Du démonstratif à l'article défini : le cas de ce en français moderne

Abstract

From the Latin distal demonstrative ille, Old French developed the definite article li / le ; concomitantly, the Old French demonstratives cist and cil were created from the Late Latin reinforced demonstratives ecce iste and ecce ille. As these demonstratives eventually evolved into the weaker ce, a new set of reinforced demonstratives of the form ce N-ci / ce N-là was forged to express the deictic contrast. These observations suggest the existence of a cyclic evolution creating definite articles out of demonstratives, thus confirming Harris’ hypothesis that the Modern French demonstrative determiner ce, following the same path as the Latin demonstrative ille, is taking over the function of the definite article le. In this contribution, we argue that this hypothesis is only partially true. The process by which the demonstrative ce could become a definite article was initiated in Old French. In Modern French, ce can be used to convey pragmatic definiteness, strictly dependent upon its linguistic or situational environment ; however, ce still cannot express semantic definiteness, which is not directly anchored in its particular context of use. And yet, semantic definiteness is the core meaning of the definite article. Ce seems to have reached a point where this shift to semantic definiteness could take place, though. We put forward an explanation why this final step of the evolution has not yet been taken.