Pochodzenie spójników przyczynowych w języku angielskim

Abstract

After some general information about the origins of the English language and the theoretical foundations of grammaticalization, we discuss the development of causal connectives in medieval English. The prototypical causal conjunction in the continental sisters of English was the word (h)want(a), unattested in even the earliest Anglo-Saxon texts. Instead in Old English we find the phrase forþon (þe) in numerous morphological and/or phonetic variant forms, which must have been an original insular formation, as no cognate forms are recorded in continental Germanic. Forþon (þe) was a high frequency word, functioning as a conjunction and an adverb alike. Its etymology is transparent: the prepositional phrase consisting of for, the preposition of cause, and the dative/instrumental form of the demonstrative pronoun must have undergone a syntactic reanalysis and was lexicalized as a new conjunction of cause or a phrasal subordinator (we find analogous formations in e.g. French par-ce (que), Polish dla-tego (że). In the 12th century forþon and its more common late OE variant forþi (þæt) rapidly dropped the deictic element from the conjunction leaving just for by itself as the usual multipurpose conjunction of cause and explanation in the next three centuries. In the last quarter of the 14th century we witness the first attestations of the new conjunction by-cause (that), grammaticalized from the original phrase by the cause that, which, we believe, arose first among bilingual Anglo-Norman and Middle English speakers in London as a loan translation of the Anglo-French causal conjunctive phrase par (la) cause que. In situations of common code-switching the educated bilingual Anglo-French speakers (and writers) copied the French strategy of forming the new causal conjunction into their English and the innovation must have become very fashionable in late-14th century London, from where it rapidly spread to the other dialects and to all social groups.