Abstract
Despite claims to the contrary, it has been shown that a number of modern Romance varieties—including European and Brazilian Portuguese, Spanish, Italian, and French—allow omission of the object of a verb, even when the object has a definite referent. Taking as a point of departure Arteaga’s (On null objects in Old French. In: Schwegler A, Tranel B, Uribe-Etxebarria M (eds) Romance linguistics: theoretical perspectives. Benjamins, Amsterdam, pp 1–11, 1997) study of null objects in Old French, this paper discusses contexts in which null objects are attested in Old French, including some not discussed by Arteaga, and including instances of manuscript variation. In addition, drawing on recent theories of null objects, and using the nature of the antecedent to the null object as a diagnostic, it is proposed that Old French possessed both null pronominals and null variables. The wide range of contexts in which Old French evinced null objects is taken to suggest that the ability to license object drop is not an innovation in Modern or even Middle French. Given that null objects are also attested in Latin, the data point to the continual availability of object drop from the earliest stages of French to the modern language.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Glosses follow the Leipzig glossing rules. A null object is represented with [e] following the verb of which it is an argument; null subjects are not indicated in the morpheme glosses but are indicated by an underlined position in the literal gloss.
- 2.
Yaguello (1998) suggested that écrasement is less likely to occur with a [+human] than a [−human] referent, an observation that remains to be investigated in Old French.
- 3.
In the following example, the antecedent (la vile ‘the city’) of the null object in the second sentence is not the direct object of a prior verb but rather the object of a preposition:
Lors sejorna l’empereres Henri par cinq jorz, et puis chevaucha
Then stayed-3-sg the-sg.emperor-m-sg-nom Henry for five days-m-pl and then rode-3-sg
trosque à la cité del Dimot, por savoir coment ele ere
until to the-f-sg city-f-sg of-art-m-sg Dimot for know-inf how it-f-sg-nom was-3-sg
abattue, et se on la porroit refermer. Et se
destroyed-f-ptcp and if one-3-sg-nom-indf it-f-sg-acc could-3-sg repair-inf and 3-sg-refl
loja devant la vile, et vit, et il et si
camped-3-sg in.front.of the-f-sg city-f-sg and saw-3-sg and he-3-m-sg-nom and his-3-pl-poss
baron, que il n’estoit mie leus de fermer en
barons-m-pl-nom that it-3-m-sg-nom neg.was-3-sg neg place-m-sg of secure-inf [e] in
tel point.
this-m-sg condition-m-sg
‘Then the emperor Henry stayed for five days, and then (he) rode as far as the city of Dimot, to see how it had been destroyed, and if one could refortify it. And (he) camped in front of the city and saw, he and his barons, that there was no place to secure __ in this condition.’ (Villehardouin, Conquête de Constantinople, §449)
By way of contrast, note the expressed object la ‘it’ in the final se clause of the first sentence.
- 4.
Modern French similarly allows LDs with or without a resumptive pronoun in wh-interrogatives, as in Jean-Claude, quand est-ce que tu l’as vu? ‘Jean-Claude, when did you see him?’ and Le chianti, qui aime? ‘Chianti, who likes?’ The second example, however, appears to be less acceptable for some speakers.
- 5.
- 6.
I follow Roberts (1993) in analyzing these examples as LDs and not stylistic inversion.
- 7.
There need not be an exact correspondence between a constituent’s discourse function and the functional projection in which it is situated (e.g., a topic in TopicP); what is important is that the LD is in a leftward (A-bar) position, as evidenced by the presence of a focus element in COMP.
- 8.
An anonymous reviewer inquires how the arbitrary human null object has evolved dioachronically. The present research is restricted to the Old French period; future research is warranted to trace the development of the possibilities attested in Modern French (see examples 1, 3).
References
Adams, Marianne. 1987. From Old French to the theory of pro-drop. Natural Language and Theory 5: 1–32.
Adams, Marianne. 1989. Verb second effects in medieval French. In Studies in Romance linguistics, ed. Carl Kirschner and Janet Decesaris, 1–31. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Anglade, Joseph. 1941. Grammaire élémentaire de l’ancien français. Paris: Armand Colin.
Arteaga, Deborah. 1997. On null objects in Old French. In Romance linguistics: Theoretical perspectives, ed. Armin Schwegler, Bernard Tranel, and Myriam Uribe-Etxebarria, 1–11. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Authier, Jean-Marc P. 1988. Null object constructions in KiNande. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 6: 19–37.
Authier, Jean-Marc P. 1989a. Arbitrary null objects and unselective binding. In The null subject parameter, ed. Osvaldo Jaeggli and Kenneth J. Safir, 45–67. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Authier, Jean-Marc P. 1989b. Two types of empty operator. Linguistic Inquiry 20: 117–124.
Benincà, Paola. 2004. The left periphery of medieval Romance. Studi Linguistici et Filologici Online 2: 243–297.
Benincà, Paola. 2006. A detailed map of the left periphery of medieval Romance. In Crosslinguistic research in syntax and semantics: Negation, tense, and clausal architecture, ed. Raffaella Zanuttini, Hector Campos, Elena Herburger, and Paul Portner, 53–86. Washington, DC: Georgetown UP.
Bescherelle. 1997. La grammaire pour tous. Paris: Hatier.
Bouchard, Denis. 1989. Null objects and the theory of empty categories. In Studies in Romance linguistics, ed. Carl Kirschner and Janet Decesaris, 33–49. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Buridant, Claude. 2000. Grammaire nouvelle de l’ancien français. Paris: Sedes.
Campos, Hector. 1986. Indefinite object drop. Linguistic Inquiry 17: 354–359.
Cecchetto, Carlo. 1997. The distribution of clitics in dislocation structures. Paper presented at the 27th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages, Irvine, CA.
Cinque, Guglielmo. 1997. Topic’ constructions in some European languages and ‘connectedness’. In Materials on left dislocation, ed. Elena Anagnostopoulou, Henk van Riemsdijk, and Frans Zwarts, 93–118. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Cole, Peter. 1987. Null objects in universal grammar. Linguistic Inquiry 18: 597–612.
Cummins, Sarah, and Yves Roberge. 2004. Null objects in French and English. In Contemporary approaches to Romance linguistics, ed. Julie Auger, J.Clancy Clements, and Barbara Vance, 121–138. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
De Cat, Cécile. 2007. French dislocation: Interpretation, syntax, acquisition. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Einhorn, E. 1974. Old French: A concise handbook. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Fónagy, Ivan. 1985. Verbes transitifs à objet latent. Revue Romane 20: 3–35.
Foulet, Lucien. 1930. Petite syntaxe de l’ancien français. Paris: Honoré Champion.
Galves, Charlotte Chambelland. 1989. L’objet nul et la structure de la proposition en portugais du Brésil. Revue des langues romanes 93: 305–336.
Garcia Velasco, Daniel, and Carmen Portero Muñoz. 2002. Understood objects in functional grammar. Working Papers in Functional Grammar 76: 1–24.
Hirschbühler, Paul. 1997. On the source of lefthand NPs in French. In Materials on left dislocation, ed. Elena Anagnostopoulou, Henk van Riemsdijk, and Frans Zwarts, 55–66. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Huang, C.-T.James. 1984. On the distribution and reference of empty pronouns. Linguistic Inquiry 15: 531–574.
Jensen, Frede. 1990. Old French and comparative Gallo-Romance syntax. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag.
Kayne, Richard S. 1994. The antisymmetry of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.
Kibler, William W. 1984. An introduction to Old French. New York: MLA.
Lambrecht, Knud. 1981. Topic, antitopic, and verb agreement in non-standard French. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Lambrecht, Knud, and Kevin Lemoine. 1996. Vers une grammaire des compléments zéro en français parlé. In Absence de marques et représentation de l’absence: Travaux linguistiques du CERLICO, ed. Jean Chuquet and Marc Fryd, 279–309. Rennes: Presses Universitaires de Rennes.
Lambrecht, Knud, and Kevin Lemoine. 2005. Definite null objects in spoken French: A construction-grammar account. In Grammatical constructions, ed. Mirjam Fried and Hans C. Boas, 13–55. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Larjavaara, Meri. 2000. Présence ou absence de l’objet: Limites du possible en français contemporain. Helsinki: Academia Scientiarum Fennica.
Luraghi, Silvia. 1997. Omission of the direct object in Latin. Indogermanische Forschungen 102: 239–257.
Marchello-Nizia, Christiane. 1995. L’évolution du français: Ordre des mots, démonstratifs, accent tonique. Paris: Armand Colin.
Marchello-Nizia, Christiane. 1998. Dislocations en ancien français: Thématisation ou rhématisation? Cahiers de Praxématique 30: 161–178.
Martin, Robert, and Marc Wilmet. 1980. Manuel du français du moyen âge. Bordeaux: SOBODI.
Melander, Jehan. 1943. Le tour français Cet homme, je le connais: Sa fréquence et sa syntaxe dans l’ancienne langue. Studia Neophilologica 16: 195–200.
Pieroni, Silvia. 1999. Subject properties and semantic roles in Latin. Paper presented at the 10th International Colloquium on Latin Linguistics, Paris.
Pinkster, Harm. 1990. Latin syntax and semantics. London: Routledge.
Priestley, L. 1955. Reprise constructions in French. Archivum Linguisticum 7: 1–28.
Prince, Ellen F. 1981. Toward a taxonomy of given-new information. In Radical pragmatics, ed. Peter Cole, 223–255. San Diego: Academic.
Raposo, Eduardo. 1986. On the null object in European Portuguese. In Studies in Romance linguistics, ed. Osvaldo Jaeggli and Carmen Silva-Corvalán, 372–390. Dordrecht: Foris.
Raynaud de Lage, Guy. 1962. Introduction à l’ancien français. Paris: Société d’Edition d’Enseignement Supérieur.
Rizzi, Luigi. 1986a. Null objects in Italian and the theory of pro. Linguistic Inquiry 17: 501–557.
Rizzi, Luigi. 1986b. On the status of subject clitics in Romance. In Studies in Romance linguistics, ed. Osvaldo Jaeggli and Carmen Silva-Corvalán, 391–419. Dordrecht: Foris.
Rizzi, Luigi. 1997. The fine structure of the left periphery. In Elements of grammar, ed. Liliane Haegeman, 281–337. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Roberts, Ian. 1993. Verbs and diachronic syntax: A comparative history of English and French. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Schøsler, Lene. 1999. Réflexions sur l’optionnalité des compléments d’objet direct en latin, en ancien français, en moyen français et en français moderne. Etudes Romanes 44: 9–27.
Schøsler, Lene. 2000. Le statut de la forme zéro du complément d’objet direct en français moderne. Etudes Romanes 47: 105–129.
Skårup, Povl. 1975. Les premières zones de la proposition en ancien français [Special issue #6]. Revue Romane.
Stein, Achim, Pierre Kunstmann, and Martin-D. Gleßgen. 2008. Nouveau Corpus d’Amsterdam. Electronic corpus of Old French literary texts c. 1150–1350, originally established by Anthonij Dees. Stuttgart: Institut für Linguistik/Romanistik.
Troberg, Michelle. 2004. Topic-comment resumptive pronouns in Modern French and Old and Middle French. Toronto Working Papers in Linguistics 23: 133–156.
Vance, Barbara. 1989. The evolution of pro-drop in medieval French. In Studies in Romance linguistics, ed. Carl Kirschner and Janet DeCesaris, 413–441. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Vance, Barbara. 1993. Verb-first declaratives introduced by et and the position of pro in Old and Middle French. Lingua 89: 281–314.
Vance, Barbara. 1997. Syntactic change in medieval French: Verb-second and null subjects. Dordrecht: Kluwer.
Vance, Barbara, Donaldson Bryan, and B. Devan Steiner. 2010. V2 loss in Old French and Old Occitan: The role of fronted clauses. In Selected proceedings of the 39th linguistic symposium on Romance languages, ed. Sonia Colina, Antxon Olarrea, and Ana Maria Carvalho, 301–320. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
Vincent, Nigel. 2000. Competition and correspondence in syntactic change: Null arguments in Latin and Romance. In Diachronic syntax: Models and mechanisms, ed. Susan Pintzuk, George Tsoulas, and Anthony Warner, 25–50. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Viollet-le-Duc, Eugène. 1874. Dictionnaire raisonné du mobilier français de l’époque carlovingienne à la Renaissance. Paris: Librairie centrale d’architecture.
Yaguello, Marina. 1998. La réalisation zéro des clitiques objet dans les constructions di-transitives du français parlé. In Analyse linguistique et approches de l’oral: Recueil d’études offert en hommage à Claire Blanche-Benveniste, ed. Mireille Bilger, Karel van den Eynde, and Françoise Gadet, 267–274. Leuven: Peeters.
Acknowledgments
I would like to acknowledge Barbara Vance, Laurent Dekydtspotter, Julie Auger, Michael Johnson, the audiences at the 34th Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages (University of Utah) and the University of Texas at Austin, and the anonymous reviewers for helpful comments and suggestions. All errors and shortcomings are my own.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2013 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht.
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Donaldson, B. (2013). Null Objects in Old French. In: Arteaga, D. (eds) Research on Old French: The State of the Art. Studies in Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, vol 88. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4768-5_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-4768-5_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht
Print ISBN: 978-94-007-4767-8
Online ISBN: 978-94-007-4768-5
eBook Packages: Humanities, Social Sciences and LawSocial Sciences (R0)