Revising the results: degree of reliance

As illustrated in section 3.2.1, Götze’s et al. (2007) decision tree reached its limits by not capturing all the informational characteristics that fronted items (especially fronted verbs) display. In some cases, adjustments could be made, in the case of (45) retaken here as (50), no concluding procedure could be established.

(50) le dit Jouen vint a elle et la tempta derrechief comme elle se voulsist consentir a ce que il meist a mort le dit feu Colin son mari. A la quelle chose elle […] se fust absentue a l’inducion du dit Jouen […] apres […] fust tres dolente et repentante de ce que elle s’estoit a ce consentue. Et pour ce, le plus tost que elle pout, parla audit Jouen […] en le requerant que a ce faire ne voulsist penser en aucune maniere et que consentir ne le pourroit.

The said Jouen came to her and tempted her again that she would want to consent to him killing the said deceased Colin her husband. At that thing she […] consented to the instigation of the said Jouen […] and after […] (she) was very distressed and repentant about the fact that she had consented to that. And because of that, as soon as she could, (she) spoke to the said Jouen […] in requesting him that he should not think of doing in any way and that consent (she) NEG could (1359, 231)

Recall that consentir is the perfect repeat of the information denoted by forms of consentir in the previous discourse but that the whole subordinate is negated and hence an opposite or contrastive reading. In the first round of coding, contrast was tested as additional category.

However, there were not any occurrences that bore a straighter contrastive reading than (50).

Yet, as can be seen in the following, the mere limitation to the values of new, accessible and given does not depict the complexity some occurrences display. Take, for instance, the example in (51).

(51) La pluie qui cheue estoit le dit jour

the rain that fallen had the said day (1359, 121)

Cheue was coded as being new since the preceding discourse of (51), given in (52) does not mention the weather conditions.

(52) […] nous a esté exposé que comme il et ses compaignons ordenez a faire l’arriere guet de nuit sur les murs de nostredite ville environ le mardi avant Noel darrain passé feussent alez en leur garde la ou il avoit pluseurs personnes entre les quels estoit feu Thiebaut Go[nn]ee si yvre que soustenir ne se povoit et oultrageux de paroles injurieuses et villaines dire a chascun estant lors sur les diz murs. Et pour ce li eust esté dit du dit arriere guet que pas n’estoit en estat de veillier veu l’estat de lui. Et escliçant et mal aler qu’il faisoit par dessus les diz murs pour la pluie qui cheue estoit le dit jour

(it) has been reported to us that as he and his companions ordered to be on night watch on the walls of our said town around Tuesday before past Christmas had gone to their watch where there were several persons among whom was defunct Thiebault Go[nn]ee so drunken that to carry himself straight (he) could not and (he was so) outrageous of injurious and vile words to say to everybody being then on the said walls. And for that (it) had been said to him by the watchman that (he) not was able to keep watch in view of his condition. And slippery and badly passable as it was on the said walls because of the rain RP fallen had the said day (1359,121)

One might argue that cheue ‘fallen’ is given or at least accessible with respect to the fact that there are few other verbs that can be used in a subject relative clause qualifying pluie ‘rain’ any further. In other terms, the combination of cheue and pluie is familiar and to some extent expected, hence the semantic content of cheue could be argued to be slight. To sum up, one could cast doubts on the procedure used to code for the different information values.

Furthermore, it appears that the semantic content of some fronted items is light and hence the question is whether an information-structural coding of these items is possible at all. In this regard, refer to the following example in (53).

(53) contenant comme en l’annee derrenier. passee feu Robin Garin de fait et senz aucune raisonnable eust batue et villenee tres excessivement et villainement la femme du dit Bachelier en l’absence d’iceli et aprés se feust venue sa dite famme a li et li eust monstré comme le dit Robin l’avoit villainement batue et sanz aucune cause raisonnable en li priant que il gardast son honneur. Et sur ce courrocié du dit fait eust parlé a deux hommes de son amitié en leur monstrant la villenie que faite li estoit en la personne de sa femme ainsi batue et villenee

containing that in the last passed year defunct Robin Garin of feat and without any reasonable had beaten and mistreated very excessively and vilely the wife of the said Bachelier in the absence of him and thereafter had come his said wife to him and had shown to him how the said Robin had vilely beaten her and without any reasonable cause (by) asking him that he should preserve her honour. And thereupon enraged about the said act (he) had spoken to two men of his amity them showing the vileness RCI made him was in the person of his wife so beaten and mistreated (1359,177)

The fronted participle faite was coded as new since no form of the verb faire was used in the previous discourse. However, the verb faire is semantically light and refers to an action that must be situated before and hence be given to some extent. In (53) above faite is used to define the term villenie, which is part of a semantic field that had been established before in the LDR by the following feu Robin Garin de fait et senz aucune raisonnable eust batue et villenee tres excessivement et villainement la femme du dit Bachelier. Hence, the label anaphoric was used to account for the apparently inconsistent information-structural value of faite. However, the question remains if these two features suffice to determine the pragmatic impact of the fronted item. Compare (53) to (54) below.

(54) ledit Guillaume Garnier pere eust esté prins prisonnier […] ledit Guillaume eust requis a nosdis ennemis qu'ils lui voulsissent donner congié d'aler fere sa finance […] en promectant retourner par devers eulx en ladicte prison […]

ledit pere ne retourna point devers eulx, comme promis l'avoit,

the said Guillaume Garnier father had been taken prisoner […] the said Guillaume had requested of our said enemies that they him would give permission to go make his financing […] making the promise to return among them to the said prison […] the said father did not return to them, as promised it.had (1424, 63)

Here the fronted participle promis is clearly given since the corresponding gérondif form en promectant, which is used within the same discourse context, i.e. the promise to come back.

Hence promis was likewise labelled as being anaphoric. But the informational value of promis is beyond the mere notion of givenness. Indeed, we find similar structures in other languages, as for instance (55) in English.

(55) He wanted to win, and WIN he did.

The common grounds of the fronting of win and promis are obvious. Both are instance of Verum Focus in the sense of Höhle (1992) and emphasize the expression of truth of the respective proposition.¹¹⁵ One might wonder whether a similar analysis is possible for faite in example (53) above. However, within the scope of the present chapter, the interpretive limits of the information-structural codings on givenness and anaphoricity are realized and the discussion of a more detailed approach on information structure is postponed to the analysis chapter, i.e.

section 4.2.