Agan to geldanne

The frequency of different nonfinite complements of agan is presented in Table 5. Visibly, there is a remarkable preponderance of the occurrences of to geldanne as a complement of agan, which is of interest in view of NORDLINGER

and TRAUGOTT’S (1997) comment on this collocation. They emphasize the use of agan to geldanne as a gloss for Latin debere (meaning ‘to owe’), which finds confirmation in five out of the eleven occurrences. It proves futile to seek any necessity meaning in those eleven instances of the construction, though.

Even more so, if we acknowledge MITCHELL’S (1988) slamming the door on admitting anything beyond the sense of possession before the end of the eleventh century in the sentences of the following type:

(3.1.4) egressus autem seruus ille inuenit unum de conseruis suis qui debebat ei centum denarios et tenens suffocabat eum dicens redde quod debes

gefoerde soðlice ðegn ðe gefand vel gemitte enne of went indeed servant who found vel met one of efneðegnum his seðe ahte to geldenna hundrað scillinga co-servants his this-that had to pay hundred shillings 7 geheald hine cuoeðende geld þæt ðu aht to geldanne and held him saying pay that thou have to pay

Infinitival complement Pre-modal

to geldanne

to syllanne

to habenne

to

donne Other Total

agan 11 6 6 5 35 63

Table 5.Co-occurrence of agan with infinitives

‘The servant was walking when he met one of his co-servants who owed him a hundred shillings, he grabbed him saying,

‘Give me back what you owe me.’’

(MtGl (Li) 18.28) (3.1.5) Ælc mon eornestlice ah to geldene sum þing, and hæfð each man therefore ought to pay some thing, and has oðerne mon þe him sceal

another man that him shall

sum ðing; forþon ðe nan mon nis ðe næbbe sume synne, some thing; because no man not-is who not-has some sin,

‘Indeed, each man owes someone something and there is someone who owes him something. It is because no man is without guilt,’

(ÆHomM 7 79) As a matter of fact, one cannot but side with MITCHELL (1988) when he argues that the agan to geldanne constructions such as in (3.1.4) and (3.1.5) do not lend “any support to the notion that agan alone means ‘to be obliged to’; the sense of the Old English is ‘You have something to pay. Pay it.’ In other words, agan means ‘to possess’ and the inflected infinitive qualifies the object. The comparison is with MnE ‘I have my house to let’, not with ‘I have to let my house’” (MITCHELL 1988: 77). Indisputable as the point made by MITCHELL

(1988) is, a comparison of agan in (3.1.4) and (3.1.5) reveals quite remarkable differences. In the former, agan to geldanne appears twice, each time as a gloss for Latin debere and each time with reference to the most prototypical type of a debt, namely a financial one. By no means, on the other hand, does the debt in (3.1.5) concern financial matters, it has some moral overtones instead. What is owed and/or paid for is a guilt or sin committed. Considering that (3.1.5) is not a line translated from Latin, it testifies to the fact that semantic bleaching of the possession meaning in the case of agan continues.

Also, I believe the significance of agan to geldanne lies elsewhere. This juxtaposition, quite likely merely a convenient way of translating debere at first, may be the first incentive to follow agan with an infinitive. If the textual popularity of this practice is any indication of its frequency in the spoken language, then the expression can be said to have acquired an aspect of idiomaticity. A mechanism that yet more enhances the fostering of agan to geldanne in Old English is that connected with a speaker’s mental lexicon being affected by the traces left by frequently used words. Theorized by BYBEE

(1985), the mechanism is credited by KRUG (1988; 2000) with much explanatory force behind the establishment of word sequences and grammatical structures. The pivotal assumption which this theory revolves around is that

a lexical item which is repeatedly swept into the consciousness of the speaker is very likely to leave a mark and, thereby, to stay there. Subsequently, a point is reached when a speaker’s familiarity with the item boosts its frequency, which in turn creates an environment favorable for grammaticalization.

Furthermore, an interesting observation that forces itself after an investigation of the corpus is a relatively high rate of recurrence of agan with different verbs of social transactions. Table 5 shows that to syllanne (‘to give’) collocates with agan six times. A host of verbs such as to gifanne (‘to give’), to dælanne (‘to give, distribute’), to bebycganne (‘to sell’), etc. also make one-off appearances. My conjecture is that only after both a sufficient amount of the semantic bleaching of agan to gyldanne and a number of traces left on speakers’ lexicon by this construction is the extension to the verbs of social transactions possible. Undoubtedly, a facilitating factor in the genesis of this extension is significant semantic affinity between the verb to geldanne and the likes of to syllanne. Once the novelty of agan (to) infinitive wears off, speakers are ready to experiment with applying the structure to new albeit related contexts and substituting semantically related infinitives for the one firmly established. The meaning of agan followed by a verb of social transactions, is still mostly possessive:

(3.1.6) 7 heo cwæð to Osulfe ðæt heo hit ahte him wel to and she said to Osulfe that she it ought him well to syllanne forðon hit wæs hire morgengifu

give because it was her morning-gift

‘She told Osulf that she had it to offer him/was supposed to give it to him as it was her morning gift’

(Ch 1445 (HarmD 18) 13)

(3.1.7) And landcop 7 hlafordes gifu, þe he

and tax-for-purchase-of-land and lord’s gift that he on riht age to gifanne,

properly ought to give

‘The tax at the purchase of land and the lord’s gift that he legally has to give’

(LawIIIAtr 3) At the same time, however, NORDLINGER and TRAUGOTT (1997) and TRAUGOTT

and DASHER (2005) in their in-depth discussion of the OE development of agan emphasize the advent of an invited inference of a deontic necessity to pay once the object possessed is no longer referential. The focal point of their argument is, in fact, the context wherein agan to geldanne occurs, as illustrated in (3.1.4) above.

In [such — J.N.] cases [...] the debt is referential, but the pennies to pay it off are not (yet). Where the object may not yet exist (like the pennies) and especially where it does not yet exist [...] the semantics of possession is bleached, and the pragmatic inference of obligation strengthened. Semanticization of the obligation has clearly occurred when the object is no longer physical, only cognitive or experiential [...]. (TRAUGOTT and DASHER 2005: 139)

Indeed, there seems to be no good reason why this line of reasoning should not also cover the cases like (3.1.6) and (3.1.7) where agan is coupled with a verb of social transactions. The referential function of the debt in (3.1.4) or (3.1.5) is now taken over by the deal imposed or agreed upon. What is not referential, however, is the thing to be given which is yet to be materialized. Particular contexts may vary to a lesser or greater degree but what is of crucial importance is that an inference of a deontic necessity to give, sell, buy, etc., sneaks into many of those contexts, an inference which is bound to stay.

Obviously, because of the way in which inference-based semantic change proceeds, it is impossible to point a finger to a precise moment when the consummation of the sense of deontic necessity in agan (to) infinitive takes place. As noted by FALTZ (1989) and BYBEE, PERKINS and PAGLIUCA (1994) it takes a transition period before a meaning brought along by an inference can be taken to be prevalent in a given item. Beforehand, sentences are encountered where both senses, the initial one and the inferential one, strive for dominance, undoubtedly, this stage being preceded by the unquestioned presence of the initial meaning and a slight implication of the second. In TRAUGOTT and DASHER’S (2005) view it is the time needed for an invited inference to evolve into a generalized invited inference. That being so, linguists venture converse hypotheses as to when the obligative sense of agan really appears. TELLIER

(1962), while providing the first instance of ahte to habanne from 1085, opts for the end of the twelfth century as a relevant date whereas aforementioned MITCHELL (1988) moves this date back by a century.