Abstract
This paper aims at demonstrating the explanatory advantages of the old hypothesis concerning the origins of the auxiliary of the Romanian analytic conditional (aș + infinitive) as deriving from the imperfect tense form of the verb (a) vrea ‘(to) want’ < *volere (< VELLE). The grammaticalization process, reconstructed through the comparison with the other Romance languages and by relating it to typical directions of the linguistic change, presupposes intermediary semantic phases (the future-in-the-past value, the hypothetical value which is mostly counter-factual), whose traces may be found in the first Romanian (translated) texts, but which have been generally considered a consequence of the simple loan translation from the language source. The uses of the conditional with a reduced auxiliary (aș, ai, etc. + infinitive) are related to those (co-occurring in the old texts) of the conditional with a recognisable auxiliary (vrea ‘wanted’ + infinitive), for which the value specific to the first grammaticalization stage is still strong—that of a future-in-the past. The text also puts forth an explanation for the atypical forms within the paradigm of the conditional auxiliary—aș(i), ar(ă)—through the overlap between the forms of the imperfect and the simple past of the verb (a) vrea ‘(to) want’.
Highlights
The origin of the auxiliary used in the formation of the paradigm of the conditional mood in Romanian constitutes the topic of a long standing debate
Densusianu’s statement is often quoted:“le conditionnel formé avec ași reste encore une énigme de la morphologie roumaine” [the conditional formed with the aid of ași still remains a mystery of the Romanian morphology] (1975, p. 572)
In order to verify the grammaticalization path described above, one needs to establish first whether in the old texts the periphrasis ar + infinitive had a temporal value of future in the past or not
Summary
The origin of the auxiliary used in the formation of the paradigm of the conditional mood in Romanian constitutes the topic of a long standing debate. We intend to browse through the main arguments brought forth by the supporters of each of the hypotheses and to reinterpret them by shifting the focus from those explanations based primarily on the evolution of forms to those which take into account the regularities of the grammaticalization process as a whole, with the involvement of the semantic and functional factors This type of approach favours the hypothesis according to which the auxilary developed from the verb a vrea ‘to want’, a hypothesis which enjoys the advantage of a tight correlation between the presupposed changes and the semantic and functional peculiarities of the conditional in general and of the Romanian modal-temporal system in particular. The ending of the 1st person sg. varies both in the language during the previous centuries as well as in presentday Romanian, being interpretable as a palatalized pronunciation of the final consonant ș5 vs. a nonpalatalized one
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