Home Linguistics & Semiotics 7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’)
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7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’)

  • Evi Van Damme , Ludovic De Cuypere and Klaas Willems
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The Diachrony of Ditransitives
This chapter is in the book The Diachrony of Ditransitives

Abstract

This chapter discusses the development of the ditransitive alternation with the verb verkaufen (‘sell’) in the history of New High German (1650-present) from a probabilistic point of view. The alternation concerns the constructional variation between the “Indirect Object Construction” (IOC) with dative case (e.g. der Frau ‘the woman’) and the “Prepositional Object Construction” (POC) (e.g. an die Frau ‘to the woman’). A random sample of 700 IOC and 741 POC attestations extracted from the HIST-Archiv, the Deutsches Textarchiv (1650-1899) and the Kernkorpus (1900-1999) was annotated for sixteen variables. The study focuses on (i) the relative proportions of both constructions over time, (ii) constituent order preferences of THEME and RECIPIENT and (iii) potentially motivating factors for the alternation. The corpus analysis reveals that POC imposes itself in the course of the 18th century, followed by a further gradual increase of the construction in the 19th century. Conversely, IOC with THEME-RECIPIENT order gradually falls into disuse. A logistic regression analysis provides evidence for the effect of ten variables on the alternation. A comparison with findings from previous studies of the corresponding alternation in English and Dutch reveals many similarities in the history of the three languages, but also a number of differences.

Abstract

This chapter discusses the development of the ditransitive alternation with the verb verkaufen (‘sell’) in the history of New High German (1650-present) from a probabilistic point of view. The alternation concerns the constructional variation between the “Indirect Object Construction” (IOC) with dative case (e.g. der Frau ‘the woman’) and the “Prepositional Object Construction” (POC) (e.g. an die Frau ‘to the woman’). A random sample of 700 IOC and 741 POC attestations extracted from the HIST-Archiv, the Deutsches Textarchiv (1650-1899) and the Kernkorpus (1900-1999) was annotated for sixteen variables. The study focuses on (i) the relative proportions of both constructions over time, (ii) constituent order preferences of THEME and RECIPIENT and (iii) potentially motivating factors for the alternation. The corpus analysis reveals that POC imposes itself in the course of the 18th century, followed by a further gradual increase of the construction in the 19th century. Conversely, IOC with THEME-RECIPIENT order gradually falls into disuse. A logistic regression analysis provides evidence for the effect of ten variables on the alternation. A comparison with findings from previous studies of the corresponding alternation in English and Dutch reveals many similarities in the history of the three languages, but also a number of differences.

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Preface V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of abbreviations IX
  5. Part 1: The nature of ditransitive arguments: the contribution of diachrony
  6. 1. How do ditransitives change? 1
  7. 2. Roles and grammatical relations in synchrony and diachrony: the case of the indirect object 19
  8. Part 2: Ditransitive verbs and construction alternation
  9. 3. The spread of the ad construction in Merovingian Latin: identifying semantic paths in the domain of ditransitives 61
  10. 4. Old Italian ditransitive constructions: between alternation and change 97
  11. 5. The emergence of the dative alternation in Dutch: towards the establishment of a horizontal link 137
  12. 6. Attraction and differentiation in the history of the English dative and benefactive alternations 169
  13. 7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’) 197
  14. Part 3: Ditransitives between stability and further developments
  15. 8. The diachrony of ditransitives in Vedic Sanskrit 231
  16. 9. Passives of ditransitives: the gradual rise of a Recipient passive in Italian 259
  17. 10. ‘Hit’ semantics and physical sensations: on the development of spontaneous event constructions with Spanish dar ‘give’ 285
  18. Subject Index 313
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110701371-007

Chapters in this book

  1. Frontmatter I
  2. Preface V
  3. Contents VII
  4. List of abbreviations IX
  5. Part 1: The nature of ditransitive arguments: the contribution of diachrony
  6. 1. How do ditransitives change? 1
  7. 2. Roles and grammatical relations in synchrony and diachrony: the case of the indirect object 19
  8. Part 2: Ditransitive verbs and construction alternation
  9. 3. The spread of the ad construction in Merovingian Latin: identifying semantic paths in the domain of ditransitives 61
  10. 4. Old Italian ditransitive constructions: between alternation and change 97
  11. 5. The emergence of the dative alternation in Dutch: towards the establishment of a horizontal link 137
  12. 6. Attraction and differentiation in the history of the English dative and benefactive alternations 169
  13. 7. The ditransitive alternation in the history of German: the case of verkaufen (‘sell’) 197
  14. Part 3: Ditransitives between stability and further developments
  15. 8. The diachrony of ditransitives in Vedic Sanskrit 231
  16. 9. Passives of ditransitives: the gradual rise of a Recipient passive in Italian 259
  17. 10. ‘Hit’ semantics and physical sensations: on the development of spontaneous event constructions with Spanish dar ‘give’ 285
  18. Subject Index 313
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