統語的接辞-ingの誕生

動名詞構造の再考から

抄録

It is often pointed out that the development of the gerundival construction can be analyzed as the acquisition of verbal property. In this paper, we will examine exactly what this property is or what it means that the gerundival construction has changed from nominal to verbal. Especially we are concerned with the question which part of the grammar has changed to allow the -ing to have this verbal property. “syntactic affixation” is referred to as the crucial notion for the explanation of the difference between -ing (or -ung) affix in Old English and -ing affix in Present-day English. We will analyze the change of the property of -ing as the consequence of a phonological, morphological, and syntactic blending of lexical affix -ing (-ung) and syntactic affix -ende through the period of Middle English. It will also be shown that the property of syntactic -ing as Verbal Case assigner is of great relevance to the development. The gerundival construction which has remained in Present-day English then will be described as the result of the change.