Strategies of subordination in vedic

This book discusses the problem of subordination in a language that is notoriously poor in subordinates, such as Vedic. The construction considered as being the typical subordinate in Vedic studies (i.e. a finite clause marked by verbal ac-cent and by a conjunction derived from the stem of the relative pronoun yá-) presents syntactic and semantic properties which are at odds with traditional definitions of subordination. An increasing grammaticalization of the subordinating linkage appears in the Rig-Veda, from implicit to explicit nexus, from particles to subordinators, from adjunction to embedding, and from assertion to presupposition. Accordingly, Vedic hypotaxis provides evidence for a theoretical view of subordination as a continuum of features partially shared with parataxis. Vedic hypotaxis is traditionally studied according to a structuralist approach. However, our analysis shows that the spread of Vedic hypotaxis is sensitive to semantic considerations.
The syntactically loose construction of yá-clauses preferably extends to relations implying separate states of affairs, with different arguments and different time reference for main clause and subordinate clause. Hypotaxis is earlier used for adverbial relations than for completive relations, which imply a tighter semantic integration between the two clauses, and which resort to compact structures such as nominalizations. This study is addressed to historical linguists and to typologists, who will find glosses for Vedic material.

Carlotta Viti is a Post-Doc research fellow at the University of Pisa. She spent periods of study at the School of Afri-can and Oriental Studies in London and at the Max-Planck-Institut für evolutionäre Anthropologie in Leipzig. She is mainly interested in linguistic typology, historical syntax, and discourse pragmatics. She has presented contributions to various journals and meetings on these subjects.