Prohibition

negated, which results in the meaning of prohibition. Needless to say, negated permission is a clear indication that it is modality that is within the scope of negation. As a result, in each of the 56 examples we obtain a one-is-not-permitted-to reading rather than one-is-permitted-not-to, which would be a concomitant of proposition negation. As hinted at earlier, prohibition of mot can be realized in two ways, that is to say, either by negating mot itself:

(3.4.16) Na he ne mot beon mid læwedum scrude gescryd.

nor he not must be with lay clothes dressed

‘Nor can he be dressed in lay clothes’

(COAELET3 206) or, alternately, by negating the verb in the main clause in which the clause with mot is embedded:

(3.4.17) Nis nanum weofodþene alyfed, þæt he wifian mote, not-is to-no altar-servant permitted, that he take-wife must, ac is ælcum forboden.

but is to-all forbidden

‘An altar servant is not permitted to marry. It is forbidden’

(COINSPOL 149) Prohibition of the former type outnumbers that of the latter type by 53 to 3.

For the sake of clarity, it should be noted that the number of explicit prohibition examples, which the former type might be called, is consistent with the number of negative clauses in the permission row in Table 21. The three examples of implicit prohibition, a label adopted for the latter type, are included among the affirmative clauses in the same table as, formally, mot is

not negated. Despite this formal difference, it should be stressed that example (3.4.17) contains a sense of prohibition no less valid than example (3.4.16). In both cases there is no room for doubt that the action which the Agonist is implied to be willing to undertake is disallowed. Still, the fact that speakers choose implicit prohibition over explicit in some circumstances stands to prove that a sentences such as (3.4.17) need some accounting for. In 3.2.5 a similar challenge is faced in the case of þearf and, having eliminated negative raising as a mechanism behind such structures, I argue that a negative marker is moved from the clause with a pre-modal to the main clause on the grounds of emphasis. Evidently, the same solution is applicable to mot. By shifting negation to the main clause in (3.4.17), the speaker/writer makes sure that prohibition, i.e. modality, is emphasized. The import that the speaker/writer assigns to the emphasis of the prohibition in this case becomes even more noticeable when one considers the somewhat redundant addition of ac is ælcum forboden, which yet more enhances the notion of prohibition. Therefore, it seems a feasible conclusion that implicit prohibition occurs in sentences marked for emphasis. Note also that (3.4.17) is an intriguing example of redundant modality in that the sense of prohibition is revealed in the main clause and then, in its own turn, mot somehow superfluously follows in the subordinate clause. Were one to say that mot carries mere permission here, the meaning would be strikingly incongruous with the prohibition in the main clause. I conjecture that mot in (3.4.17), owing to the shift of negation to the main clause, takes over the function of a periphrastic subjunctive marker. If the modality is marked elsewhere (the main clause), the pre-modal, relieved of its lexical burden, proceeds to signal non-factuality of the proposition.

Interestingly enough, in the Institutes of Polity I find a sentence which, on top of being semantically parallel to (3.4.17), contrasts nicely with it. Consider (3.4.18):

(3.4.18) And preoste is forboden, þæt he beon ne mot, ... æt þam and to-priest is forbidden, that he be not must, at the brydlacum,

marriage-ceremony

‘A priest cannot be at the marriage ceremony’

(COINSPOL 193) The parallelism pivots on the fact that in (3.4.18) prohibition is also expressed in the main clause and, thereafter, mot in the subordinate clause ensues.

Nevertheless, at this point (3.4.18) deviates from (3.4.17) in that mot, in the presence of the negative marker, repeats the already-stated prohibition, which makes (3.4.18) a more prototypical case of redundant modality than (3.4.17) (witness the indicative form mot in (3.4.18) vs. subjunctive mote in (3.4.17)). It

might be conclusively reasoned that (3.4.17) becomes an alternative to the structure in (3.4.18) as the repetition of modality from the main clause gives way to the use of a pre-modal in the subordinate clause as a marker of the subjunctive. Unfortunately, any detailed investigation into this issue is outside the scope of this study.

Sentence (3.4.18) brings us to the 53 explicit prohibition examples. All these sentences are truly negative with the particle ne accompanying mot. The vast number of such examples in the sample renders it possible to see a cline of prohibition running from the most subjective to the least subjective occurrences. Respective examples follow:

(3.4.19) þu scealt eac yfelne ege an forlætan, woruldearfoða, thou shalt also evil fear one forsake, worldly-afflictions, ne most ðu wesan for ðæm ealles to ormod,

not must thou be for these all to discouraged

‘Thou shalt also forsake the evil fear of worldly afflictions, nor must you be discouraged by all of them’

(COMETBOE 28) (3.4.20) On þam dæge ge ne motan cweþan æt þære mæssan:

on that day you not must say at the mass:

dominus uobiscum, dominus vobiscum

‘On that day you must not say ‘dominus vobiscum’ during the mass’

(COAELET3 34) (3.4.21) Forþonþe he mot mæssian, þeahþe he munuc ne sy, and because he may say-mass, although he monk not be, and munuc ne mot mæssian, butan he mæssepreost sy.

monk not must, say-mass but he priest be

‘Because he may say mass even though he is not a monk, and a monk cannot say mass unless he is a priest’

(COAELET3 119) (3.4.22) Sawla ne moton manfremmende in minum leng æhtum

souls not must working-wickedness in my long property wunigan.

stay

‘souls may not stay long in my property working wickedness’

(COCYNEW 905) (3.4.23) Hi ne mostan na wifian on nanre wudewan ne on

they not must not marry on no widow nor on

forlætenan wife be Godes leafe þa ac abandoned woman according-to God’s permission then but on clænum mædene.

on pure maiden

‘According to God’s law, they must not marry a widow or an abandoned woman but a pure maiden’

(COAELET3 130) It will be clear from these examples that the instances of mot with a sense of prohibition form a cline analogous to the cline of permission analyzed in 3.4.3.1. The major difference between the clines could be described as occasioned by a barrier placed by the Antagonist in the way of the Agonist in the case of prohibition. As noted in 3.4.3.1, permission calls for a scenario where the barrier is withdrawn, thereby making it possible for the Agonist to act. Since the other parameters affecting the cline of prohibition match those pertaining to the cline of permission, I will limit my discussion to a few major points. Thus, prohibition in my sample has very weak association with directives as there are only two examples where the speaker is one with the Antagonist (see (3.4.19)). Otherwise, the sample abounds in deontic statements which, with the notable exception of (3.4.22), take the subject as the Agonist.

As with permission, in such cases the prohibition most often originates in religious ethics or a legal code. The Agonist may be specific (see (3.4.20)), yet is much more frequently generic (see (3.4.21), (3.4.22), and (3.4.23)). The speaker may relate prohibition issued in the present and holding for the present with a possible future orientation (see (3.4.19) through (3.4.22)) as well as prohibition relevant for the past (see (3.4.23)). By way of summary, it bears remarking that the core of the cline of prohibition is poorly represented, even more so than that of permission. For instance, my sample evinces no strongly subjective examples with the speaker overtly marking his or her involvement.

At the same time, as might be expected, most examples swarm toward the less subjective skirt and periphery.