><td>Plural</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td><td>canta-nt-ibus</td></tr></tbody></table>

The morphology of the present participle calls for some remarks.
(i) In the nominative singular and the accusative neuter singular, the infix **-nt-** and the adjectival ending are merged in **-ns** (Marouzeau 1910: 3).

(ii) In the accusative masculine and feminine plural, the ending **-is** is gradually generalised at the cost of **-es**. However, due to the tendency of medieval copyists to replace the ending **-is** by **-es**, only a few written traces of this evolution persist (Marouzeau 1910: 3-4).

(iii) In the genitive plural, the ending **-ium** co-exists with **-um** until the 2nd or even the 1st c. BC. From this period onward, the former generalises at the expense of the latter (Marouzeau 1910: 3-4).

(iv) In the ablative singular, the present participle has two endings: **-i** and **-e** (Marouzeau 1910: 3). It has traditionally been assumed that the present participle takes the ending **-i** in adnominal phrases and **-e** in adjunct phrases or when nominalised as the head of a NP (Marouzeau 1910: 4; Leumann 1977: 438). However, many forms have been shown to violate this “syntactico-semantic rule” (Walvoort 2018: 3). Hence, the inflectional variation between **-e** and **-i** can hardly be considered functionally motivated (Eklund 1970: 12 fn. 1; Piccoli 1972: 23; Walvoort 2018: 20). Witness (93), in which the adnominal present participle *ineunte* ‘beginning’ has the ending **-e** instead of **-i**.

(93) [...] *si quis ab ineu-nt-e aetate habet*
if INDF.NOM.M.SG from begin-PTCP.PRS-ABL.F.SG age.ABL.F.SG have.PRS.3SG
*causam celebritatis [...].*
responsibility.ACC.F.SG reputation.GEN.F.SG
‘If someone has the responsibility of a reputation from his youth (lit. ‘beginning age’) onward (...).’
(Cic. *Off.* 2.44.3)

The inflectional variation between the ablative singular endings **-i** and **-e** is of little interest in this study, and hence it will not be further examined.<fnref n="44" /> What is more important here is that for some forms ending in **-ns** or an inflectional variant of this ending (hence **-ns** forms’), it is difficult to establish whether they are present participles or third declension adjectives (Marouzeau 1910: 48; Eklund 1970: 12-13, 18-25; Walvoort 2018: 4-5). This derives from the fact that many third declension adjectives historically derive from present participles. Like most cases of language change, this evolution from present participles to adjectives is slow and gradual, since it results from the repeated use of present participles in adjectival functions and under specific semantic and pragmatic circumstances (Traugott & Dasher 2002: 283; Himmelmann 2004: 26-31 on so-called ‘splits’ in lexicalisation). Due to the “gradualness” (*cf*. Trousdale & Traugott 2010: 5) of this evolution, some **-ns** forms cannot unambiguously be categorised, in synchrony, as present participles or third declension adjectives (Marouzeau 1910: 59; Eklund 1970: 12-13, 18-25; Scherer 1975: 94). The resulting “categorial indeterminacy” (*cf*. Aarts 2007: 4) of these forms

<footnote n="44">⁴⁴ For a state of the art discussion, see Walvoort (2018).</footnote>
may lead to controversial category assignments. The categorisation of instances of *sciens* 'knowing' combined with the verb *esse* 'to be' (94) is illustrative in this respect (Eklund 1970: 45).

(94) *Carthagini* ego sum gnatus, ut tu
Carthage.ABL.F.SG I.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.1SG born.NOM.M.SG so that you.NOM.M.SG
sis *scie-ns*.
be.SBJV.PRS.2SG know-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
'I was born in Carthage, so that you know (lit. 'are knowing/aware').' (Plaut. *Poen*. 1038)

Used in this syntactic configuration, *sciens* 'knowing' is analysed as an adjective by Marouzeau (1910: 37, 54-55), but as a present participle by most scholars (e.g. Ernout & Thomas 1951: 274-275; Palmer 1964: 326; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388; Scherer 1975: 96). Eklund (1970: 45) argues that there are no decisive arguments in favour of this or that analysis, so that it is impossible to categorise this form it in a conclusive way. The categorial indeterminacy of this and similar forms (or the disagreement about their category) raises an important theoretical and methodological issue for this thesis: which forms qualify as present participles, and should therefore be included in the dataset, and which forms qualify as adjectives, and should as such be excluded? A detailed discussion of this issue will be held in Chapter 3 (§3.4.2.1). For now, it suffices to mention that, in this thesis, the Latin present participle will be defined in a broad sense on the basis of the following description of Eklund (1970: 12):

[T]he term “present participle” denotes words formed from present stems of verbs used in the language current at the time when the text in question was written by adding *-nt* to the present stem (*-nts* > *-ns*; sometimes there may be a vowel between the stem and *-nt*).

### 1.3.2. Syntactic properties of the present participle

Having investigated the morphological properties of the present participle in Classical Latin, I will now examine its syntactic properties. I will focus first on its internal syntax (§1.3.2.1), and then on its external syntax (§1.3.2.2).

#### 1.3.2.1. *Internal syntax of the present participle*

As for the gerund, two factors pertaining to the internal syntax of the present participle will be examined: the internal syntactic complexity of present participle phrases (§1.3.2.1.1) and the marking of the internal argument of the present participle (§1.3.2.1.2).
1.3.2.1.1. Internal syntactic complexity of present participle phrases

Like that of gerund phrases, the internal syntactic structure of present participle phrases shows different degrees of complexity (Marouzeau 1910: 13-22; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387; Pinkster 2021: §14.14, §16.91). Those with the lowest degree of complexity only contain the present participle, like *abundantes* ‘abounding’ (95).<fnref n="45" />

(95) *Semper abunda-nt-es*      *hastas*      *frangit=que*      *quatit=que.*
always abound-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.PL lance.ACC.F.PL shake.PRS.3SG=and break.PRS.3SG=and
‘He always shakes and breaks the numerous lances.’ (Enn. *ann.* 395)

Most of these phrases only contain the present participle because its arguments and possibly also adjuncts are semantically and syntactically shared with the main clause (Marouzeau 1910: 15). This sharing holds in particular for the subject of the present participle, which mostly corresponds to a constituent of the main clause, namely the NP with which it agrees in case, gender, and number. For instance, in (96) the implicit subject of *flentes* ‘crying’ corresponds to the pronoun *hi* ‘they’, which is the subject of the main clause verb *orabant* ‘they prayed’.

(96) *Hi*      [*...* **fle-nt-es**      [*...* **orabant**      *ut* [*...*].
DEM.NOM.M.PL cry-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL pray.PST.3PL that
‘They prayed in tears (lit. ‘while crying’) that (...).’ (Caes. *Gall.* 7.78.4)

In the case of adjunct nominative present participles, the implicit subject shared with the main verb may be explicit in the main clause (e.g. in (96)) or implicit, that is to say, pro-dropped (e.g. in (97)).

(97) [*...* **fle-nt-es**      *ab eo*      *salutem*      *petiverunt*      [*...*].
cry-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL from DEM.ABL.M.SG safety.ACC.F.SG ask_for.PST.3PL
‘They asked for safety from him while crying.’ (Caes. *civ.* 3.98.3)

As for the implicit non-subject arguments of the present participle, as in the case of the gerund, they are either deactualised (*cf*. Dik 1985: 11) or inferable from the discourse context, as in respectively (98) and (99): in (98), *sapientes* ‘wise’ lacks an internal argument with a concrete reference, which causes it to be interpreted in an absolute way (*cf*. Dik 1997: 89); in (99), *insequente* ‘following’ does have an internal argument with a concrete reference, but is left implicit for the sake of linguistic economy (it corresponds to a NP like *hanc noctem* ‘this night’).

<footnote n="45">⁴⁵ When these phrases have a syntactic function characteristic of an adjective, like the adnominal *abundantes* ‘abounding’ (95), the present participle is often close to an analysis as an adjective (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387). A detailed discussion of this will be held in §3.4.2.1.</footnote>
(98) *Nos autem, qui sapie-nt-es non sumus,*
we.NOM.M.PL but REL.NOM.M.PL be_wise-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL NEG be.PRS.1PL
*fugitivos [...] esse dicunt.*
runaway.ACC.M.PL be.INF.PRS say.PRS.3PL

‘But they say that we, who are not wise, are runaways.’ (Cic. *Mur*. 62)

(99) *Nocte inseque-nt-e legati responsa ad*
night.ABL.F.SG follow-PTCP.PRS-ABL.F.SG legate.NOM.M.PL answer.ACC.N.PL to
*suos referunt [...].*
their.ACC.M.PL bring.PST.3PL

‘The following night, the legates brought the answers to their people.’ (Caes. *Gall*. 8.23.1)

Present participle phrases with a higher degree of internal syntactic complexity than those just illustrated contain the present participle and an additional constituent. This constituent may be an argument of the present participle or an adjunct (Pinkster 2021: §14.14). For example, *adpetentis* ‘aspiring’ (100) takes the noun *regnum* ‘power’ as its internal argument, while *peccantibus* ‘sinning’ (101) is accompanied by the PP *in magna aliqua re* ‘in some important matter’, which functions as a respect adjunct (cf. Pinkster 2015: 914).

(100) *Sp. Maeli regnum adpete-nt-is domus*
Sp. Maelius.GEN.M.SG power.ACC.N.SG aspire-PTCP.PRS-GEN.M.SG house.NOM.F.SG
*est complanata [...].*
be.PRS.3SG level_with_the*_ground.PTCP.PST.NOM.F.SG*

‘The house of Sp. Maelius, who aspired to rule, was levelled with the ground.’ (Cic. *dom*. 101)

(101) [...] *ne existiment ita se adligatos, ut ab*
that_not mean.SBJV.PRS.3PL so REFL.ACC.M.PL bind.PTCP.PST.ACC.M.PL that from
*amicis in magna aliqua re pecca-nt-ibus*
friend.ABL.M.PL in great.ABL.F.SG some.ABL.F.SG matter.ABL.F.SG sin-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.PL
*non discedant.*
NEG withdraw.SBJV.PRS.3PL

‘(...) that they should not think themselves so bound that they cannot withdraw from friends who sin in some important matter.’ (Cic. *Lael*. 42)

Phrases with still a higher degree of internal syntactic complexity contain the present participle, its internal argument(s), and one or more adjunct(s). An example is given in (102): *intuens* ‘looking’ selects the noun *terram* ‘ground’ as its internal argument and is further accompanied by the adverb *modeste* ‘modestly’, which acts as a manner adjunct.

(102) *Adnuo / terram intue-ns modeste.*
nod.PRS.1SG ground.ACC.F.SG look_to-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG modestly
‘I nod while modestly looking to the ground.’ (Ter. *Eun*. 579-580)
Present participle phrases with the highest degree of internal syntactic complexity also contain an
explicit subject, but this possibility is restricted to adjunct phrases. *Senatum illuc vocante Metello consule* 'because consul Metellus was summoning the senate there' (103) is a case in point: the NP *Metello consule* 'consul Metellus' is the subject of *vocante* 'summoning', the noun *senatum* 'senate' its internal argument, and the adverb *illuc* 'thence' its spatial adjunct.

(103) [...] *concursus* est ad templum Concordiae
running_to.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG to temple.ACC.N.SG Concord.GEN.F.SG
*factus* senatum illuc voca-*nt-e*
make.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.SG senate.ACC.M.SG thence summon-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG
*Metello* consule.
Metellus.ABL.M.SG consul.ABL.M.SG

'A running was made to the temple of Concord since consul Metellus was summoning the senate there.' (Cic. *Dom*. 11)

In line with Lehmann's (1988: 191-197) claim that a high degree of internal syntactic complexity of a
clause is correlated with a low degree of desententialisation (see also §1.2.2.1.1), the present participle
phrases in this section show a decreasing degree of desententialisation. As a corollary, they show an
increasing degree of finiteness. Parallel to the term 'gerund phrase', the term 'present participle phrase'
will be used in this thesis as a cover term for all types of constituents headed by a present participle,
irrespective of their syntactic function and their degree of internal syntactic complexity. The term
'present participle clause' will be retained for specific instances of present participle phrases containing
(at least) an explicit second argument, and thus exhibiting a clear clause-like internal structure.

Present participle phrases with a high degree of internal syntactic complexity are rare until the 1st
c. BC. They are mostly adjuncts headed by a nominative present participle (Marouzeau 1910: 13-22).
This gradually changes from the 1st c. BC onward, especially in literary texts and in other types of texts
written in a high register (Marouzeau 1910: 13-22; Lyer 1932: 230-231; Laughton 1964: 31-33). What
can be observed from this century onward is an increasing number of adjunct nominative phrases with
a high degree of internal syntactic complexity, on the one hand, and an increasing degree of internal
syntactic complexity of all other types of present participle phrases, on the other. However, the former
keep having the most complex internal syntactic structure (Marouzeau 1910: 13-22; Laughton 1964: 31-
33). As a result, the mean degree of finiteness of present participle phrases increases (cf. Lehmann 1988:
191-197). This development is reminiscent of the process called 'finitisation' by Rose (2016: 350), i.e.
"the extension of finite features to a non-finite construction (without change in dependent status)" (see
also, e.g., Harris & Campbell 1995; Heine 2009; Givón 2016). Since non-finite clauses subject to
finitisation acquire more morphosyntactic properties characteristic of finite clauses, and since the degree
of finiteness of a clause is reflected on the morphosyntactic structure of its head (Givón 1990: 853;
Bisang 2001: 1400; Nikolaeva 2010: 1178-1179), the finitisation of present participle phrases from the
1st c. BC onward entails a process of morphosyntactic verbalisation of the present participle (cf. Marouzeau 1910: 13-22; Lyer 1932: 230-231).

### 1.3.2.1.2. Marking of the internal argument of the present participle

The remaining factor pertaining to the internal syntax of the present participle to be discussed is the marking of its internal argument – at least if this argument is explicit and not syntactically shared with the main clause. As in the case of the gerund, a distinction can be made between two types of present participles (Pinkster 2015: 62, 223-225). Most forms have the internal syntax of a verb, because their internal argument is marked in the same way as when it is governed by a finite verb (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 755; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 384). For example, *vocante* ‘summoning’ (103) assigns the accusative to the noun *senatum* ‘the senate’, as do all finite forms of *vocare* ‘to summon’. Occasionally, however, the internal argument is marked in the same way as when it depends on an adjective (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 275; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387; Scherer 1975: 94). Witness (104), where *gerentum* ‘managing’ assigns the genitive to the noun *rei* ‘business’, while all finite forms of *gerere* ‘to manage’ assign the accusative to their internal argument.

(104) *Piaculum est miserere nos hominum rei sin.NOM.N.SG be.PRS.3SG pity.INF.PRS we.ACC.M.PL man.GEN.M.PL business.GEN.F.SG male gere-nt-um. badly manage-PTCP.PRS-GEN.M.PL
'It is a sin that we pity people who manage their business badly.' (Plaut. *Truc*. 223)

In line with Lehmann’s (1988: 191-197) claim that clauses showing verbal internal syntax have a higher degree of finiteness than those displaying adjectival internal syntax, the present participle phrase in (103) is more finite than the one in (104).

### 1.3.2.2. External syntax of the present participle

In Classical Latin, the external syntax of the present participle is diverse. It can occur in adnominal phrases (§1.3.2.2.1), subject predicates (§1.3.2.2.2), object predicates (§1.3.2.2.3), or adjuncts (§1.3.2.2.4), but it can also act as the main verb of a progressive construction (§1.3.2.2.5) or as what will be referred to in this study as a ‘presentative progressive construction’ (§1.3.2.2.6), i.e. a construction of the type *I see him coming*. A few instances are also found of present participles used as finite verbs (§1.3.2.2.2.7).
In addition to these uses, the present participle can be nominalised, viz. function as the head of a
NP (Marouzeau 1910: 63-70; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 763; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 275; Laughton
1964: 70-83; Palmer 1964: 326; Scherer 1975: 95-96; Menge et al. 2000: 713; Pinkster 2015: 956-958).
Some present participles are more or less lexicalised in this function, such as *negotians* ‘merchant’ and
*amans* ‘lover’, but most of them serve as the head of what Corblin (1990: 65) calls a ‘NP without a
noun’ or ‘nounless NP’ (Fr. *groupe nominal sans nom*’). These are NPs in which the original head noun
is left unspecified, but can easily be inferred from the discourse context. Due to the ellipsis of this noun,
the originally adnominal adjective or participle is contextually nominalised, i.e. attributed the status of
head of the NP. For instance, in (105) *audientis* ‘of the hearer’ is contextually nominalised as the head
of a genitive NP, the implicit head noun corresponding to a genitive (pro)noun like *hominis* ‘of a man’
or *alicuius* ‘of someone’. In a similar vein, *conantis* ‘those who try’ (106) is the head of an accusative
NP, the implicit head noun being an accusative (pro)noun like *milites* ‘soldiers’ or *quos* ‘those’.

(105) *Nullo* *enim modo* *animus* *audie-nt-is* *aut*
no.ABL.M.SG for way.ABL.M.SG mind.NOM.M.SG hear-PTCP.PRS-GEN.M.SG or
*incitari* *aut leniri* *potest* [...].
arouse.INF.PRS.PASS or soothe.INF.PRS.PASS can.PRS.3SG
‘For the mind of the hearer can in no way be aroused or soothed.’ (Cic. *de orat*. 132)

(106) *Rursus cona-nt-is* *progredi* *insequitur* *et moratur*.
again try-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL advance.INF.PRS pursue.PRS.3SG and delay.PRS.3SG
‘He pursued and delayed those trying to advance again.’ (Caes. *civ*. 1.65.2)

As mentioned by Pinkster (2015: 956), the nominalised use of the present participle often compensates
for the lack of a regular noun denoting a specific type of agent. This use of the present participle is not
very frequent in the earliest texts, but “became common in the philosophical and other technical works
of Cicero and then spread to Livy and later historians” (Pinkster 2015: 956). Given that their use derives
from a process of (contextual) lexicalisation, present participles serving as the head of a (nounless) NP
will not be taken into account in this study.<fnref n="46" /> It should nonetheless be noted that, for some present
participles, it is difficult to establish whether they are nominalised or function as the head of an adjunct
(Ernout & Thomas 1951: 275; Eklund 1970: 16-18; Pinkster 2015: 954, 958). Pinkster (2015: 958) cites
as an example the form *lacrumantem* ‘crying’ (107).

(107) *Lacruma-nt-em* *lacinia* *tenet* *lacrumans*.
cry-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG fringe.ABL.F.SG hold.PRS.3SG cry.PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
‘In tears (lit. ‘while crying’) she holds him who cries at the fringe (of his cloak).’ (Plaut. *Asin*. 587)

<footnote n="46">⁴⁶ For this use of the present participle, see, among others, Marouzeau (1910: 63-70), Laughton (1964: 70-83), Adams (1973), and Pinkster (2015: 956-958). Riemann (1885: 85-88) deals with this use of the present participle in Livy, Önnerfors (1956: 124-126) in Pliny the Elder, Hintzen (1993: 95-114) in Cicero’s orations, and Laughton (1964: 70-83) in Cicero in general.</footnote>
The distinction between present participles used as the head of a NP and those heading an adjunct phrase will be explored in detail in Chapter 3 (§3.4.2.2).

1.3.2.2.1. Adnominal present participles

Like the gerund, the present participle can serve as the head of an adnominal phrase (Marouzeau 1910: 12, 22; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 763, 770-771; Laughton 1964: 52-69; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387; Scherer 1975: 96; Menge et al. 2000: 708-709, 713-714; Pinkster 2015: 994-996). Two examples are given below: in (108), *distantes inter se milia passum IIII* ‘standing four miles apart’ depends on the NP *pontes duos* ‘two bridges’, and specifies the distance between two bridges; in (109), *ferventem* ‘boiling’ depends on the noun *aquam* ‘water’, and defines the type of water in which cabbage should be put.

(108) *In Sicori* *flumine* *pontes* *effecerat* *duos*
in Sicoris.ABL.M.SG river.ABL.N.SG bridge.ACC.M.PL make.PST.3SG two.ACC.M.PL
***dista-nt-es*** *inter* *se* *milia* *passum* IIII.
stand_apart-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL between REFL.ACC.M.PL mile.ACC.N.PL step.GEN.M.PL four
‘He had made two bridges over the river Sicoris, standing four miles apart.’ (Caes. *civ*. 1.40.1)

(109) [...] *coicito* *in aquam* ***ferve-nt-em*** [...].
put.IMP.PRS.2PL in water.ACC.F.SG boil-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.SG
‘Put it (cabbage) in boiling water.’ (Cato *agr*. 156.7)

As for their gerund counterparts, a distinction should be made between semantically necessary and
optional adnominal present participle phrases (Laughton 1964: 53-54; Pinkster 2015: 965-966). The
former type is illustrated by *animum auditoris idonee comparans ad reliquam dictionem* ‘bringing the
mind of the hearer into a proper condition to receive the rest of the speech’: this phrase depends on the
noun *oratio* ‘(part of a) speech’, whose meaning alone does not suffice to form a meaningful information
unit within the context of (110). Indeed, the present participle clause serves to define the part of a plea
(*oratio*) referred to by the term *exordium* ‘*exordium*’.<fnref n="47" />

<footnote n="47">⁴⁷ This analysis of *animum auditoris idonee comparans ad reliquam dictionem* ‘bringing the mind of the auditor into a proper condition to receive the rest of the speech’ (110) is at odds with Pinkster’s (2015: 996) analysis. This author regards this clause as semantically optional. However, the omission of this clause makes the sentence nonsensical, at least within the context of (110). As stated in the running text, the present participle clause serves to define the type of a plea called *exordium* ‘*exordium*’. In such a definition, the present participle clause is clearly semantically necessary (as noted also by Laughton 1964: 53-54).</footnote>
(110) *Exordium est oratio animum auditoris idonee*
exordium.NOM.N.SG be.PRS.3SG speech.NOM.F.SG mind.ACC.M.SG hearer.GEN.M.SG suitably
**compara-ns** ad reliquam dictionem.
bring-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG to remaining.ACC.F.SG declaration.ACC.F.SG

‘An exordium is a (part of a) speech that brings the mind of the hearer in a proper condition to receive the rest of the declaration (lit. ‘that brings he mind of the hearer in a suitable way to the rest of the declaration).’ (Cic. inv. 1.20)

Examples of adnominal present participle phrases that are semantically optional are *distantes inter se milia passum IIII* ‘standing four miles apart’ (108) and *ferventem* ‘boiling’ (109).

Another distinction that should be made is between appositive and restrictive adnominal present participle phrases. This distinction pertains to the referentiality of the head noun (Pinkster 2015: 1047; Poletto & Sanfelici 2017: 805). Appositive phrases express information about a noun that is not required to identify its referent (Poletto & Sanfelici 2017: 805). A clear example is *regnum adpetentis* ‘aspiring to rule’ (100), which depends on the proper noun *Sp. Maeli* ‘Sp. Maelius’. An example of a form depending on a common noun is *ingravescens* ‘worsening’ (111).

(111) *Ita=que non illum vis hiemis, non nives, non*
so=and NEG DEM.ACC.M.SG violence.NOM.F.SG winter.GEN.F.SG NEG snow.NOM.F.PL NEG
longitudo itineris, non asperitas viarum, non
length.NOM.F.SG journey.GEN.N.SG NEG roughness.NOM.F.SG road.GEN.F.PL NEG
morbus ingravesce-ns retardavit [...].
illness.NOM.M.SG worsen-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG slow_down.PST.3SG

‘So, neither the violence of the winter, nor the snow, nor the length of the journey, nor the roughness of the roads, nor his worsening illness slowed him down.’ (Cic. Phil. 9.2)

Restrictive phrases, on the contrary, provide information about a noun that is required to identify its referent (Poletto & Sanfelici 2017: 805). For instance, *orientem* ‘rising’ (112) depends on the noun *solem* ‘sun’ and specifies the point of compass in the direction of which the Belgae are gazing. The presence of this form is required to identify the part of the sun’s daily trajectory that metonymically stands for the point of compass in issue.

(112) *Belgae [...] spectant in septentrionem et orie-nt-em*
Belga.NOM.M.PL gaze.PRS.3PL to north.ACC.M.SG and rise-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
*solem*.
sun.ACC.M.SG

‘The Belgae gaze to the north and the east (lit. ‘the rising sun’).’ (Caes. *Gall.* 1.1.6)
The distinction between appositive and restrictive adnominal present participle phrases runs parallel to that between appositive and restrictive finite relative clauses, to which the former (or so-called ‘reduced relative clauses’) are structurally equivalent (Poletto & Sanfelici 2017: 804-805). It is also worth noting that most appositive phrases are semantically optional (e.g. (108/109/111)), while most restrictive phrases are semantically obligatory (e.g. (110)). However, there is no one-to-one correspondence between the two distinctions. Witness *orientem* ‘rising’ (112), which is restrictive, but in theory semantically optional.

Like adjectives, adnominal present participles are assigned case through agreement with their governing noun. For example, *distantes* ‘standing apart’ (108), *ferventem* ‘boiling’ (109), and *orientem* ‘rising’ (112) are in the accusative through agreement with the accusative nouns *pontes* ‘bridges’ (108), *aquam* ‘water’ (109), and *solem* ‘sun’ (112), while *comparans* ‘bringing’ (110) and *ingravescens* ‘worsening’ (111) stand in the nominative through agreement with the nominative nouns *oratio* ‘passage’ (110) and *morbus* ‘illness’ (111). This feature distinguishes present participles from gerunds, since the latter are assigned case on the basis of their function or governing preposition.

Prior to exploring the second use of the present participle, it should be pointed out that adnominal present participle phrases include a type of phrases that are often treated as an independent type and referred to as ‘dominant participle constructions’ or ‘*ab urbe condita* constructions’ (Heick 1936; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 280; Laughton 1964: 84-99; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 394; Menge et al. 2000: 709, 717-718; Pinkster 2021: §15.132-§15.134). These phrases are made up of a noun and a present participle that, taken together, “form a complex of substantival character, capable of standing as subject or object of a verb, or of being governed by a preposition” (Laughton 1964: 84; see also Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 762; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 280; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 394).<fnref n="48" /> In such complexes, “the meaning of the participle predominates” (Laughton 1964: 84), feature underpinning the label ‘dominant participle construction’.<fnref n="49" /> Examples of this type of present participles are *exorientem* ‘rising’ (113) and *consentiens* ‘agreeing’ (114).

(113) *Ante solem exorie-nt-em nisi in palaestram veneras [...]*
before sun.ACC.M.SG rise-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG if_not to gymnasium.ACC.F.SG come.PST.2SG
‘If you had not come to the gymnasium before sunrise (...).’ (Plaut. *Bacch*. 424)

(114) [...] *vehementer eum consentie-ns Etruria movebit.*
vigorously DEM.ACC.M.SG agree-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG Etruria.NOM.F.SG move.FUT.3SG
‘The agreement of Etruria (lit. ‘the agreeing Etruria’) will move him vigorously.’ (Cic. *fam*. 6.6.8)

<footnote n="48">⁴⁸ According to Pinkster (2021: §15.132-§15.134), dominant present participle phrases can only serve as an argument of a verb. This entails that phrases introduced by a preposition and functioning as adjuncts, like *ante solem exorientem* ‘before sunset’ (111), are to be analysed in a different way, namely as NPs containing an adnominal present participle.</footnote>

<footnote n="49">⁴⁹ As for the term ‘*ab urbe condita* construction’, it is based on the title of Livy’s history of Rome (*Ab urbe condita* ‘From the foundation of the city’). This title is an exemplary instance of the phrase (but with a past participle). This term has long been used because of “the difficulty of finding a clear and concise definition in grammatical terms” (Laughton 1964: 84).</footnote>
PPs and NPs containing a dominant present participle are respectively adjuncts and arguments of a verb, as in respectively (113) and (114). However, within these PPs and NPs, the present participle is clearly adnominal (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 762).<fnref n="50" /> The analysis of constituents like *consentiens Etruria* ‘the agreement of Etruria’ (114) as verb complement *present participle phrases*, as proposed by Pinkster (2021: §15.132-§15.134), is untenable. The same holds for the analysis of phrases like *ante solem exorientem* ‘before sunrise’ (113) as adjunct *present participle phrases*. Admittedly, the constituents in issue act as respectively verb complements and adjuncts, but instead of instantiating present participle phrases, they instantiate respectively NPs and PPs. Within these NPs and PPs is used a specific type of adnominal present participle, *viz.* one whose meaning prevails over that of the head noun.<fnref n="51" /> It is not without importance that Laughton (1964: 97) states, with respect to PPs such as *ante solem exorientem* ‘before sunrise’ (113), that not all dominant present participles “can be confidently distinguished from attributive uses”. The same idea is put forward by Pinkster (2021: §15.133) with regard to NPs like *consentiens Etruria* ‘the agreement of Etruria’ (114) when asserting that “[I]t is not always easy to decide whether a sequence consisting of a (pro)noun and a participle is a noun phrase or a participial clause”. As opposed to that of the past participle, the dominant use of the present participle is extremely rare throughout the history of Latin (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 769; Laughton 1964: 84-99; Menge *et al.* 2000: 718; Pinkster 2021: §15.132-§15.134). Hence, the analysis adopted in this thesis will have no (or a negligible) impact on the quantitative results.

### 1.3.2.2.2. Subject predicate present participles

Another use of the present participle is as the predicate of the subject (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 763; Laughton 1964: 1; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388; Scherer 1975: 96; Menge *et al.* 2000: 717; Pinkster 2015: 60).<fnref n="52" /> In this study, subject predicates will be defined as syntactically obligatory constituents used in combination with a copular verb (or a verb used as such) in order to assign some property or definition to the subject of a proposition, independently of some other state of affairs (as in Quirk *et al.* 1985: 54-55; Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268-271; Pinkster 2015: 30). For instance, *madentes* ‘(being) wet’ (115) acts as the predicate of the subject *cinconnorum fimbriae* ‘the fringes of the curls’: it ascribes the feature [+wet] to the referent of this subject by means of the copular verb *erant* ‘they were’. Likewise, *amans sui*

<footnote n="50">⁵⁰ Menge *et al.* (2000: 709) recognise that the present participle is in “*ein attributives Verhältnis zum scheinbar regierenden Nomen*”, but find it nonetheless “*irreführend dem Partizip in diesen Konstruktionen die untergeordnete Funtion des Attributs zuzuweisen*” (see also pp. 717-718). They take the dominant present participle as a “*Prädikatsnomen*”, but this analysis is not convincing. As they admit themselves, these forms are semantically dominant, but can nevertheless be omitted without making the sentence ungrammatical or devoid of meaning. As such, they should be taken as a sub-type of adnominal present participles.</footnote>

<footnote n="51">⁵¹ Due to the semantic dominance of the present participle, NPs and PPs of this type can in many languages be translated by a NP or PP in which the Latin present participle is rendered by a noun and serves as the head, while the Latin head noun is rendered by an adnominal NP. Witness, for instance, the English translation of *ante solem exorientem* ‘before sunrise’ (113) and *consentiens Etruria* ‘the agreement of Etruria’ (114) (Kühner & Stegmann 1914: 762, 769).</footnote>

<footnote n="52">⁵² Marouzeau (1910: 37-39) analyses all subject predicates present participles as adjectives. However, this analysis confuses the category and the function of the forms, and should as such be rejected.</footnote>
‘loving herself’ (116) is the predicate of the subject of *est* ‘she is’, *viz.* *virtus* ‘virtue’. The property assigned to the referent of this subject is paraphrasable as ‘self-respecting’ or ‘self-esteeming’.

(115) [...] *erant* [...] *made-nt-es* cincinnorum fimbriae [...].
be.PST.3PL be_wet-PTCP.PRS-NOM.F.PL curl.GEN.M.PL fringe.NOM.F.PL
‘The fringes of the curls were wet.’ (Cic. *Pis*. 25)

(116) *Omnino est amans sui virtus.*
totally be.PRS.3SG love-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG her.GEN.F.SG virtue.NOM.F.SG
‘Virtue totally loves herself (lit. ‘is totally loving herself’).’ (Cic. *Lael*. 98)

In the grammatical tradition of English, the constituents labelled here ‘subject predicate phrases’ are also referred to as ‘(subject) predicative constructions’ (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55). Depending on the morphosyntactic category of the head, a distinction is moreover made between ‘predicat(iv)e adjectives (or adjective phrases)’, like *totally independent* (117), and ‘predicat(iv)e nouns (or NPs)’, such as *a separate nation* (118) (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 54-55).

(117) *The country became totally independent.* (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 54)

(118) *The country became a separate nation.* (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55)

Quirk *et al.* (1985: 54-55) use yet another term, *i.e.* ‘subject complement’, also used by Pinkster (2015, 2021) in the two recent volumes of his *Oxford Latin Syntax*. In the grammatical tradition of French, the constituents under discussion are called ‘*attributs du sujet*’, and a distinction is commonly made between syntactically necessary (e.g. *gourmand* ‘gourmand’ (119)) and syntactically optional (e.g. *enchanté du colloque* ‘delighted with the conference’ (120)) subject predicates (Riegel *et al.* 1994⁴: 234-239; Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268-271).<fnref n="53" />

(119) *Mon collègue est gourmand.*
my.M.SG colleague.M.SG be.PRS.3SG gourmand.M.SG
‘My colleague is gourmand.’ (Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268)

(120) *Mon collègue est rentré en France enchanté*
my.M.SG colleague.M.SG be.PRS.3SG return.PTCP.PST.M.SG to France delighted.M.SG
*du colloque.*
from;ART.DEF.M.SG conference.M.SG
‘My colleague returned to France delighted with the conference.’ (Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268)

Noteworthily, the use of syntactically optional subject predicates in Modern French is constrained. As shown by Buchard (2006), the only verbs allowing such constituents are unaccusative verbs, *i.e.* verbs whose subject behaves like an internal rather than an external argument, and is thus inside the VP (*cf.* Perlmutter 1978; Burzio 1986; Legendre & Sorace 2003). It is this feature that enables regarding the

<footnote n="53">⁵³ These types are referred to as respectively ‘*attributs du sujets essentiels*’ and ‘*attributs du sujet non essentiels*’.</footnote>
constituents in issue as a sub-group of subject predicates instead of, e.g., subject-oriented adjuncts, since
the verbs combined with a prototypical (or syntactically necessary) subject predicates belong to the same
group of verbs as those allowing a syntactically optional subject predicate, viz. intransitive verbs of the
unaccusative type. However, this syntactic constraint does not exist in Classical Latin – nor in Late
Latin. Witness (121): *flens* ‘crying’ is a present participle that is functionally equivalent to the adjective
phrase *enchanté du colloque* ‘delighted with the conference’ (120) in Modern French, since they both
designate the circumstances under which the subject performs a motion, but that differs from it by being
combined not with an unaccusative verb, but with a transitive verb, namely *circumit* ‘he goes around’.

(121) [...] **fle-ns** *Petreius* *manipulos* *circumit* [...].
cry-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG *Petreius*.NOM.M.SG *maniple*.ACC.M.PL *go_around*.PRS.3SG
‘*Petreius* goes around the maniples while crying.’ (Caes. *civ*. 1.76)

In other words, the syntactic constraint allowing to distinguish a specific group of subject predicates in
Modern French is absent in Classical (and Late) Latin. Hence, the constituents under discussion will in
this thesis not be analysed as subject predicates, but as (subject-oriented) adjuncts (see also §1.3.2.2.4).

It is important to emphasise that, despite their syntactic differences, constituents like *enchanté du
colloque* ‘delighted with the conference’ (120) and *flens* ‘crying’ (121) are both secondary predicates,
since they express a state of affairs that is “interpreted as holding for one of the participants of the main
predicate” (Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005: 4; see also, e.g., Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 3;
Pinkster 2021: §21.14). In the literature, these constituents are often referred to as such (or as ‘depictive
secondary predicates’), but other terms have also been used, such as ‘predicative attributes’ (Paul 1919;
Halliday 1967), ‘copredicates’ or ‘copredicatives’ (Nichols 1978; Plank 1985), ‘predicative adjuncts’
(Hengeveld 1992), ‘participant-oriented adjuncts’ (Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005), and ‘co-
eventive adjuncts’ (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012). As evident from this non-exhaustive list of terms,
the precise syntactic function of secondary predicates is subject to debate: some authors consider them
a specific type of subject predicates (e.g. Paul 1919; Halliday 1967; Riegel *et al*. 19944: 235-236, 237;
Buchard 2006), while others regard them as a sub-type of adjuncts (e.g. Hengeveld 1992; Himmelmann
& Schultze-Berndt 2005; Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012; Rémi-Giraud 2013). The disagreement is due
to the fact that, in many languages, the constituents concerned are neither prototypical subject predicates
nor prototypical adjuncts, but an intermediary type displaying features of both types of constituents.
Such an intermediary status has also been acknowledged for structurally equivalent constituents headed
by other forms, like adjectives (e.g. Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005; Fabricius-Hansen & Haug
2012; Rémi-Giraud 2013) and adverbs (e.g. Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005; Molinier 1990). It
is important to stress in this regard that the criteria to analyse the constituents involved as either subject
predicates or adjuncts are language-specific, and hence the syntactic analysis of functionally equivalent
constituents may vary among the languages of the world, as mentioned above for (Classical) Latin and
Modern French.

Like subject predicate adjectives, subject predicate present participles can be marked in two cases: the nominative and the accusative (cf. Pinkster 2015: 1181-1184). In (115) and (116), *madentes* ‘(being) wet’ (115) and *amans* ‘loving’ (116) stand in the nominative, which is the default marking of subjects and their agreeing dependents in Latin. By contrast, *cedentem* ‘yielding’ (122) is in the accusative: the clause in which it is used, namely *multa multis de suo iure cedentem* ‘yielding much of his own right to many others’, is embedded in an accusative and infinitive construction. In this type of construction, the subject and its agreeing dependents are marked in the accusative instead of the nominative.

(122) *Conveniet* [...] *esse* [...] *aequum*, *facilem*, *multa* be_appropriate.FUT.3SG be.INF.PRS fair.ACC.M.SG courteous.ACC.M.SG many.ACC.N.PL multis de suo iure *cede-nt-em* [...]$^{54}$ many.DAT.M.PL from his.ABL.N.SG right.ABL.N.SG yield-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG

‘It will be appropriate to be fair, courteous, and willing to yield much of his own right to many others.’

(Cic. *off*. 2.64.4)

1.3.2.2.3. Object predicate present participles

Present participle phrases cannot only act as subject predicates, but also as object predicates (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 282; Laughton 1964: 50-51; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387).<fnref n="55" /> By analogy to their subject counterparts, object predicates will be defined in this study as syntactically obligatory constituents used in combination with a transitive verb in order to assign some property or definition to the object of this verb, independently of some other state of affairs (Quirk et al. 1985: 54-55; Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268-271; Pinkster 2015: 30). For example, in (123) *flentem* ‘crying’ is the predicate of the direct object pronoun *te* ‘you’: the referent of this pronoun is caused to be in a particular circumstance by the referent of the subject of the factitive verb *facit* ‘he makes’ (Pinkster 2015: 791).

(123) [...] *qui* te *nunc fle-nt-em* facit.

REL.NOM.M.SG you.ACC.M.SG now cry-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG make.PRS.3SG

‘(...) who now makes you sad (lit. ‘crying’).’ (Plaut. *Pseud*. 1041)

<footnote n="54">⁵⁴ The subject of this accusative and infinitive construction is implicit. It has a generic reference and corresponds to an accusative (pro)noun like *hominem* ‘man’ or *aliquem* ‘someone’.</footnote>

<footnote n="55">⁵⁵ Laughton (1964: 50-51) speaks in this regard of ‘completive participles’. Menge *et al.* (2000: 714) analyse the object NP and the present participle as an accusative and participle construction, which they analyse as a complement clause functioning as the direct object of the transitive main verb. This analysis is untenable. An equally untenable analysis is that of Pinkster (2021: §21.7), who takes the present participle phrases as adjuncts. See the running text for the reason why these analyses are untenable. Hofmann & Szantyr (1965: 387) seem to take the present participles as object predicates, but they are very implicit about this. Marouzeau (1910: 37-39) analyses all object predicates present participles as adjectives, but this analysis confuses the category and the function of the forms involved. Hence, it is also untenable (the same remark on Marouzeau’s analysis was made with respect to subject predicate present participles; see fn. 52).</footnote>
As for their subject counterparts, the grammatical tradition of English also refers to object predicates as ‘(object) predicative constructions’ (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55). Depending on the morphosyntactic category of their head, a distinction is made again between ‘predicat(iv)e adjectives (or adjective phrases)’, like *rather expensive* (124), and ‘predicat(iv)e nouns (or NPs)’, like *a genius* (125) (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55).

(124) *Most people consider these books rather expensive.* (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55)

(125) *Most people considered Picasso a genius.* (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 55)

Parallel to their use of the term ‘subject complement’, Quirk *et al.* (1985: 54-55) make use of the term ‘object complement’ for the constituents concerned, just like Pinkster (2015, 2021) in his two volumes of the *Oxford Latin Syntax*. Similarly to the label ‘attribut du sujet’, the grammatical tradition of French refers to constituents like *flentem* ‘crying’ (123) as ‘attributs de l’objet’. A distinction is again made in this tradition between syntactically necessary (e.g. *délicieux* ‘delicious’ (126)) and optional (e.g. *froid* ‘cold’) object predicates (Riegel *et al.* 1994a: 239-241; Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268-270).<fnref n="56" />

(126) *Mon collègue trouve les petits gâteaux délicieux.*
my.M.SG colleague.M.SG find.PRS.3SG ART.DEF.M.PL little.M.PL cake.M.PL delicious.M.PL
‘My colleague finds the little cakes delicious.’ (Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268)

(127) *Mon collègue a bu son café froid.*
my.M.SG colleague.M.SG have.PRS.3SG drink.PTCP.PST his.M.SG coffee.M.SG cold.M.SG
‘My colleague drank his coffee cold.’ (Rémi-Giraud 2013: 268)

As shown by Buchard (2006: 71), the use of syntactically optional object predicates in Modern French is also constrained, as in the case of their subject counterparts: the object needs to be an internal argument of the main verb, assume the semantic role of patient or theme, and code the participant who is involved in the main state of affairs in a particular state.<fnref n="57" /> These constraints are again absent in (Classical) Latin, as apparent from the existence of adjunct present participles whose subject is coreferential with a non-direct object argument of the main verb, such as an indirect object (see §1.3.2.2.4). Hence, constituents that are functionally equivalent to the adjective *froid* ‘cold’ (127) in Modern French, like the coordinated present participle clauses *ovantem* ‘rejoicing’ and *prope triumphantem* ‘almost triumphating’ (128), have a different syntactic analysis in this language, *viz.* as object-oriented adjuncts (see §1.3.2.2.4).

<footnote n="56">⁵⁶ By analogy to their subject counterparts, these types of object predicates are referred to as respectively ‘attributs de l’objet essentiels’ and ‘attributs de l’objet non essentiels’.</footnote>

<footnote n="57">⁵⁷ This constraint is reminiscent of that on the use of syntactically optional subject predicates in Modern French. This is due to the similar functional properties of intransitive verbs of the unaccusative type and (some) transitive verbs. This parallel allows Buchard (2006) to propose a unified analysis of syntactically optional subject and object predicates in Modern French, and of subject and object predicates in general.</footnote>
(128) [...] cum [...] me **ova-nt-em** et prope **triumpha-nt-em**
when I.ACC.M.SG rejoice-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG and almost triumph-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
**populus** [...] in **Capitolium** [...] tulerit [...].
people.NOM.M.SG to Capitol.ACC.N.SG bring.PST.3SG
‘When the people brought me to the Capitol (while I was) rejoicing and almost triumphating.’
(Cic. *Phil*. 14.12.10)

Like object predicate adjectives, object predicate present participles are usually marked in the accusative (Pinkster 2015: 790-792). This is the default case of direct objects and their agreeing dependents in Latin (Pinkster 2015: 1181-1184). Witness *flentem* ‘crying’ (123) and *appetentem* ‘desiring’ (129).<fnref n="58" />

(129) *Eadem=que* ratio fecit hominem hominum
same.NOM.F.SG=and reason.NOM.F.SG make.PST.3SG man.ACC.M.SG man.GEN.M.PL
**appete-nt-em** [...].
desire-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘The same reason made man desirous of men (lit. ‘desiring men’).’ (Cic. *fin*. 2.45)

1.3.2.2.4. Adjunct present participles

A fourth use of the Classical Latin present participle is in adjuncts (Marouzeau 1910: 22-37; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 771-792; Lyer 1932: 222-223; Laughton 1964: 19-45, 100-117; Palmer 1964: 326; Scherer 1975: 96; Menge *et al*. 2000: 708-709, 715-716; Pinkster 2021: §16.87-§16.98, §21.7). Witness *abiens* ‘leaving’ (130), which acts as a temporal adjunct expressing a state of affairs that partly overlaps with that denoted by the main verb, *viz*. *respondit* ‘he answered’.

(130) *Ille* mihi **abie-ns** ita respondit, ‘se
DEM.NOM.M.SG I.DAT.M.SG leave-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG so answer.PST.3SG REFL.ACC.M.SG
**sectari** simiam’.
chase.INF.PRS monkey.ACC.F.SG
‘When leaving, he answered me such, that the was chasing a monkey.’ (Plaut. *Mil*. 179)

Adjunct present participles can be marked in various cases. This case depends on the reference of their
subject and is assigned through agreement with a (usually explicit) noun (Marouzeau 1910: 6-12, 24-
32; Lyer 1932: 223; Laughton 1964: 19-45, 101-117; Palmer 1964: 326; Vester 1983: 6, 121-127, 132;
Pinkster 2021: §16.87-§16.98, §21.7). The present participle stands in the nominative when its subject

<footnote n="58">⁵⁸ Note that the present participle *appetentem* ‘desiring’ (129) has adjectival internal syntax: its direct object is assigned the genitive, while it is marked in the accusative when governed by a finite form of *appetere* ‘to desire’.</footnote>
is coreferential with the subject of the main verb, as in (131), except when it is embedded in an accusative and infinitive construction. In this case, the present participle stands in the accusative (e.g. (132)).

(131) *Pompeius* *enim discede-ns* *ab urbe in senatu*
Pompey.NOM.M.SG for leave-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG from city.ABL.F.SG in senate.ABL.M.SG
dixerat [...].
say.PST.3SG

‘For when leaving the city, Pompey had said in the senate (...).’ (Caes. *civ.* 1.33)

(132) *Quod* *Tarquinium dixisse ferunt exsula-nt-em* [...].
REL.ACC.N.SG Tarquin.ACC.M.SG say.INF.PST say.PRS.3PL live_in_exile-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘This is what they say that Tarquin had said during his exile.’ (Cic. *Lael*. 53)

However, some forms violate this semantic constraint (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 12; Laughton 1960: 22; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 143; Keydana 1997: 328-329; Adams 2005: 93; Galdi 2017: 33; Pinkster 2021: §16.95). These instances are not without controversy, as will be demonstrated on the basis of the most cited example in this connection, namely *contemnentes* ‘contemning’ (133).

(133) *Hi contemne-nt-es eum, assurgere*
DEM.NOM.M.PL contemn-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL DEM.ACC.M.SG stand_up.INF.PRS
ei nemo voluit.
DEM.DAT.M.SG nobody.NOM.M.SG want.PST.3SG

‘Since they contemned him, nobody wanted to stand up for him.’ (Calp. *hist*. 27)

The subject of *contemnentes* ‘contemning’ (133) corresponds to the pronoun *hi* ‘they’. Strictly speaking, this subject differs from that of the main verb *voluit* ‘nobody wanted’, *i.e.* the pronoun *nemo* ‘nobody’. Hence, the present participle clause may be analysed as a so-called ‘nominative absolute (adjunct) construction’ (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 12; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 143; Galdi 2017: 33, 61-62; details of absolute adjunct present participle phrases will be given below).<fnref n="59" /> However, the subject of *contemnentes* ‘contemning’ has the same referent as that of the main verb *voluit* ‘nobody wanted’. The negative pronoun *nemo* ‘nobody’ stands indeed for *nemo eorum* ‘none of them’ (Galdi 2017: 62). According to Keydana (2008: 329), this resolves the conflict between the plural marking of *hi* ‘they’ and the singular marking of *nemo* ‘nobody’. Within this line of thinking, Keydana (2008: 329) takes *hi* ‘they’ as a so-called ‘*nominativus pendens*’, viz. a nominative constituent functioning “as the logical rather than syntactical subject at the beginning of a sentence, followed by a sentence in which this subject is now replaced by a pronoun in the case required by the syntax” (Wallace 1996: 51). In this way, the

<footnote n="59">⁵⁹ Hofmann & Szantyr (1965: 143) also analyse this constituent as a nominative absolute adjunct phrase. However, they argue that this constituent is not deliberately used as such, but as the result of anacoluthon, that is to say, an interruption in the planned syntax. They hold that deliberate uses of nominative absolute present participles do not occur before Late Latin.</footnote>
present participle does not violate the subject coreferentiality constraint mentioned above, so that it does not qualify as a nominative absolute adjunct (Keydana 2008: 328-329; Pinkster 2021: §16.95).

Other nominative present participles that potentially violate the subject coreferentiality constraint are also subject to debate. Generalising over the discussions of specific instances, two opposite camps can be distinguished: some authors recognise the existence of absolute adjunct nominative present participles already in Classical Latin (Baehrens 1913: 266-270; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 12; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 143-144; Galdi 2017: 33-37), while others reject it, acknowledging their existence only in Late Latin (Kroll 1915: 352; Bacherler 1922: 101; Keydana 2008: 328-329; Adams 2005: 93; Pinkster 2021: §16.95).

Present participles whose subject is coreferential with the direct object of the main verb are typically marked in the accusative. Witness (134), in which the subject of *inhaerentem* ‘sticking’ and *occurrentem* ‘approaching’ corresponds to respectively *alium* ‘a second one’ and *tertium* ‘a third one’.

(134) Ac mox alium pedibus meis mordicus and immediately other.ACC.M.SG foot.DAT.M.PL my.DAT.M.PL with_the_teeth inhaere-nt-em per scapulas ictu temperato stick-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG between shoulder.ACC.F.PL stroke.ABL.M.SG control.PTCP.PST.ABL.M.SG tertium=que inprovide occurre-nt-em pectore third.ACC.M.SG=and thoughtlessly approach-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG chest.ABL.N.SG offenso peremo. hit.PTCP.PST.ABL.N.SG kill.PRS.1SG

‘And immediately I killed another one by a controlled stroke between the shoulders as he was sticking with his teeth to my feet and a third one by a stroke on the chest (lit. ‘by a stroken chest’) as he was approaching thoughtlessly.’ (Apul. *met*. 3.6.1-2)

The present participle typically stands in the dative when its subject is coreferential with the indirect object of the main verb. *Dormienti* ‘sleeping’ (135) is a case in point.

(135) Credebas dormie-nt-i haec tibi believe.PST.2SG sleep-PTCP.PRS-DAT.M.SG DEM.ACC.N.PL you.DAT.M.SG confecturos deos? accomplish.PTCP.FUT.ACC.M.PL god.ACC.M.PL

‘Did you believe that the gods would accomplish this for you as you were sleeping?’ (Ter. *Ad*. 693)

As to the genitive, it is mostly assigned to present participles whose subject is coreferential with an adnominal NP (Laughton 1964: 34-35). Witness (136): the implicit subject of *absentis* ‘being absent’ is the genitive pronoun *cuius* ‘whose’, which depends on the noun *nomen* ‘name’.
(136) Cuius abse-nt-is nomen recepisti?

INT.GEN.M.SG be_absent-PTCP.PRS-GEN.M.SG name.ACC.N.SG accept.PST.2SG

'Whose name did you accept in his absence?' (Cic. *Verr.* 2.110)

Finally, the present participle is in the ablative when its subject is not coreferential with any constituent of the main clause (Lehmann 1988: 201; Menge *et al.* 2000: 719; Pinkster 2021: §16.90).<fnref n="60" /> For instance, the subject of *regnante* 'ruling' (137) corresponds to the ablative noun *Anco* 'Ancus'. This noun does not perform a syntactic function within the main clause, and is therefore not a constituent of it.

(137) Anco regna-nt-e Lucumo [...] Romam commigravit [...].

Ancus.ABL.M.SG reign-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG Lucumo.NOM.M.SG Rome.ACC.F.SG move.PST.3SG

'In the reign of Ancus (lit. 'when Ancus was reigning'), Lucumo moved to Rome.' (Liv. 1.34.1)

As a general rule, the subject of adjunct present participles is syntactically shared with the main clause when it is coreferential with one of its constituents (e.g. (130-131/133-136)), but explicit inside the present participle clause when it is not coreferential with any constituent of the main clause (e.g. (137)). In a few instances, however, the subject of the present participle is implicit without being coreferential with a constituent of the main clause. In these cases, the subject of the present participle can usually be easily inferred from the discourse context (Marouzeau 1910: 36; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 773; Pinkster 2021: §16.92). Witness (138), in which the implicit subject of *timentibus* 'fearing' corresponds to a noun like *incolis* 'inhabitants'.

(138) Attalus quoque Pteleon nihil [...] time-nt-ibus

Attalus.NOM.M.SG also Pteleon.ACC.N.SG nothing.ACC.N.SG fear-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.PL

*oppressit*.

crush.PST.3SG

'Attalus also crushed Pteleon, although its inhabitants did not fear anything.' (Liv. 31.46.13)

In the grammatical tradition of Latin, adjunct present participles whose subject is coreferential with a constituent of the main clause are called 'conjunct participles' (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 771; Vester 1977; Lehmann 1988) or *praedicativa* (Laughton 1964: 19-45; Vester 1983; Pinkster 1984; Kooreman

<footnote n="60">⁶⁰ However, this is a tendency rather than a rule (cf. Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 786-787; Hoff 1989; Menge *et al.* 2000: 722-723; Kruijer & la Roi 2018; Pinkster 2021: §16.90). In some cases, the subject of ablative present participles is indeed coreferential with a constituent of the main clause. For instance, in (i) the subject of the coordinated forms *permittente* 'allowing' and *suadente* 'advising' is the noun *patre* 'father'. This noun is coreferential with (and anaphorically repeated by) the pronoun *eo* 'him'. This pronoun *eo* 'him' is the complement of the preposition *ab* 'from', this PP as a whole serving as the spatial adjunct of the main verb *semigravit* 'he went away'.</footnote>

<footnote>(i) [...] non modo permitte-nt-e patre, sed etiam suade-nt-e ab
not only allow-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG father.ABL.M.SG but even advise-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG from
eo semigravit [...].
DEM.ABL.M.SG go_away.PST.3SG

'He went away from him, his father not only allowing (this), but even advising (it).' (Cic. *Cael.* 18)</footnote>
1989; Menge *et al.* 2000: 708-709; Cabrillana 2010, 2019).<fnref n="61" /> In the two volumes of his *Oxford Latin Syntax*, Pinkster (2015, 2021) uses the more modern label ‘secondary predicate’. As for the forms whose subject is not coreferential with a constituent of the main clause, they are commonly labelled ‘absolute present participles’, and, depending on their case form, a distinction is made between, e.g., nominative and ablative absolute present participles (Marouzeau 1910: 34-37; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 771; Laughton 1964: 100-117; Lehmann 1988: 201; Menge *et al.* 2000: 718-724; Pinkster 2021: §16.87-§16.98).<fnref n="62" />

However, the use of these labels varies from author to author, which easily causes terminological confusion (Pinkster 2015: 30). For example, some scholars use them for referring to syntactic functions. Witness Vester (1983: 121), who states that “[T]he use of the part. praes. that is relevant for this study is formed by part. praes. with the syntactic function Praedicativum” (capital original). In a similar vein, Pinkster (2015: 30) writes that “[T]he last syntactic function of clause constituents to be discussed in this section is the SECONDARY PREDICATE” (small capitals original; see also Pinkster 2021: Ch. 21). These authors rightly recognise a syntactic difference between conjunct and absolute present participles (or participles in general), as the former are more tightly connected to the main clause by being oriented toward one of its participants. However, these two types of forms share a more fundamental syntactic property, namely that they are syntactically and semantically optional constituents that modify the main state of affairs in some way or other (Dik 1997: 87). For this reason, traditional Latin grammars subsume conjunct and absolute present participles under the same group of forms, *i.e.* adjuncts forms, and analyse them as distinct sub-types of adjuncts (e.g. Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 771-792). This approach is also taken by, among others, Fabricius-Hansen & Haug (2012) from a cross-linguistic perspective. In this thesis, the distinction between conjunct and absolute present participles is less central. Hence, they will be grouped and jointly referred to as ‘adjunct present participles’ (wherever necessary, a distinction will nonetheless be made between the two types of adjuncts). Thus, the term ‘adjunct present participle’ will be used in a way similar to ‘adverbial modifier’ or ‘adverbial’ (Quirk *et al.* 1985: 49), just like in, for instance, Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt (2005), Fabricius-Hansen & Haug (2012), and Haug (2012). As such, it stands in opposition with the term ‘complement’.

<footnote n="61">⁶¹ Menge *et al.* (2000: 708-709, 715-716) also use the term ‘conjunct participle’ for adnominal present participles. This practice has not been followed by other authors. The Latin term for ‘conjunct participle’ is ‘*participium coniunctum*’ in the singular and ‘*participia coniuncta*’ in the plural. The singular form of the term ‘*praedicativa*’ is ‘*praedicativum*’.</footnote>

<footnote n="62">⁶² The terms ‘conjunct participle’ and ‘absolute participle’ are also used in other grammatical traditions and even in comparative linguistics and linguistic typology (cf. König & van der Auwera 1990: 338; Haspelmath 1995: 46). In Fabricius-Hansen & Haug (2012: 2, 9), these traditional terms are replaced by respectively ‘open adjuncts’ and ‘closed adjuncts’. The history of the term ‘ablative absolute’ (Lat. ‘*ablativus absolutus*’) is investigated by, among others, Scaglione (1970) and Keydana (1997: 6-7). A detailed discussion of absolute adjunct present participle phrases in Latin can be found in, e.g., Weihenmajer (1891) and Horn (1918). See also Flinck-Linkomies (1929) and the discussion in Laughton (1964: 100-101). The evolution of absolute adjunct present participle phrases in the transition from Latin to Romance is investigated by Müller-Lancé (1994). Absolute adjunct present participles are relatively rare in the earliest texts, but gain in frequency from the 1st c. BC onward (Laughton 1964: 101-117; Pinkster 2021: §16.88).</footnote>
It is worth adding that the analysis of conjunct and absolute present participles as sub-types of adjunct present participles has an important parallel in the domain of finite adjunct clauses, to which adjunct present participle clauses are claimed to be structurally equivalent (cf. Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 766; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 283; Laughton 1964: 19-45, 101-117; Pinkster 2021: §14.14, §21.7). Compare (139) and (140): in (139), the subject of *cum ex renibus laboraret* ‘when he took pains in his kidneys’ is coreferential with the subject of the main verb *clamitabat* ‘he shouted’, while in (140), the subject of *cum omnes milites naves conscendissent* ‘when all soldiers had boarded the ship’ is not coreferential with any constituent of the main clause. However, despite the fact that the subject of the *cum*-clause is involved in the main state of affairs in (139), but not in (140), the two types of *cum*-clauses are uncontroversially subsumed under the same type of clauses, namely adjunct clauses.

(139) [...] *cum ex renibus laboraret* [...] *clamitabat* [...].
when from kidney.ABL.M.PL take_pains.SBJV.PST.3SG shout.PST.3SG
‘When he took pains in his kidneys, he shouted (...).’ (Cic. *Tusc*. 2.60)

(140) *Hos [...] signo revocare constituit cum omnes*
DEM.ACC.M.PL sign.ABL.N.SG summon.INF.PRS decide.PST.3SG when all.NOM.M.PL
*milites naves conscendissent.*
soldier.NOM.M.PL ship.ACC.F.PL board.SBJV.PST.3PL

‘He decided to summon them with a sign when all soldiers had boarded the ships.’ (Caes. *civ*. 27)

Another aspect of adjunct present participles that should be discussed concerns their semantic value. In the literature, two opposite views have been defended. According to most authors, adjunct present participles have a default semantic value, namely a temporal value of simultaneity (Lyer 1932: 222-223, 398; Laughton 1964: 20-45, 109-110; Palmer 1964: 326; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 386; Krisch 1988; Adams 2013: 725; Pinkster 2015: 542-543). This value should be interpreted in a relatively large sense, covering at least the two temporal relations referred to by Hetterle (2015: 47) as ‘simultaneity duration’ and ‘simultaneity overlap’ (cf. Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 756; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 273-274; Laughton 1964: 20-21, 109-110; Palmer 1964: 326; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 386; Scherer 1975: 94; Menge *et al*. 2000: 712; Pinkster 2015: 543). The latter is illustrated in (130/131/137): the states of affairs denoted by *abiens* ‘leaving’ (130), *discedens ab urbe* ‘leaving the city’ (131), and *Anco regnante* ‘in the reign of Ancus’ (137) are presented as overlapping with those denoted by the main verbs *respondit* ‘he answered’ (130), *dixerat* ‘he had said’ (131), and *commigravit* ‘he moved’ (137), while in reality they are prior to them or overlap with them for only a limited stretch of time (see also Cristofaro 2003; Diessel 2008: 470).<fnref n="63" /> The relation of simultaneity duration is exemplified in (141) and (142).<fnref n="64" />

<footnote n="63">⁶³ Conjunct forms expressing simultaneity overlap are often built on a verb denoting arrival or departure, as in (130) and (131) (Laughton 1964: 38-39; Palmer 1964: 326; Menge *et al*. 2000: 712).</footnote>

<footnote n="64">⁶⁴ Conjunct forms having this temporal value are qualified by Laughton (1964: 21, 24-25) as ‘modal’. This same description is found in, e.g., Marouzeau (1910: 24), Hofmann & Szantyr (1965: 384), and Menge *et al*. (2000: 716, 719).</footnote>
(141) [...] *fle-ns*

*Petreius* *manipulos* *circumit* [...].

cry-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG *Petreius*.NOM.M.SG *maniple*.ACC.M.PL *go_around*.PRS.3SG

'Petreius goes around the maniples while crying.' (Caes. *civ*. 1.76) [=121]

(142) [...] *quo*

*inspecta-nt-e*

*ac sede-nt-e*

*legem*

REL.ABL.M.SG look-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG and sit-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG law.ACC.F.SG

*tribunus*

*plebis*

*tulit*

[...].

tribune.NOM.M.SG plebs.GEN.F.SG enact.PST.3SG

'As he was looking and sitting, a tribune of the plebs enacted a law.' (Cic. *p*. red. in *sen*. 11)

The states of affairs expressed by *flens* ‘crying’ (141) and *inspectante ac sedente* ‘looking and sitting’ (142) are concomitant with those expressed by the main verbs *circumit* ‘he goes around’ (141) and *tulit* ‘he enacted’ (142). That is to say, they take place at exactly the same time (cf. Dixon 2009: 10; Hetterle 2015: 47). Thus, *flens* ‘crying’ (141) and *inspectante ac sedente* ‘looking and sitting’ (142) denote the circumstances under which Petreius wanders through his maniples (141) and under which a tribune of the plebs enacted a law (142). In the grammatical tradition of Latin, this value is usually referred to as ‘accompanying circumstance’ (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 777; Pinkster 2015: 899) or ‘concomitant action’ (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 273).<fnref n="65" />

However, the default temporal value of adjunct present participles is often backgrounded in
favour of a pragmatically inferred value (Lyer 1932: 223; Laughton 1964: 20-45, 110; Palmer 1964:
326; Krisch 1988; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 99; Pinkster 2021: §16.89, §21.7). For instance, in (143)
the conjunct phrase *diutius durans* ‘lasting longer’ is endowed with a conditional value. And in (144),
the absolute phrase *tacentibus nobis* ‘us being silent’ has a concessive value.

(143) [...] *diutius dura-ns*

*mortis*

*index*

*est.*

longer last-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG death.GEN.F.SG indication.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG

'If it lasts longer, it is an indication of death.' (Cels. 2.6.2)

(144) [...] *ex his horum contraria facile tace-nt-ibus*

from DEM.ABL.N.PL DEM.GEN.N.PL opposite.NOM.N.PL easily be_silent_-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.PL

*nobis intellegentur.*

we.ABL.M.PL understand.FUT.PASS.3PL

'From these things their opposites will be understood easily, even when we are silent.' (Cic. *inv.*
2.157)

The inventory of semantic values that can be foregrounded at the cost of the default temporal value of adjunct present participles is large and varied (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 771-777; Lyer 1932: 223; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 283-284; Laughton 1964: 20-45, 110; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 384-385;

<footnote n="65">⁶⁵ Laughton (1964) speaks of ‘concomitance’ in the case of conjunct present participles (pp. 20-45), but of ‘accompanying circumstance’ in the case of absolute present participles (pp. 101-117). However, the temporal value of the two types of forms is identical, as evident from the comparison between (141) and (142). Hence, Laughton’s distinction should be avoided.</footnote>
Menge et al. 2000: 715-716, 719-720; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 103-106; Pinkster 2021: §16.89, §21.7).<fnref n="66" /> These pragmatically inferred values often co-exist with the default temporal value of adjunct present participles. In some contexts, it is therefore difficult to determine the primary semantic value of the present participle (Laughton 1964: 25; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 99).

In contrast with the first group of authors, the second group argue that adjunct present participles do not have a default semantic value (Marouzeau 1910: 6-12; Vester 1983: 125-126, 130, 134). Although most forms have a more or less backgrounded temporal value, they hold that this value must be inferred from the discourse context as much as all other semantic values, such as cause and concession. However, this view is problematic for at least two reasons. The first one has to do with the fact that the present participle is inflected for the category tense (Pinkster 2015: 50). As for any other non-finite verb inflected for this category, the tense value of the Latin present participle is not absolute, but relative. That is to say, it depends on a reference point provided by the discourse context (Comrie 1985: 64; Pinkster 2015: 541, 2021: §21.7). Since the present participle is built on the present stem of the verb, its relative tense value is simultaneity: it denotes a state of affairs co-occurring or at least partly overlapping with that expressed by the main verb (Pinkster 2015: 50, 541-542). Given that most present participles have a more or less backgrounded temporal value, this simultaneity value is best taken as their default semantic value. The second reason has to do with the fact that, as mentioned earlier, many adjunct present participles combine a temporal and a non-temporal value. If this temporal value does not correspond to the default meaning of the present participle, it is difficult to explain why, in a given discourse context, two distinct semantic values are inferred, while only one of them is foregrounded. On the whole, the hypothesis that adjunct present participles have a default temporal value is thus more convincing.

It is also worth adding that the semantic relation between an adjunct present participle and its main clause does not always need to be inferred from the discourse context. Occasionally, this relation is lexicalised by what Kortmann (1991: 11) calls an ‘augmentor’ (Marouzeau 1910: 31-32; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 789-791; Lease 1928, 1931; Lyer 1932: 223; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 284-285; Laughton 1964: 110; Palmer 1964: 326; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 385; Tränkle 1968: 139-140; Vester 1983: 126-127; Menge et al. 2000: 719, 725; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 99; Pinkster 2021: §16.89, §21.18). For example, the conjunct phrase *quasi dormiens* ‘as if sleeping’ (145) specifies the state of affairs denoted by the main verb *iacuerit* ‘it has lain’ by comparing it with another state of affairs. The adverb *quasi* ‘as if’ is used to code this relation of ‘similarity/comparison’ (Hetterle 2015: 54; see Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 105). Likewise, the concessive value of the absolute phrase *defendente nullo* ‘nobody defending’ (146) is lexicalised by the adverb *tamen* ‘yet’ (Pinkster 2021: §16.89).

<footnote n="66">⁶⁶ Focusing on conjunct nominative present participles in a corpus of technical texts between the 2nd c. BC and the 6th c. AD, Galdi & Vangaever (2019: 103-106) inventorise 14 distinct semantic values.</footnote>
(145) [...] *requirendum* est [...] *num* sine sensu quasi
inquire.GERV.NOM.N.SG be.PRS.3SG whether without feeling.ABL.M.SG as_if
**dormie-ns** iacuerit.
sleep-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG lay.SBJV.PST.3SG

‘We must inquire (lit. ‘it should be inquired (by us)’) whether it has lain without feeling, as if it
were asleep.’ (Cels. 8.4.1)

(146) [...] *quo* **defende-nt-e** nullo tamen
for_which_reason defend-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG nobody.ABL.M.SG nonetheless
*armatis* ascendere esset difficile [...].
arm.PTCP.PST.DAT.M.PL climb.INF.PRS be.SBJV.PST.3SG difficult.NOM.N.SG

‘For which reason it was nonetheless difficult for armed men to climb, although nobody was
defending.’ (Hirt. *Gall.* 8.33.1)

As mentioned by Pinkster (2021: §16.89), augmentors can be part of the adjunct or of the main clause, as in respectively (145) and (146). In Classical Latin, the use of augmentors is rare, confined to semantic relations that are conceptually complex (Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 99), and partly influenced by Greek syntax (Marouzeau 1910: 82; Palmer 1964: 326).

As in the case of adjunct gerunds, a few remarks should also be made about the information-
structural value of adjunct present participles. Like their gerund counterparts, adjunct present participles
can expand the rheme of a sentence through elaboration and framing (Haug 2012: 294-301; Galdi &
Vangaever 2019: 111-112). Recall that elaborating adjuncts specify the main state of affairs by zooming
in on it, viz. by representing parts of it with greater granularity (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 7; Haug
2012: 295-299). An example of this type of adjunct present participles is *flens* ‘crying’ (141), which
expresses the circumstances under which Petreius goes around his maniples. Elaborating adjuncts appear
at the level of the core predication, i.e. the combination of the main verb and its arguments (*cf*. Dik 1997:
51), and are as such semantically (and pragmatically) tightly connected to the VP. However, the present
participles remain syntactically unconstrained: they can be combined with all types of main verbs, viz.
transitive as well as intransitive ones and, within the group of intransitive verbs, unaccusative as well as
unergative ones. From a semantic point of view, this type of present participles express the manner of
the main state of affairs, the means by which it is realised, or a state of affairs co-occurring with it (Haug
2012: 304; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 109; see also Kooreman 1989: 225-226). In Classical Latin,
elaborating present participles are not highly frequent, at least not the nominative ones (Galdi &
Vangaever 2019: 110-111).

In view of the discussions held in §1.3.2.2.2 and §1.3.2.2.3, it is worth adding that this group of
elaborating present participles comprise all secondary predicates of the types illustrated by *flens* ‘crying’
(121/141) and *ovantem et prope triumphantem* ‘rejoicing and almost triumphating’ (128), which are
repeated below for practical reasons.
(121) [...] *fle-ns*

*Petreius* *manipulos* *circumit* [...].

cry-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG Petreius.NOM.M.SG maniple.ACC.M.PL go_around.PRS.3SG

'Petreius goes around the maniples while crying.' (Caes. *civ.* 1.76) [=141]

(128) [...] *cum* [...] *me* *ova-nt-em* et *prope* *triumpha-nt-em*

when I.ACC.M.SG rejoice-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG and almost triumph-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG

*populus* [...] *in* *Capitolium* [...] *tulerit* [...].

people.NOM.M.SG to Capitol.ACC.N.SG bring.PST.3SG

'When the people brought me to the Capitol (while I was) rejoicing and almost triumphating.'

(Cic. *Phil*. 14.12.10)

Since they are secondary predicates, these constituents establish a relation with the subject or another
constituent of the main clause (Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005: 4). For example, in (121/141)
*flens* ‘crying’ is subject-oriented, because the state of affairs expressed by it relates to the subject of the
main verb (i.e. the noun *Petreius*), while in (128), *ovantem et prope triumphantem* ‘rejoicing and almost
triumphating’ is object-oriented, since the state of affairs denoted by it related to the direct object of the
main verb (i.e. the pronoun *me* ‘me’). At the same time, these constituents provide rhematic information
serving to present part of the main state of affairs with a higher degree of specificity (Fabricius-Hansen
& Haug 2012: 7; Haug 2012: 295-299). That is to say, they are semantically and pragmatically tightly
connected to the core predication. For this reason, the informational value of elaborating secondary
predicates is usually more or less equally high as that of the main clause (cf. Winkler 1997; Geuder
2000: 199-200; Himmelmann & Schultze-Berndt 2005: 18; Güldemann 2005). This is in line with the
idea that the use of elaborating constituents compensates for the lack of a single verb whose meaning
alone corresponds to that coded by the combination of the core predication and the elaborating phrase.
In a certain sense, the meaning of elaborating phrases can thus be conceived of as a context-induced and
analytically rendered sense of a verb that is semantically underspecified as compared with the more
detailed representation the speaker has in mind (Fabricius-Hansen & Haug 2012: 1; Haug 2012: 295;
Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 109).

As to the second type of adjunct present participles, i.e. framing forms, they expand the rheme of
the sentence by anchoring the state of affairs coded by the extended predication in time or space or by
relating it to another, often known, state of affairs (Haug 2012: 299-301). Remember that the extended
predication is defined as the combination of the core predication and possibly one or more elaborating
adjunct(s) (Dik 1997: 51-52). The framing use of adjunct present participles is uncontroversial, and will
therefore not be discussed more extensively (this use has been discussed in more detail with respect to
the gerund; see §1.2.2.2.5). Suffice it to mention that several examples of framing present participles
have been cited in this section, among which the temporal forms *abiens* ‘leaving’ (130) and *discedens*
‘leaving’ (131), the causal form *contemnentes* ‘contemning’ (133), and the conditional form *durans*
‘lasting’ (143).
Contrary to adjunct gerunds, adjunct present participles can also expand the rheme of the sentence in a third way (Haug 2012: 301-303; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 110-112; see also Marouzeau 1910: 29). Indeed, they may provide information that is equally new and central as that asserted by the main clause (or perhaps even more central), but that is semantically unrelated to it (Haug 2012: 301-303). Thus, instead of denoting a state of affairs related to the main state of affairs by means of, e.g., a temporal, causal, or conditional relationship, these constituents designate a state of affairs that stands more or less on its own, at least from a semantic and pragmatic point of view (Haug 2012: 301-302).<fnref n="67" /> However, from a syntactic point of view, they depend on another, usually finite verb, just like elaborating and framing adjuncts (Haug 2012: 301-303). An example of this type of adjuncts is *cottidie everrentes eorum stabula* ‘sweeping out their quarters every day’ (147), which expresses an instruction that is equally important for taking care of turtledoves as that coded by the main clause (Marouzeau 1910: 29; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 110).

(147) Cibatui quod sit, obiciunt triticum siccum
food.DAT.M.SG insofar_as be.SBJV.PRS.3SG offer.PRS.3PL wheat.ACC.N.SG dry.ACC.N.SG
in centenos vicenos turtures fere semodium,
for hundred.ACC.M.PL twenty.ACC.M.PL turtledove.ACC.M.PL about half-modius.ACC.M.SG
cottidie everre-nt-es eorum stabula [...].
every_day sweep_out-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL their.GEN.M.PL quarter.ACC.N.PL

‘As to food, they offer dry wheat, about a half-modius for 120 turtledoves, and they sweep out their quarters every day.’ (Varro *rust*. 3.8.2)

This type of adjuncts are called ‘independent rhemes’ by Haug (2012: 301-303). However, since this term does not specify whether the adjuncts are independent from the thematic or the rhematic part of the main clause, Galdi & Vangaever (2019: 110) propose the term ‘secondary focus adjuncts’. The adjective *secondary* refers in this respect to the pragmatically independent status of the adjuncts, not to some hierarchical status. In Classical Latin, adjunct present participles are only rarely used as secondary focus adjuncts (Marouzeau 1910: 29; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 111-112).<fnref n="68" />

A final remark that should be made about adjunct present participles pertains to ablative absolute forms. In Classical Latin, some of these forms show signs of a partly grammaticalised status as prepositions (Rovai 2013, 2014; Galdi 2019). This is the case of *praesente* ‘in the presence of’, *absente* ‘in the absence of’, *stante* ‘during’, *praesidente* ‘in command of’, and *faciente* ‘by’ (Rovai 2013, 2014; Galdi 2019: 103-104), to which some authors add (*co*)*operante* ‘by’, *dispensante* ‘by’, *instigante* ‘at the instigation of’, *praestante* ‘thanks to’, and *favente* ‘with help of’ (Horn 1918: 35-39; Flinck-Linkomies

<footnote n="67">⁶⁷ The discourse relation between the main clause and this type of adjuncts is one of coordination in the sense described by Asher & Lascarides (2003) within their framework of Segmented Discourse Representation Theory (SDRT).</footnote>

<footnote n="68">⁶⁸ Focusing on nominative conjunct adjunct present participles in technical literature between the 2nd c. BC and the 1st c. AD, Galdi & Vangaever (2019: 111-112) show that 71% have a framing function, 28% an elaborating function, and only 1% a secondary focus function.</footnote>
1929: 221; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 133-134). In Classical Latin, the present participles with the clearest prepositional features are forms like *praesente* ‘in the presence of’ (148): its ablative singular marking is at odds with the ablative plural marking of the pronoun *nobis* ‘us’, while it should agree with this pronoun when acting as a prototypical absolute adjunct present participle (Rovai 2013; Galdi 2019: 95-96).

(148) [...] *nec praese-nt-e* nobis alius quisquam
NEG be_present-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG we.ABL.M.PL other.NOM.M.SG anyone.NOM.M.SG
est servos Sosia.
be.PRS.3SG slave.NOM.M.SG Sosia.NOM.M.SG

‘And in our presence there is no other slave Sosia.’ (Plaut. Amph. 400)

However, Classical Latin does not possess present participles with prepositional features that have completed their grammaticalisation process. Even Late Latin does not have fully grammaticalised prepositions going back to ablative absolute present participles (Galdi 2019).<fnref n="69" /> Therefore, the forms in question will not be analysed in this thesis as prepositions, but as ablative absolute present participles.

### 1.3.2.2.5. Present participles used in a progressive construction

In Classical Latin, the present participle can also function as the main verb of a progressive construction (Marouzeau 1910: 38; Aalto 1949: 75; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 274-275; Palmer 1964: 326; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388; Scherer 1975: 96; Menge et al. 2000: 717; Pinkster 2015: 544-545). This is a verbal periphrasis made up of a verb that is more or less grammaticalised into an aspectual auxiliary and a present participle acting semantically and syntactically as the main verb (Aalto 1949: 76). The grammatical(ised) meaning of the auxiliary scopes over the lexical meaning of the present participle (cf. Gast & Diessel 2012: 15), and consists of presenting the state of affairs denoted by the latter in its “uninterrupted duration or continuity” (Garey 1957: 91). Hence, it serves as a marker of the progressive aspect (Haverling 2010: 492).<fnref n="70" /> In the Classical period, the progressive marker can be realised by a form of the verb *esse* ‘to be’ (149) or by a posture like *stare* ‘to stand’ (150) (Aalto 1949: 75).

<footnote n="69">⁶⁹ In Late Latin, the prepositional use of some present participles is more evident than in Classical Latin. For instance, some instances of *faciente* ‘by’ show clear signs of a decategorised status: despite being built on the transitive verb *facere* ‘to do’, the form *faciente* ‘by’ is often used without a direct object. This causes its meaning to be interpreted in a more general way (Galdi 2019: 97). Also, while the verb *facere* ‘to do’ imposes the selection restrictions [+animate] and [+control] on its subject, the noun accompanying the form *faciente* ‘by’ often presents the features [-animate] and [-control]. This indicates that *faciente* ‘by’ has lost at least part of its argument structure (Galdi 2019: 97). In addition, some instances are found in which *faciente* ‘by’ does not agree with the accompanying noun, much like *praesente* ‘in the presence of’ in (148) (Galdi 2019: 96-97). Finally, *faciente* ‘by’ tends to develop a fixed position after the accompanying noun (Galdi 2019: 96). The fixation of the linear position of a linguistic item is a well-known symptom of grammaticalising items (Lehmann 1982³: 158-160).</footnote>

<footnote n="70">⁷⁰ The progressive aspect is also referred to as the continuous (e.g. Comrie 1976) or durative aspect (e.g. Gougenheim 1929).</footnote>
(149) *Cuius* *decursum* *antecedebat* *rivus*, *qui*
REL.GEN.F.SG slope.ACC.M.SG run_in_front_of.PST.3SG rivulet.NOM.M.SG REL.NOM.M.SG
*ad eorum* *accessum* *summam* *efficiebat* *loci*
to their.GEN.M.PL approach.ACC.M.SG critical.ACC.F.SG make.PST.3SG territory.GEN.M.SG
*iniquitatem.* *Nam palustri* *et voraginoso* *solo*
unevenness.ACC.F.SG for marshy.ABL.N.SG and full_of_pits.ABL.N.SG soil.ABL.N.SG
*curre-ns* *erat* *ad dextrum.*
run-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG be.PST.3SG to right.ACC.N.SG

‘In front of the slope of this (plain) ran a rivulet, which made the unevenness of the territory critical for their approach. For to the right it was running on marshy soil full of pits.’ (Bell. Hisp. 29.2)

(150) [...] *tristis* *Aristaeus* *nostri* *genitoris* *ad undam*
sad.NOM.M.SG Aristaeus.NOM.M.SG our.GEN.M.SG father.GEN.M.SG at water.ACC.F.SG
*stat* ***lacrima-ns*** [...].
stand.PRS.3SG cry-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG

‘Aristaeus is (lit. ‘stands’) sadly crying near the waters of our father.’ (Verg. georg. 4.355-356)

The use of the present participle as the main verb of a progressive construction derives from its use as the head of an elaborating conjunct adjunct phrase (Aalto 1949: 76). Without going into detail here, the lexical meaning of *esse* ‘to be’ or a posture verb combined with an elaborating nominative present participle is sometimes backgrounded in favour of the grammatical value described above,<fnref n="71" /> whereas the lexical meaning of the present participle is not only preserved, but foregrounded (Heine 1993: 54, 2002: 86).<fnref n="72" /> However, a distinction should be made between *esse* ‘to be’ and the posture verbs: while the lexical meaning of the former is mostly strongly backgrounded, if not entirely lost, that of the latter often co-exists with their grammatical meaning, phenomenon called ‘persistence’ by Hopper (1991: 22; see also Heine 2002: 86). Compare (149) and (150): in (149), *erat* ‘it was’ does not serve to express the existence of a rivulet, but to present the running of this rivulet as a continuous activity that makes it difficult for Caesar’s troops to approach the Pompeians; in (150), on the contrary, *stat* ‘he stands’ does not only serve to present the crying of Aristaeus as ongoing, but possibly also to express that Aristaeus is standing near some water. The adverb *possibly* is crucial here, since the persistence of the lexical meaning of grammaticalising forms is by no means compulsory (Hopper 1991: 22; Heine 2002: 86). In many contexts, it is even unclear whether this lexical meaning is preserved or lost. *Stat* ‘he stands’ (150)

<footnote n="71">⁷¹ Heine (1993: 54) refers to the process “whereby in specific contexts a lexical item is emptied of its lexical semantics and acquires a grammatical function” as ‘desemanticisation’. Various other terms are used for this process (for an overview, see, e.g., Heine 1993: 89).</footnote>

<footnote n="72">⁷² In a recent paper (Vangaever 2019), I investigated the emergence of the progressive present participle construction within the theoretical framework of Diachronic Construction Grammar (Hilpert 2013; Traugott & Trousdale 2013; Barðdal et al. 2015; Coussé et al. 2018). I argue that the emergence of this construction is a case of grammatical constructionalisation, i.e. a historical process in which the formal and functional structure of an existing construction are reanalysed, so as to give rise to a new construction (Traugott & Trousdale 2013: 1). The term ‘construction’ is taken here in the sense described in the framework of Construction Grammar, viz. as a unique, conventionalised, and arbitrary form-function pairing with different degrees of internal complexity and lexical specificity (Goldberg 1995: 4, 2006: 3; Croft 2001: 18).</footnote>
is in fact a case in point, but in order to demonstrate this, the passage in (150) needs to be interpreted
within its discourse context, given in (151). For practical reasons, this passage is translated, but not
glossed.<fnref n="73" />

(151) *Carmine quo captae dum fusis mollia pensa / devolvunt, iterum maternas impulit auris / luctus Aristaei, vitreisque sedilibus omnes / obstipuere; sed ante alias Arethusa sorores / prospiciens summa flavum caput extulit unda / et procul: "O gemitu non frustra exterrita tanto / Cyrene soror, ipse tibi, tua maxima cura / tristis Aristaeus nostri genitoris ad undam / stat lacrimans, et te crudelem nomine dicit."*

‘And while, charmed by the strain, they unrolled the soft coils from their spindles, again the wail of Aristaeus smote upon his mother’s ear, and all upon their crystal thrones were startled. Yet, first of all the sisters, Arethusa, looking forth, raised her golden head above the water’s brim, and cried from afar: “O sister Cyrene, you are not alarmed by this loud lament in vain. Aristaeus, your own beloved, is sadly crying near the waters of our father, and he says that you are cruel by name.”’ (Verg. georg. 4.348-356)

The lamenting of Aristaeus is at the center of this passage: it is expressed not only by the present participle *lacrimans* ‘crying’, but also by the nouns *luctus* ‘wail’ and *gemitu* ‘lament’. This is what triggers the attention of Arethusa and her sisters, and what causes Arethusa to investigate what is going on. When she finds out the reason of Aristaeus’ lamentating, she addresses her sister Cyrene and presents her findings. Within this context, the primary function of *stat* ‘he stands’ is to present the lamenting of Aristaeus as a continuous activity, because it is the durative character of his lamentations that makes Arethusa find out about it. It is possible that Aristaeus is standing near the water while lamenting, but he may just as well be sitting, lying, or even pacing around.<fnref n="74" /> What matters most is that he is lamenting. The question whether he is standing while doing so is contextually less relevant.

Since the lexical meaning of *esse* ‘to be’ is strongly backgrounded, if not completely lost, while that of the posture verbs may co-exist with their grammatical value, the analysis of present participles as the main verb of a progressive construction instead of as the head of an adjunct phrase is usually more evident when they are combined with *esse* ‘to be’ than with a posture verb. For some combinations of a posture verb and a present participle, it is indeed difficult to establish whether they form a progressive construction or the bi-clausal structure that gave historically rise to it. This type of syntactic ambiguity, described by Rosenbach (2010: 154) in terms of ‘constructional gradience’, can only be resolved when

<footnote n="73">⁷³ The same translation-instead-of-glossing strategy will be adopted for all other examples that will be presented in their broader discourse context in this thesis. For most of these instances, a separate example comprising the present participle or gerund to be discussed will nonetheless be provided, usually as an introductory instance to illustrate some syntactic use (as in this section).</footnote>

<footnote n="74">⁷⁴ Some thirty verses before the passage in (151), it is said that Aristaeus sadly stopped near the sacred fount at the stream’s head (*tristis ad extremi sacrum caput adstitit amnis*; v. 319). Hence, it is most likely that he is still standing while lamenting. However, this does not exclude the lexical meaning of *stat* ‘he stands’ from being backgrounded in favour of its grammatical, i.e. progressive, value.</footnote>
taking into account the discourse context, as shown for *stat lacrimans* ‘he is crying’ (150). This issue
will be examined in detail in Chapter 3 (§3.5.4).

In Classical Latin, progressive present participle constructions are extremely rare, but nonetheless
found from the earliest texts onward (Aalto 1949: 75; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388; Pinkster 2015:
544-545). Most of them occur in substandard varieties (e.g. (149)), but unambiguous instances are also
found in standard varieties (e.g. (150)) (Marouzeau 1910: 38; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388). One of
the oldest examples is *bibentes esse* ‘they are drinking’ (152). This construction is embedded in an
accusative and infinitive clause, which, in turn, is part of a relative clause. The result is a syntactically
complex sentence, but one in which the function of the present participle as the main verb of a
progressive construction is beyond discussion.

(152) [...] *isti* Graeci [...] / *quos* semper videas
DEM.NOM.M.PL Greek.NOM.M.PL REL.ACC.M.PL always see.SBJV.PRS.2SG
**bibe-nt-es** esse in thermopolio [...].
drink-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL be.INF.PRS in tavern.ABL.N.SG
‘(...) those Greeks, who you always see drinking in the tavern.’ (Plaut. *Curc*. 288-292)

Given its extreme rareness, the progressive present participle construction does not hold as a fully
grammatical(ised) construction in Classical Latin (Bybee 1985, 2010; Croft 2000: 5; Traugott 2015: 53,
55). The construction is still emerging in this period, and does not become more frequent until Late
Latin (Eklund 1970: 74; Pinkster 1998: 230; Haverling 2010: 496). However, even in Late Latin it does
not become highly frequent. In this sense, the Latin progressive present participle construction is usually
considered an exploratory ‘forerunner’ (Bertinetto *et al*. 2000: 538) or ‘precursor’ (Bertinetto 2000: 563)
of the Romance progressive construction (e.g. It. *sto cantando* ‘I am singing’), a kind of ‘experimental
substitute’ of the synthetic imperfect tense (Pinkster 1998: 234; Haverling 2010: 492-493).

1.3.2.2.6. Present participles used in a presentative progressive construction

Another construction in which the present participle occurs combines a present participle, a perception
verb, and an accusative NP. The present participle agrees with this NP, which acts as its logical subject.
The perception verb evokes an act of visual (e.g. *conspicor* ‘I see’ (153)) or auditory (e.g. *audiebam* ‘I
heard’ (154)) perception.
(153) *Sed quis illic est quem huc*
but INT.NOM.M.SG that.one.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG REL.ACC.M.SG hither
**advenie-nt-em** *conspicor?*
come-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG see.PRS.1SG

‘But who is that one that I see coming hither?’ (Plaut. *Epid*. 435)

(154) *Cum quo Antiochum saepe disputa-nt-em audiebam.*
with REL.ABL.M.SG Antiochus.ACC.M.SG often discuss-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG hear.PST.1SG
‘I heard Antiochus often discussing with him (Heraclitus).’ (Cic. *Lucullus* 11)

In the grammatical tradition of Latin, the present participle and the accusative NP are jointly referred to as an ‘accusative and participle construction’ (Maraldi 1980: 47; Menge *et al.* 2000: 714; Greco 2013: 173-174; Zheltova 2017: 317; Pinkster 2021: §21.8).<fnref n="75" /> This construction is usually analysed as a complement clause functioning as the direct object of the perception verb. This function explains the accusative marking of both the NP and its agreeing participle (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 282; Bolkestein 1976: 287, 289; Menge *et al.* 2000: 714; Greco 2013: 173, 177). The accusative and participle construction denotes a state of affairs that “may be conceived of as causing sound or being visible” (Bolkestein 1976: 286), and that is ongoing at the time of its visual or auditory perception (Maraldi 1980: 48-49; Greco 2013: 180-181). Hence, it is associated with the progressive aspect, just like its counterparts in other languages, such as English (e.g. *I saw the accused stabbing the victim*) (Comrie 1976: 40; Greco 2013: 181, fn. 25).

More recently, Greco (2013: 179-180) and Zheltova (2017: 317-319) argue that the combination of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction holds as an evidential strategy. Evidentiality is described as the “linguistic category whose primary meaning is source of information” (Aikhenvald 2004b: 3). Evidential values can be marked by either grammatical morphemes or lexemes devoted to the expression of the source of information, or by grammatical constructions acquiring this value as a secondary value. It is these grammatical constructions having a non-coded, backgrounded evidential value that Aikhenvald (2004b: 105) calls ‘evidential strategies’. According to Greco (2013: 179-180) and Zheltova (2017: 317-319), the combination of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction qualifies as an evidential strategy because the perception verb expresses the source of the information reported in the accusative and participle construction as a secondary value. Its primary function remains the expression of sensory perception. For instance, in addition to denoting an act of respectively visual and auditory perception, *conspicor* ‘I see’ (153) and *audiebam* ‘I heard’ (154) indicate that the information coded by the accompanying accusative and participle construction is

<footnote n="75">⁷⁵ The Latin term for this construction is ‘*Accusativus cum Participio*’. Within the field of English linguistics, Declerck (1982: 1) uses the term ‘Participial Perception Verb Complements’.</footnote>
provided by the speaker. According to Greco (2013: 179-180), the evidence expressed by the complex of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction is direct and attested.

Pinkster (2021: §21.8) defends yet another analysis of this complex: the accusative NP alone acts as the direct object of the perception verb, while the present participle functions as the head of an adjunct expressing the circumstances under which its subject is perceived by that of the perception verb. In this analysis, the present participle clauses *huc advenientem* ‘coming here’ (153) and *cum quo saepe disputantem* ‘often discussing with him’ (154) express the circumstances under which an unknown man (153) and Antiochus (154) are respectively seen and heard by the speaker.<fnref n="76" /> Laughton (1964: 50) also seems to analyse the accusative NP as the direct object of the perception verb, but instead of taking the present participle as a conjunct adjunct, like Pinkster, he views it as an object predicate.<fnref n="77" /> Laughton’s analysis is in line with that usually proposed for the corresponding forms in French, whether in Old French (e.g. Buridant 2000: 327, 2019: 467) or Modern French (e.g. Halmøy 2013: 279-280).<fnref n="78" />

In this thesis, another analysis of the complex of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction will be proposed. The basic idea is that this is a grammatical construction that (historically) derives from the bi-clausal structure exemplified in (155).<fnref n="79" /> This structure contains a transitive verb, an accusative NP, and an elaborating conjunct adjunct present participle.

(155) [...] *vix illum adsequor curre-nt-em [...].*
hardly DEM.ACC.M.SG follow.PRS.1SG run-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
'I (can) hardly follow him as he is running.' (Sen. *epist.* 83.4)

In (155), *currentem* ‘running’ unambiguously serves as the head of an adjunct phrase. This phrase specifies the circumstances under which the referent of its subject, *viz.* the pronoun *illum* ‘him’, is involved in the state of affairs denoted by the main verb *adsequor* ‘I follow’. The pronoun *illum* ‘him’ is the direct object of *adsequor* ‘I follow’, and is therefore assigned the accusative (*cf*. Pinkster 2015: 1181-1184). Since conjunct adjunct present participles agree with the NP acting as their subject, this case is also assigned to *currentem* ‘running’. Since it is adjunct, *currentem* ‘running’ can be omitted without affecting the grammaticality and/or core meaning of the sentence, as shown in (156) (*cf*. Dik 1997: 87).

<footnote n="76">⁷⁶ This might also be the analysis of Hofmann & Szantyr (1965: 387). However, they are not explicit about the precise function of the present participle, and hence this cannot be stated with certainty.</footnote>

<footnote n="77">⁷⁷ Laughton (1964: 50) qualifies these present participles as ‘completive’.</footnote>

<footnote n="78">⁷⁸ Some authors do not provide an explicit analysis of the present participle. For instance, Kühner & Stegmann (1914⁵: 763) state that these forms are used “*in prädikativem Sinne zur Ergänzung eines Verbalbegriffes*”, but it is unclear whether they take these forms as object predicates, like Laughton (1964: 50), or as verb complements, like most authors (e.g. Ernout & Thomas 1951: 282; Bolkestein 1976: 287, 289; Menge *et al.* 2000: 714; Greco 2013: 173, 177).</footnote>

<footnote n="79">⁷⁹ In a recent paper (Vangaever 2021), I investigated the emergence of this construction within the theoretical framework of Diachronic Construction Grammar (Hilpert 2013; Traugott & Trousdale 2013; Barðdal *et al.* 2015; Coussé *et al.* 2018). I argue that it instantiates a case of grammatical constructionalisation, just like the emergence of the progressive present participle construction (see fn. 72 in §1.3.2.2.5).</footnote>
(156) Vix illum adsequor.
hardly DEM.ACC.M.SG follow.PRS.1SG
'I (can) hardly follow him.' (adapted from Sen. epist. 83.4)

If the transitive verb is realised by a perception verb, its combination with an accusative NP and a present participle often allows the same analysis. This is in fact the analysis proposed by Pinkster (2021: §21.8) for all instances of this combination. The present participle phrase then denotes the circumstances under which the referent of its subject is perceived by that of the subject of the perception verb, as illustrated above for *huc advenientem* ‘coming here’ (153) and *cum quo saepe disputantem* ‘often discussing with him’ (154). Since it still holds as an adjunct, the present participle phrase can be omitted without rendering the sentence ungrammatical and/or changing its meaning. This is shown for the examples in (153-154) in respectively (157-158).

(157) Sed quis illic est quem conspicor?
but INT.NOM.M.SG that.one.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG REL.ACC.M.SG see.PRS.1SG
‘But who is it that one that I see?’ (adapted from Plaut. Epid. 435)

(158) Antiochum audiebam.
Antiochus.ACC.M.SG hear.PST.1SG
‘I heard Antiochus.’ (adapted from Cic. Lucullus 11)

However, the combination of a perception verb, an accusative NP, and a present participle can often be analysed in a different way. This alternative analysis is typically more appropriate to the discourse context. The examples in (153-154) are cases in point, but in order to demonstrate this, they need to be interpreted within their broader discourse context, provided in respectively (159-160).

(159) Nil homini amico est opportuno amicius / sine tuo labore quod velis actum est tamen / Ego si allegassem aliquem ad hoc negotium / minus hominem doctum minusque ad hanc rem callidum / os sublitum esset, itaque me albis dentibus / meus derideret filius meritissimo / Atque haec stultitiast me illi vitio vortere / egomet quod factitavi in adulescentia / cum militabam ; pugnis memorandis meis / eradicabam hominum aureis, quando occeperam / Sed quis illic est quem huc advenientem conspicor / suam qui undantem chlamydem quassando facit?

‘A friend in need is a friend indeed. What you want done is done, without any effort on your part. If I’d employed someone less smart in this business and less clever in this matter, I’d have been fooled: my son would laugh at me, showing me his white teeth, and I’d fully deserve it. But who is this I can see coming here? He makes his cloak move like a wave by shaking it’ (Plaut. Epid. 425-436)
(160) "Cum Alexandriae pro quaestore", inquit, "essem, fuit Antiochus mecum, et erat iam antea Alexandriae familiaris Antiochi Heraclitus Tyrius, qui et Clitomachum multos annos et Philonem audierat, homo sane in ista philosophia, quae nunc prope dimissa revocatur, probatus et nobilis; cum quo Antiochum saepe disputantem audiebam, sed utrumque leniter."

"When I was in Alexandria as deputy quaestor", he said, "Antiochus was in my company, and the Tyrian Heraclitus, Antiochus's friend, was already in Alexandria. He had listened to Clitomachus and Philo for many years, and he was truly esteemed and famous in this philosophical school, which is now revived after being almost abandoned. I heard Antiochus often discussing with him (Heraclitus), but each of them (discussing) gently."" (Cic. *Lucullus* 11)

In (159), the speaker (Periphanes) delivers a monologue on the pleasure of having a friend in need. During his monologue, an unknown soldier appears and approaches him. As soon as he notices this, Periphanes interrupts his monologue and asks himself who is the man approaching him. In (160), the speaker (Lucullus) delivers a monologue on his experiences at Alexandria in the company of the philosophers Antiochus and Heraclitus. After introducing Heraclitus and specifying the philosophical school to which he belongs, Lucullus states that Antiochus and Heraclitus have held many philosophical discussions. Within these contexts, the most informative part of the excerpts in (153-154) is not that Periphanes sees someone (153) and that Lucullus hears Antiochus (154), but that an unknown soldier approaches Periphanes (153) and that Antiochus has held many philosophical discussions with Heraclitus (154). That is to say, the states of affairs being focused on are expressed by the present participle clauses *huc advenientem* 'coming here' (153) and *cum quo disputantem* 'discussing with him' (154). The acts of visual and auditory perception designated by *conspicor* 'I see' (153) and *audiebam* 'I heard' (154), as for them, are somewhat backgrounded. On closer inspection, the lexical meaning of these verbs is backgrounded in favour of a more grammatical meaning (or function), in line with the mechanism of desemanticisation (Heine 1993: 89). Since desemanticisation is the first shift in a grammaticalisation process (Heine 1993: 54-56), this suggests that some perception verbs combined with an accusative NP and a present participle have a more or less grammaticalised status. This hypothesis will now be explored in more detail.

The hypothesis that I will defend is based on the logical distinction drawn by Kuroda (1972: 154) and Lambrecht (1994: 139-140) between two types of judgments in view of their information structure: categorical judgments and thetic judgments. The former have a clear subject-predicate structure, since they involve "both the act of recognition of a subject and the act of affirming or denying what is expressed by the predicate about the subject" (Lambrecht 1994: 139). For instance, in (161) the predicate *is blue* expresses some information about the subject NP *this flower* (Lambrecht 1994: 139).

<footnote>(161) *This flower is blue*. (Lambrecht 1994: 139)</footnote>
As for thetic judgments, they involve “the recognition or rejection of some judgment material, without predicating this judgment of some independently recognised subject” (Lambrecht 1994: 139). Hence, they do not have a bipartite structure. Canonical examples of thetic judgments are meteorological (162) and existential (163) sentences (Kuroda 1972: 154; Lambrecht 1994: 139-140).

(162) *It rains*. (Lambrecht 1994: 140)

(163) *There are yellow flowers*. (Lambrecht 1994: 140)

Lambrecht (1994: 141-142) relates this logical distinction between categorical and thetic judgments to a pragmatic distinction: utterances expressing a categorical judgment have a topic-comment structure, while those conveying a thetic judgment lack a topic, and are as such “all-new”.

I hypothesise that in some complexes of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction, the primary function of the perception verb is not to express an act of perception nor the source of the information coded by the present participle phrase, but to introduce the state of affairs denoted by the present participle as new information, viz. as a thetic information unit. This function as a marker of information structure is grafted onto the lexical meaning of the perception verb, which is partly desemanticised and, as such, grammaticalised. This pragmatic function of the perception verb is apparent in both (153/159) and (154/160): *conspicor* ‘I see’ (153/159) and *audiebam* ‘I heard’ (154/160) both introduce a state of affairs whose information value is significantly higher than that of the acts of sensory perception. In other words, *conspicor* ‘I see’ (153/159) and *audiebam* ‘I heard’ (154/160) are used as presentative markers rather than as full lexical perception verbs. It is worth noting that the presentative function of some perception verbs is cued or even emphasised by the presence of *ecce ‘behold’, i.e. the presentative *par excellence* in Latin (e.g. (164)).

(164) *Ecce autem video rure redeu-nt-em senem.*
behold but see.PRS.1SG farm.ABL.N.SG return-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG old_man.ACC.M.SG
‘But behold, I see the old man returning from the farm.’ (Ter. *Eun.* 967)

As for the state of affairs denoted by the accusative NP and the present participle, it is still interpreted as ongoing. This is in line with the former function of the present participle phrase, *i.e.* to express a durative state of affairs taking place at the time of the act of visual or auditory perception. Some complexes of a perception verb and an accusative and participle construction thus combine a presentative and a progressive value. Hence, they will be labelled ‘presentative progressive constructions’.

The hypothesis that perception verbs used in a presentative progressive construction show signs of a grammaticalised status entails that the internal syntactic structure of this construction differs from that of its source structure illustrated in (155): the perception verb shifts from the status of main verb to that of presentative marker, while the present participle shifts from the status of head of an adjunct to
that of main verb. As for the accusative NP, it loses its function as the direct object of the perception verb and specialises as the subject of the present participle. Its accusative marking remains reminiscent of its former function, conformingly to the process of syntactic reanalysis, defined by Langacker (1977: 58) as “the change in the structure of an expression or class of expressions that does not involve any immediate or intrinsic modification of its surface structure”. Due to these shifts, the originally bi-clausal source structure is in a certain sense reanalysed as a mono-clausal construction.

It is important to add, however, that the degree of grammaticalisation of the perception verbs is low. The main reason is that their lexical meaning typically co-exists with their grammatical meaning (or function), as in the case of the posture verbs used in a progressive present participle construction (*cf*. Hopper 1991: 22; Heine 2002: 86). Witness (164), where *video* ‘I see’ certainly evokes an act of visual perception, but nonetheless serves in the first place to announce the return of an old man (and to present this information as all-new). Note also that the evidential value of the perception verbs persists along with their sensory value. For instance, *video* ‘I see’ (164) also indicates that the source of the information coded by *rure redeuntem senem* ‘the old man returning from the farm’ is the speaker, in this case the slave Parmeno. Due to the persistence of the lexical meaning of the perception verbs, it is sometimes difficult to establish whether a complex of a perception verb, an accusative NP, and a present participle forms a presentative progressive construction or its bi-clausal source structure. Like that of some combinations of a posture verb and a present participle, the syntactic ambiguity of these complexes can only be resolved when taking into account the discourse context: if the sensory value of the perception verb is backgrounded and if the present participle carries the highest informational value, the complex qualifies as a presentative progressive construction; if, on the contrary, the sensory value of the perception verb is foregrounded and if the present participle conveys accessory information about the referent of the accusative NP, it instantiates its bi-clausal source structure.

In the previous discussion, all perception verbs occurring in a presentative progressive construction are active. Hence, the present participle and its subject NP are marked in the accusative. This is the most common configuration, but it is not the only possible one. Occasionally, the perception verb is in the passive, which induces a nominative marking on the present participle and its subject NP (*cf*. Pinkster 2021: §21.8). These passive structures allow the same analysis as their active counterparts, irrespective of whether the perception verb evokes an act of visual (165) or auditory (166) perception.

(165) [...] *Antonius* [...] *cum cohortibus* XII *descende-ns*
Anthony.NOM.M.SG with cohort.ABL.F.PL twelve descend-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
ex loco superiore cernebatur.
from place.ABL.M.SG higher.ABL.M.SG see.PST.PASS.3SG

‘Anthony was seen descending from a higher position with twelve cohorts.’ (Caes. *civ.* 3.65.1)
(166) Saepe auditus est [...] se=que ire ad
often hear.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG REFL.ACC.M.SG=and go.INF.PRS to
illam [...] dictita-ns [...].
DEM.ACC.F.SG declare-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG

‘He was often heard declaring that he should go to her.’ (Tac. *ann.* 13.46.1)

In presentative progressive constructions, the present participle sometimes competes with the infinitive, at least when the perception verb evokes “actual perception” instead of “knowledge and reflection based on some form of perception” (Riemann 1886⁷: 470 fn. 1; Marouzeau 1910: 40; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 283; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387; Maraldi 1980: 51, 71 fn. 2; Menge *et al.* 2000: 714; Greco 2013: 177-180; Pinkster 2021: §15.98, §21.7).<fnref n="80" /> An example of what could hold as a presentative progressive infinitive construction is given in (167).

(167) Virum bonum eccum Parmenonem incedere video.
man.ACC.M.SG good.ACC.M.SG behold Parmeno.ACC.M.SG approach.INF.PRS see.PRS.1SG
‘Behold! I see Parmeno, that good man, approaching.’ (Ter. *Eun.* 918)

### 1.3.2.2.7. Present participles used as syntactically finite verbs

The final use of the present participle to be discussed is as a syntactically finite verb, i.e. as the predicate of a clause in which it “has a position such, that it seems to serve as a finite form and can be replaced – without any other changes being made in the sentence – by a finite form” (Eklund 1970: 119; see also Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389-390).<fnref n="81" /> One of the oldest instances of this type of present participles is *attolentia* ‘lifting up’ (168), used in coordination with the morphologically finite verb *signatur* ‘it is marked’ (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389; Eklund 1970: 140).<fnref n="82" />

<footnote n="80">⁸⁰ The present participle and the infinitive do not compete when the perception verb has a cognitive instead of a sensory value. In this case, only the infinitive can be used (Riemann 1886⁷: 469-470; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 703-704; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387-388; Maraldi 1980: 47-48, 51; Pinkster 1990: 131; Greco 2013: 179-180).</footnote>

<footnote n="81">⁸¹ Marouzeau (1910: 29) might have this use of the present participle in mind when stating that “[I]l arrive même chez Varron que le participe contienne un énoncé de même nature et de même importance que le verbe principal, et qu’il ait ainsi la valeur d’une nouvelle proposition principale”. However, the only example cited by him should be taken as a specific type of conjunct adjunct present participles, namely a secondary focus participle (cf. Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 106, 110).</footnote>

<footnote n="82">⁸² This example dates from the 1st c. AD and is used by the poet Statius. Until at least the 2nd c. AD, the few instances of syntactically finite present participles mostly occur in poetry (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389). This raises the question whether the finite use of the present participle is ‘natural’ in this period or the mere result of poetic syntactic liberty. The oldest instance of a syntactically finite present participle is used by the 1st c. BC poet Propertius (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389).</footnote>
(168) [...] *omnia* nam *laetas* pila attolle-nt-ia
all.NOM.N.PL for joyous.ACC.F.PL spear.NOM.N.PL lift_up-PTCP.PRS-NOM.N.PL
frondes nulla=que famosa signatur
leaves.ACC.F.PL no.NOM.F.SG=and infamous.ABL.F.SG mark.PRS.PASS.3SG
lancea penna.
lance.NOM.F.SG feather.ABL.F.SG

‘For all spears lift up joyous leaves and no lance is marked with an infamous feather.’ (Stat. *silv.*
5.1.92)

From the 2nd c. AD onward, the syntactically finite use of the present participle becomes slightly more frequent, especially in substandard varieties and in religious texts (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389; Eklund 1970: 117-205 *passim*). As an example, consider the form *facientes* ‘they do’ (169).

(169) Qui ergo extra voluntatem illius facie-nt-es
REL.NOM.M.PL so without consent.ACC.F.SG DEM.GEN.M.SG do-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL
quid morem debitam habent.
INDF.ACC.N.SG death.ACC.F.SG be_due.PTCP.PST.ACC.F.SG receive.PRS.3PL

‘So those who do something without his consent receive a due death.’ (Clem. *ad Cor.* 41.3)

The use of the present participle as a finite verb is in fact controversial. Due to its rareness in Classical Latin and to the complexity of the scientific debate, its discussion will be held with respect to Late Latin in Chapter 2 (§2.1.2.2.2.3.3). For now, it is important to mention that finiteness is not a morphological property of a verb, as has long been claimed, but a morphosyntactic property of a clause that is reflected on the morphology of a verb only in the second place (Givón 1990: 853; Bisang 2001: 1400; Nikolaeva 2010: 1178-1179). This is particularly clear when looking at the morphology of verbal nouns in Northern Khanty: in this language, verbal nouns inflect for person and number in complement and adverbial clauses (e.g. (170)), but not in relative clauses (e.g. (171)) (Nikolaeva 2007: 2).

(170) Ma xo:t we:r-m-e:m jupina [...].
I house make-NMLS.1SG after
‘After I built the house (...).’ (Nikolaeva 2007: 2)

(171) Ma we:r-əm xo:t-e:m [...].
I make-NMLS house-1SG
‘The house I built (...).’ (Nikolaeva 2007: 2)

In other words, in Northern Khanty verbal nouns are not inherently marked or unmarked for person and number, but in function of the syntactic configuration in which they are used (Nikolaeva 2007: 2). This and similar observations in other languages, such as Old Neapolitan (e.g. Vincent 1998: 141), indicate indeed that finiteness is a clausal rather than a verbal property (Givón 1990: 853; Bisang 2001: 1400; Nikolaeva 2010: 1178-1179). It is for this reason that this final use of the present participle will be
referred to in this thesis as ‘**syntactically finite**’ – morphologically speaking, the present participle
remains non-finite).

1.3.2.2.8. External syntactic profile of the present participle

As shown in the previous sections, the external syntax of the present participle in Classical Latin is
diverse: it can (i) occur in adnominal phrases, subject predicates, object predicates, and adjuncts; (ii) act
as the main verb of a progressive or presentative progressive construction; and (iii) be used syntactically
as a finite verb. It is well known that these uses are not equally frequent, but no corpus studies have been
performed to quantify their exact relative frequency, as in the case of the gerund. In order to fill this gap
and to provide a point of comparison for the empirical investigation of Late Latin that will be conducted
in the second part of this thesis, I carried out a quantitative study of the external syntax of the present
participle in a Classical Latin corpus at the beginning of my doctoral research. I used the same corpus
as for the study of the external syntax of the gerund (see §1.2.2.2.6), and reported the results in the same
paper, i.e. Vangaever (2018). Like the gerunds, the present participles occurring in this corpus have been
retrieved automatically using the interface of the LASLA database (recall that the texts included in this
database are morphosyntactically annotated). From the 2 013 forms selected have been manually
discarded all present participles used as the head of a NP (n=221). The remaining 1 792 instances have
been manually annotated for several parameters, among which their syntactic use is most relevant here.
Before discussing the frequency of the various uses of the present participle in this Classical Latin
corpus, two rectifications of my 2018 qualitative analysis be made.

(i) The Classical Latin corpus contains six present participles built on the verb *audire* ‘to hear’ and combined with a form of the verb *esse* ‘to be’ and the ablative noun *dictu* ‘word, order’ (172). These forms are analysed as the main verb of a progressive construction in Vangaever (2018: 29-30), but should be taken instead as a constitutive part of a more or less lexicalised verbal expression meaning ‘to obey the order of someone’ (Gaffiot 1934: 187).

(172) *Quo* *nuntio* *perterritus* *discessit* et *dicto*
REL.ABL.N.SG message.ABL.N.SG frighten.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.SG leave.PST.3SG and order.DAT.N.SG
*audie-ns* *fuit* *regi*.
hear-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG be.PST.3SG king.GEN.M.SG

‘Frightened by this message, he left and obeyed the king’s order.’ (Bell. Afr. 57.3)

Since lexicalised verbal expressions will be discarded from the dataset of this thesis (see §3.4), the six forms used in the verbal expression *dictu audiens esse* ‘to obey the order of someone’ will be excluded from the results that will be reported here (as for the three instances of the gerund *solvendo* ‘to pay’ used in the expression *solvendo esse* ‘to be solvent’; see §1.2.2.2.6).
(ii) The second rectification concerns 37 present participles combined with a perception verb and a NP (e.g. *sedentem* ‘sitting’ (173)). In Vangaever (2018: 26-27), these forms are analysed as object predicates, in line with the analysis of the corresponding forms in the grammatical tradition of French (e.g. Buridant 2000: 327, 2019: 467 for Old French; Halmøy 2013: 279-280 for Modern French). In this study, these instances are taken as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction, at least when the sensory value of the perception verb is backgrounded in favour of a presentative function (see §1.3.2.2.6).

(173) [...] *in quibus eo usque se praebebat*
in REL.ABL.N.PL by always REFL.ACC.M.SG prove.PST.3SG
*patientem* *atque impigrum*, *ut eum* *nemo*
*be patient*.PTCP.PRS.ACC.M.SG and active.ACC.M.SG that DEM.ACC.M.SG nobody.NOM.M.SG
*umquam in equo sede-nt-em* *viderit*.
ever in horse.ABL.M.SG sit-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG see.SBJV.PST.3SG

‘In these things he always proved himself patient and active by that degree that nobody ever saw
him sitting on a horse.’ (Cic. *Verr.* 6.27)

In view of these rectifications, the number of forms on which the quantitative analysis of the external syntax of the present participle in Classical Latin should be based corresponds to 1 786 instead of 1 792, and includes 37 instances used as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction. In this thesis, the quantitative results reported in Vangaever (2018) will be adjusted in the light of these two rectifications. Due to the large size of the original dataset, this adjustment has a negligible impact on the overall tendencies.

The adjusted inventory and relative frequency of the different uses of the present participle in this
Classical Latin corpus is provided in Figure 1.5. This figure shows what will hereafter be referred to as
‘the external syntactic (or distributional) profile of the Classical Latin present participle’.

<figure><img src="image_11.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.5.** External syntactic profile of the present participle in Classical Latin (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>
Figure 1.5 shows that the Classical Latin present participle is mostly used in adjuncts (57%). Hence, it could be considered specialised in this use, as claimed by Laughton (1964: 20). However, the proportion of adjunct present participles is not exceptionally high, especially not in comparison with the adnominal forms (39%). Thus, the specialisation of the present participle in adjuncts should be relativised. What is most relevant in Figure 1.5 is that the two dominant uses of the present participle jointly represent 96% of all forms, and that its remaining uses are thus extremely rare. The absence of present participles used syntactically as finite verbs confirms their extreme rareness at this stage of the language.

As in the case of the gerund, however, the external syntactic profile of the present participle varies depending on its case form. Since the present participle is assigned case through agreement with a noun, this variation is nonetheless less relevant. It appears that nominative and ablative forms mostly occur in adjuncts, while accusative, genitive, and dative forms are chiefly used in adnominal phrases (Vangaever 2018: 25).<fnref n="83" /> The fact that nominative and ablative present participles more often occur in adjuncts than accusative, genitive, and dative forms has to do with the reference of their subject: the subject of adjuncts is mostly either coreferential with the subject of the main clause or not coreferential with any constituent of this clause. Since the nominative is the default marking in the former scenario and the ablative in the latter, it is only logical that most adjunct present participles stand in the nominative or ablative.

### 1.3.3. Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle

After having examined the morphological and syntactic properties of the present participle, I will in this section establish its morphosyntactic profile. This profile will be obtained by mapping its external syntactic profile on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin. In this mapping, I will also take into account the morphological properties of the present participle. As noted in §1.3.1, these properties combine verbal and adjectival features.

Depending on their syntactic use, present participles can be divided in three distinct groups: adnominal, subject predicate, and object predicate present participles perform a syntactic function characteristic of an adjective, while adjunct present participles have the prototypical function of an adverb (Haspelmath 1995: 4; Nedjalkov 1998: 421-422; Ylikoski 2003: 228). As for the forms used in a progressive or presentative progressive construction, they can in principle be mapped on two categories. From a diachronic point of view, they should be mapped on the adverb, because they historically derive from forms heading an adjunct phrase. However, from a synchronic perspective, they should be mapped on the verb, because they serve as the semantic and syntactic main verb of a construction in which another verb form is more or less grammaticalised as either a progressive or a

<footnote n="83">⁸³ Within the group of conjunct adjunct forms, the “nominative present participle shows an overwhelming preponderance over the oblique cases” (Laughton 1964: 31; see also Marouzeau 1919: 13, 22-23).</footnote>
presentative marker. The synchronic analysis of these participles is most appropriate, and hence they will be mapped on the category of the verb. With respect to syntactically finite present participles, they are obviously mapped on the verb.

Depending on whether the present participle has the external syntax of an adjective, an adverb, or a verb, a distinction can thus be made between respectively ‘adjectival present participles’, ‘adverbial present participles’, and ‘verbal present participles’. This distinction is absent from the grammatical tradition of (Classical) Latin, but will be used throughout this thesis to facilitate the description and analysis of (the evolution of) the present participle.<fnref n="84" /> The mapping of the various uses of the present participle on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin is synthesised in Table 1.6.

<table><caption>**Table 1.6.** Mapping of the uses of the present participle on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Morphosyntactic category</th><th>Use of the present participle</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="3">Adjective</td><td>Adnominal</td></tr><tr><td>Subject predicate</td></tr><tr><td>Object predicate</td></tr><tr><td>Adverb</td><td>Adjunct</td></tr><tr><td rowspan="3">Verb</td><td>Main verb of a progressive construction</td></tr><tr><td>Main verb of a presentative progressive construction</td></tr><tr><td>Syntactically finite</td></tr></tbody></table>

The morphosyntactic profile of the present participle can be obtained by calculating the relative frequency of adjectival, adverbial, and verbal present participles in a given corpus. Based on its external syntactic profile in Figure 1.5, the morphosyntactic profile of the Classical Latin present participle is presented in Figure 1.6.

<figure><img src="image_12.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 1.6.** Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in Classical Latin (based on Vangaever 2018)</figcaption></figure>

<footnote n="84">⁸⁴ Laughton (1964: 20-45) also uses the term ‘adverbial present participle’, but restricts it to conjunct forms having a semantic value other than their default temporal value.</footnote>
In Classical Latin, the present participle has most often adverbial external syntax (57%). However, it also frequently displays adjectival external syntax (40%).<sup>85</sup> Its use with verbal external syntax is extremely rare (2%). However, a distinction should again be made between the case forms of the present participle: nominative and ablative forms predominantly have adverbial external syntax, in line with their dominant use in adjuncts, whereas accusative, genitive, and dative forms mostly have adjectival external syntax (Vangaever 2018: 25).

### 1.3.4. Typological profile of the present participle

This final section will establish the typological profile of the present participle in Classical Latin. As in the case of the gerund, this profile is obtained by mapping the morphosyntactic profile of the Classical Latin present participle on Haspelmath's (1995: 4) typology of non-finite verb forms. Recall that this author distinguishes three cross-linguistically recurrent types of non-finite verb forms: (i) masdars, *i.e.* forms displaying nominal external syntax; (ii) converbs, *i.e.* forms with adverbial external syntax; and (iii) participles, *i.e.* forms showing adjectival external syntax. In this typology, the Classical Latin adverbial present participle falls under the converb type and the adjectival present participle under the participle type. The verbal present participle does not belong to any of these types (at least not from a synchronic point of view), and will therefore be left out from the following discussion. Since it can have the external syntax of the prototypical members of three distinct categories, the Classical Latin present participle holds as a 'tri-functional category of non-finite verb forms' (cf. Nedjalkov 1995: 105).

Based on the results shown in Figure 1.6, the Classical Latin present participle is strongly related to the converb type (57%). Its association with the participle type is less strong (40%), but the difference is relatively modest. Contrary to what could be expected on the basis of its language-specific label, the link of the Classical Latin present participle with the cross-linguistically recurrent participle type is thus relatively weak. This demonstrates the potentially misleading character of language-specific labels in comparative linguistics and linguistic typology, and, as a corollary, the interest of using language-independent comparative concepts in these fields (Haspelmath 2010: 665; Lehmann 2018a: 33). The same applies to diachronic linguistics, since this discipline can be conceived of as a particular type of comparative linguistics.

<footnote n="85"><sup>85</sup> According to Palmer (1964: 325), the adverbial present participle is less frequent than the adjectival present participle in the earliest texts. This might well be, but since he does not provide quantitative evidence, this claim should be taken with caution. The same holds for Hofmann & Szantyr's claim (1965: 383) that in substandard varieties from the earliest period onward, the present participle decreasingly has adverbial external syntax (see also Horn 1918: 4). With respect to the standard varieties, Hofmann & Szantyr (1965: 384) state that the use of the present participle “geht *ihren eigenen Weg*”, but they do not explicate what they mean by this nor how these varieties differ from the substandard language (their remarks following this citation concern moreover the internal syntax of the present participle instead of its external syntax).</footnote>
Remember that Haspelmath’s (1995: 4) typology of non-finite verb forms is handled in this study as a comparative tool, *i.e.* a set of language-independent comparative concepts serving to describe the use of the present participle in Classical Latin in a grammatically unbiased way (Haspelmath 2010: 665; Lehmann 2018a: 33).<fnref n="86" /> The labels ‘masdar’, ‘converb’, and ‘participle’ are thus intended as purely functional labels, *i.e.* deprived of any kind of formal and language-specific content (Haspelmath 2010: 665; Lehmann 2018a: 33). In spite of its strong link with Haspelmath’s (1995: 4) converb type, the Classical Latin present participle can therefore not be described as a converb. In other words, it cannot be asserted that it *is* a converb. The Classical Latin present participle *is* nothing but the Classical Latin present participle, *viz.* a language-specific category of non-finite verb forms with a unique set of morphological and syntactic properties and an equally unique morphosyntactic profile.

**1.4. Functional competition between the gerund and the present participle**

Sections 1.2 and 1.3 have explored the morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund and the present participle in Classical Latin and established their external syntactic, morphosyntactic, and typological profiles. The aim of the final section of this chapter is to compare the main morphological and syntactic properties of the two types of non-finite verb forms in Classical Latin, and to determine to which extent they are in functional competition at this stage of the language. This section serves as the conclusion of this chapter.

The morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund and the present participle partly overlap. From a morphological perspective, they are both built on the present stem of a verb, but to this stem are attached different morphemes: the gerund contains the infix -nd- and one of the endings of the second declension neuter singular nouns, while the present participle contains the infix -nt- and one of the endings of the third declension adjectives. Since the gerund has a nominal ending and the present participle an adjectival ending, the morphology of the gerund displays verbal and nominal features, while that of the present participle combines verbal and adjectival properties.

From a syntactic point of view, a distinction needs to be made between the internal and the external syntax of the gerund and the present participle. Their internal syntactic properties are similar: they both have mostly verbal internal syntax, but can nonetheless show the internal syntax of a nominal category (of a noun in the case of the gerund and of an adjective in the case of the present participle). At this stage of the language, present participle phrases with a high degree of internal syntactic complexity are more frequent than their gerund counterparts. This is mainly due to the fact that gerund

<footnote n="86">⁸⁶ As in the case of the gerund, this strategy paves the way for a grammatically unbiased comparison of the use of the present participle in the different Romance languages, both from a diachronic and from a synchronic point of view.</footnote>
phrases containing an explicit direct object are usually avoided in favour of NPs including a personal gerundive.

With respect to their external syntax, it corresponds to that of a noun or an adverb in the case of the gerund, but to that of an adjective, an adverb, or a verb in the case of the present participle. The external syntax of the two types of non-finite verb forms thus partly overlaps, in that they can both occur in adjuncts. However, this external syntactic overlap has more of a semantic complementary distribution than of a full-fledged functional competition, since the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle are specialised in different semantic values (Vester 1983: 125; Kooreman 1989: 219; Adams 2013: 725-726; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-108). For instance, prepositional accusative, prepositional and bare genitive, and dative gerunds predominantly express the purpose of the main state of affairs (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 731-732, 742; Aalto 1949: 60-64, 86-87; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 376-377; Menge et al. 2000: 737; Pinkster 2021: §16.100), and bare ablative gerunds mostly express the manner of the main state of affairs, the means by which it is realised, or the state of affairs by which it is unintentionally brought about (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 751-752; Lyer 1932: 223-226, 382-384; Aalto 1949: 65-68; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266; Palmer 1964: 324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379; Vester 1983: 101-120; Kooreman 1989: 221; Menge et al. 2000: 740-741; Adams 2013: 725; Pinkster 2021: §16.101). By contrast, present participles typically have a temporal value of simultaneity or a pragmatically inferred value overriding this temporal value, such as condition or concession (Laughton 1964: 20-38; Vester 1983: 121-125; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 103-106).

However, the semantic complementary distribution between the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle is a tendency rather than a rule. On the one hand, the adverbial gerund sometimes has a semantic value characteristic of the adverbial present participle (Marouzeau 1910: 79; Löfstedt 1911: 159; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 751-753; Lyer 1932: 222, 384-389; Aalto 1949: 65-66, 68-70; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 266-267; Palmer 1964: 324; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 379-380; Scherer 1975: 93; Vester 1983: 112-120; Menge et al. 2000: 741; Adams 2013: 725-740; Vincent 2016: 45; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-103; Pinkster 2021: §21.14). This holds in particular for the bare ablative gerund (see §1.2.2.2.5). Witness (76), repeated below, where the coordinated forms *ornando* ‘cheering’ and *celebrando* ‘celebrating’ express the circumstances accompanying the main state of affairs, or (174), in which *erumpendo* ‘bursting out’ anchors the main state of affairs in time. Both of these temporal values are typically expressed by adjunct present participles (see §1.3.2.2.2.4).

(76) [...] *vestrum* *egressum* *orna-nd-o* *atque* *celebra-nd-o* [...] *your.ACC.N.SG* departure.ACC.N.SG cheer-GER-ABL and celebrate-GER-ABL *prosequebantur.*

*escort.PST.3PL*

‘They escorted your departure while cheering and celebrating.’ (Cic. *Pis.* 3)
(174) *Ita erumpe-nd-o* navis [...] incendunt.
so burst_out-GER-ABL ship.ACC.F.PL burn.PRS.3PL
‘So, as they burst out, they burn the ships.’ (*Bell. Hisp.* 36.3)

This latter value is also the default value of ablative gerunds governed by the preposition *in* ‘in’, like *redeundo* ‘returning’ (175) (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 753; Menge *et al.* 2000: 738; Pinkster 2021: §16.102).

(175) [...] *in redeu-nd-o* [...] *succubuit* [...].
in return-GER-ABL succumb.PST.3SG
‘He succumbed as he was returning.’ (Suet. Aug. 2.98.5)

On the other hand, the adverbial present participle sometimes has a semantic value characteristic of the adverbial gerund (Marouzeau 1910: 27, 79; Lyer 1932: 222, 384; Woodcock 1959: 73; Laughton 1964: 21, 25-26; Vester 1983: 123-125; Adams 2013: 725; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 103-106).<fnref n="87" /> For example, *haec et multa eius modi dicens* ‘saying these and similar things’ (176) specifies the means by which the main state of affairs is realised. This value is typically expressed by bare ablative gerunds.

(176) *Haec et multa eius modi dice-ns*
DEM.ACC.N.PL and many.ACC.N.PL DEM.GEN.M.SG manner.GEN.M.SG say-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
fidem faciebat [...].
trust.ACC.F.SG make.PST.3SG
‘By saying these and many similar things he gained trust.’ (Cic. *Brut*. 197)

These and similar instances unambiguously show that, despite their specialisation in different semantic values, the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle compete with each other already at this stage of the language (Marouzeau 1910: 78-80; Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 752-753; Aalto 1949: 65, 69-70; Scherer 1975: 93; Kooreman 1989: 221; Menge *et al.* 2000: 741; Adams 2013: 725-740; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-108; Pinkster 2021: §21.7). Recall in this respect that the use of bare ablative gerunds with a temporal value is more characteristic of substandard than of standard varieties, but that unambiguous instances of these forms are nonetheless found in standard varieties from the earliest texts onward (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 752-753; Ernout & Thomas 1951: 267; Tränkle 1960: 14; Fedeli 1980: 72-73; Wackernagel & Langslow 2009: 352; Haverling 2010: 369; Adams 2013: 725-740; Vangaever 2018: 12-14; Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 100-103, 106-107; Pinkster 2021: §21.14).

Clear evidence of the competition between the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle is provided by instances like (177). In this example, the gerund clause *incruentam et sine luctu*

<footnote n="87">⁸⁷ Laughton (1964: 25-28) describes such present participles as ‘gerundial’, leading to formulations like “the gerundial present participle is not very frequent in the writing of Cicero’s maturity’(p. 26). Such descriptions mix up form and function, and easily lead to terminological confusion. They should be avoided at any cost.</footnote>
victoriam et alia huiusce modi praetexendo ‘pretending a victory without blood or sorrow and other things of this kind’ and the present participle clause omne belli decus sibi retinens ‘keeping all glory of war for himself’ are coordinated as the temporal adjuncts of the state of affairs denoted by monebat ‘he warned’. Thus, they are both used with the typical semantic value of the adverbial present participle (Vester 1983: 130-131; see also Aalto 1949: 69; Adams 2003: 748).

(177) Eadem Mucianus crebris epistulis monebat, same.ACC.N.PL Mucianus.NOM.M.SG frequent.ABL.F.PL letter.ABL.F.PL warn.PST.3SG incruentam et sine luctu victoriam et alia without_blood.ACC.F.SG and without sorrow.ABL.M.SG victory.ACC.F.SG and other.ACC.N.PL huius=ce modi praetexe-nd-o, sed gloriae avidus DEM.GEN.M.SG=DEM manner.GEN.M.SG pretend-GER-ABL but fame.GEN.F.SG eager.NOM.M.SG atque omne belli decus sibi retine-ns. and all.ACC.N.SG war.GEN.N.SG glory.ACC.N.SG REFL.DAT.M.SG keep-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG ‘Mucianus warned for the same things in many letters, pretending (to wish) a victory without blood and sorrow and other things of this kind here, but (actually being) eager of fame and keeping all glory of war for himself.’ (Tac. *hist.* 3.8.3)

Coordination of adverbial gerunds and present participles is also possible with a semantic value characteristic of the former. Witness (178): the present participle clause *vetustissimum quemque militum nomine vocans* ‘by addressing any old soldier by name’ and the bare ablative gerund clause *contubernalis appellando* ‘by calling (them) messmates’ serve as the instrument adjuncts of the state of affairs denoted by *adfectaverat* ‘he had desired’ (Vester 1983: 131; see also Aalto 1949: 69; Adams 2003: 748).

(178) [...] studia militum [...] adfectaverat [...] vetustissimum enthusiasm.ACC.N.PL soldier.GEN.M.PL aspire.PST.3SG oldest.ACC.M.SG quemque militum nomine voca-ns ac [...] any.ACC.M.SG soldier.GEN.M.PL name.ABL.N.SG address-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG and contubernalis appella-nd-o [...]. messmate.ACC.M.PL call-GER-ABL

‘He had aspired the enthusiasm of the soldiers by addressing any of the oldest soldiers by name and by calling them messmates.’ (Tac. *hist.* 1.23.1)

Two final remarks should be made about the competition between the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle.

(i) While the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle are often equivalent from a semantic point of view, there is an important syntactic difference between them. Indeed, the present participle is often used with an explicit direct object, whereas gerunds governing such an object are typically
replaced by NPs containing a personal gerundive. Therefore, in contexts where the non-finite head of an adjunct governs a direct object, the present participle is much more common than the gerund (Laughton 1960: 28). Consequently, the competition between the two forms mainly applies to phrases with a low degree of internal syntactic complexity. However, this too is a tendency rather than a rule, as evidenced by the coordination of the syntactically complex gerund clause *incruentam et sine luctu victoriam et alia huiusce modi praetexendo* ‘pretending a victory without blood and sorrow and other things of this kind’ and the more or less equally complex present participle clause *omne belli decus sibi retinens* ‘keeping all glory of war for himself’ (177). Anyhow, it is clear that the competition between the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle is not independent from that between the gerund and NPs containing a personal gerundive. As we will see in the following chapter, the relation between these two competitions plays an important role in the evolution of the gerund and the present participle in Late Latin.

(ii) The second remark relates to the scope of the competition between the gerund and the present participle. In the literature, discussions of this competition usually focus on the bare ablative gerund and, since the subject of this form is mostly coreferential with that of the main verb (Aalto 1949: 78; Vester 1983: 103; Kooreman 1989: 220; Adams 2013: 736; Pinkster 2021: §14.12, §21.14), the nominative present participle. However, the competition between the gerund and the present participle is not restricted to these forms. For instance, ablative gerunds governed by *in* ‘in’ (e.g. *redeundo* ‘returning’ (175)), may compete with nominative present participles to situate the main state of affairs in time, just like bare ablative gerunds (e.g. *erumpendo* ‘bursting out’ (174)). And nominative present participles may express the purpose of the main state of affairs, just like prepositional accusative, prepositional and bare genitive, and dative gerunds (Kühner & Stegmann 1914⁵: 757, 777; Laughton 1964: 30-31; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 387). Witness the clause *quarum oblivionem quaerens* ‘pursuing the oblivion of this (misery)’ (179).

(179) [...] *incurro* *in memoriam* *communium* *miseriarum*, *quarum* run_into.PRS.1SG in memory.ACC.F.SG common.GEN.F.PL misery.GEN.F.PL REL.GEN.F.PL oblivionem *quaere-ns* *hunc* [...] *sermonem* oblivion.ACC.F.SG pursue-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG DEM.ACC.M.SG discussion.ACC.M.SG produxi [...]. spin_out.PST.1SG

‘I run into the memory of our common misery, the oblivion of which I pursued by spinning out this discussion.’ (Cic. *Brut*. 251)

The focus on bare ablative gerunds and nominative present participles in discussions of the functional competition between the gerund and the present participle has mainly a historical explanation. As we will see in the following chapter, in Late Latin the competition between the adverbial gerund and the adverbial present participle gains in intensity and also starts settling in a
way that is crucial for the evolution of the gerund and the present participle as a whole. The forms
that play a central role in this intensifying competition are the ablative gerund and the nominative
present participle. Thus, the historical interest of these forms has been retrospectively projected on
their functional competition at earlier stages of the languages.

With respect to the central topic of this thesis, it is worth emphasising that the competition between the
gerund and the present participle in Classical Latin does not raise a categorial problem. Indeed, since
the two types of non-finite verb forms are morphologically distinct, instances occurring in adjuncts can
always be categorised as gerunds or present participles with absolute certainty. That is to say, the
functional competition between the gerund and the present participle does not blur the categorial
distinction between them. As we will see in the following chapter, this also holds for Late Latin, but not
for Old French.
<figure><img src="image_13.png" /></figure>
Chapter 2. The gerund and the present participle from Late Latin to Old French

The preceding chapter has investigated the morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund and the present participle in Classical Latin, and examined to which extent these two types of non-finite verb forms compete with each other and with other types of non-finite verb forms at this stage of the language. This second chapter will deal with the gerund and the present participle in Late Latin, taken as the period between the 3rd and the 10th c. AD.<fnref n="1" />

It is commonly claimed that the morphological properties of the gerund and the present participle in Late Latin remain relatively stable, while their syntactic properties drastically change. These syntactic changes are held to take mainly place in the light of the functional competition between the gerund and the infinitive (Aalto 1949: 73; Elcock 1960: 111; Harris 1978: 198-199; Bauer 1993), on the one hand, and between the gerund and the present participle (Aalto 1949: 73; Elcock 1960: 111; Väänänen 1963: 140; Harris 1978: 200; Kooreman 1989; Bauer 1993; Maraldi 1994; Adams 2003: 748-749, 2013: 725-740; Pinkster 2021: §21.14), on the other. These competitions are argued to gain in intensity and to start settling in a way that radically distinguishes the use of the gerund and the present participle in Late Latin from their use in Classical Latin. The settling of these competitions is considered part of a much more general evolution, namely the restructuring of the system of non-finite verb forms (Elcock 1960: 110-119; Harris 1978: 195-203; Bauer 1993: 59, 2005). This restructuring is not limited to Late Latin, but takes instead place on an Indo-European scale (cf. Bichakjian 1988a, 1988b; Bauer 1993). In the transition from Late Latin to Old French, this restructuring of the system of non-finite verb forms is partly compromised due to morphological and phonetic evolutions affecting the endings of the gerund and the present participle. These evolutions suspend the definitive settling of the functional competition between these two forms (Ménard 1973: 170; Harris 1978: 200; Aravielle 1984: 40; Vincent 1988: 47; Jensen 1990: 322; Buridant 2000: 237, 2019: 343; Wackernagel & Langslow 2009: 352 fn. 15; Bazin-Tacchella 2020: 852), and also challenge their categorial distinction (Ménard 1973: 169; Adams 2013: 749; De Smet 2014: 39-40; Bazin-Tacchella 2020: 852). The developments in question particularise Old French among the other Old Romance languages (Elcock 1960: 111; Harris 1978: 200; Vincent 1988: 47; Wackernagel & Langslow 2009: 352 fn. 15; Adams 2013: 726).

The aim of this chapter is to explore the evolution of the morphological and syntactic properties of the gerund and the present participle from Late Latin to Old French. The evolution of their syntactic properties will be mainly examined in the light of their mutual functional competition and that between

<footnote n="1">¹ As mentioned in §1.1 (fn. 1), Late Latin is often defined as the period between 200 and 600 AD (e.g. Haverling 1988: 20-23; Cuzzolin & Haverling 2009; Pinkster 2015: 5). Banniard (2018: 29) extends this period to 900, but in this thesis, the 10th c. will also be included. In the empirical part, three sub-periods of Late Latin will be distinguished, namely Imperial Latin (3rd-5th c.), Merovingian Latin (6th-7th c.), and Early Medieval Latin (8th-10th c.).</footnote>
the gerund and the infinitive. As in the preceding chapter, attention will also be paid to other competitors
of the gerund and the present participle, without however devoting an in-depth analysis to them. The
investigation of the existing knowledge about the evolution of the gerund and the present participle from
Late Latin (§2.1) to Old French (§2.2) will allow formulating the research questions of this thesis (§2.3).

**2.1. The gerund and the present participle in Late Latin**

The examination of Late Latin will focus first on the gerund (§2.1.1), and then on the present participle (§2.1.2). I will also discuss their main changes in the transition from Late Latin to Romance. Evolutions characteristic of the transition from Late Latin to Old French will be explored in §2.2, along with those taking place within the period of Old French.

**2.1.1. The gerund**

This section will investigate the morphological (§2.1.1.1) and syntactic (§2.1.1.2) changes of the gerund in Late Latin, and determine their impact on its morphosyntactic (§2.1.1.3) and typological (§2.1.1.4) profiles.

**2.1.1.1. Morphological changes of the gerund**

Globally speaking, the morphological properties of the gerund remain stable between Classical and Late Latin. However, two evolutions can be observed. The first change affects the forms of verbs of the fourth and fifth conjugations, having the present stem ending -ie (Elcock 1960: 111). Possibly under influence of the infinitive in -ire (e.g. *audire* ‘to hear’), this ending comes to be gradually replaced by -i. The latter is preserved in Portuguese, Gascon, Catalan, and Sardinian, but lost in all other Romance languages.<fnref n="2" /> These languages have generalised -a and -e, which correspond to the present stem endings of the verbs of respectively the first and second/third conjugations.<fnref n="3" /> The general trend in Late Latin thus consists of the generalisation of -and- (e.g. *cantando* ‘singing’) and -end- (e.g. *delendo* ‘destroying’) at the expense of -iend-l-ind- (e.g. *moriendo* ‘dying’). As we will see in §2.2.1, Old French further generalised one of these endings (Ernout & Thomas 1951: 267; Elcock 1960: 111; Väänänen 1963: 141; Bazin-Tacchella

<footnote n="2">² Traces of -i nonetheless persist in other Romance languages, like Piedmontese (e.g. *drumint* ‘sleeping’) (Elcock 1960: 111).</footnote>

<footnote n="3">³ These two endings are preserved in Portuguese, Gascon, Catalan, and Sardinian along with the ending -i (Elcock 1960: 111). Castilian preserved -a, while -e evolved to -ie (e.g. *escribiendo* ‘writing’ instead of *escribendo*) (Elcock 1960: 111).</footnote>