forms to the total number of present participles also increases, in accord with expectations, but only in a very slight way.

<table><caption>**Table 5.15.** Frequency of adnominal present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#adnominal present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#adnominal present participles/<br>#present participle</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>67 (22.33)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>16,50%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>626 (33.39)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>16,73%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>748 (43.75)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>19,48%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the rising proportion of adnominal present participles is probably random. Indeed, this proportion is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin in a statistically significant way, but none of these periods alone makes a significant contribution to the obtained chi-square values ($\chi^2 = 8.48; df = 2; p = 0.0144$) (Table 5.16).

<table><caption>**Table 5.16.** Observed vs expected proportion of adnominal present participles to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>67 (16,50%)</td><td>73 (17,98%)</td><td>-0.73</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>626 (16,73%)</td><td>675 (18,04%)</td><td>-1.88</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>748 (19,48%)</td><td>693 (18,05%)</td><td>+2.10</td></tr></tbody></table>

The conclusion to be drawn is that the proportion of adnominal present participles is relatively stable within the period of Late Latin, after having sharply declined between Classical and Late Latin. In other words, the corpus of this study does not evidence a specialisation of the present participle in adnominal phrases, neither from Classical to Late Latin nor during the Late Latin period. This is confirmed by the evolution of the absolute frequency of the forms in issue: it rises both between Classical and Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin, but much less sharply than the frequency of the present participle in general. Hence, the present participle neither show signs of a direct specialisation in adnominal uses. Note that the slightly increasing proportion of adnominal present participles between Merovingian and Early Medieval Latin is mirrored by an equally slightly decreasing share of adverbial present participles (see Table 5.3). This confirms that the frequency pattern of these two types of participles are correlated.
### 5.3.1.3. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

The frequency of adnominal present participles in the Late Latin corpus is highest in the legal texts, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.17). This result is in line with that obtained for the adnominal gerund (see §4.2.1.3).

<table><caption>**Table 5.17.** Frequency of adnominal present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th rowspan="2">Thematic domain</th><th colspan="2">#adnominal present participles</th><th colspan="2">#present participles</th></tr><tr><th>(per 10 000 words)</th><th></th><th>(per 10 000 words)</th><th></th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>216</td><td>(27.65)</td><td>1 849</td><td>(236.68)</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>811</td><td>(32.73)</td><td>5 753</td><td>(232.20)</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>646</td><td>(64.59)</td><td>1 183</td><td>(118.28)</td></tr></tbody></table><table><thead><tr><th></th><th>#adnominal present participles/</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td></td><td>#present participles</td></tr></tbody></table>

Given the extent of this difference, it comes as no surprise that a chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggests that it is probably not random. Indeed, the share of adnominal present participles is lower than expected in the historical and religious texts and higher than expected in the legal texts in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 912.20; df = 2; p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.18).

<table><caption>**Table 5.18.** Observed vs expected proportion of adnominal present participles to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>216 (11,68%)</td><td>352 (19,04%)</td><td>-7.25</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>811 (14,09%)</td><td>1 096 (19,05%)</td><td>-8.6</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>646 (54,61%)</td><td>225 (19,02%)</td><td>+28.03</td></tr></tbody></table>

Thus, the question arises as to what distinguishes the use of adnominal present participles in legal texts from their use in historical and religious texts. As in the case of the adnominal gerund, the answer lies in the productivity of the adnominal present participle.

The productivity of this form has been measured in function of the lexical variation between the present participle and the governing noun. Table 5.19 shows that the adnominal present participle is less productive in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts, as has been observed with respect to both the adnominal gerund (see §4.2.1.3) and the adverbial present participle (see §5.2.3).
<table><caption>**Table 5.19.** Productivity of the adnominal present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><th>#tokens</th><td>216</td><td>811</td><td>646</td></tr><tr><th>#types</th><td>182</td><td>681</td><td>215</td></tr><tr><th>#hapaxes</th><td>167</td><td>618</td><td>147</td></tr><tr><th>#types/#tokens</th><td><strong>0.84</strong></td><td><strong>0.84</strong></td><td><strong>0.33</strong></td></tr><tr><th>#hapaxes/#tokens</th><td><strong>0.77</strong></td><td><strong>0.76</strong></td><td><strong>0.23</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Hence, the adnominal present participle is lexically less open (or less schematic) in legal texts than in historical and religious texts (cf. Barðdal 2008: 22). The number of hapaxes is lower in the legal texts than in the historical texts even in absolute numbers, although the total number of lexical combinations in the legal texts is almost three times as high as in the historical texts. Within the group of legal texts, the productivity of the adnominal present participle is lower than that of the adjunct present participle, for which the type-token and hapax-token ratios are respectively 0.69 and 0.57 (see §5.2.3, Table 5.7). The same conclusion was drawn for the productivity of the adnominal and adverbial gerund (see 4.2.1.3 and §4.3.3, respectively).

As in the case of the adnominal gerund and the adverbial present participle, the lower productivity of the adnominal present participle in the legal texts is not only due to the lower number of types and hapaxes in theses texts, but also to the relatively high frequency of certain lexical combinations. This is evident from Table 5.20, presenting the inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent combinations in the three thematic domains.

<table><caption>**Table 5.20.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexical combinations of a noun and an adnominal present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of noun</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td>annus 'year'</td><td>sequi 'to follow'</td><td>8 (3,70%)</td></tr><tr><td>locus 'place'</td><td>nuncupare 'to call'</td><td>7 (3,24%)</td></tr><tr><td>officium 'service'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>4 (1,85%)</td></tr><tr><td>tempus 'time'</td><td>succedere 'to succeed'</td><td>4 (1,85%)</td></tr><tr><td>vita 'life'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>4 (1,85%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"><strong>27 (12,50%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td>dies 'day'</td><td>sequi 'to follow'</td><td>11 (1,36%)</td></tr><tr><td>vita 'life'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>10 (1,23%)</td></tr><tr><td>saeculum 'era'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>8 (0,99%)</td></tr><tr><td>locus 'place'</td><td>nuncupare 'to call'</td><td>7 (0,86%)</td></tr><tr><td>dies 'day'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>5 (0,62%)<sup>6</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"><strong>41 (5,06%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="6">⁶ The religious texts contain three other lexical combinations occurring five times.</footnote>
<table><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td><i>locus</i> 'place'</td><td><i>nuncupare</i> 'to call'</td><td>92 (14,24%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>dies</i> 'day'</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>70 (10,84%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>villa</i> 'house'</td><td><i>nuncupare</i> 'to call'</td><td>38 (5,88%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>tempus</i> 'time'</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>36 (5,57%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>epistula</i> 'letter'</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>24 (3,72%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td></td><td></td><td><b>260 (34,76%)</b></td></tr></table>

The five most frequent lexical combinations represent 35% of all combinations in the legal texts, against only 13% in the historical texts and 5% in the religious texts. Moreover, the most frequent combination alone accounts for 14% in the legal texts vs 4% in the historical texts and 1% in the religious texts. The most frequent combination in the legal texts is *dies* 'day'/*praeesse* 'to be present' (29). The runner-up, also accounting for more than 10% of all combinations, is *locus* 'place'/*nuncupare* 'to call' (30).

(29) [...] *dabo ergo tibi a die praese-nt-i* [...].
give.FUT.1SG so you.DAT.M.SG from day.ABL.M.SG beollo-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG
'So I will give you from this day (...).' (Form. Sal. Bign. 10)

(30) [...] *quod [...] terra sua in loco nuncupa-nt-e*
because land.ABL[ACC].F.SG his.ABL[ACC].F.SG in place.ABL.M.SG call-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG
illo *per fortia* *tullisset* [...].
DEM.ABL.M.SG by force.ABL[ACC].N.PL take.SBJV.PST.3SG
'(...) because he had taken by force his land in the place called X.' (Form. Marc. 1.28)

The low productivity of the adnominal present participle in the legal texts also manifests itself in the lexical variation of present participles separately – as observed for the adnominal gerund, but not for the adverbial present participle. This variation is lower in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts, although the difference with especially the religious texts is less significant than in the case of the lexical combinations of present participles and governing nouns (Table 5.21).

<table><caption>**Table 5.21.** Lexical variation of the adnominal present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>216</td><td>811</td><td>646</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>118</td><td>337</td><td>79</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>89</td><td>206</td><td>37</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.55</strong></td><td><strong>0.42</strong></td><td><strong>0.12</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.41</strong></td><td><strong>0.25</strong></td><td><strong>0.06</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

On closer inspection, the low lexical variation of the adnominal present participles in the legal texts is partly due to the high frequency of certain lexemes. Indeed, the five most frequent lexemes represent
69% of all adnominal present participles in the legal texts *versus* only 31% and 19% in respectively the historical and religious texts. Furthermore, the most frequent lexeme accounts for 35% of all adnominal present participles in the legal texts, while representing 13% in the historical texts and 8% in the religious texts (Table 5.22).

<table><caption>**Table 5.22.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes used for adnominal present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>27 (12,5%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>sequi</i> 'to follow'</td><td>14 (6,48%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>sapere</i> 'to be wise'</td><td>10 (4,63%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>habere</i> 'to have'</td><td>9 (4,17%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>nuncupare</i> 'to call'</td><td>7 (3,24%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>67 (31,08%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>62 (7,64%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>habere</i> 'to have'</td><td>35 (4,32%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>sequi</i> 'to follow'</td><td>24 (2,96%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>venire</i> 'to come'</td><td>16 (1,97%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>habitare</i> 'to dwell'</td><td>16 (1,97%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>153 (18,87%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td><i>praeesse</i> 'to be present'</td><td>227 (35,14%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>nuncupare</i> 'to call'</td><td>159 (24,61%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>aspicere</i> 'to face'</td><td>29 (4,49%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>commanere</i> 'to stay'</td><td>17 (2,63%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>consistere</i> 'to stay'</td><td>16 (2,48%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>448 (69,35%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Table 5.22 further shows that the three types of texts share their most frequent lexeme, viz. *praeesse* 'to be' (e.g. (30)). This lexeme alone represents about a fifth of all adnominal present participles in the Late Latin corpus (19% or 316 instances out of 1 673).

The lexical variation of the nouns governing a present participle is also lowest in the legal texts (Table 5.23).
<table><caption>**Table 5.23.** Lexical variation of the nouns governing a present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><th>#tokens</th><td>216</td><td>811</td><td>646</td></tr><tr><th>#types</th><td>132</td><td>377</td><td>154</td></tr><tr><th>#hapaxes</th><td>102</td><td>246</td><td>90</td></tr><tr><th>#types/#tokens</th><td><strong>0.61</strong></td><td><strong>0.46</strong></td><td><strong>0.24</strong></td></tr><tr><th>#hapaxes/#tokens</th><td><strong>0.47</strong></td><td><strong>0.30</strong></td><td><strong>0.14</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The low variation of these nouns in the legal texts is also positively influenced by the high frequency of specific lexemes, though less significantly than in the case of the present participles (see Table 5.24).

<table><caption>**Table 5.24.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes used for nouns governing a present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of noun</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td>annus 'year'</td><td>11 (5,09%)</td></tr><tr><td>homo 'man'</td><td>11 (5,09%)</td></tr><tr><td>locus 'place'</td><td>10 (4,63%)</td></tr><tr><td>tempus 'time'</td><td>9 (4,17%)</td></tr><tr><td>animus 'spirit'</td><td>5 (2,31%)<sup>7</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"><strong>46 (21,30%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td>vir 'man'</td><td>37 (4,56%)</td></tr><tr><td>omnis 'every'</td><td>30 (3,70%)</td></tr><tr><td>cunctus 'all'</td><td>20 (2,47%)</td></tr><tr><td>dies 'day'</td><td>18 (2,22%)</td></tr><tr><td>frater 'brother'</td><td>15 (1,85%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"><strong>120 (14,80%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td>locus 'place'</td><td>96 (14,86%)</td></tr><tr><td>dies 'day'</td><td>70 (10,84%)</td></tr><tr><td>villa 'house'</td><td>41 (6,35%)</td></tr><tr><td>tempus 'time'</td><td>38 (5,88%)</td></tr><tr><td>homo 'man'</td><td>36 (5,57%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"><strong>281 (43,50%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The most frequent lexemes in the historical, religious, and legal texts are respectively *annus* 'year' (31), *vir* 'man' (32), and *locus* 'place' (30).

<footnote n="7">⁷ The historical texts contain three more nouns governing a present participle with a token frequency of 5.</footnote>
(31) [...] *seque-nt-e* anno [...] *ad Ligerem* fluvium [...] follow-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG year.ABL.M.SG to Loire.ACC.M.SG river.ACC.M.SG *venerunt*. come.PST.3PL

‘The following year they came to the river Loire.’ (Fredeg. *cont.* 28)

(32) [...] *audita* est [...] *vox* virum Dei hear.PTCP.PST.NOM.F.SG be.PRS.3SG voice.NOM.F.SG man.GEN.M.PL God.GEN.M.SG *plange-nt-ium* [...]. lament-PTCP.PRS-GEN.M.PL

‘A voice was heard of men of God who were lamenting.’ (Vit. Gall. Wett. 2.30)

### 5.3.1.4. Case marking of the present participle

The final aspect of the Late Latin adnominal present participles to be investigated is their case marking. However, since they are assigned case through agreement with a noun rather than on the basis of their function, the morphological marking of these forms is less relevant than that adnominal gerunds. Suffice it to mention that, in the Late Latin corpus, examples of adnominal present participles have been found in all case forms: the nominative (33), the accusative (34), the genitive (35), the dative (36), the ablative (37), and even the vocative (38).

(33) *Turba* [...] *circumquaque commane-ns* adcurrere festinabat [...]. crowd.NOM.F.SG all_around dwell-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG approach.INF.PRS hurry.PST.3SG

‘A crowd dwelling all around approached in a hurry.’ (Pass. Vit. 1.1.10.17)

(34) “ *Eustachi*, vis *modo accipere* *immine-nt-em* Eustachus.VOC.M.SG want.PRS.2SG now accept.INF.PRS threaten-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.SG tibi *temptationem* [...]”. you.DAT.M.SG temptation.ACC.F.SG

“‘Eustachus, do you now wish to accept the temptation that threatens you?’” (Pass. Eustach. 1.7)

(35) *Habeant* stulti *lucrum* *labe-nt-is* temporis. have.SBJV.PRS.3PL fool.NOM.M.SG profit.ACC.N.SG perish-PTCP.PRS-GEN.N.SG time.GEN.N.SG

‘May the fools have profit in this perishable life.’ (Pass. Caec. 1.16.4)

(36) [...] *et tegumentum distribuit ibi mane-nt-ibus* viris and shelter.ACC.N.SG give.PST.3SG there dwell-PTCP.PRS-DAT.M.PL man.DAT.M.PL *timoratis*.

devout.DAT.M.PL

‘And he gave shelter to the devout men who dwelled there.’ (Vit. Gall. Wett. 2.36)
(37) [...] qui **arde-nt-i** desiderio orandi gratia
REL.NOM.M.SG burn-PTCP.PRS.ABL.M.SG desire.ABL.N.SG pray.GER.GEN for_the_sake_of
perrexit ad urbem Turonicam.
go.PST.3SG to city.ACC.F.SG of_Tours.ACC.F.SG

'Who with a burning desire went to the city of Tours for the sake of praying.' (Vit. Austr. 2.9)

(38) Nunc autem, fili **sapie-ns**, quaeso [...].
now but son.VOC.M.SG be_wise-PTCP.PRS.VOC.M.SG beg.PRS.1SG

'But now I beg you, my wise son (...).' (Epist. Austr. 23)

Figure 5.2 shows the frequency of the case forms. As evident from this figure, present participles depend much more often on ablative, accusative, and nominative nouns than on genitive, dative, and vocative nouns. This result is more or less in line with the case distribution of NPs (cf. Pinkster 2015: 1180).

<figure><img src="image_37.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.2.** Case marking of the adnominal present participles in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

### 5.3.1.5. Conclusion

Against predictions, the share of adnominal present participles to the total number of present participles drops between Classical and Late Latin. It increases within the period of Late Latin, but in a statistically insignificant way. The (normalised) absolute frequency of these participles rises both from Classical to Late Latin and during the Late Latin period, but much less steeply than that of the present participle in general. Hence, the data of this study do not show any sign of a direct or indirect specialisation of the present participle in adnominal phrases. The frequency of adnominal present participles is higher in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts. This difference is inversely related to a difference in productivity. A possible explanation of these thematic differences will be given in §5.5.
### 5.3.2. Subject predicate present participles

The next type of present participles occurring in adjectival syntactic configurations are subject predicate present participles (e.g. *timens* ‘fearing’ (39)).

(39) [...] si fueris pius et misericors et time-ns
if be.SBJV.PST.3SG pious.NOM.M.SG and merciful.NOM.M.SG and fear-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
Deum [...].
God.ACC.M.SG

‘If you were pious and merciful and God-fearing.’ (Epist. Merov. 15)

The aim of this section is to investigate the frequency of this type of present participles between Classical and Late Latin (§5.3.2.1) and during the Late Latin period (§5.3.2.2). As for the previous types of present participles, the frequency study of subject predicate present participles in Late Latin will be refined by the study of their frequency and productivity in the historical, religious, and legal texts (§5.3.2.3). In this latter section, I will also explore the inventory of the copular verbs (or the verbs used as such). The examination of the participles in issue will be concluded by the analysis of their case marking (§5.3.2.4).

#### 5.3.2.1. Frequency from Classical to Late Latin

Unlike adjunct and adnominal present participles, subject predicate present participles are rare, both in Classical and in Late Latin (Table 5.25). Hence, the quantitative results obtained for these forms should be interpreted with caution. Their (normalised) absolute frequency increases between Classical and Late Latin, but much less sharply than that of the present participle in general. Therefore, their proportion to the total number of present participles declines instead of rises, contrary to what is predicted in view of the intensifying competition between the present participle and the gerund in Late Latin.

<table><caption>**Table 5.25.** Frequency of subject predicate present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#subject predicate present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#subject predicate present participles/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>49 (0.78)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>2,74%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>154 (3.62)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>1,75%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test shows that the proportion of subject predicate present participles is higher than expected in Classical Latin and lower than expected in the Late Latin period in a statistically very significant way ($\chi^2 = 7.08; df = 1; p = 0.0078$) (Table 5.26). Hence, this declining proportion might reflect on ongoing linguistic change.
<table><caption>**Table 5.26.** Observed vs expected proportion of subject predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>49 (2,74%)</td><td>34 (1,90%)</td><td>+2.51</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>154 (1,75%)</td><td>169 (1,92%)</td><td>-1.13</td></tr></tbody></table>

However, the decrease rate of only 1% and the low (normalised) absolute frequency of subject predicate present participles suggest that this decline is nonetheless random. Recall in this respect that statistical significance does not necessarily mean that some trend cannot be accidental. As Gries (2013: 28) puts it: “[T]he word *significant* is used in a technical sense here, meaning the effect (here, the difference) is large enough for us to **assume** that, given the size of the sample(s), it is **probably** not a random difference” (italics original, emphasis mine).

### 5.3.2.2. Frequency within the period of Late Latin

During the Late Latin period, the (normalised) absolute frequency of subject predicate present participles also rises, but again less steeply than that of the present participle in general (Table 5.27). The proportion of these forms to the total number of present participles does not show a rectilinear tendency. It remains relatively stable, while it is expected to rise in the light of the competition between the present participle and the gerund.

<table><caption>**Table 5.27.** Frequency of subject predicate present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#subject predicate<br>present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#subject predicate<br>present participles/<br>#present participle</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>7 (2.33)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>1,72%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>62 (3.31)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>1,66%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>70 (4.09)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>1,82%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the modestly fluctuating proportion of subject predicate present participles is probably random. Indeed, this proportion is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin, but the differences between these periods are statistically insignificant ($\chi^2 = 0.30; df = 2; p = 0.8607$) (Table 5.28).
<table><caption>**Table 5.28.** Observed vs expected proportion of subject predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Medieval, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>7 (1,72%)</td><td>7 (1,72%)</td><td>-0.03</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>62 (1,66%)</td><td>65 (1,74%)</td><td>-0.39</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>70 (1,82%)</td><td>67 (1,74%)</td><td>+0.39</td></tr></tbody></table>

In other words, the data of this study does not evidence a specialisation of the present participle in subject predicates, neither between Classical and Late Latin nor within the period of Late Latin.

### 5.3.2.3. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

In the Late Latin corpus, the frequency of subject predicate present participles is highest in the legal texts, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.29). This result is in line with that obtained for adnominal present participles. Nevertheless, the low frequency of subject predicate present participles in the Late Latin corpus disallows drawing solid conclusions from these figures.

<table><caption>**Table 5.29.** Frequency of subject predicate present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#subject predicate present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#subject predicate present participles/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>26 (3.33)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>1,41%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>78 (3.15)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>1,36%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>50 (5.00)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>4,23%</td></tr></tbody></table>

Yet, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test betokens that the proportion of subject predicate present participles is lower than expected in the historical and religious texts, but higher than expected in the legal texts in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 47.74; df = 2; p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.30). Hence, the differences between the legal texts, on the one hand, and the historical and religious texts, on the other, might not be random.

<table><caption>**Table 5.30.** Observed vs expected proportion of subject predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>26 (1,41%)</td><td>32 (1,73%)</td><td>-1.13</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>78 (1,36%)</td><td>101 (1,76%)</td><td>-2.28</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>50 (4,23%)</td><td>21 (1,78%)</td><td>+6.42</td></tr></tbody></table>
As in the case of the adjunct and adnominal present participles, the question that arises is separates the use of subject predicate present participles in legal texts from their use in historical and religious texts. Again, the answer lies in the productivity of the forms at stake.

I measured the productivity of the subject predicate present participle in function of the lexical variation between the present participle and the copular verb (or the verb used as such). Although the low absolute number of subject predicate present participles does not allow drawing firm conclusions from the study of their productivity, it is clear that these forms are less productive in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts (Table 5.31). This was also observed for both adjunct and adnominal present participles.

<table><caption>**Table 5.31.** Productivity of the subject predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>26</td><td>78</td><td>50</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>15</td><td>43</td><td>10</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>9</td><td>34</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.58</strong></td><td><strong>0.55</strong></td><td><strong>0.20</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.35</strong></td><td><strong>0.44</strong></td><td><strong>0.06</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Thus, the subject predicate present participle is less schematic in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts (cf. Barðdal 2008: 22). The number of types and hapaxes is lower in the legal texts than in the historical texts even in absolute numbers, although the total number of lexical combinations in the legal texts is about twice as high as in the historical texts.

As it turns out, the low productivity of the subject predicate present participle in the legal texts is partly due to the high frequency of one lexical combination, namely *appare* ‘to appear’/neglegere ‘to neglect’ (40).

(40) [...] si exinde **neglige-ns** aut tardus apparuero [...].

if by_that_cause neglect-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG or slow.NOM.M.SG appear.FUT.1SG

‘If I will have appeared negligent or slow by that cause (...).’ (Form. Marc. 2.27)

This is evident in Table 5.32, showing the inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexical combinations of a copular verb and a subject predicate present participle in the three thematic domains.
<table><caption>**Table 5.32.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexical combinations of a copular verb and a subject predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of copular verb</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>sapere 'to be wise'</td><td>4 (15,38%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>timere 'to fear'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>abundare 'to abound'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>habere 'to have'</td><td>2 (7,69%)<sup>8</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"></td><td><strong>15 (57,69%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>posse 'to be master of'</td><td>15 (19,23%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>7 (8,97%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>sapere 'to be wise'</td><td>6 (7,69%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>adesse 'to be (present)'</td><td>4 (5,13%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>pati 'to bear'</td><td>3 (3,85%)<sup>9</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"></td><td><strong>35 (44,87%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td>appare 'to appear'</td><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>20 (40,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>6 (12,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>adesse 'to be (present)'</td><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>6 (12,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>5 (10,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>adesse 'to be (present)'</td><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>4 (8,00%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="3"></td><td><strong>41 (82,00%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The five most frequent lexical combinations account for 82% in the legal texts, versus 58% and 45% in respectively the historical and the religious texts. Furthermore, the most frequent combination represents 40% in the legal texts, against 15% in the historical texts and 19% in the religious texts.

The low productivity of the subject predicate present participle in the legal texts is also apparent from the lexical variation of the present participles separately. This variation is much lower in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts, in both absolute and relative terms (Table 5.33).

<table><caption>**Table 5.33.** Lexical variation of the subject predicate present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>26</td><td>78</td><td>50</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>15</td><td>35</td><td>7</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>9</td><td>24</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.58</strong></td><td><strong>0.45</strong></td><td><strong>0.14</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.35</strong></td><td><strong>0.31</strong></td><td><strong>0.06</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

<footnote n="8">⁸ The historical texts contain one more lexical combination occurring twice.</footnote>

<footnote n="9">⁹ There is one more lexical combination occurring three times in the religious texts.</footnote>
On closer inspection, the low lexical variation of the participles in the legal texts is strongly influenced by the high frequency of certain lexemes. On the one hand, the five most frequent lexemes account for 96% of all subject predicate present participles in the legal texts versus 58% in the historical texts and 21% in the religious texts. On the other hand, the most frequent lexeme in the legal texts represents 58% of all subject predicate present participles, while it accounts for 15% in the historical texts and 21% in the religious texts (Table 5.34).

<table><caption>**Table 5.34.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes used for subject predicate present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td>sapere 'to be wise'</td><td>4 (15,38%)</td></tr><tr><td>abundare 'to abound'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>timere 'to fear'</td><td>3 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>habere 'to have'</td><td>2 (7,69%)<sup>10</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>15 (57,69%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td>posse 'to be able to'</td><td>16 (20,51%)</td></tr><tr><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>9 (11,54%)</td></tr><tr><td>sapere 'to be wise'</td><td>8 (10,26%)</td></tr><tr><td>abesse 'to be absent'</td><td>4 (5,13%)</td></tr><tr><td>constare 'to stand firm'</td><td>3 (3,85%)<sup>11</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>40 (51,28%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td>neglegere 'to neglect'</td><td>29 (58,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>praeesse 'to be present'</td><td>12 (24,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>abesse 'to be absent'</td><td>3 (6,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>conscire 'to know well'</td><td>3 (6,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>valere 'to be strong'</td><td>1 (2,00%)<sup>12</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>48 (96,00%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The most frequent lexeme in the legal texts, viz. *neglegere* 'to neglect', is illustrated in (40). The lexemes with the highest frequency in the historical and religious texts are respectively *sapere* 'to be wise' (41) and *posse* 'to be able to' (42).<sup>13</sup>

<footnote>(41) [...] *sacrifica diis et esto sapie-ns.*
sacrifice.IMP.PRS.2SG god.DAT.M.PL and be.IMP.PRS.2SG be_wise-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
'Make offers to the gods and be wise.' (*Pass. Vict.* 1.642.40)</footnote>

<footnote n="10"><sup>10</sup> The historical texts contain one more subject predicate present participle occurring twice.</footnote>

<footnote n="11"><sup>11</sup> There are two more subject predicate present participles with a token frequency of three in the religious texts.</footnote>

<footnote n="12"><sup>12</sup> The legal texts contain two other subject predicate present participles occurring once.</footnote>

<footnote n="13"><sup>13</sup> Note that *potens* 'being able to' (43) has verbal internal syntax, since it governs an infinitive clause as its direct object.</footnote>
(42) [...] *pote-ns* est dominus parare mensam [...].
be_able_to-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3SG Lord.NOM.M.SG prepare.INF.PRS meal.ACC.F.SG
'The Lord is able to prepare a meal.' (Vit. Gall. Wal. 1.28)

The lexical variation of the copular verbs is much smaller than that of the present participles, which is unsurprising given their grammatical status. Table 5.35 shows that these verbs show no lexical variation in the historical texts (1 type), a low variation in the legal texts (3 types), and a higher variation in the religious texts (11 types). In Table 5.35, these absolute numbers are more relevant than the type-token and hapax-token ratios, which are provided only for the sake of uniformity with §5.2.3 and §5.3.1.3.

<table><caption>**Table 5.35.** Lexical variation of the verbs combined with a subject predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>26</td><td>78</td><td>50</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>1</td><td>11</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>0</td><td>7</td><td>0</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.04</strong></td><td><strong>0.14</strong></td><td><strong>0.06</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.09</strong></td><td><strong>0.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Table 5.36 presents the inventory and frequency of all copular verbs (or verbs used as such) in the three thematic domains.

<table><caption>**Table 5.36.** Inventory and frequency of the verbs combined with a subject predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of copular verb</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="2">Historical</td><td rowspan="2">esse 'to be'</td><td>26 (100,00%)</td></tr><tr><td><strong>26 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="11">Religious</td><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>64 (82,05%)</td></tr><tr><td>facere 'to do'</td><td>3 (3,85%)</td></tr><tr><td>adesse 'to be (present)'</td><td>2 (2,56%)</td></tr><tr><td>exstare 'to stand out'</td><td>2 (2,56%)</td></tr><tr><td>existere 'to appear'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td>habere 'to consider'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td>permanere 'to remain'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td>superesse 'to remain'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td>testari 'to prove'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>1 (1,28%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>78 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>
<table><tr><td rowspan="4">Legal</td><td><i>appare</i> 'to appear'</td><td>20 (40,00%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>esse</i> 'to be'</td><td>20 (40,00%)</td></tr><tr><td><i>adesse</i> 'to be (present)'</td><td>10 (20,00%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><b>50 (100,00%)</b></td></tr></table>

Globally speaking, *esse* 'to be' (41-42) is dominant: it accounts for 71% of all verbs combined with a subject predicate present participle (110 instances out of 154). Most of the remaining verbs are of the intransitive type, and thus occur in active syntactic configurations. This holds for *appare* 'to appear' (40), *adesse* 'to be (present)' (43), *exstare* 'to stand out' (44), *exsistere* 'to appear' (45), *permanere* 'to remain' (46), and *superesse* 'to remain' (47).

(43) [...] *isdem* vero homo [...] *praese-ns* aderat [...]. same.NOM.M.SG but man.NOM.M.SG beollopresent-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG beollopresent.PST.3SG 'But the same man was present.' (Form. Sal. Lind. 19)

(44) [...] *partibus* Aripethi *fave-ns* extitit [...]. region.ABL.F.PL Aripethus.GEN.M.SG favour-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG stand_out.PST.3SG 'He stood favourable to the region of Aripethus.' (Vit. Bonit. 23)

(45) [...] *Victor* dixit: "Semper *sapie-ns* extiti." Victor.NOM.M.SG say.PST.3SG always be_wise.PTCP-PRS.NOM.M.SG appear.PST.3SG 'Victor said: "I always appeared wise."' (Pass. Vict. 1.642.41)

(46) [...] *famulus* dei permansit *ova-ns* atque servant.NOM.M.SG God.GEN.M.SG remain.PST.3SG rejoice-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG and intrepidus. fearless.NOM.M.SG 'The servant of God remained rejoicing and fearless.' (Vit. Pard. 15)

(47) [...] *quae* hactenus [...] *divinis* *polle-ns* REL.NOM.F.SG to_this_time divine.ABL.N.PL be_strong-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG privilegiis nunc superest. privilege.ABL.N.PL now remain.PRS.3SG '(...) who now remains to this time powerful in the laws of God.' (Vit. Sadalb. 11)

The other verbs are transitive verbs used as copular verbs in passive syntactic configurations: *testari* 'to testify' (48), *facere* 'to make' (49), *habere* 'to consider' (50), and *videre* 'to see' (51).<fnref n="14" />

(48) [...] et ipsa *posside-ns* eclesia testatur [...]. and INTENS.NOM.F.SG possess-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG church.NOM.F.SG testify.PRS.3SG 'And the church proves wealthy.' (Vit. Desid. 28)

<footnote n="14">¹⁴ *Testari* 'to testify' is originally a deponent verb. However, in Late Latin it becomes aligned on the model of the regular active verbs, just like other deponent verbs (e.g. *hortari* 'to incite') (cf. Väänänen 1963³: 101, 128; see also fn. 11 in §2.1.1.2.2.1.2).</footnote>
(49) *Factus* *es* **sapie-ns** *sicut Ioseph* [...].
make.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.SG be.PRS. 2SG be_wise-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG like Joseph.NOM.M.SG
‘You are made wise, like Joseph.’ (*Pass. Vict.* 1.643.40)

(50) [...] *ut* [...] **pote-ns** *etiam et vere apostolicus*
that be_able-PTCP.PRS.NOM.F.SG indeed and truly apostolic.NOM.M.SG
*haberetur*.
consider.SBJV.PST.PASS.3SG
‘(...) that he was indeed considered powerful and truly apostolic.’ (Sulp. Sev. *Mart*. 1.7.3)

(51) [...] *videbatur* **sufficie-ns** *et contentus*.
see.PST.PASS.3SG suffice-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG and satisfactory.NOM.M.SG
‘He was considered sufficient and satisfactory.’ (*Vit. Walb.* 2.20.10)

5.3.2.4. Case marking of the present participle

Subject predicate present participles are marked in either the nominative or the accusative (cf. Pinkster 2015: 1181-1184). The forms in (39) to (51) are all marked in the nominative, which is the default case of subjects and their agreeing dependents. By contrast, *absentem* ‘absent’ (52) stands in the accusative, since it is embedded in an accusative and infinitive construction. This is the only type of construction in which subjects and their agreeing dependents are marked in the accusative instead of the nominative.

(52) [...] *ut me* **abse-nt-em** *esse non sentiant* [...].
that I.ACC.M.SG be_absent-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG be.INF.PRS NEG notice.SBJV.PRS.3PL
‘(...) that they do not notice that I am absent.’ (*Vit. Desid.* 34)

In the Late Latin corpus, the use of subject predicate present participles within accusative and infinitive constructions is rare. Hence, the overwhelming majority of the subject predicate present participles are marked in the nominative (Figure 5.3).

<figure><img src="image_38.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.3.** Case marking of the subject predicate present participles in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>
### 5.3.2.5. Conclusion

Present participles are only rarely used in subject predicates, both in Classical and in Late Latin. Their (normalised) absolute frequency slightly increases between these two periods and during the Late Latin period itself, but much less steeply than the (normalised) frequency of the present participle in general. Hence, their proportion to the total number of present participles does not rise, against predictions. From Classical to Late Latin, this proportion even declines, while remaining relatively stable within the period of Late Latin. In other words, the present participle does not specialise in subject predicates, neither in a direct way, nor in an indirect way. Subject predicate present participles resemble adnominal present participles by being more frequent and less productive in legal texts than in historical and religious texts.

## 5.3.3. Object predicate present participles

The final type of adjectival present participles to be investigated are object predicates (e.g. *neclegentem* ‘negligent’ (54)).

(53) [...] in nullo te invenimus neclege-nt-em.

in no.ABL.N.SG you.ACC.M.SG find.PST.1PL neglect-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG

‘In no way do we consider you negligent.’ (Form. Bitur. 4)

This section aims to investigate the frequency of object predicate present participles from Classical Latin to Late Latin (§5.3.3.1) and within the period of Late Latin (§5.3.3.2). Their frequency in the Late Latin corpus will be further explored in view of their frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains (§5.3.3.3). All object predicate present participles stand in the accusative, and so their case marking will not be studied in a separate section.

### 5.3.3.1. Frequency from Classical to Late Latin

Like their subject counterparts, object predicate present participles are extremely rare, in both Classical and Late Latin (Table 5.37). Their (normalised) absolute frequency slightly rises between Classical and Late Latin, but, once again, much less sharply than the frequency of the present participle in general. As a consequence, their proportion to the total number of present participles decreases, contrary to what is expected in view of the competition between the present participle and the gerund. Considering the low frequency of this type of participles, all quantitative results obtained for them need to be interpreted with caution.
<table><caption>**Table 5.37.** Frequency of object predicate present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#object predicate present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#object predicate present participles/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>12 (0.19)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>0,67%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>16 (0.38)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>0,18%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the proportion of object predicate present participles is higher than expected in Classical Latin and lower than expected in Late Latin in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 11.66; df = 1; p = 0.0006$) (Table 5.38).

<table><caption>**Table 5.38.** Observed vs expected proportion of object predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>12 (0,67%)</td><td>5 (0,28%)</td><td>+3.34</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>16 (0,18%)</td><td>23 (0,26%)</td><td>-1.51</td></tr></tbody></table>

This suggest that the declining tendency observed in Table 5.37 might not be accidental. However, given the decrease rate of only 0,49% and the extremely low absolute frequency of object predicate present participles, this decline can hardly be interpreted as reflecting a linguistic change – as in the case of the decline of subject predicate present participles from Classical to Late Latin (see §5.3.2.1). Recall in this regard that statistical significance does not necessarily mean that some trend cannot be random.

### 5.3.3.2. Frequency within the period of Late Latin

Due to their extreme rarity in Late Latin, little can be said about the evolution of object predicate present participle during this period. Table 5.39 shows that the frequency of these forms slightly increases, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of n Late Latin. Though in line with expectations, this increase is too low to be significant.

<table><caption>**Table 5.39.** Frequency of object predicate present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#object predicate present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#object predicate present participles/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>0 (0.00)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>0,00%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>7 (0.37)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>0,19%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>8 (0.47)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>0,21%</td></tr></tbody></table>
This is confirmed by a chi-square goodness-of-fit test. Indeed, it indicates that the proportion of object predicate present participles is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin, but the differences between the three periods are statistically speaking insignificant, and thus most likely random ($\chi^2 = 0.85; df = 2; p = 0.6538$) (Table 5.40).

<table><caption>**Table 5.40.** Observed vs expected proportion of object predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>0 (0,00%)</td><td>1 (0,25%)</td><td>-0.87</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>7 (0,19%)</td><td>7 (0,19%)</td><td>-0.01</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>8 (0,21%)</td><td>7 (0,18%)</td><td>+0.29</td></tr></tbody></table>

The expected frequency of object predicate present participles is smaller than five in Imperial Latin, so that a chi-square goodness-of-fit test is in theory not recommendable (cf. Levshina 2015: 29). However, the conclusion emerging from this test, namely that the increasing frequency of object predicate present participles is random, is highly reliable in the light of the normalised results in Table 5.39.

To conclude, the data of this thesis do not provide evidence in favour of a – direct nor indirect – specialisation of the present participle in object predicates, neither between Classical and Late Latin nor during the Late Latin period. The same conclusion was drawn for their subject predicate counterparts.

### 5.3.3.3. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

Due to their extremely low frequency in the Late Latin corpus, little can also be said about the frequency of object predicate present participles in the three thematic domains. Table 5.41 shows that the frequency of these forms is highest in the historical texts, in (normalised) absolute terms as well as in proportion to the total number of present participles – the qualification *highest* should be relativised here.

<table><caption>**Table 5.41.** Frequency of object predicate present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#subject predicate present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#subject predicate present participles/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>6 (0.77)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>0,32%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>9 (0.36)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>0,16%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>1 (0.10)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>0,08%</td></tr></tbody></table>

Due to their extreme rarity in the three types of texts, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test is less relevant. For the sake of completeness, however, the results of this test are shown in Table 5.42. As expected, the
differences between the three thematic domains are probably random. Indeed, the proportion of object predicate present participles is higher than expected in the historical texts and lower than expected in the religious and legal texts, but in a statistically insignificant way ($\chi^2 = 2.88; df = 2; p = 0.2369$).

<table><caption>**Table 5.42.** Observed vs expected proportion of object predicate present participles to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>6 (0,32%)</td><td>3 (0,16%)</td><td>+1.43</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>9 (0,16%)</td><td>10 (0,17%)</td><td>-0.46</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>1 (0,08%)</td><td>2 (0,17%)</td><td>-0.78</td></tr></tbody></table>

The expected frequency of object predicate present participles is smaller than five in both the historical and the legal texts, so that a chi-square goodness-of-fit test is again not recommendable (cf. Levshina 2015: 29). However, the conclusion drawn on the basis of this test, viz. that the differences between the three thematic domains are random, is highly reliable in the light of the normalised frequencies reported in Table 5.41.

Due to the extreme rarity of object predicate present participles, it is also impossible to draw solid conclusions about their productivity. The productivity of these forms has been measured in terms of the lexical variation between the present participles and the main verbs. As for their subject counterparts, the low frequency of object predicate present participles makes that the absolute number of types and hapaxes is more relevant than the type-token and hapax-token ratios. As shown in Table 5.43, all lexical combinations are unique in the three thematic domains.

<table><caption>**Table 5.43.** Productivity of the object predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>6</td><td>9</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>6</td><td>9</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>6</td><td>9</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The same conclusion arises for the lexical variation of the present participles alone: in the three thematic domains, they are all realised by a different lexeme. Hence, the figures representing the lexical variation of the present participles are identical to those showing the productivity of the object predicate present participle (see Table 5.43).
In contrast, the lexical variation of the transitive main verbs is lowest in the religious texts. Yet, the difference with the historical texts is too small to be significant, especially in view of the low absolute number of instances (Table 5.44).

<table><caption>**Table 5.44.** Lexical variation of the verbs combined with an object predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>6</td><td>9</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>6</td><td>6</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>6</td><td>6</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.67</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.67</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

As it turns out, the religious texts contain only one lexeme occurring more than once, viz. the factitive verb *reddere* ‘to render’ (e.g. (55)), used four times.

(54) [...] voluit se proicere in aqua, sed iterum want.PST.3SG REFL.ACC.M.SG throw.INF.PRS in water.ABL[ACC].F.SG but again consta-nt-em eum reddidit providentia stand_firm-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG DEM.ACC.M.SG render.PST.3SG providence.NOM.F.SG Dei [...]. God.GEN.M.SG

‘He wanted to throw himself in the water, but the divine providence made him steadfast again.’

(Pass. Eustach. 1.10)

Table 5.45 shows the inventory and frequency of the verbs combining with an object predicate present participle in the three thematic domains. Due to their rarity, their frequency is only presented in absolute terms.

<table><caption>**Table 5.45.** Inventory and absolute frequency of the transitive main verbs combined with an object predicate present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of main verb</th><th>Frequency</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="6">Historical</td><td>cognoscere 'to know'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>ferre 'to consider'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>ostendere 'to show'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>relinquere 'to leave'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>respicere 'to consider'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>1</td></tr></tbody></table>
<table><tr><td rowspan="6">Religious</td><td>reddere 'to render'</td><td>4</td></tr><tr><td>facere 'to make'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>habere 'to have'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>ostendere 'to show'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>relinquere 'to leave'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>tradere 'to hand over'</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>invenire 'to consider'</td><td>1</td></tr></table>

From a semantic point of view, the verbs listed in Table 5.44 can be divided into three groups. The first group comprises *facere* ‘to make’ ((5), repeated below) and *reddere* ‘to render’ (e.g. (54)). These verbs indicate that their subject causes the direct object to be in a particular state or circumstance.

(5) [...] *ut ipse me faciat noce-nt-em.*

that INTENS.NOM.M.SG I.ACC.M.SG make.SBJV.PRS.3SG harm-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘(...) that he himself can make me harmful.’ (Pass. Caec. 1.29.21)

The second group of verbs is composed of *cognoscere* ‘to know’ (55), *ferre* ‘to consider’ (56), *invenire* ‘to consider’ (57), *respicere* ‘to consider’ (58), *videre* ‘to see’ (59), and *ostendere* ‘to show’ (60). They all indicate how the subject perceives or conceives of the direct object.

(55) [...] *quem cognoverat sanctam relegationem secta-nt-em* [...].<fnref n="15" />

REL.ACC.M.SG know.PST.3SG holy.ACC.F.SG religion.ACC.F.SG pursue-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘(...) whom he had known as pursuing of the holy religion.’ (Fredeg. *chron*. 4.78)

(56) *Illum ferebat levm, alium superbum,*
DEM.ACC.M.SG consider.PST.3SG capricious.ACC.M.SG other.ACC.M.SG arrogant.ACC.M.SG
*illum habunda-nt-em* [...].
DEM.ACC.M.SG be_rich-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘He considers this one capricious, that one arrogant, yet another one extravagant.’ (Greg. Tur. *Franc*. 6.46)

(57) [...] *in nullo te invenimus neclege-nt-em.*
in no.ABL.N.SG you.ACC.M.SG find.PST.1PL neglect-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘In no way do we consider you negligent.’ (Form. *Bitur*. 4) [=53]

(58) [...] *dum me dole-nt-em atque illum* as_long_as I.ACC.M.SG grieve-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG and DEM.ACC.M.SG *innocentem respicitis* [...].
innocent.ACC.M.SG consider.PRS.2PL
‘As long as you consider me grieving and him innocent.’ (Epist. Austr. 44)

<footnote n="15">¹⁵ This example clearly shows that even object predicate present participles can have verbal internal syntax. The analysis of *sectantem* ‘pursuing’ as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction is unlikely here, since *sanctam relegationem* *sectantem* ‘pursuing the holy religion’ denotes a property of the direct object of *cognoverat* ‘he had known’ rather than a state of affairs presented as ongoing. Moreover, *cognoverat* ‘he had known’ is used as a cognitive rather than a perception verb.</footnote>
(59) *Qui cum eam vidissent pulchram, elegantem atque*
*REL.NOM.M.PL when DEM.ACC.F.SG see.SBJV.PST.3PL pretty.ACC.F.SG elegant.ACC.F.SG and*
* sapie-nt-em, Chlodoveo nunciaverunt haec.<fnref n="16" />*
*be_wise-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.SG Chlodoveus.DAT.M.SG report.PST.3PL DEM.ACC.N.PL*
*'As they found her pretty, elegant, and wise, they reported this to Chlodoveus.'* (*Hist. Franc.* 11)

(60) *Sententia [...] vos saevie-nt-es et nos*
*judgment.NOM.F.SG you.ACC.M.PL rage-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL and we.ACC.M.PL*
*innocentes ostendit.*
*innocent.ACC.M.PL show.PRS.3SG*
*'The judgment shows you ferocious and us innocent.'* (*Pass. Caec.* 1.29.5)

The final group of verbs comprise *relinquere* ‘to leave’ (61), *tradere* ‘to hand over’ (62), and *habere* ‘to have’ (63). They indicate that the direct object is involved in some state of affairs in a particular state or circumstance.

(61) [*...*non ibi maiorem hominem **vive-nt-em** reliquit [*...*].
NEG there older.ACC.M.SG man.ACC.M.SG live-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG leave.PST.3SG
‘He did not leave there any old man alive.’ (*Hist. Franc.* 41)

(62) *Fuit vir [...] quem reverentia paternalis*
*be.PST.3SG man.NOM.M.SG REL.ACC.M.SG reverence.NOM.F.SG paternal.NOM.F.SG*
* nobis tradidit Gallum nuncupa-nt-e.*
*we.DAT.M.PL hand_down.PST.3SG Gallus.ACC.M.SG call-PTCP.PRS-ABL[ACC].M.SG*
*'There was a man whom the paternal reverence handed down to us with the name Gallus.'* (*Vit. Gall. Wett.* 1.1)

(63) *Ille, ne contristare eos videretur, quos potius*
*DEM.NOM.M.SG lest sadden.INF.PRS DEM.ACC.M.PL see.SBJV.PST.PASS.3SG REL.ACC.M.PL rather*
* ova-nt-es habere cupiebat [*...*].
*rejoice-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL have.INF.PRS want.PST.3SG*
*'In order not to appear to sadden those whom he wanted to have rather rejoicing (...).'* (*Vit. Austr.* 1.2)

### 5.3.3.4. Conclusion

Unlike adjunct and adnominal present participles, but like subject predicate present participles, object predicate present participles represent a very small or even negligible proportion of the total number of present participles in both Classical and Late Latin. Against expectations, this proportion drops between

<footnote n="16">¹⁶ In this example, *sapientem* ‘wise’ could also be analysed as the subject predicate of *eam* ‘her’ in an accusative and infinitive construction, the infinitive *esse* ‘to be’ being implicit. However, the postulation of an implicit *esse* ‘to be’ is not necessary in order for the sentence to be grammatical or interpretable, and hence *sapientem* ‘wise’ has been taken as an object predicate. Anyhow, this analysis does not influence the quantitative results for either subject or object present participles.</footnote>
these two periods and remains relatively stable during the Late Latin period. Their (normalised) absolute frequency rises between Classical and Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin, but less steeply than the frequency of the present participle in general and also too slightly to be significant. Hence, the present participle does not specialise in object predicates in the Late Latin period, neither directly, nor indirectly. The frequency and productivity of object predicate present participles do not show significant variation in the three thematic domains, contrary to what has been observed for adjunct, adnominal, and subject predicate present participles. However, the extreme rarity of object predicate present participles in the Late Latin corpus calls for some vigilance in evaluating this result.

### 5.3.4. General conclusion: the evolution of the adjectival present participle

The previous sections have explored the frequency of adnominal, subject predicate, and object predicate present participles from Classical to Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin separately. The aim of this section is to collate the results obtained in §5.3.1 to §5.3.3, in order to examine the evolution of the adjectival present participle as a whole.

Table 5.46 shows that the (normalised) absolute frequency of adjectival present participles rises between Classical and Late Latin. However, this increase is less steep than the frequency rise of present participles in general. As a corollary, the proportion of adjectival present participles decreases between the two periods, against predictions.

<table><caption>**Table 5.46.** Frequency of adjectival present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#adjectival present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#adjectival present participles/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>722 (11.55)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>40,43%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>1 843 (43.27)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>20,98%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, this decline might not be random. Indeed, the proportion of adjectival present participles is higher than expected in Classical Latin and lower than expected in Late Latin in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 230.53$; df = 1; p < 0.0001) (Table 5.47).

<table><caption>**Table 5.47.** Observed vs expected proportion of adjectival present participles to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>722 (40,43%)</td><td>433 (24,24%)</td><td>+13.87</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>1 843 (20,98%)</td><td>2 132 (24,27%)</td><td>-6.25</td></tr></tbody></table>
Put differently, the data of this study do not show a specialisation of the present participle in adjectival external syntax, but, on the contrary, a disassociation from this syntax. The question that arises is how to account for this unexpected decline of adjectival instances. The answer lies in the frequency pattern of the adverbial present participle, as noted with respect to the decrease of adnominal present participles separately (see §5.3.1.1). Indeed, the declining proportion of adjectival present participles contrasts with what is predicted by the competition of the present participle with the gerund, but is in line with what is expected in view of the rising proportion of adverbial present participles (see §5.2.1). Since the corpus of this study does not provide evidence in favour of the gradual replacement of the present participle by the gerund in adverbial external syntax, and thus of the disassociation of the present participle from this syntax, it is only logical that this same corpus does not show a specialisation of the present participle in adjectival external syntax. After all, this specialisation of this form in adjectival syntactic configurations is primarily considered the indirect result of a declining portion of adverbial present participles. Hence, this specialisation does not obtain if the proportion of adverbial present participle gains instead of drops. Some factors explaining the unexpected increase of adverbial present participles from Classical to Late Latin have been discussed in §5.2.1 (see also §5.8).

The decline instead of rise of adjectival present participles between Classical and Late Latin is all the more significant in the light of the broad definition of the present participle adopted in this study. In a narrower definition, some adjectival present participles would be considered adjectives, and would as such be excluded from the dataset. Therefore, the proportion of adjectival present participles would even be lower. As a corollary, the specialisation of the present participle in adjectival external syntax would be disproven in an even more pronounced way.

Additionally, the finding that the present participle has adjectival external syntax in only 21% of all instances in Late Latin, while in most Old Romance languages, it always has an adjectival function (or is occasionally used in a progressive construction), confirms the conclusion drawn with respect to the adverbial present participle, namely that there is a huge gap between the use of the present participle in Late Latin, at least in the written texts transmitted to us, and in Romance.

Within the period of Late Latin, the frequency of adjectival present participles increases, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.48). However, their absolute frequency rises much less sharply than the frequency of the present participle in general. Hence, the rate of their increasing proportion is very modest.
<table><caption>**Table 5.48.** Frequency of adjectival present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#adjectival present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#adjectival present parti-<br>ciples/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>74 (24.66)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>18,23%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>695 (37.08)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>18,58%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>826 (48.31)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>21,51%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test shows that the proportion of adjectival present participles is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin in a statistically significant way ($\chi^2 = 8.81; df = 2; p = 0.0122$) (Table 5.49). However, none of these periods makes a significant contribution to the obtained chi-square values on its own. Therefore, the increasing proportion of adjectival present participles observed in Table 5.48 is probably random.

<table><caption>**Table 5.49.** Observed vs expected proportion of adjectival present participles to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>74 (18,23%)</td><td>81 (19,95%)</td><td>-0.79</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>695 (18,58%)</td><td>747 (19,97%)</td><td>-1.91</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>826 (21,51%)</td><td>767 (19,97%)</td><td>+2.14</td></tr></tbody></table>

In other words, the data of this study neither provide evidence in favour of a specialisation of the present participle in adjectival external syntax within the period of Late Latin.

What the data of this study do show is that the frequency of adjectival present participles is much higher in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts (Table 5.50). This holds for both their (normalised) absolute frequency and their proportion to the total number of present participles. The same tendency was observed for the nominal gerund (see §4.2.4).

<table><caption>**Table 5.50.** Frequency of adjectival present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic<br>domain</th><th>#adjectival present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#adjectival present participles/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>248 (31.74)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>13,41%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>898 (36.24)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>15,61%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>697 (69.69)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>58,92%</td></tr></tbody></table>

Not unsurprisingly, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggests that this difference between the legal texts, on the one hand, and the historical and religious texts, on the other, is not random. Indeed, the proportion of adjectival present participles is lower than expected in the historical and religious texts and higher
than expected in the legal texts in a statistically highly significant way (χ² = 941.19; df = 2; p < 0.0001)
(Table 5.51).

<table><caption>**Table 5.51.** Observed *vs* expected proportion of adjectival present participles to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>248 (13,41%)</td><td>388 (20,98%)</td><td>-7.10</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>898 (15,61%)</td><td>1 207 (20,98%)</td><td>-8.89</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>697 (58,92%)</td><td>248 (20,96%)</td><td>+28.49</td></tr></tbody></table>

Noteworthy, this difference in frequency is related to a difference in use, *i.e.* in productivity. Indeed, the productivity of the adjectival present participle is usually lower in the legal texts than in the historical and religious texts. This conclusion was also drawn in the case of the nominal gerund (see §4.2.4). I will return to this issue in §5.5, when discussing the external syntactic profile of the present participle.

## 5.4. The verbal present participle

Having explored the evolution of the adverbial and the adjectival present participle, I will investigate in this section the evolution of the verbal present participle. This participle can be used in three ways: (i) as the main verb of a progressive construction, like *admirans* ‘admiring’ and *cernens* ‘contemplating’ (64); (ii) as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction (e.g. *exorantem* ‘praying’ (65)); or (iii) as a syntactically finite verb (e.g. *veniens* ‘coming’ (66)).

(64) Et statim aperti sunt oculi eius et and immediately open.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.SG be.PRS.3PL eye.NOM.M.PL his.GEN.M.SG and *erat* *admira-ns* *cerne-ns=que* be.PST.3SG admire-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG contemplate-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG=and *magnalia* *Dei* [...]. mighty_work.ACC.N.PL God.GEN.M.SG ‘And immediately his eyes opened, and he was admiring and contemplating the mighty works of God.’ (Greg. Tur. *Franc.* 6.6)
(65) [...] milites
soldier.NOM.M.PL
fluvium
river.ACC.N.SG
[...] invenerunt
find.PST.3PL
dominum
Lord.ACC.M.SG
Christi
Christ.GEN.M.SG
exora-nt-em.<fnref n="17" />
pray-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
athletam
servant.ACC.M.SG
Vitum
Vitus.ACC.M.SG
circa
near

(66) Qui venie-ns in aecclesiam et nihil in
REL.NOM.M.SG come-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG to church.ACC.F.SG and nothing.ACC.N.SG in
eam invenit [...].
DEM.ACC[ABL].F.SG find.PST.3SG

'He came to church and found nothing in it.' (Vit. Wandr. 19)

Not all verbal present participles compete with gerunds. Indeed, only the ones occurring in a progressive construction are part of this competition. However, the predicted evolution of these forms from Classical to Late Latin is less rectilinear than that of the adverbial and adjectival present participles (see below). Regarding the two other types of verbal present participles, though they do not compete with the gerund, some hypotheses about their evolution can be formulated. Given the lack of a unified hypothesis about the evolution of the verbal present participle in general, the hypotheses about the evolution of the three sub-types will be presented separately. This section will examine first the forms occurring in progressive constructions (§5.4.1), then those used in a presentative progressive construction (§5.4.2), and finally the ones used syntactically as finite verbs (§5.4.3). A conclusion will be drawn in §5.4.4.

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

Progressive present participle constructions are extremely rare in Classical Latin, though they are found from the earliest texts onward, especially in substandard varieties (Aalto 1949: 75; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 388; Pinkster 2015: 544-545). They become more frequent only in Late Latin, according to some authors from the 3rd c. onward (Eklund 1970: 74; Pinkster 1998: 230), but according to others only from Merovingian Latin onward (Haverling 2010: 496). Their increasing frequency in Late Latin has been claimed to be strongly influenced by Biblical Greek (Haverling 2010: 492-495), although some scholars hold that the influence of Biblical Greek should not be overestimated (Amenta 2003: 146-148; Haverling

<footnote n="17">¹⁷ It is worth stressing that verbs like *invenire* ‘to find’ can be combined with three types of present participles depending on their (primary) semantic value. Used as cognitive verbs, they combine with an object predicate present participle (e.g. (57)). The present participle expresses in this case a property of the object or, to be more precise, how this object is conceived of by the subject. Used as perception verbs, on the contrary, they combine with either an adjunct present participle or with a present participle serving as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction (see the discussion in §1.3.2.2.6). In the former case, the visual or auditory perception of the direct object is more important than the state of affairs performed by this object. In the latter case, in contrast, the state of affairs carried out by this object prevails over its being perceived. Used in a presentative progressive construction (e.g. (65)), the sensory value of the perception verb is backgrounded in favour of a grammatical value, consisting of introducing the state of affairs denoted by the present participle as new information, *viz.* as a thetic information unit.</footnote>
2010: 495-496). In any case, even in Late Latin, the progressive present participle construction does not become highly frequent. Hence, it is ascribed the status of an exploratory ‘forerunner’ (Bertinetto et al. 2000: 538) or ‘precursor’ (Bertinetto 2000: 563) of the Romance progressive construction, i.e. a kind of ‘experimental substitute’ of synthetic imperfect tense verb forms (Pinkster 1998: 234; Haverling 2010: 492-493). Furthermore, the present participle is argued to be increasingly replaced by the gerund in this construction (Lyer 1934: 169; Aalto 1949: 75; Dietrich 1973: 305, 307; Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 380). However, this substitution process is not absolute, since some Old Romance languages show occasional instances of progressive present participle constructions (see §2.1.2.2.2.3.1).

In view of these evolutions, the frequency of present participles used in progressive constructions is expected to be lower in Classical than in Late Latin in absolute terms, but not necessarily in proportion to the total number of present participles. No hypothesis can be formulated about their frequency pattern within the period of Late Latin, since there is a conflict between two trends: an increasing frequency due to the influence of Biblical Greek and a decreasing frequency due to the generalisation of the gerund at the expense of the present participle. Given the influence of Biblical Greek, the present participles used in a progressive construction in Late Latin are expected to be more frequent in religious than in historical and legal texts.

Due to the absence of progressive gerund constructions in the Late Latin corpus (see §4.4), there is no evidence in favour of the expansion of these constructions at the cost of their present participle competitors. Consequently, the Late Latin corpus is nonetheless expected to show a rising frequency of progressive present participle constructions, both from Classical to Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin – at least in absolute terms.

The aim of this section is to investigate the frequency of the present participles in issue between Classical and Late Latin (§5.4.1.1) and during the Late Latin period itself (§5.4.1.2). The frequency of the Late Latin instances will be further evaluated in the light of their frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains, in order to examine whether they are indeed more frequent in religious than in other types of texts (§5.4.1.3). The productivity study of the progressive present participle construction will also examine the inventory of the verbs used as grammatical markers of the progressive aspect. As to the case marking of the present participles, they are either in the nominative (64) or, when embedded in an accusative and infinitive construction, in the accusative (Vangaever 2019: 253). In the Late Latin corpus, however, no progressive present participle constructions have been found within an accusative and infinitive construction. Hence, all participles concerned are in the nominative. For this reason, their case marking will not be investigated in a separate section.
### 5.4.1.1. Frequency from Classical to Late Latin

Like subject and object predicate present participles, present participles functioning as the main verb of a progressive construction are extremely rare in both Classical and Late Latin (Table 5.52). In accord with predictions, their frequency increases between these two periods, in (normalised) absolute terms as well as in relation to the total number of present participles. However, the increase rate of both frequency measurements is extremely modest.

<table><caption>**Table 5.52.** Frequency of present participles used in a progressive construction in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>progressive construction<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>progressive construction/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>2 (0.03)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>0,11%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>59 (1.39)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>0,67%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the increasing proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction might nonetheless not be random. Indeed, this portion is lower than expected in Classical Latin and higher than expected in Late Latin in a statistically very significant way ($\chi^2 = 7.11$; df = 1; p = 0.0077) (Table 5.53).

<table><caption>**Table 5.53.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>2 (0,11%)</td><td>10 (0,56%)</td><td>-2.59</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>59 (0,67%)</td><td>51 (0,58%)</td><td>+1.17</td></tr></tbody></table>

Although this rise is in line with what is predicted by, e.g., Eklund (1970: 74), Pinkster (1998: 230), and Haverling (2010: 496), the increase rate of only 0,56% and the extremely low absolute number of forms in question disallows interpreting the rising proportion as linguistically significant, that is, as reflecting an ongoing linguistic change. Rather, the progressive present participle construction appears indeed as an exploratory construction (cf. Pinkster 1998: 234; Bertinetto 2000: 563; Bertinetto et al. 2000: 538; Haverling 2010: 492-493).

### 5.4.1.2. Frequency within the period of Late Latin

A similar conclusion can be drawn for the period of Late Latin alone: the frequency of present participles used in a progressive construction rises, in accord with expectations, but only in a very slight way (Table
5.54). This frequency increase holds for both the (normalised) absolute frequency of the forms involved and for their proportion to the total number of present participles.

<table><caption>**Table 5.54.** Frequency of present participles used in a progressive construction in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#present participles used<br>in a progressive construction<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>progressive construction/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>2 (0.67)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>0,49%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>19 (1.01)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>0,51%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>30 (1.75)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>0,78%</td></tr></tbody></table>

Given the smallness of the increase rate of both frequency measurements, it comes as no surprise that a chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggests the rising proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction is probably random: this proportion is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin, but the differences between the three periods are statistically insignificant ($\chi^2 = 2.36; df = 2; p = 0.3073$) (Table 5.55).

<table><caption>**Table 5.55.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>2 (0,49%)</td><td>3 (0,74%)</td><td>-0.73</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>19 (0,51%)</td><td>24 (0,64%)</td><td>-1.88</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>30 (0,78%)</td><td>25 (0,65%)</td><td>+2.10</td></tr></tbody></table>

Since the expected frequency of present participles in progressive constructions is smaller than five in Imperial Latin, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test is in principle not recommendable (Levshina 2015: 29). Nevertheless, the conclusion that the increasing trend observed in Table 5.54 does not reflect a linguistic change is reliable in view of the normalised frequencies in this table. This further suggests that, in Late Latin, the progressive present participle construction has the status of an exploratory construction.

### 5.4.1.3. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

As expected in the light of the hypothesised influence of Biblical Greek, Late Latin progressive present participle constructions are most frequent in the religious texts, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.56). However, the difference between
the religious texts, on the one hand, and the historical and legal texts, on the other, is not enormous – this is not surprising given the overall rareness of this type of participles.

<table><caption>**Table 5.56.** Frequency of present participles used in a progressive construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#present participles used in a progressive construction (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a progressive construction/ #present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>7 (0.90)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>0,37%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>49 (1.98)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>0,85%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>3 (0.30)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>0,25%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test shows that the proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction is lower than expected in the historical and legal texts and higher than expected in the religious texts in a statistically significant way, but none of these thematic domains makes a significant contribution to the obtained chi-square values ($\chi^2 = 8.22; df = 2; p = 0.0164$) (Table 5.57).

<table><caption>**Table 5.57.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a progressive construction to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>7 (0,37%)</td><td>12 (0,65%)</td><td>-1.54</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>49 (0,85%)</td><td>39 (0,68%)</td><td>+1.67</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>3 (0,25%)</td><td>8 (0,68%)</td><td>-1.76</td></tr></tbody></table>

Hence, the difference between the religious texts, on the one hand, and the historical and religious texts, on the other, might be random. Although the low frequency of these forms does not allow drawing firm conclusions, this result confirms the claim made by Amenta (2003: 146-148) and repeated by Haverling (2010: 495-496) that Biblical Greek certainly had an influence on the use of the present participle as the main verb of a progressive construction in Late Latin, but that this influence should not be overestimated. After all, the absolute number of this type of present participles is very low even in the religious texts: 49 instances on a total number of 5 753 present participles (i.e. 0,85%) and 247 763 words (i.e. 2 forms per 10 000 words) (see Table 5.56).

The frequency of the Late Latin progressive present participle construction will now be further examined in terms of its productivity, measured in function of the lexical variation between the present participles and the verbs used as grammatical markers of the progressive aspect (hence ‘auxiliaries’). Although no solid conclusions can be drawn from the study of its productivity due to its low absolute number of occurrences, the progressive present participle construction is more or less equally productive in the three thematic domains (Table 5.58). The lower type-token and hapax-token ratios in the religious
texts are insignificant because of the disequilibrium of the absolute number of instances in these texts and in the historical and legal texts.

<table><caption>**Table 5.58.** Productivity of the progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>7</td><td>49</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>7</td><td>45</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>7</td><td>41</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.92</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.84</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

In other words, the progressive present participle construction is more or less equally schematic in the three thematic domains. Table 5.58 also shows that the historical and legal texts contain no combinations occurring more than once. By contrast, the religious texts contain four combinations occurring twice: *esse* ‘to be’/*agere* ‘to do’, *esse* ‘to be’/*egredi* ‘to exit’, *esse* ‘to be’/*laudare* ‘to praise’, and *esse* ‘to be’/*custodire* ‘to guard’. The latter is exemplified in (67).

(67) *Erant autem custodie-nt-es eosdem beatissimos be.PST.3PL but guard-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL same.ACC.M.PL very_blessed.ACC.M.PL apostolos milites multi [...]. apostle.ACC.M.PL soldier.NOM.M.PL many.NOM.M.PL

‘But many soldiers were guarding these same very blessed apostles.’ (Pass. Proc. 1.3.2)

Like the productivity of the progressive present participle construction in general, the lexical variation of the present participles alone is similar in the three thematic domains (Table 5.59).

<table><caption>**Table 5.59.** Lexical variation of the present participles used in a progressive construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>7</td><td>49</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>7</td><td>43</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>7</td><td>38</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.88</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td><td><strong>0.78</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

All lexemes in the historical and legal texts are hapaxes. Those occurring more than once in the religious texts are *laudare* ‘to praise’ (n=3), *agere* ‘to do’ (n=2), *custodire* ‘to guard’ (n=2), *dicere* ‘to say’ (n=2), and *egredi* ‘to exit’ (n=2). The first of these is illustrated in (68).
<table><tr><td>(68)</td><td>[...] pauperum</td><td>voces</td><td>[...] lauda-nt-es</td><td>erant</td><td>dominum</td><td>[...].</td></tr><tr><td></td><td>poor.GEN.M.PL</td><td>voice.NOM.F.PL</td><td>praise-PTCP.PRS-NOM.F.PL</td><td>be.PST.3PL</td><td>Lord.ACC.M.SG</td><td></td></tr><tr><td colspan="7">'The voices of the poor were praising the Lord.' (Vit. Aud. 19)</td></tr></table>

Since the auxiliaries primarily serve a grammatical function, their lexical variation is smaller than that of the present participles. In the Late Latin corpus, the auxiliaries show a minimal variation in the legal texts (2 types). This variation is slightly higher in the historical texts (3 types) and highest in the religious texts (5 types), although it remains low even in this latter type of texts. In Table 5.60, these absolute numbers are more relevant than the type-token and hapax-token ratios.

<table><caption>**Table 5.60.** Lexical variation of the auxiliaries used in a progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>7</td><td>49</td><td>3</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>3</td><td>5</td><td>2</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>2</td><td>1</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.43</strong></td><td><strong>0.10</strong></td><td><strong>0.67</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.29</strong></td><td><strong>0.02</strong></td><td><strong>0.33</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The inventory and frequency of the auxiliaries in the three types of texts are presented in Table 5.61.

<table><caption>**Table 5.61.** Inventory and frequency of the auxiliaries used in a progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of auxiliary</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="4">Historical</td><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>5 (71,43%)</td></tr><tr><td>permanere 'to remain'</td><td>1 (14,29%)</td></tr><tr><td>sedere 'to sit'</td><td>1 (14,29%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>7 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="6">Religious</td><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>33 (67,35%)</td></tr><tr><td>stare 'to stand'</td><td>10 (20,41%)</td></tr><tr><td>ire 'to go'</td><td>3 (6,12%)</td></tr><tr><td>sedere 'to sit'</td><td>2 (4,08%)</td></tr><tr><td>assistere 'to stand near'</td><td>1 (2,04%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>49 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="3">Legal</td><td>astare 'to stand near'</td><td>2 (66,67%)</td></tr><tr><td>esse 'to be'</td><td>1 (33,33%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>3 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>
The Late Latin corpus contains the three types of verbs capable of acting as the auxiliary of a progressive present participle construction: *esse* ‘to be’, posture verbs, and motion verbs. *Esse* ‘to be’ (69) prevails: it accounts for 66% of all auxiliaries (39 instances out of 59). The motion verbs are lexically restricted to *ire* ‘to go’ (70), while the posture verbs comprise five lexemes: *stare* ‘to stand’ (71), *permanere* ‘to remain’ (72), *sedere* ‘to sit’ (73), *assistere* ‘to stand near’ (74), and *astare* ‘to stand near’ (75).

(69) Deus erat in Christo mundum reconcilia-ns
God.NOM.M.SG be.PST.3SG in Christ.ABL.M.SG world.ACC.M.SG conciliate-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG
sibi?
REFL.DAT.M.SG

‘Was God conciliating the world for himself in the body of Christ? (Epist. Merov. 1)

(70) [...] reliquit uxorem suam et accipiens duos
leave.PST.3SG wife.ACC.F.SG his.ACC.F.SG and take.PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG two.ACC.M.PL
infantes suos ibat ingemesce-ns et
child.ACC.M.PL his.ACC.M.PL go.PST.3SG sigh-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG and
dice-ns [...].
say-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG

‘He left his wife and after he took his two children he went sighing and saying (...).’ (Pass. Eustach. 1.10)

(71) Et diacono dicente singulorum nomina semper
and deacon.ABL.M.SG say.PTCP.PRS.ABL.M.SG each.GEN.M.PL name.ACC.N.PL always
pisinni plurimi stant responde-nt-es semper [...].
child.NOM.M.PL many.NOM.M.PL stand.PRS.3PL anwer-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.SG always
‘And always as the deacon says the names of each (of them), many children are always answering (...).’
(Peregr. Aeth. 24.6)

(72) Si enim permanserit turbas facie-ns et sediciones
if for remain.SBJV.PST.3SG uproar.ACC.F.PL make-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG and rebellion.ACC.F.PL
aecclesie [...].
church.GEN.F.SG

‘For if he continued to cause uproar and rebellions against the church (...).’ (Epist. Merov. 6)

(73) Fabricabat in usu regis utensilia [...] ex auro
fabricate.PST.3SG in use.ABL[ACC].M.SG king.GEN.M.SG utensil.ACC.N.PL from gold.ABL.N.SG
et gemmis. Sedebat fabrica-ns in defossum [...].
and gems.ABL.F.PL sit.PST.3SG fabricate-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG in digging_hole.ACC[ABL].N.SG
‘He fabricated utensils out of gold and gems for the use of the king. He was fabricating (them) in a
digging hole.’ (Vit. Elig. 1.10)
(74) [...] *ait* *ad fratres*, *qui* *undique* *adsistebant*
say.PST.3SG to brother.ACC.M.PL REL.NOM.M.PL from_every_side stand_near.PST.3PL
*ministra-nt-es* *ei* [...].
serve-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL DEM.DAT.M.SG

'He said to the brethren, who were serving him from every side (...).' (Vit. Pard. 21)

(75) [...] *ut* [...] *ex* *hoc* *in nostri* *presentia* *debuissent*
that because_of DEM.ABL.N.SG in our.GEN.M.SG presence.ABL.F.SG must.SBJV.PST.3PL
*adstare* *causa-nt-es*.
stand_near.INF.PRS litigate-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL

'(...) that they should litigate because of this in our presence.' (Form. Marc. 1.37)

It is worth recalling that the lexical meaning of the posture and motion verbs often co-exists with their grammatical meaning, which consists of presenting the state of affairs denoted by the present participle as ongoing (see §1.3.2.2.5, §2.2.2.2.3.1, but especially §3.5.4). For instance, the subject of *fabricans* 'fabricating' (73) is actually sitting while fabricating utensils for the king, as is evident from the sentence following the passage in (73), namely *sedens ergo Eligius ad opus praedictum* 'so, as Eligius was sitting near the aforesaid construction site (...)'. However, what matters most in (73) is that Eligius has been fabricating utensils for quite some time. As such, the lexical meaning of *sedebat* 'he sat' is contextually backgrounded in favour of its grammatical meaning (cf. Heine 2002: 86). Thus, the analysis of *fabricans* 'he was fabricating' as the main verb of a progressive construction is more likely than as the head of an adjunct clause specifying the circumstances accompanying the state of affairs denoted by *sedebat* 'he sat', in which analysis it functions a full lexical posture verb.

### 5.4.1.4. Conclusion

In line with its status as an exploratory forerunner of the Romance progressive construction (cf. Pinkster 1998: 234; Bertinetto 2000: 563; Bertinetto et al. 2000: 538; Haverling 2010: 492-493), the progressive present participle construction is infrequent in both Classical and Late Latin. Its frequency slightly rises between these two periods and during the Late Latin period, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles, but only in a very slight and insignificant way. In the Late Latin corpus, progressive present participle constructions are more frequent in religious than in historical and legal texts, but the difference between the two groups of texts is statistically speaking not significant. This confirms Amenta's (2003: 146-148) claim that the influence exerted by Biblical Greek on this use of the present participle in Late Latin should not be overestimated. The progressive present participle construction is more or less equally schematic in the three thematic domains, even though its extreme rareness in the Late Latin corpus does not allow drawing a firm conclusion from its productivity
study. The auxiliary is most often realised by *esse* ‘to be’, but it can also be instantiated by a posture or motion verb.

### 5.4.2. Present participles used in a presentative progressive construction

The next type of verbal present participles to be discussed function as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction. In this construction, a present participle is combined with a NP and one of the following items: (i) a third person form of *habere* ‘to have’ (76); the presentative *ecce* ‘behold’ (77); or (iii) a verb of sensory perception, like *audi* ‘hear’ (78) (see §1.3.2.2.6).<fnref n="18" />

(76) *Habebat itaque in cubiculo suo multa sanctorum*
have.PST.3SG and so in room.ABL.N.SG his.ABL.N.SG many.ACC.N.PL saint.GEN.M.PL
*depende-nt-ia pignora [...]*
hang-PTCP.PRS-ACC.N.PL symbol.ACC.N.PL
‘And so, in his room there hang many symbols of saints.’ (Vit. Elig. 1.12)

(77) *Cum ibidem prestolaretur adversarii adventum, ecce!*
when there wait.SBJV.PST.3SG adversary.GEN.M.SG arrival.ACC.M.SG behold
*venie-ns quidam ex ministris Betheleni.*
come_PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG INDF.NOM.M.SG from servant.ABL.M.PL Bethelnus.GEN.M.SG
‘When he waited there for the arrival of his adversary, behold, there came some servant of Bethelnus.’
(Vit. Austr. 1.4)

(78) [...]*apertius audi apostholum protesta-nt-em* [...].
more_openly hear.IMP.PRS.2SG apostle.ACC.M.SG protest-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
‘Hear the apostle protesting more openly: “(...)”.’ (Epist. Merov. 1)

As mentioned in §1.3.2.2.6, the lexical meaning of the perception verbs is typically backgrounded in favour of a grammatical meaning. The latter consists of presenting the state of affairs designated by the present participle as all-new, that is to say, as a thetic information unit. Besides their persistent lexical meaning and their grammatical function, the perception verbs also have an evidential value, since they express the source of information expressed by the present participle (Greco 2013: 179-180; Zheltova 2017: 317-319). As to the present participles, they denote a durative state of affairs, *i.e.* a state of affairs presented in its ongoing duration.

In this construction, the present participle does not compete with the gerund. Nonetheless, some hypotheses about the evolution of these participles can be formulated. Of particular interest is Greco’s

<footnote n="18">¹⁸ The few instances of presentative progressive constructions with *habere* ‘to have’ are in fact ambiguous. Indeed, *habere* ‘to have’ cannot only be interpreted in an impersonal way, used with a presentative function, but also in a personal way, used with a possessive meaning. However, the possessive meaning of *habere* ‘to have’ seems backgrounded in favour of its grammatical function, which consists of introducing the state of affairs denoted by the present participle and the accompanying NP as new information. In any case, the low frequency of these constructions (n=5) does not impact the quantitative results.</footnote>
(2013: 185) claim that they are more frequent between the 4th and the 6th c. than in earlier stages of the language. Therefore, the frequency of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction is expected to be lower in the Classical than in the Late Latin corpus – the latter covering in this thesis the period between the 4th and the 10th c. –, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles.<fnref n="19" /> Furthermore, Greco (2013: 185) states that the high number of present participles used in this construction between the 4th c. and the 6th c. is partly due to the influence of Biblical Greek. Hence, the absolute and relative frequency of these forms in the Late Latin corpus is expected to be higher in the religious texts than in the historical and legal texts.

The aim of this section is to examine these hypotheses. I will first investigate the frequency of the participles in issue from Classical to Late Latin (§5.4.2.1) and within the period of Late Latin (§5.4.2.2). Then, I will explore their frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains (§5.4.2.3). This latter section will also explore the inventory of the items acting as presentative markers. The analysis of this type of present participles will be concluded by the study of their morphological marking (§5.4.2.4).

### 5.4.2.1. Frequency from Classical to Late Latin

Both in Classical and in Late Latin, present participles occur more frequently in presentative progressive constructions than in progressive constructions. Yet, they do not have a high frequency in either period, neither in (normalised) absolute terms, nor in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.62). The frequency of this type of present participles rises between the two periods according to both measurements, but the increase rate is very slight. Their rising absolute frequency is moreover to be seen within the light of a much more steeply rising frequency of present participles in general.

<table><caption>**Table 5.62.** Frequency of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>presentative progressive con-<br>struction (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>presentative progressive con-<br>struction/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>37 (0.59)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>2,07%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>217 (5.10)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>2,47%</td></tr></tbody></table>

The rising proportion of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction is probably random. Indeed, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggests that this proportion is lower than expected in

<footnote n="19">¹⁹ The frequencies reported in Greco (2013) are absolute and not normalised. Hence, his claim about the frequency of present participles used in presentative progressive constructions is subject to caution, as he admits himself (Greco 2013: 183, fn. 29).</footnote>
Classical Latin and higher than expected in Late Latin in a statistically insignificant way ($\chi^2 = 0.82$; df = 1; p = 0.3652) (Table 5.63).

<table><caption>**Table 5.63.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>37 (2,07%)</td><td>43 (0,56%)</td><td>-0.90</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>217 (2,47%)</td><td>211 (0,58%)</td><td>+0.41</td></tr></tbody></table>

This result is at odds with the prediction made on the basis of Greco's (2013: 185) claim, namely that the frequency of these participles forms is higher between the 4th and the 6th c. than in earlier stages of the language. Such a frequency difference has been observed, both in absolute and in relative terms, but, it is most likely due to chance.

### 5.4.2.2. Frequency within the period of Late Latin

Within the period of Late Latin, the (normalised) absolute frequency of present participles occurring in a presentative progressive construction does not show a rectilinear trend (Table 5.64). In contrast, their proportion to the total number of present participles declines, though in a very slight way.

<table><caption>**Table 5.64.** Frequency of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>presentative progressive con-<br>struction (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a<br>presentative progressive con-<br>struction/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>14 (4.67)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>3,44%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>99 (5.28)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>2,64%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>85 (4.97)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>2,21%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test shows that this proportion is higher than expected in the Imperial and Merovingian Latin periods and lower than expected in Early Medieval Latin, but the differences between these periods are statistically insignificant ($\chi^2 = 3.05$; df = 2; p = 0.2176) (Table 5.65).
<table><caption>**Table 5.65.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>14 (3,44%)</td><td>10 (2,46%)</td><td>+1.24</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>99 (2,64%)</td><td>93 (2,49%)</td><td>+0.65</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>85 (2,21%)</td><td>95 (2,47%)</td><td>-1.04</td></tr></tbody></table>

Hence, the declining proportion observed in Table 5.64 is probably random. The conclusion to be drawn is that, both between Classical and Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin, the frequency of this type of present participles is low, but more or less stable.

### 5.4.2.3. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

In accord with Greco's (2013: 185) claim that, in Late Latin, the use of the present participle as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction is influenced by Biblical Greek, the frequency of this type of participles is highest in the religious texts of the Late Latin corpus, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.66).

<table><caption>**Table 5.66.** Frequency of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#present participles used in a presentative progressive construction (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used in a presentative progressive construction/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>16 (2.05)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>0,87%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>200 (8.07)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>3,48%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>1 (0.10)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>0,08%</td></tr></tbody></table>

Greco's claim is further confirmed by a chi-square goodness-of-fit test: the proportion of the participles at stake is lower than expected in the historical and legal texts and higher than expected in the religious texts in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 70.12$; df = 2; $p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.67).

<table><caption>**Table 5.67.** Observed vs expected proportion of present participles used in a presentative progressive construction to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>16 (0,87%)</td><td>46 (2,49%)</td><td>-4.39</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>200 (3,48%)</td><td>142 (2,47%)</td><td>+4.86</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>1 (0,08%)</td><td>29 (2,45%)</td><td>-5.22</td></tr></tbody></table>
As it turns out, the high proportion of these participles in the religious texts is not correlated with a low degree of productivity, as opposed to what has been observed for, e.g., the high proportion of adverbial and adnominal present participles in the legal texts. The productivity of this type of constructions has been measured in terms of the lexical variation of the present participles and the presentative markers. As shown in Table 5.68, the productivity of this construction is higher in the religious texts than in the historical texts. However, due to the low absolute number of forms in the historical texts, this difference is probably hazardous. Since the legal texts contain only one instance of this type of present participles, there is no interest in comparing them with the historical and religious texts.

<table><caption>**Table 5.68.** Productivity of the presentative progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>16</td><td>200</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>9</td><td>156</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>8</td><td>134</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.56</strong></td><td><strong>0.78</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.50</strong></td><td><strong>0.67</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

On closer scrutiny, the lower productivity in the historical texts is due to the fact that the same lexical combination accounts for half of all combinations in these texts. This combination involves the verb of auditory perception *audire* ‘to hear’ and the declarative verb *dicere* ‘to say’ (79).

(79) *Audite* *Dominum* *dice-nt-em* [...].

hear.IMP.PRS.2PL Lord.ACC.M.SG say-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG

‘Here is what the Lord says: “(...)”.’ (Epist. Merov. 11)

This combination also represents the unique presentative progressive present participle construction in the legal texts, and it is also the most frequent combination in the religious texts (9 instances out of 200). The inventory and the cumulative frequency of the five most frequent combinations in the religious texts is presented in Table 5.69.
<table><caption>**Table 5.69.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexical combinations of a presentative marker and a present participle in the religious texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Lexeme of presentative</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>audire 'to hear'</td><td>dicere 'to say'</td><td>9 (4,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>venire 'to come'</td><td>8 (4,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>stare 'to stand'</td><td>4 (2,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>audire 'to hear'</td><td>clamare 'to shout'</td><td>3 (1,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>sedere 'to sit'</td><td>3 (1,50%)<sup>20</sup></td></tr><tr><td></td><td></td><td><strong>27 (13,50%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Thus, the schematicity of this present participle construction is not significantly higher or lower in any thematic domain. However, the low absolute number of instances in the historical and especially legal texts does not allow drawing solid conclusions from their productivity study.

The same observation can be made with respect to the lexical variation of the present participles. Table 5.70 shows that this variation is more or less equally high in the historical and religious – the legal texts are again left out from this comparison because they contain only one instance.

<table><caption>**Table 5.70.** Lexical variation of the present participles used in a presentative progressive construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>16</td><td>200</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>9</td><td>115</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>8</td><td>86</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.56</strong></td><td><strong>0.58</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.50</strong></td><td><strong>0.43</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

In the historical texts, the lexeme *dicere* 'to say' (e.g. (79)) represents half of the present participles. The other half are all hapaxes. *Dicere* 'to say' also represents the only form in the legal texts. The inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes in the religious texts are shown in Table 5.71.

<footnote n="20">²⁰ The religious texts contain five other lexical combinations occurring three times.</footnote>
<table><caption>**Table 5.71.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes used for present participles in a presentative progressive construction in the religious texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>dicere 'to say'</td><td>15 (7,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>venire 'to come'</td><td>12 (6,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>stare 'to stand'</td><td>8 (4,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>sedere 'to sit'</td><td>8 (4,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>iacere 'to lie'</td><td>8 (4,00%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>51 (25,50%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

In the religious texts, the most frequent lexeme is the same as in the historical texts, i.e. *dicere* 'to say' (e.g. 79)). The runner-up is *venire* 'to come' (80).

(80) [...] *cum vidissent* *Egyptios* *post se venie-nt-es*, when *see.SBJV.PST.3PL* *Egyptian.ACC.M.PL* after *REFL.ACC.M.PL* *come-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL* *exclamaverunt*.

*shout.PST.3PL*

'When they saw the Egyptians coming behind them, they shouted.' (*Peregr. Aeth.* 7.4)

Since the presentative markers primarily serve a grammatical function, their lexical variation is smaller than that of the present participles. In the Late Latin corpus, these markers show a small variation in the historical texts (4 types), but a relatively large variation in the religious texts – the legal texts are again less relevant here. In Table 5.72, these absolute numbers are more telling than the type-token and hapax-token ratios.

<table><caption>**Table 5.72.** Lexical variation of the presentative markers used in a presentative progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>16</td><td>200</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>4</td><td>12</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>2</td><td>3</td><td>1</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.25</strong></td><td><strong>0.06</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.13</strong></td><td><strong>0.02</strong></td><td><strong>1.00</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Table 5.73 shows the inventory and cumulative frequency of the items used as presentative markers in the three thematic domains.
<table><caption>**Table 5.73.** Inventory and frequency of the presentative markers used in a presentative progressive present participle construction in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of presentative marker</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="4">Historical</td><td>audire 'to hear'</td><td>11 (68,75%)</td></tr><tr><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>3 (18,75%)</td></tr><tr><td>reperire 'to find'</td><td>1 (6,25%)</td></tr><tr><td>invenire 'to find'</td><td>1 (6,25%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>16 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="12">Religious</td><td>videre 'to see'</td><td>72 (36,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>invenire 'to find'</td><td>38 (19,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>audire 'to hear'</td><td>35 (17,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>cernere 'to see'</td><td>12 (6,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>reperire 'to find'</td><td>12 (6,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>ecce 'behold'</td><td>10 (5,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>conspicere 'to observe'</td><td>8 (4,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>aspicere 'to behold'</td><td>5 (2,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>habere 'to have'</td><td>5 (2,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>conspicari 'to observe'</td><td>1 (0,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>intueri 'to look at'</td><td>1 (0,50%)</td></tr><tr><td>meminisse 'to remember'</td><td>1 (0,50%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>200 (100,00%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="2">Legal</td><td>audire 'to hear'</td><td>1 (100%)</td></tr><tr><td></td><td><strong>1 (100%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

Table 5.73 shows that the Late Latin corpus contains the three types of lexemes capable of acting as the presentative marker: at third person form of the verb *habere* ‘to have’ (81), the presentative *ecce* ‘behold’ (82), and verbs of visual or auditory perception (80/83). The verb of visual perception *videre* ‘to see’ is dominant, representing 35% of all presentative markers (75 instances out of 217).

(81) *Habebat autem pende-nt-em collo capsellam [...].*
have.PST.3SG but hang-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.SG neck.ABL.N.SG small_box.ACC.F.SG
‘But there was a small box hanging on his neck.’ (Vit. Gall. Wal. 1.11)

(82) [...] cum alveum Mosellae [...] transmeassent, ecce!
when channel.ACC.M.SG Moselle.GEN.F.SG cross.SBJV.PST.3PL behold
venie-ns sancta Tetta [...].
come-PTCP.PRS-NOM.F.SG saint.NOM.F.SG Tetta.NOM.F.SG
‘When they had crossed the channel of the Moselle, behold, there came saint Tetta.’ (Vit. Adelph. 6)
(83) [...] *quia numquam te verba insana frustra*
because never you.ACC.M.SG word.ACC.N.PL demented.ACC.N.PL in_vain
*loque-nt-em* audivimus.
speak-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG hear.PST.1PL

'Because we never heard you speaking demented words in vain.' (Vit. Pard. 21)

The dominant group of perception verbs contains only one verb denoting an act of auditory perception, viz. *audire* 'to hear' (83) (47 instances out of 217). As to the verbs denoting an act of visual perception, they are represented by eight distinct lexemes and jointly account for 71% of all presentative markers (154 instances out of 217). These verbs are *videre* 'to see' (84), *invenire* 'to find' (85), *cernere* 'to see' (86), *reperire* 'to find' (87), *conspicere* 'to observe' (88), *aspicere* 'to behold' (89), *conspicari* 'to observe' (90), and *intueri* 'to look at' (91).

(84) [...] *sanctus Moyses vidit filios Israhel*
saint.NOM.M.SG Moses.NOM.M.SG see.PST.3SG son.ACC.M.PL Israel.NOM.M.SG
*habe-nt-es choros his diebus [...].*
have-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL chorus.ACC.M.PL DEM.ABL.M.PL day.ABL.M.PL
'Saint Moses saw the sons of Israel having choruses these days.' (Peregr. Aeth. 5.4)

(85) *Malignus vero spiritus unum seniorem monachum*
malicious.NOM.M.SG but spirit.NOM.M.SG one.ACC.M.SG senior.ACC.M.SG monk.ACC.M.SG
*invenit aquam haurie-nt-em [...].*
find.PST.3SG water.ACC.F.SG pour-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
'But the malicious spirit found an old monk pouring water.' (Greg. M. dial. 2.30.9)

(86) [...] *septem angelos "agius agius agius" cane-nt-es cernebat.*
seven angel.ACC.M.PL agius agius agius sing-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL see.PST.3SG
'He saw seven angels singing: "agius, agius, agius".' (Pass. Vit. 3.1.7.10)

(87) [...] *ipsum=que verrem in ipso introitu*
INTENS.ACC.M.SG=and thief.ACC.M.SG in INTENS.ABL.M.SG entrance.ABL.M.SG
*monasterii iace-nt-em repperit [...].*
monastery.GEN.N.SG lie-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG find.PST.3SG
'And he found the thief lying at the entrance of the monastery.' (Vit. Trud. 19)

(88) [...] *presbyterum quendam inibi sacrosancta tracta-nt-em*
priest.ACC.M.SG INDF.ACC.M.SG in_that_place sacred.ACC.N.PL dragabout-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
*mysteria conspexit [...].*
mysterious_thing.ACC.N.PL observe.PST.3SG
'He saw some priest dragging about sacred mysterious things to that place.' (Vit. Gall. Wal. 2.41)
(89) [...] *credidimus dementes esse quos fulge-nte-s*
believe.PST.1PL demented.ACC.M.PL be.INF.PRS REL.ACC.M.PL shine-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL
*nunc aspicimus et flore-nt-es.*
now behold.PRS.1PL and prosper-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.PL

‘We believed demented those whom we see now shining and prospering.’ (Pass. Caec. 1.18.39)

(90) [...] *Genuvefa conspicata generis humani*
Genevieve.NOM.F.SG observe.PTCP.PST.NOM.F.SG kind.GEN.N.SG human.GEN.N.SG
*adversarium in ampulle ore sede-nt-em [...]*
enemy.ACC.M.SG in bottle.GEN.F.SG mouth.ABL.N.SG sit-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG
*insufflavit in eum [...]*
blow.PST.3SG to DEM.ACC.M.SG

‘After she saw the enemy of the human kind sitting on the mouth of the bottle, Genevieve blew at him.’ (Vit. Genov. 48)

(91) [...] *cum reginam cum principibus defle-nt-em intueretur [...]*
when queen.ACC.F.SG with prince.ABL.M.PL weep-PTCP.PRS-ACC.F.SG look_at.SBJV.PST.3SG
‘When he saw the queen weeping with the princes (...).’ (Vit. Elig. 2.38)

There is also one verb that does not denote an act of sensory perception, but a cognitive activity, namely *meminisse* ‘to remember’ (93).

(92) *Memini, Domine, dice-nt-em te quod*
remember.IMP.PRS.2SG Lord.VOC.M.SG say-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG you.ACC.M.SG that
*oportet me temptare [...]*
be_necessary.PRS.3SG I.ACC.M.SG attempt.INF.PRS

‘Lord, remember yourself saying that is necessary for me to attempt (...).’ (Pass. Eustach. 1.11)

The use of this cognitive verb instead of a verb of sensory perception is not surprising given the semantic link between the two types of verbs (e.g. Willems 1983). It is interesting to note in this respect that the unique instance of a verb of cognition appears in one of the latest texts (10th c.).

From a morphosyntactic perspective, Table 5.73 shows that the presentative marker is most often instantiated by a verb (n=207), the use of the presentative *ecce* ‘behold’ being confined to 10 instances.

### 5.4.2.4. Case marking of the present participle

If the presentative marker is instantiated by a verb, the present participle and the NP with which it agrees are marked in the accusative in active syntactic configurations, as in all above-cited examples, but in the nominative in passive syntactic configurations, as in (93).
(93) [...] et *auditi* sunt duo chori incredibili [...] and hear.PTCP.PST.NOM.M.PL be.PRS.3PL two choir.NOM.M.PL incredible.ABL.F.SG *dulcedine* **perstrepe-nt-es.** sweetness.ABL.F.SG make_noise-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL 'And two choirs were heard making noise with an incredible sweetness.' (Vit. Gal. Walh. 2.4)

If, on the contrary, the presentative is realised by *ecce* ‘behold’, the present participle and the NP are mostly in the nominative (77/82), though they can also stand in the accusative (94) (cf. Pinkster 2015: 368; see also §2.1.2.2.2.3.2).

(94) *Ecce dominum [...] sta-nt-em ad summitatem scale [...].* behold Lord.ACC.M.SG stand-PTCP.PRS-ACC.M.SG at top.ACC.F.SG stairs.GEN.F.SG 'Behold the Lord standing at the top of the stairs.' (Vit. Pard. 8)

The frequency of these two case forms in the Late Latin corpus is presented in Figure 5.4.

<figure><img src="image_39.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.4.** Case marking of the present participles used in a presentative progressive construction in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

### 5.4.2.5. Conclusion

Present participles used in a presentative progressive construction become more frequent from Classical to Late Latin, both in normalised absolute terms and in relation of the total number of present participles. However, the frequency increase is modest and statistically insignificant. During the Late Latin period, no rectilinear trend can be observed for the absolute frequency of these participles, while their proportion to the total number of present participles declines, though in a statistically insignificant way. In line with Greco’s (2013: 185) claim this use of the present participle in Late Latin is influenced by Biblical Greek, present participle acting as the main verb of a presentative progressive construction are more frequent in religious texts than in historical and legal texts. Although no solid conclusions can be drawn from the
study of its productivity, this present participle construction seems more or less equally productive in the three thematic domains. The presentative marker is mostly instantiated by a perception verb, but it can also be realised by the presentative *ecce* ‘behold’, a third person form of the verb *habere* ‘to have’, or even a cognitive verb.

In the transition from Late Latin to most Romance languages, the present participle is replaced in this construction by its sole competitor since the earliest stages of the Latin language, *i.e.* the infinitive (Aspland 1974: 16; see also §1.3.2.2.6 and §2.1.2.2.2.3.2).

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

The final type of present participles to be explored are the ones that are syntactically used as finite verbs. These forms have “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). As an example, consider *veniens* ‘coming’ (95), which can be replaced by the finite perfect tense verb *venit* ‘he came’.

(95) **Quidam** [...] *Vincentius* *nomine* *nummorum* *arcarius*
INDF.NOM.M.SG Vincentius.NOM.M.SG name.ABL.N.SG money.GEN.M.PL treasurer.NOM.M.SG
**venie-ns** *ad civitatem* *Gabis* *ut* *ex*
come-PTCP.PRS.NOM.M.SG to city.ACC.F.SG Gabi.ABL.M.PL in_order_to onBehalf_of
**actionem** *auri* *publici* *munimen* *acciperet*.
function.ACC[ABL].F.SG gold.GEN.N.SG public.GEN.N.SG protection.ACC.N.SG receive.SBJV.PST.3SG
‘Someone named Vincentius, the treasurer of the public monies, came to the city of Gabi in order to receive protection on behalf of its function for the public gold.’ (Pass. *Getul.* 1.99.1) [=9]

As mentioned in §2.1.2.2.2.3.3 and §4.4, the use as a finite verb is recognised for the present participle by most authors, while it has gone unnoticed for the gerund. Therefore, present participles used as finite verbs have not been taken into account in discussions of the competition between the present participle and the gerund. However, the Late Latin corpus contains a few instances of gerunds used as finite verbs, and these forms can undoubtedly be replaced by present participles (see §4.4). Nevertheless, due to the extreme rareness of this type of gerunds (n=3), it is most unlikely that the gerund became a full-fledged competitor of the present participle in this use. Hence, this question will not be further addressed.

Some hypotheses can nonetheless be formulated about the evolution of syntactically finite present participles. These forms are claimed to be extremely rare until at least the 2nd c., and to become more frequent from the 3rd c. onward, especially in religious texts (Hofmann & Szantyr 1965: 389; Eklund 1970: 117-205). Therefore, it is expected that the participles in issue are more frequent in the Late Latin
than in the Classical corpus, and that in the Late Latin corpus, they are more frequent in the religious texts than in the historical and legal texts.

The first hypothesis is confirmed by the data of this study: while the Classical Latin corpus does not contain any present participles used as finite verbs (see §1.3.2.2.8), the Late Latin corpus comprises 254 of them. This amounts to 3,12% of all Late Latin present participles (and to 6.43 forms per 10 000 words). Thus, this use of the present participle is more frequent than in both progressive and presentative progressive constructions. Due to the absence of syntactically finite present participles in the Classical Latin corpus, their frequency study will immediately focus on the Late Latin period (§5.4.3.1). Their frequency in Late Latin will be further examined in view of their frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains (§5.4.3.2). The final aspect of these forms that will be analysed is their case marking (§5.4.3.3).

### 5.4.3.1. Frequency within the period of Late Latin

Though the present participle is used more frequently as a finite verb than as the main verb of progressive or presentative progressive construction, its frequency in this use is still relatively low, both in absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.74). On the diachronic axis, the frequency of the participles in question increases.

<table><caption>**Table 5.74.** Frequency of present participles used as finite verbs in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#present participles used<br>as finite verbs (per 10 000<br>words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used as<br>finite verbs/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>3 (1.00)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>0,74%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>73 (3.89)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>1,95%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>152 (8.89)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>3,96%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the increasing proportion of syntactically finite present participles might not be random: this proportion is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in Early Medieval Latin in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 33.45; df = 2; p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.75).
<table><caption>**Table 5.75.** Observed *vs* expected proportion of present participles used as finite verbs to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>3 (0,74%)</td><td>12 (2,96%)</td><td>-2.52</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>73 (1,95%)</td><td>107 (2,86%)</td><td>-3.27</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>152 (3,96%)</td><td>110 (2,86%)</td><td>+4.05</td></tr></tbody></table>

The question thus arises as to what explains the increasing use of this type of present participles in Late Latin. The most plausible answer lies in the increasing use of adjunct present participles with a relatively high degree of syntactic autonomy, i.e. being only loosely connected to their syntactically superordinate clause (for nominative absolute forms, see, e.g., Horn 1918: 54-59 and Biese 1828: 75; for nominative conjunct forms, see, e.g., Galdi & Vangaever 2019: 106). This hypothesis is supported by the fact that absolute and conjunct adjunct nominative present participles are two of the possible sources of the use of the present participle as finite verbs (for absolute forms, see Löfstedt 1911: 158-159; Biese 1928: 82; Cavallin 1934: 77; Eriksson 1939: 65-66; Eklund 1970: 168-171; for conjunct forms, see Eklund 1970: 162-167). Another factor that might have contributed to the increasing use of the present participle as a finite verb is the expanding narrative use of adjunct nominative present participle (see §5.2.1). Indeed, this type of participles often denote a state of affairs as important as (or sometimes even more important than) the state of affairs denoted by the finite main verb (cf. Van Acker 2004: 130-131).

The figures in Table 5.75 further suggest that, although they are not extremely frequent, present participles occur frequently enough as syntactically finite verbs for us to assume that at least some of these forms are deliberately used as such, contrary to what is claimed by Adams (1976: 60-65). Veniens ‘coming’ (95) might be a case in point.

### 5.4.3.2. Frequency and productivity in the three thematic domains

In the Late Latin corpus, the frequency of syntactically finite present participles is higher in the historical texts than in the religious and legal texts, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in proportion to the total number of present participles (Table 5.76). This result conflicts with Eklund’s (1970: 117-205) claim that this use of the present participle is characteristic of the language used in religious texts.

<table><caption>**Table 5.763.** Frequency of present participles used as finite verbs in the historical, the religious, and the legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#present participles used as finite verbs (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles used as finite verbs/#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>85 (10.88)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>4,60%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>145 (5.85)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>2,52%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>24 (2.40)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>2,02%</td></tr></tbody></table>
What is more, a chi-square goodness-of-fit test indicates that this difference between the historical texts, on the one hand, and the religious and legal texts, on the other, might not be accidental. Indeed, the proportion of the forms in issue is lower than expected in the religious and legal texts and higher than expected in the historical texts in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 24.39; df = 2; p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.77).

<table><caption>**Table 5.77.** Observed *vs* expected proportion of present participles used as finite verbs to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>85 (4,60%)</td><td>53 (2,87%)</td><td>+4.31</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>145 (2,52%)</td><td>166 (2,89%)</td><td>-1.65</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>24 (2,02%)</td><td>34 (2,87%)</td><td>-1.74</td></tr></tbody></table>

However, closer inspection shows that the high proportion of present participles used as finite verbs in the historical texts is mainly due to their relatively high frequency in two texts: Fredegar's *Chronica* and the anonymous *Liber Historiae Francorum*. These texts contain respectively 37 and 33 instances. Hence, the high proportion of this type of present participles in the historical texts might be an idiolectic feature of the authors of these texts rather a linguistic feature of the language used in historical texts in general.

As for those used in a presentative progressive construction, the present participles used as finite verbs are more or less equally productive in the three thematic domains (Table 5.78). The productivity of these forms has been measured in terms of their lexical variation.

<table><caption>**Table 5.78.** Productivity of the present participles used as finite verbs in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th></th><th>Historical</th><th>Religious</th><th>Legal</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>#tokens</td><td>85</td><td>145</td><td>24</td></tr><tr><td>#types</td><td>51</td><td>115</td><td>17</td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes</td><td>40</td><td>90</td><td>14</td></tr><tr><td>#types/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.60</strong></td><td><strong>0.79</strong></td><td><strong>0.71</strong></td></tr><tr><td>#hapaxes/#tokens</td><td><strong>0.47</strong></td><td><strong>0.62</strong></td><td><strong>0.58</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

In other words, the difference in frequency of syntactically finite present participles in historical texts, on the one hand, and religious and legal texts, on the other, is not related to a difference in productivity. Syntactically finite present participles are thus more or less equally schematic (or lexically open) in the three thematic domains.

However, a closer look at the lexical variation of the present participles reveals that the historical and especially legal texts contain more lexemes with a relatively high frequency than the religious texts.
On the one hand, the five most frequent lexemes represent 39% of all present participles used as finite verbs in the historical texts and 54% in the legal texts, against only 14% in the religious texts. On the other hand, the most frequent lexemes in the historical and legal texts account for respectively 16% and 25% all syntactically finite present participles versus 5% in the religious texts (Table 5.79).

<table><caption>**Table 5.79.** Inventory and cumulative frequency of the five most frequent lexemes used for syntactically finite present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>Lexeme of present participle</th><th>Frequency (%)</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td rowspan="5">Historical</td><td>venire 'to come'</td><td>14 (16,47%)</td></tr><tr><td>mittere 'to send'</td><td>7 (8,24%)</td></tr><tr><td>dirigere 'to direct'</td><td>5 (5,88%)</td></tr><tr><td>dicere 'to say'</td><td>4 (4,71%)</td></tr><tr><td>petere 'to ask for'</td><td>3 (3,53%)</td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>33 (38,82%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Religious</td><td>venire 'to come'</td><td>7 (4,82%)</td></tr><tr><td>postulare 'to ask for'</td><td>4 (2,76%)</td></tr><tr><td>deprecari 'to beg'</td><td>4 (2,76%)</td></tr><tr><td>referre 'to report'</td><td>3 (2,07%)</td></tr><tr><td>respondere 'to answer'</td><td>3 (2,07%)<sup>21</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>21 (14,48%)</strong></td></tr><tr><td rowspan="5">Legal</td><td>praecipere 'to order'</td><td>6 (25,00%)</td></tr><tr><td>venire 'to come'</td><td>2 (8,33%)</td></tr><tr><td>optare 'to wish'</td><td>3 (8,33%)</td></tr><tr><td>orare 'to pray'</td><td>1 (4,17%)</td></tr><tr><td>facere 'to do'</td><td>1 (4,17%)<sup>22</sup></td></tr><tr><td colspan="2"></td><td><strong>13 (54,17%)</strong></td></tr></tbody></table>

The historical and religious texts share their most frequent lexeme, viz. *venire* 'to come' (95). The most frequent lexeme in the legal texts is *praecipire* 'to order' (96).

(96) **Precipie-nt-es** *enim ut [...].*
order-PTCP.PRS-NOM.M.PL for that
'For we order that (...).' (*Form. Marc.* 1.17)

### 5.4.3.3. Case marking of the present participle

In the Late Latin corpus, the overwhelming majority of the present participles functioning as finite verbs are marked in the nominative (95-96). This is in line with the possible sources of this use of the present

<footnote n="21">21 The religious texts contain two more lexemes occurring three times.</footnote>

<footnote n="22">22 The remaining eleven forms used as finite verbs in the legal texts are hapaxes.</footnote>
participle: as the main verb of a progressive construction, as the head of a nominative absolute adjunct, or as the head of a nominative conjunct adjunct (see §2.1.2.2.2.3.3). However, a few forms are marked in the ablative (e.g. *monente* ‘warning’ (97)).

(97) *Et apostolo mone-nt-e:* “Quis nos separabit and apostle.ABL.M.SG warn-PTCP.PRS-ABL.M.SG INT.NOM.M.SG we.ACC.M.PL separate.FUT.3SG a caritate Christi?”. from charity.ABL.F.SG Christ.GEN.M.SG

‘And the apostle warned: “Who will isolate us from the charity of Christ?”’ (Vit. *Madelb*. 1.0.14)

The common view that the use of the present participle as a syntactically finite verb is undeliberate and often results from anacoluthon is particularly convincing for ablative forms like *monente* ‘warning’ (97). These forms are indeed much less often used in constituents that are claimed to be the at the basis of the syntactically finite use of the present participle.

The frequency of the nominative and ablative markings is presented in Figure 5.5.

<figure><img src="image_40.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.5.** Case marking of the present participles used as finite verbs in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

### 5.4.3.4. Conclusion

While there are no instances of syntactically finite present participles in the Classical Latin corpus, they are more frequent than those occurring in a progressive or presentative progressive construction in the Late Latin corpus. Though their – absolute as well as relative – frequency is still low in this period, it is high enough for us to assume that this use of the present participle is not always undeliberate. The forms in issue become more frequent in Late Latin and they are also more frequent in the historical texts than in the religious and legal texts. However, their higher frequency in the historical texts might be the result
of their high frequency in two particular texts: Fredegar's *Chronica* and the anonymous *Liber Historiae Francorum*. The productivity of this type of present participles does not significantly differ in the three thematic domains. The forms are mostly marked in the nominative, but a few instances are found marked in the ablative.

In the transition from Late Latin to Romance, present participles used as finite verbs are replaced by morphologically finite verbs. Given the mismatch between the morphologically non-finite form of the present participles and their syntactic use as finite verbs, this substitution is not surprising. It might be explained along the lines of Timberlake's (1977: 141) concept of 'actualisation': the process whereby the morphology of a linguistic item becomes aligned on its function. In our case, the non-finite form of the present participle becomes aligned on its syntactic use, giving rise to a morphologically finite verb exempt from the form-function mismatch just mentioned.

### 5.4.4. General conclusion

The preceding sections have investigated the frequency of present participles used in a progressive and presentative progressive construction and as syntactically finite verbs from Classical to Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin. The aim of this section is to collate the results obtained in these sections, in order to explore the evolution of the verbal present participle as a whole.

In Classical Latin, the present participle has only rarely verbal external syntax (2%). In Late Latin, this syntax occurs about three times as often (6%), although verbal present participles still represent a small portion of the total number of present participles (Table 5.80). In (normalised) absolute terms, the frequency of verbal present participles also rises relatively steeply, i.e. from 1 to 12 instances per 10 000 words.

<table><caption>**Table 5.80.** Frequency of verbal present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#verbal present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#verbal present participles/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>39 (0.62)</td><td>1 786 (28.57)</td><td>2,18%</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>530 (12.44)</td><td>8 785 (206.27)</td><td>6,03%</td></tr></tbody></table>

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the increasing proportion of verbal present participles is probably not random. Indeed, this proportion is lower than expected in Classical Latin and higher than expected in Late Latin in a statistically highly significant way ($\chi^2 = 40.14; df = 1; p < 0.0001$) (Table 5.81).
<table><caption>**Table 5.81.** Observed vs expected proportion of verbal present participles to the total number of present participles in Classical and Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Classical Latin</td><td>39 (2,18%)</td><td>96 (5,38%)</td><td>-5.83</td></tr><tr><td>Late Latin</td><td>530 (6,03%)</td><td>473 (5,38%)</td><td>+2.63</td></tr></tbody></table>

As evident from the previous sections, this increase is mainly due to the rising frequency of syntactically present participles (the number of present participles used in a progressive construction is way too low to significantly contribute to this trend, and the number of present participles occurring in a presentative progressive construction rises too slightly and, in addition, in statistically insignificant way).

During the Late Latin period, the frequency of verbal present participles steadily increases, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in relation to the total number of present participles (Table 5.82).

<table><caption>**Table 5.82.** Frequency of verbal present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#verbal present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#verbal present participles/<br>#present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>19 (6.33)</td><td>406 (135.32)</td><td>4,68%</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>191 (10.19)</td><td>3 741 (199.57)</td><td>5,11%</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>267 (15.62)</td><td>3 840 (224.58)</td><td>6,95%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test indicates that the proportion of verbal present participles is lower than expected in Imperial and Merovingian Latin and higher than expected in the Early Medieval Latin period in a statistically very significant way (χ² = 12.03; df = 2; p = 0.0024) (Table 5.83). However, none of these periods makes a significant contribution to the obtained chi-square values on its own. Hence, the increasing proportion observed in Table 5.82 is probably random.

<table><caption>**Table 5.83.** Observed vs expected proportion of verbal present participles to the total number of present participles in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>19 (4,68%)</td><td>24 (5,91%)</td><td>-1.07</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>191 (5,11%)</td><td>223 (5,96%)</td><td>-2.17</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>267 (6,95%)</td><td>229 (5,96%)</td><td>+2.49</td></tr></tbody></table>

Put differently, the frequency of verbal present participles significantly increases from Classical to Late Latin, but remains relatively stable within the period of Late Latin.

Whereas the frequency of the verbal present participles in Late Latin does not show significant variation on the diachronic axis, it does show great variation in the three thematic domains. In particular,
the present participle has verbal external syntax more than twice as often in the historical and religious texts than in the legal texts (Table 5.84). The difference between the two groups of texts is also apparent in (normalised) absolute terms.

<table><caption>**Table 5.84.** Frequency of verbal present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Thematic domain</th><th>#verbal present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#present participles (per 10 000 words)</th><th>#verbal present participles/ #present participles</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Historical</td><td>108 (13.82)</td><td>1 849 (236.68)</td><td>5,84%</td></tr><tr><td>Religious</td><td>394 (15.90)</td><td>5 753 (232.20)</td><td>6,85%</td></tr><tr><td>Legal</td><td>28 (2.80)</td><td>1 183 (118.28)</td><td>2,37%</td></tr></tbody></table>

A chi-square goodness-of-fit test suggests that these thematic differences might not be random. Indeed, the proportion of verbal present participles is lower than expected in the historical and legal texts and higher than expected in the religious texts in a statistically highly significant way (χ² = 32.81; df = 2; p < 0.0001) (Table 5.85). However, the only significant contribution to the obtained chi-square values is made by the underrepresentation of verbal present participles in the legal texts.

<table><caption>**Table 5.85.** Observed vs expected proportion of verbal present participles to the total number of present participles in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Imperial Latin</td><td>108 (5,84%)</td><td>112 (6,06%)</td><td>-0.34</td></tr><tr><td>Merovingian Latin</td><td>394 (6,85%)</td><td>347 (6,03%)</td><td>+2.52</td></tr><tr><td>Early Medieval Latin</td><td>28 (2,37%)</td><td>71 (6,00%)</td><td>-5.13</td></tr></tbody></table>

The conclusion arising from these figures is that the language used in legal texts greatly differs from its use in historical and religious texts, as already stated earlier. This difference between the legal texts and the historical and religious texts will be dealt with in more detail in the following section (§5.5).

## 5.5. External syntactic profile of the present participle

The preceding sections have explored the frequency of the different uses of the present participle from Classical to Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin. The aim of this section is to collate the results obtained in these sections, so as to examine the external syntactic profile of the present participle. Since the frequency of the different uses of the present participle has been discussed in detail in the previous sections, the figures presenting its external syntactic profile in the current section will be commented in a global way (as for the gerund in §4.5).
The external syntactic profile of the present participle is dominated by the same two uses in both Classical and Late Latin, namely in adjuncts and in adnominal phrases (Figure 5.6). Together, these uses represent no less than 96% of all present participles in Classical Latin and 92% in Late Latin. In both periods, the adjunct use of the present participle prevails over its adnominal use. Over time, it becomes even more dominant, contrary to what is predicted by the competition of the present participle with the gerund. The other uses of the present participle each account for less than 3% in the two periods, so that the impact of their frequency rise or decline on the external syntactic profile of the present participle is negligible. Globally speaking, the external syntax of the present participle is similar in the two periods, unlike what has been observed for the gerund (see §4.5). For practical reasons, the frequency of the uses smaller than 3% are not mentioned in Figure 5.6. For Classical Latin, these frequencies are: (i) 2,74% for subject predicate forms; (ii) 2,07% for instances used in a presentative progressive construction; (iii) 0,67% for object predicates present participles; (iv) 0,11% for forms used in a progressive construction; and 0% for syntactically finite present participles. For Late Latin, the frequencies amount to respectively 1,75%, 2,47%, 0,18%, 0,67%, and 2,89%.

<figure><img src="image_41.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.6.** External syntactic profile of the present participle in Classical and Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

Note that the two dominant uses of the present participle in Classical and Late Latin are the same as in the case of the gerund (see §4.5). Also, in the course of time, the adjunct use extends its dominance for both the present participle and the gerund. However, the frequency rise of the adjunct use is much more significant for the gerund (i.e. from 24% to 61%) than for the present participle (i.e. from 57% to 73%).
During the Late Latin period, the external syntactic profile of the present participle remains fairly stable (Figure 5.7) – as observed for the gerund (see §4.5). Indeed, its two dominant uses represent 94% of all present participles in Imperial Latin, 93% in Merovingian Latin, and 91% in Early Medieval Latin. Over time, the dominance of the adjunct use over the adnominal use is preserved, although the frequency difference between them grows smaller, from 61% in Imperial Latin to 52% in Early Medieval Latin. In Imperial Latin, the frequency of the other uses of the present participle, left unspecified in Figure 5.7, are: (i) 1,72% for subject predicates; (ii) 3,44% for presentative progressive constructions; (iii) 0% for object predicates; (iv) 0,49% for progressive constructions; and (v) 0,74% for syntactically finite forms. For Merovingian Latin, these percentages are respectively 1,66%, 2,64%, 0,19%, 0,51%, and 1,95%. For Early Medieval Latin, they amount to respectively 1,82%, 2,21%, 0,21%, 0,78%, and 3,96%.

<figure><img src="image_42.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.7.** External syntactic profile of the present participle in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</figcaption></figure>

While the external syntactic profile of the present participle in Late Latin does not show great variation from a diachronic point of view, it does show significant variation in the three thematic domains (Figure 5.8). As in the case of the gerund, the external syntactic profile of the present participle in the legal texts greatly differs from that in the historical and religious texts. Most strikingly, the present participle is predominantly adnominal in the legal texts, whereas in the historical and religious texts, it mostly occurs in adjuncts. However, the combined frequency of these two uses is similar in the three thematic domains, *viz.* 92% in the historical and religious texts and 93% in the legal texts. The percentages of the other uses of the present participle, *viz.* in subject predicates, in presentative progressive constructions, in object predicates, in progressive constructions, and as syntactically finite verbs are respectively 1,41%,
0,87%, 0,32%, 0,37%, and 4,60% for the historical texts; 1,36%, 3,48%, 0,16%, 0,85%, and 2,52% for the religious texts; and 4,23%, 0,08%, 0,08%, 0,25%, and 2,02% for the legal texts.

<figure><img src="image_43.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.8.** External syntactic profile of the present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

This result confirms the conclusion drawn earlier with respect to the gerund, namely that the language used in legal texts differs from that in historical and religious texts. As such, the same methodological insight can be drawn from these figures: at least for Late Latin, it is advisable not to rely exclusively on legal texts to study language change, and to evaluate results obtained from these texts separately from those of other types of texts. The atypical character of the use of the present participle in legal texts might be due to the specific stylistic features of these texts, as hypothesised with regard to the gerund (see §4.5). On the one hand, the archaic character of the juridical style might explain the dominance of adnominal instead of adjunct present participles, feature reminiscent of Classical Latin (see Figure 5.6). On the other hand, the formulaic character of the juridical style might account for the larger number of present participles with a low degree of productivity, observed in particular for this dominant group of adnominal present participles.

Like that of the gerund, the external syntactic profile of the present participle also varies with its case form. However, since the present participle is assigned case through agreement with a noun instead of on the basis of its function, this variation is less relevant. Hence, it will not be discussed (nor will it be in the following sections on the morphosyntactic and typological profiles of the present participle).
**5.6. Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle**

In this section, I will establish the morphosyntactic profile of the present participle, and investigate the evolution of this profile from Classical to Late Latin (§5.6.1) and within the period of Late Latin (§5.6.2). The morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in Late Latin will also be examined comparatively in the historical, religious, and legal texts (§4.6.3).

Remember that the morphosyntactic profile of the present participle is obtained by mapping its external syntactic profile on the morphosyntactic categories of Classical/Late Latin, while taking into account its specific morphological properties, which combine verbal and adjectival features (see §1.3.1). As mentioned in §1.3.3 and §2.1.1.3 and operationalised in §5.2 to §5.4, this mapping yields three types of present participles: (i) adverbial present participles, used in adjuncts; (ii) adjectival present participles, occurring in adnominal phrases, subject predicates, or object predicates; (iii) verbal present participles, used in progressive or presentative progressive constructions or functioning syntactically as finite verbs.

**5.6.1. From Classical to Late Latin**

There is no doubt that the morphosyntactic profile of the present participle changes from Classical to Late Latin. Nevertheless, the general tendency remains identical: the adverbial present participle prevails and followed first and foremost by the adjectival present participle (Figure 5.9). The verbal present participle is the least frequent.

<figure><img src="image_44.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.9.** Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in Classical and in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

The increase of adverbial and verbal present participles and the decline of adjectival present participles are all three statistically highly significant, and therefore probably not random (see respectively §5.2.1,
§5.4.4, and §5.3.4). The increase of adverbial present participles and the decrease of adjectival present participles are at odds with what is predicted by the intensifying functional competition between the present participle and the gerund in Late Latin: the present participle is held to – indirectly – specialise in adjectival external syntax as the result of its gradual replacement by the gerund in adverbial external syntax. The data of this study show the opposite trend: we observe a further specialisation of the present participle in adverbial instead of adjectival external syntax (this specialisation is moreover direct, since the (normalised) absolute frequency of adverbial present participles sharply increases between Classical and Late Latin; see §5.2.1). This finding is in line with that obtained for the gerund in Chapter 4, i.e. that the gerund does not develop into a full-fledged substitute of the adverbial present participle, at least not in the texts of the Late Latin corpus of this study. Some factors explaining the unexpected rise of adverbial present participles between Classical and Late Latin have been discussed in §5.2.1.

## 5.6.2. Within the period of Late Latin

Within the period of Late Latin, the morphosyntactic profile of the present participle remains relatively stable, just like that of the gerund (see §4.6). The frequency of its adjectival and verbal uses increases, while its adverbial use declines (Figure 5.10), but none of these trends are statistically significant (see §5.2.2, §5.3.4, and §5.4.4). The conclusion to be drawn is that, from a morphosyntactic point of view, the use of the present participle is relatively homogeneous between Imperial and Early Medieval Latin.

<figure><img src="image_45.png" /><figcaption>Figure 5.10. Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in Imperial, Merovingian, and Early Medieval Latin</figcaption></figure>

Thus, the data of this study neither show signs of a specialisation of the present participle in adjectival syntactic configurations during the Late Latin period. What is more, despite their declining frequency,
adverbial present participles still represent 72% of all present participles even in the latest period, viz.
Early Medieval Latin. The adverbial use of the present participle having disappeared in the Romance
languages, it appears again that there is a large gap between the use of the present participle in Late
Latin, at least in the written records transmitted to us, and in Romance. This more general conclusion
was also drawn in the case of the gerund (see §4.6.2).

**5.6.3. Comparison between the thematic domains**

Like its external syntactic profile, the morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in Late Latin
shows great variation in the three thematic domains. Indeed, this profile is dominated by the adverbial
present participle in the historical and religious texts, whereas in the legal texts, it is dominated by the
adjectival present participle (Figure 5.11). However, the dominance of adverbial present participles in
the historical and religious texts is much more pronounced than that of the adjectival present participles
in the legal texts.

<figure><img src="image_46.png" /><figcaption>**Figure 5.11.** Morphosyntactic profile of the present participle in the historical, religious, and legal texts in Late Latin</figcaption></figure>

These figures confirm the issue raised earlier with regard to the external syntactic profile of the present participle (and to the external syntactic and morphosyntactic profile of the gerund), namely that language used in legal texts significantly differs from that in historical and religious texts.

**5.7. Typological profile of the present participle**

The final step in describing the evolution of the present participle consists of establishing its typological
profile. Recall that this profile is determined by mapping the morphosyntactic profile of the present
participles on Haspelmath’s (1995: 4) typology of non-finite verbs, in which a three-type distinction is
made between: (i) masdars (i.e. forms with nominal external syntax); (ii) participles (i.e. forms having
adjectival external syntax); and (iii) converbs (i.e. forms with adverbial external syntax). The adverbial
present participle is subsumed under the converb type, while the adjectival present participle falls under
the participle type. Like the verbal gerund, the verbal present participle belongs to the converb type from
a historical point of view, while from a synchronic perspective, it is not related to any of these types (see
also §1.3.4). Hence, it will be left out in the following discussion.

In Classical Latin, the present participle predominantly falls under the converb type (57%). Its
link with the participle type is weaker (40%), in contradiction with its language-specific label. In Late
Latin, this trend is even more pronounced: the association of the present participle with the converb type
is stronger (73%) and that with the participle type weaker (21%). Instead of undergoing a process of
‘participialisation’ between Classical and Late Latin, to be defined as the historical process in which a
non-finite verb form specialises in the external syntax of an adjective, the present participle thus appears
to undergo a process of converbalisation, like the gerund. However, unlike in the case of the gerund, the
converbalisation process of the present participle ends within the period of Late Latin, because its link
with the converb type slightly weakens between Imperial and Early Medieval Latin. Nonetheless, even
in the latest stage, the present participle is much more strongly related to the converb type than to the
participle type. This clearly illustrates the potentially misleading character of language-specific labels
in comparative, typological, and possibly also diachronic research. Of course, this does not mean that
the Late Latin present participle *is* a converb, just like the Classical Latin present participle *is* not a
converb. The Late Latin present participle is nothing but the Late Latin present participle, that is to say,
a language-specific category of non-finite verb forms with a unique set of morphological and syntactic
properties and an equally unique morphosyntactic profile.

**5.8. Conclusion**

According to the standard hypothesis of the functional competition between the present participle and
the gerund, the present participle undergoes in Late Latin a process of participialisation: it is claimed to
be gradually substituted by the gerund in adverbial external syntax, and hereby forced to – indirectly –
specialise in adjectival external syntax. The participialisation of the present participle is claimed to be
part of a more general evolution, i.e. the restructuring of the paradigm of non-finite verb forms (Elcock
1960: 110-119; Harris 1978: 195-203; Bauer 1993: 59, 2005). This development is characterised by an
increasing degree of isomorphism and morphosyntactic specialisation: roughly speaking, the infinitive
specialises in nominal external syntax, the gerund in adverbial external syntax, and the present participle
in adjectival external syntax.
However, the data of this study do not evidence a participialisation of the present participle: the adjectival present participle declines instead of rises between Classical and Late Latin, and increases within the period of Late Latin only in a slight and statistically insignificant way. Moreover, the decline of adjectival present participles between Classical and Late Latin, i.e. from 40% to 21%, is much more pronounced than their rise during the Late Latin period, i.e. from 18% in Imperial Latin to 22% in Early Medieval Latin. Finally, even in the latest period of Latin, more than seven out of ten present participles (72%) display adverbial rather than adjectival external syntax.

Since this study is the first to empirically investigate the external syntactic and morphosyntactic evolution of the present participle between Classical and Late Latin and within the period of Late Latin, its results have important implications for our understanding of the competition of the present participle with the gerund. However, the results of this and the previous chapter are even more important for the evolution of the gerund and the present participle from Late Latin to Old French, in particular for the categorial status of the Old French *-ant* form. Since there is no conclusive empirical evidence in favour of a specialisation of the Late Latin gerund in adverbial external syntax and of the Late Latin present participle in adjectival external syntax, it cannot be assumed that, in the transition from Late Latin to Old French, the present participle only survives in adjectival syntactic configurations. As a result, the categorial indeterminacy of the Old French *-ant* form, caused by the morphological merging of the gerund and the present participle, cannot be resolved on the basis of its external syntax – the adverbial forms qualifying as gerunds and the adjectival ones as present participles. This does not only challenge the distinction between the categories of the gerund and the present participle in Old French, but also threatens their very existence in this language (cf. Adams 2003: 749; De Smet 2014: 40).

However, as pointed out with respect to the gerund (see §4.8), the fact that the data of this study do not show a specialisation of the present participle in adjectival external syntax does not necessarily mean that this evolution does not take place. For instance, the corpus of Late Latin texts used in this study might not be sufficiently representative of the language used in the period investigated. Although the corpus elaborated within the context of the PaLaFra project and used as the Late Latin corpus of this study is large and varied in comparison with the existing Late Latin corpora, it is well known that, from a sociolinguistic point of view, there is a huge gap between written and spoken language (Herman 2006: 186). Given that language change typically emerges in the spoken language and reaches the written language at a later stage (Herman 2006: 186), it could be argued that the data of this dissertation do not faithfully reflect the ongoing changes in the spoken language.

The absence of spoken records of this period makes it impossible to verify this hypothesis, but the fact that the Romance languages have emerged from different spoken varieties of Late Latin could give us an important clue. If the present participle does participialise in spoken Late Latin, it is expected that there is a huge gap between the use of the present participle in written Late Latin and the first written
records of the Romance languages. This is undoubtedly the case for Romance languages like Spanish and Italian, in which the present participle survived as a morphologically distinct form from the gerund and can only have adjectival external syntax. However, the morphological merging of the gerund and the present participle in Old French makes that this scenario cannot merely be hypothesised for the Old French *-ant* form. For how can we be sure that Old French adverbial *-ant* forms go back to Late Latin gerunds if Late Latin present participles can just as well display adverbial external syntax (and have this syntax even more frequently)? Put differently, the morphological merging of the gerund and the present participle in Old French particularises their categorial distinction within the Romance family, and hence this matter cannot be handled in the same way as in other Romance languages. The way in which this topic should be dealt with will be expounded and operationalised in the next and final chapter of this thesis.
# Chapter 6. The -ant form in Old French

## 6.1. Introduction

### 6.1.1. Aim of the chapter

In the transition from Late Latin to Old French, a series of morphological and phonetic evolutions affect the endings of the gerund and the present participle, and ultimately lead to the same form for the two types of non-finite verbs (Elcock 1960: 112; Ménard 1973: 170; Harris 1978: 200; Aravielle 1984: 40; Buridant 2000: 237, 2019: 343; Wackernagel & Langlsow 2009: 352 fn. 15; De Smet 2014: 39-40; Bazin-Tacchella 2020: 852-853). This form is built on the present stem of a verb and contains the ending -ant (e.g. *dans-ant* ‘dancing’) – or at least tends to generalise this ending. Due to this morphological merging, the category of -ant forms can no longer be determined on the basis of morphological criteria (Bazin-Tacchella 2020: 852). However, two exceptions can be made from a retrospective historical approach, i.e. taking into account morphological criteria valid in Late Latin (cf. Aravielle 1984: 38).

(i) In Late Latin, only the gerund can be governed by a preposition. Hence, all Old French prepositional -ant forms, like *en fuiant* ‘when fleeing’ (1), can in principle be taken as gerunds (Anglade 1958: 217; Ménard 1973: 173-175; Harris 1978: 199; Aravielle 1984: 38-39; Jensen 1990: 322; De Smet 2014: 39).

(1) Li leins en fui-ant / Sa trace vait
ART.DEF.SBJ.M.SG lion.SBJ.M.SG in flee-V.ANT his.OBL.F.SG track.OBL.F.SG go.PRS.3SG
cuvrant [...].
cover.V.ANT
‘The lion covers his track while fleeing.’ (Ph. de Thaon *Bestiaire* 165-166)

(ii) Conversely, only the Late Latin present participle agrees with a noun in case, gender, and number. Hence, all Old French -ant forms with an inflectional variant of the ending -ant, such as *ardanz* ‘burning’ (2), can in theory be taken as present participles (cf. Bazin-Tacchella 2020: 852-853).<fnref n="1" />

<footnote n="1">¹ Recall from §2.2.1 that agreeing -ant forms are inflected on the model of the epicene adjectives of the type *grant* ‘big’, but that these adjectives and, incidentally, -ant forms are later aligned on the model of the non-epicene adjectives, like *dur* ‘hard’. Hence, the inflectional ending of -ant forms shows some variation, as we will see in various examples cited in this chapter.</footnote>
(2) [...] S' el vient par aventure / U fus
if she.SBJ.F.SG come.PRS.3SG by chance.OBL.F.SG where fire.SBJ.M.SG
**ard-anz** serat [...].
burn-V.ANT.SBJ.M.SG be.FUT.3SG

'If by chance it (a beast) comes where there will be a burning fire (...).' (Ph. de Thaon *Bestiaire*
1314-1315)

However, these morphological criteria only apply if we assume that the gerund and the present participle do not encroach on each other’s morphology, neither in the transition from Late Latin to Old French nor during the Old French period itself. But, as pointed out by De Smet (2014: 40), empirical data testify of such encroachment. Witness *enhortanz* ‘encouraging’ (3): the fact that it is governed by the preposition *por* ‘to’ suggests that it should be taken as a gerund, while its morphological agreement with the subject *li apostoiles* ‘the apostle’ points to an analysis as a present participle.

(3) [...] *por les clers enhort-anz li*
to ART.DEF.OBL.M.PL clerk.OBL.M.PL encourage-V.ANT.OBL.M.PL ART.DEF.SBJ.M.SG
*apostoiles i donat consentement*
apostle.SBJ.M.SG to_it give.PST.3SG consent.OBL.M.SG

‘The apostle gave his consent to it in order to encourage the clerks.’ (Dial. Greg. 4)

Due to these conflicting features, *enhortanz* ‘encouraging’ (3) is to be taken as either an agreeing gerund or a prepositional present participle (cf. De Smet 2014: 40).<fnref n="2" /> In the first scenario, it provides evidence in favour of morphological encroachment of the gerund on the present participle, while in the second one, it evidences morphological encroachment of the present participle on the gerund. In both scenarios, this and similar forms unambiguously show that morphological exchange takes place between the two types of non-finite verb forms in Old French. Consequently, the morphological criteria in (i-ii) are less reliable in categorising Old French *-ant* forms than has been suggested so far.

Since the category of *-ant* forms cannot be identified on the basis of morphological criteria, the only basis left to resolve their categorial indeterminacy is their syntactic use, approached again from a retrospective historical point of view: all forms are categorised depending on whether their syntactic use is reminiscent of the Late Latin gerund or present participle (cf. Arnavielle 1984: 38). As noted in §3.6.2, two opposite scenarios can be distinguished, and, depending on the scenario, two methods to investigate the categorial status of the Old French *-ant* form.

<footnote n="2">² Since the presence of a preposition is not a purely morphological criterion, but also a partly syntactic one, it should be given priority to the purely morphological agreement criterion. Hence, the status of *enhortanz* ‘encouraging’ (3) as an agreeing gerund is more likely than as a prepositional present participle. However, this issue is less relevant here. What matters more is that the forms concerned unambiguously show morphological encroachment between the gerund and the present participle.</footnote>
(i) The first scenario presupposes that the Late Latin gerund and present participle specialise in distinct syntactic uses and survive in Old French with a different external syntactic profile. This scenario requires the validation of the standard hypothesis about the competition between the gerund and the present participle in Late Latin, namely of an evolution toward functional and morphosyntactic differentiation. Thus, it only holds if, in Late Latin: (i) the gerund shows signs of a converbalisation process and the present participle of a participialisation process; and (ii) the gerund also tends to substitute the present participle in progressive constructions. Would this scenario emerge from the empirical data, the categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form could be resolved on purely functional grounds: the forms used in adjuncts and progressive constructions would qualify as gerunds, while those occurring in adnominal phrases, subject predicates, object predicates, and presentative progressive constructions would hold as present participles. All -ant forms could be categorised, without leaving any degree of categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form. The existence of the gerund and the present participle in Old French as two distinct categories of non-finite verb forms would be undeniable.

(ii) In the second scenario, the presumed functional and morphosyntactic differentiation of the Late Latin gerund and present participle does not emerge from the empirical data. As such, the categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form can be resolved for some, but not for all instances. Indeed, under the assumption that the gerund and the present participle do not encroach on each other's distribution in the transition from Late Latin to Old French nor within the period of Old French itself, all -ant forms used with a function inaccessible to the Late Latin gerund could be taken as present participles (the Old French -ant form does not perform any function inaccessible to the Late Latin present participle, and hence the opposite does not apply). This holds for all forms occurring in adnominal phrases, subject predicates, object predicates, and presentative progressive constructions. By contrast, the forms used in adjuncts and progressive constructions would be categorially indeterminate, because these functions are accessible to both the Late Latin gerund and present participle (cf. De Smet 2014: 39). Some of these indeterminate forms could nonetheless be categorised on the basis of the morphological criteria mentioned above, with the proviso that these criteria are not very reliable and that abstraction is made of the empirically observed morphological exchange between the gerund and the present participle. Most -ant forms would in any case remain indeterminate. These forms would challenge the categorial distinction between the gerund and the present participle in Old French, and, hence, the existence of these two categories in this language. The theoretical implications of this scenario would be paradigm-shifting, but in order to evaluate them appropriately, it would be necessary to determine the exact degree of categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form. If this degree were low, the theoretical implications would be modest and the existence of the gerund and the present participle as two distinct categories could perhaps
be ‘saved’. If, on the contrary, it were high, the theoretical implications would be significant and
threaten the very existence of the categories of the gerund and the present participle in Old French.

As apparent from the preceding discussion, all depends on the results of the empirical investigation of the Late Latin gerund and present participle conducted in Chapters 4 and 5. As we have seen there, these results show signs of a converbalisation of the Late Latin gerund. However, this evolution of the gerund is not a direct result of an expansion of the gerund at the expense of the present participle in adverbial external syntax, but rather the indirect result of its decline in nominal external syntax, where it is replaced by the infinitive. Secondly, the gerund does not substitute the present participle in progressive constructions. Finally, the present participle does not show any sign of a participialisation process. Thus, the scenario emerging from the Late Latin data is the second one, viz. that which does not allow a radical functional split between the gerund and the present participle. Consequently, the Old French -ant form is at least to some extent categorially indeterminate. The question that arises is how indeterminate this form is and what this degree of indeterminacy means for the categorial distinction between the gerund and the present participle.

The aim of this final chapter is to explore this question by empirically investigating the use of the
-ant form in Old French.

**6.1.2. Methodology**

The degree of categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form will be established by calculating
the proportion of -ant forms that cannot be categorised as either gerunds or present participles on the
basis of the syntactic and morphological criteria mentioned in the preceding section. Concretely, all
prepositional forms will be taken as gerunds, while all agreeing forms and those performing a function
inaccessible to the Late Latin gerund will be categorised as present participles (the Old French -ant form
does not have any function inaccessible to the Late Latin present participle, so no forms can be taken as
gerunds instead of present participles on the basis of syntactic criteria; see §6.1.1 above). The remaining
forms are categorially indeterminate. These are the bare forms with the non-inflected ending -ant (or a
phonetic or graphical variant) and a use accessible to both the Late Latin gerund and present participle.

The degree of categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form will thus be calculated on the
basis of its degree of categorial determinacy. The proportion of the categorially determinate forms will
be calculated from a strict “retrospective historical approach” (cf. Aspland 1968: 151), i.e. assuming that
the gerund and the present participle do not show morphological and/or distributional encroachment,
neither in the transition from Late Latin to Old French, nor within the period of Old French itself. Such
encroachment certainly took place (De Smet 2014: 40; see also §2.1.1), but the degree of morphological
and/or distributional exchange between the gerund and the present participle cannot be measured. One
reason for this is the shift of the present participle toward morphological invariability. Indeed, for forms
with the non-inflected ending -ant where an agreeing ending is expected, it is not clear whether they are
(i) present participles encroaching on the morphology of the gerund, (ii) gerunds encroaching on the
distribution of the present participle, or (iii) uninflected present participles (cf. De Smet 2014: 39-40).
In any case, the existence of morphological and distributional encroachment between the gerund and the
present participle will be taken into account in the evaluation of the degree of categorial indeterminacy
of the Old French -ant form.

On the basis of this degree of categorial indeterminacy, I will assess the two hypotheses of the
categorial distinction between the gerund and the present participle in Old French: the Splitter and the
Lumper Hypothesis. Recall that the advocates of the Splitter Hypothesis argue that the gerund and the
present participle exist in Old French as two distinct types of non-finite verb forms, just like in (Late)
Latin (Gougenheim 1929; Anglade 1958: 215-217; Väänänen 1963³: 140-141; Ménard 1973: 169-175;
Harris 1978: 199-201; Arnavielle 1982, 1984: 38, 1997; Jensen 1990: 322-334; Buridant 2000: 324-
327, 2019: 461-469), while the proponents of the Lumper Hypothesis defend the view that the
morphological merging of the gerund and the present participle in Old French suspends their categorial
distinction and causes the two types of non-finite verb forms to merge also on a categorial level (Adams
2003: 749; De Smet 2014: 40).

In addition to its categorial status, I will examine the frequency of the various uses of the -ant
form within the period of Old French, i.e. between Early Old French (9th-11th c.) and the 12th-13th c.
As in the case of the Late Latin gerund and present participle in Chapters 4 and 5, the frequency of these
uses will be further investigated in the light of their frequency and productivity in the different thematic
domains. A comparison will also be made between versified texts and texts in prose, but only at the end
of this chapter, when discussing the external syntactic and morphosyntactic profile of the Old French
-ant form. All absolute frequencies will be normalised and all proportions will be statistically evaluated
by means of chi-square goodness-of-fit tests, so as to distinguish random trends from those reflecting
ongoing linguistic changes (cf. Gries 2013: 28; Levshina 2015: 221).

The results of this chapter are based on the 2 153 -ant forms occurring in the Old French corpus.
The forms that cannot be unambiguously assigned to either Early Old French or the 12th-13th c. will be
discarded from the quantitative analyses pertaining to their evolution during the Old French period, but
retained in all other analyses. This holds for 131 instances used in the *Chanson de Roland*. As noted in
§3.3.2, this is the only text on the verge between the two periods of Old French. The evolution of the -ant
form in Old French will thus be based on 2 022 instances. These occurrences represent 94% of all Old
French instances, and hence the results emerging from them are representative of the Old French corpus
in general. The results for Early Old French and the 12th-13th c. will be systematically compared with
those obtained for the *Chanson de Roland*. At the end of this chapter, these findings will be collated, so as to determine whether the language used in this text is closer to that in the earlier or the later period.

Of the 2 022 periodisable -ant forms, 33 belong to the Early Old French period and 1 989 to the 12th-13th c. (i.e. respectively 2% and 98%). The extremely low number of instances in Early Old French obliges to consider all quantitative results obtained for this period with caution, despite the fact that all absolute frequencies will be normalised.

It should furthermore be reiterated that, like the Latin present participle, the Old French -ant form has been defined in a very broad sense, comprising any non-finite verb form with the ending -ant (or a phonetic/graphical/inflectional variant) and built on a verb “used in the language current at the time when the text in question was written” (Eklund 1970: 12). It may be formed regularly or irregularly, but needs to have either the same meaning as its corresponding finite verb or one that can be derived from it through deactualisation and/or contextual recategorisation (see §3.4.1.2.4). I will take the broadness of this definition into account in the evaluation of all quantitative results, but especially of those of the adjectival -ant form.

In contrast with the study of the Late Latin gerund and present participle, the analysis of the Old French -ant form will not consider its case marking. In the transition from Late Latin to Old French, the gerund acquires the invariable ending -ant, and is therefore neither subject nor oblique case. The present participle tends to generalise this same ending, and hence it also gradually falls outside the case system (which is in any case collapsing, especially in Anglo-Norman). Because of these developments and of the morphological merging of the gerund and the present participle, case marking becomes an irrelevant issue for the Old French -ant form – or at least irrelevant in this study.

### 6.1.3. Structure of the chapter

The examination of the Old French -ant form will be structured on the basis of its syntactic use. First, I will investigate the forms with adjectival external syntax (§6.2), then those displaying adverbial external syntax (§6.3), and finally those with verbal external syntax (§6.4). The results obtained in these sections will be collated in §6.5, so as to establish the external syntactic profile of the Old French -ant form. On the basis of this profile, I will then determine its morphosyntactic (§6.6) and typological (§6.7) profile. The degree of categorial determinacy of the -ant form will be measured for each of its uses separately throughout §6.2 to §6.4, and for the -ant form in general in §6.8. Section 6.9 aims to evaluate the degree of categorial indeterminacy of the Old French -ant form, in order to state a standpoint with regard to the Splitter and Lumper Hypothesis of the categorial distinction between the gerund and the present participle. A conclusion will be drawn in §6.10.
## 6.2. The adjectival -ant form

The -ant form can occur in three types of adjectival syntactic configurations, namely adnominal phrases (e.g. *curant* 'running' (4)), subject predicates (e.g. *bruianz* 'making noise' (5)), and object predicates (e.g. *querant* 'seeking' (6)).

(4) *En Rencesvals ad un' ewe cur-ant [...].*
in Roncevaux have.PRS.3SG ART.INDF.OBL.F.SG water.OBL.F.SG run-V.ANT
'In Roncevaux there is a running water (stream).' (Roland 2225)

(5) [...]*l'* **eve** **estoit** **roide** **et** **brui-anz.**
ART.DEF.SBJ.F.SG water.SBJ.F.SG be.PST.3SG swift.SBJ.F.SG and make.noise.V.ANT.SBJ.F.SG
'The water was swift and noisy.' (Chr. de Troyes *Yvain* 3083)

(6) [...] *Tost le fait pain quer-ant [...].*
soon he.OBJ.M.SG make.PRS.3SG bread.OBL.M.SG seek-V.ANT
'He soon impoverishes him (lit. 'makes him poor/bread-seeking').' (Ph. de Thaon *Bestiaire* 1012)

This section will examine successively the -ant forms in adnominal phrases (§6.1.1), subject predicates (§6.1.2), and object predicates (§6.1.3). Section 6.1.4 will collate these results, so as to draw conclusions for the adjectival -ant form in general.

In Late Latin, only the present participle can have adjectival external syntax. Hence, all adjectival -ant forms can in principle be categorised as present participles. For this reason, the contribution of the adnominal, subject predicate, and object predicate forms to the degree of categorial determinacy of the Old French -ant form will not be measured for each type of forms separately, but only for the adjectival forms in general (§6.1.4).

### 6.2.1. Adnominal -ant forms

I will explore first the frequency of adnominal -ant forms in the Old French corpus in general (§6.2.1.1), and then their frequency and productivity in the different thematic domains (§6.2.1.2).

#### 6.2.1.1. Frequency

In the Old French corpus as a whole, adnominal -ant forms are not very frequent. Indeed, their absolute frequency amounts to only 6.17 instances per 10 000 words. This frequency is higher in the 12th-13th c. than in Early Old French, but the difference between the two periods is too small to be significant (Table 6.1). In relative terms, adnominal -ant forms represent almost a quarter of all -ant forms in the
Old French corpus (24% or 521 instances out of 2 153). This proportion is lower in Early Old French, but given the low absolute number of instances in this period, no firm conclusions can be drawn.

<table><caption>**Table 6.1.** Frequency of adnominal -ant forms in Early Old French and the 12th-13th c.</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>#adnominal -ant forms<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#-ant forms<br>(per 10 000 words)</th><th>#adnominal -ant forms/<br>#-ant forms</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Early Old French</td><td>5 (5.58)</td><td>33 (36.84)</td><td>15,15%</td></tr><tr><td>12th-13th c.</td><td>475 (5.88)</td><td>1 989 (24.63)</td><td>23,88%</td></tr></tbody></table>

The *Chanson de Roland* comprises 41 adnominal -ant forms. This equals 14.92 occurrences per 10 000 words and 31% of all -ant forms in this text (n=131). The *Chanson de Roland* behaves in this respect more like 12th-13th c. texts than as Early Old French texts.

According to a chi-square goodness-of-fit test, the increasing proportion of adnominal -ant forms is probably random: this proportion is lower than expected in Early Old French and higher than expected in the 12th-13th c. in a statistically insignificant way ($\chi^2 = 0.71$; df = 1; p = 0.3994) (Table 6.2).

<table><caption>**Table 6.2.** Observed vs expected proportion of adnominal -ant forms to the total number of -ant forms in Early Old French and the 12th-13th c.</caption><thead><tr><th>Period</th><th>Observed frequency (%)</th><th>Expected frequency (%)</th><th>Standardised residuals</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td>Early Old French</td><td>5 (15,15%)</td><td>8 (24,24%)</td><td>-1.01</td></tr><tr><td>12th-13th c.</td><td>475 (23,88%)</td><td>472 (23,73%)</td><td>+0.13</td></tr></tbody></table>

Within the period of Old French, the -ant form thus does not specialise in its adnominal use, contrary to what the figures in Table 6.1 might suggest.

### 6.2.1.2. Frequency and productivity in the five thematic domains

The frequency of adnominal -ant forms is highest in the didactical texts, both in (normalised) absolute terms and in relation to the total number of -ant forms (Table 6.3). The difference with the other thematic domains is larger in absolute terms than in relative terms. The (normalised) absolute frequency of this type of -ant forms is lowest in the legal texts, while their proportion to the total number of -ant forms is lowest in the historical texts.