The first part of the joint-research is to describe the synchronic structuring and diachronic development of the declensional system in the Old North Russian (=ONR), manifested in the Birchbark letters, with comparative reference to the corresponding ...
The first part of the joint-research is to describe the synchronic structuring and diachronic development of the declensional system in the Old North Russian (=ONR), manifested in the Birchbark letters, with comparative reference to the corresponding system of Old Russian (=OR). In consideration of the facts that the existence of a variety of declension patterns in a language must be construed as one of variation phenomena and that identification of affixal patterns and determination of their distribution are a critical moment of grammar, this paper points out that firstly, the GS ending for ONR feminine nouns, unlike for OR partners, was generalized as –ě rather than –i, which is the one for OR, and that secondly, the NS ending for ONR masculine nouns was realized as –e rather than –ъ. This study provides new interpretations for these two points. General characteristics of the verbal tense system, which are manifested in the Novgorod Birchbark letters, are generally identical with that of the spoken variant of Old Russian (Kiev dialect), but show big differences from the written one. As for the past tense, the l-perfect form is most frequently used, expressing most of temporal meanings of the past tense. The fact that the perfective verb tends to be used in the context of Aorist, which becomes more obvious in the later documents, shows the incipient stage of Aspect development in Russian. The aspectual contrast has not yet been accomplished, and the non-suffixal simplex verb performs the biaspectual function, whereas the suffixal verb exhibits the lexical meaning of the suffix itself. The researcher on syntactic construction has investigated licensing of the nominative case without accompanying phi-agreement, focusing on non-agreeing nominative arguments found in the Old North Russian infinitival modal construction and the North Russian perfect construction. It is argued that the non-finite Infl consists of a defective Tense ([-Tense]) and an intact AGR, which is actually responsible for nominative case and phi-agreement. When the AGREE relation is established between a non-finite Infl and a DP within a phase, phi-agreement is not morphologically realized on the predicate due to the absence of [+Tense], but the nominative case of the AGR is licensed to the DP. In this way, the nominative object in the Old Russian infinitival modal construction is licensed in the non-finite environment. For the double nominative construction, such as the North Russian perfect, the Infl enters the AGREE relation with multiple DPs (Multiple Agree). The Infl realizes phi-features of only one of the DPs while the nominative case is overtly licensed to the two DPs. The study on the Passive addresses the question of how to derive the Russian instrumental case marked passive agents in the Minimalist syntactic framework. In the history of the Russian language, morphological realization of passive agents have developed from P(reposition)-type, i.e., otъ plus genitive case marked noun, to the I(nstrumental)-type. Arguing that such a change in case marking corresponds to the change in syntactic status, namely, adjunct to argument-adjunct, the present paper draws another construction with passive-like semantics, i.e., the so-called adversity impersonal construction. Drawing upon the similarities in semantics and case usage, it is proposed that agent phrases in passive and causer phrases in adversity impersonals are the same in structure. Capitalizing much upon the abovementioned diachronic and synchronic facts and the recent advances in theory, especially, Ch. Collins’ smuggling approach, the proposed syntactic derivation of the passive sentences imparts a crucial role of inversing to an auxiliary-like verb be (byt’), which is merged in the head of vP. It is further argued that an argument-adjunct-generating PredP contains PRO, whereas an adjunct PP does not. The current proposal can neatly account for the word order facts, diachronic developments and the undeniable presence of an agent in passive. In the final research agenda, to study the colloquial and literary system of orthography, and spelling doublets of orthography of birch bark documents, the four gospels of ‘Gennadius-Bible(1499)’ written in Church Slavonic language were selected as the study material, and a comparative study was done against the orthography of literary language, focusing on the usage in respect to the spelling doublets corresponding to /u/, /ja/, /o/, /f/, which can establish the chronological orthography. As a result, the 15th century birch bark documents and Gennadius-Bible(1499), although using identical spelling, were verified to have been developing their own distinct orthography within the frame of spoken language and written language, and the details are as follows: 1) the standard which Gennadius-Bible(1499) and birch bark documents shared are limited to the 3 situations including the usage of letter о, which corresponds to /o/ following a consonant, the usage of ‘little yus’, which corresponds to /ja/ following palatalized consonant, and the usage of ф and ‘fita’, which correspond to /f/, 2) whereas the semiotic aspects of relevant letters were noticeable in Gennadius-Bible(1499), the birch bark literature remains on the primary functions of letters, 3) in terms of the acceptance of ‘the Second South Slavic Influence’, the birth back literature displayed a total of 6 usages including the usage of ‘ligatura/digraph’ following a consonant, using letter а, which corresponds to [ja], using ‘ять (jat’)’, which corresponds to [’a], the usage of ‘о-ochnoe’, and the usage of Greek alphabet ‘omega’ and ‘fita’. This provides an opportunity to continue a follow-up study on the correlation of literature genre, which reflects the systems of the two languages, and the orthography, and can be utilized in the studies on the distinctiveness and universality of the orthography of the Old North Russian.