Formal Approaches to Semantic Microvariation: Adverbial ...

It is therefore reasonable to analyze the sentences in (21) and (22) as involving movement:
the adnominal quantifiers peu and moult are moved from a position inside the
direct object to a topic position in the left periphery of the clause. Therefore, in Old
French, in split DPs, the quantifier is always a determiner whose domain consists
uniquely of properties composed of objects.
A fact that is relevant to the development of QAD in French is that it was very
common for degree quantifiers to be topicalized in their use as verbal modifiers. An
example of this with peu is shown in (26).
(26) Poi me redoute Synagons
little me fear Synagon-NOM
‘Synagon fears me little’
Anon. Moniage Guillaume, Seconde Redaction. (1180) p. 223
Thus, in Old French, although they were semantically different, the object quantifier
peu and the event quantifier peu often occupied the same syntactic position. This
gives rise to strings in the language with the adverb in topic position that look formally
very similar to structures in which the determiner is in topic position. An example of
a topicalized adverb with a de phrase verbal complement is shown below.
(27) Moult me mervail de ces clers sages
a lot me marvel of these clerics wise
‘I marvel a lot at these wise clerics’
Hue de Rotelande. Ipomédon. (1180). p. 63.
The fact that the two uses of a degree quantifier could co-occur in the same position
could even result in strings that were ambiguous. For example in (28), peu could either
be quantifying over fruit ‘fruit’ or portent ‘bring’.
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