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Ecce in Archaic Latin: interjection or demonstrative?

  • Verónica Orqueda EMAIL logo , Renata Rivera Castro and Francisca Toro Varela
Published/Copyright: January 13, 2025
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Abstract

Longstanding debate persists regarding the classification of Latin ecce as word class. While some scholars regard it as a particle or demonstrative, others characterize it as an interjection. This study examines the implications of these approaches and analyzes the behavior of ecce in Archaic Latin according to different grammatical and semantic criteria. The analysis confirms that ecce functions primarily as a predicative demonstrative. Furthermore, it contends that ecce can be specifically categorized as a presentative predicative demonstrative. These results suggest that the interjectional use of this demonstrative must have arisen only secondarily.


Corresponding author: Verónica Orqueda, Facultad de Letras, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Santiago, Chile, E-mail:

Funding source: FONDECYT project, National Research and Development Agency

Award Identifier / Grant number: 1210321

Acknowledgments

We are grateful to the journal’s editors and two anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments. We also thank Berta González Saavedra and Annamaria Bartolotta for carefully reading previous versions of the paper. Conclusions and mistakes are our own.

  1. Research funding: The research presented in this article was part of the FONDECYT project #1210321, funded by the National Research and Development Agency (ANID).

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Published Online: 2025-01-13
Published in Print: 2024-05-27

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