The Syntax of Early English - Cryptm.org

24 The syntax of early Englishthe change in the impersonals is closely related to other changes taking placein the grammar.Denison (1990) argues that this is an undue simplification. Not all impersonalverbs fit the above framework of genitive source and dative experiencer,and not all verbs appear in all three surface structures (as noted also byAnderson 1988, and as shown in detail in the work of Allen 1986, 1995).Moreover, Denison argues that the notion ‘impersonal’ extends to more verbsand phrasal combinations than have been recognized in the literature so far.An example is the verb secgan, which can be used impersonally as in (22a);other examples involve verbs that belong to the semantic class of impersonals,and which similarly take a dative experiencer (such as (22b), with derigan,semantically similar to scamian), or appear in combination with a true impersonal(22d), but which nevertheless obligatorily take a nominative subject,unlike the ‘true’ impersonals of (21):(22) a. swa hit her beforan sægas it here before says‘as mentioned above’ (Or 9.70.19)b. swa æt æt fyr ne mihte him deriganso that the fire (N) not-could him (D) harm‘so that the fire could not harm him’ (ÆCHom I, 37.570.9)c. se cyning a sona swie æs fægnodethe king (N) then at-once greatly this (G) rejoiced‘the king at once rejoiced greatly in this’ (ÆHom 22.333)d. oe forhwy hi ne mægen hiora ma scamian onneor why they(N) not-may them (G) more shame thanfægnianrejoice‘or why they may not be more ashamed of these things/themselves thanglad’ (Bo 30.68.14 cf. Denison (1990: 124))According to Denison this indeterminacy and synchronic variation make ithard to fit the impersonals into a constrained syntactic analysis. To account forthe subsequent development of the impersonals, Denison invokes the notion of‘gradience’ or ‘serial relationship’, and shows how, by lexical diffusion, the ‘true’(subjectless) impersonals slowly adopt the characteristics of the pseudo-onessuch as those in (22). This explanation takes account of all the raw data, andinvolves no idealization (as the analyses by Anderson and Fischer and van derLeek do), and in that sense it may be more accurate. But it is not in any way clearfrom Denison’s proposal that it has anything to say on the directionality of thechange in impersonals: a change via gradation may go one way or another. Inthe analyses of Anderson and Fischer and van der Leek, the structure of thegrammar in which the impersonals figure determines the path of development.