The Impact of Contact Languages on the Grammaticalization of the Modern Hebrew Superlative

Yael Reshef The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel [email protected]

Abstract

Modern Hebrew grammatical constructions include a tripartite paradigm of degree comparison consisting of the positive adjective, the comparative, and the superlative. Such a paradigm did not exist in classical Hebrew, and the expression of the superlative in both Biblical Hebrew and Rabbinic Hebrew required reference to a comparison class by means of a noun. Based on an examination of textual evidence from the initial phases of the formation of Modern Hebrew, this article traces the emergence of the modern superlative constructions and evaluates the role of contact languages in the process.

Keywords superlative – adjective degree comparison – revival of Hebrew – language contact – grammaticalization

Modern Hebrew possesses two common paradigms to express the degree comparison of adjectives:

Positive Comparative Superlative (1) ADJ yoter (‘more’)+ADJ haxi (‘most’)+ADJ (2) ADJ ADJ+yoter (‘more’) ha-ADJ(the-ADJ)+beyoter (‘most’) e.g., gadol yoter gadol/gadol yoter haxi gadol/ha-gadol beyoter big more big/big more most big/the-big most ‘big’ ‘bigger’ ‘biggest’

Paradigm (1) is the unmarked option in speech and in casual writing, and paradigm (2) is used in more formal style (Shatil 2014:283–289, 291–292; Glinert 1989:213, 2013:799). From the structural viewpoint, haxi may be used with both adjectives and adverbs (e.g., haxi maher ‘most quickly’), whereas beyoter is restricted to adjectives. Alongside these common constructions, classical superlative constructions ’qəṭōn bānāw (small.CS sons.his) ‘his youngest son קְ ןטֹ֥ ּבָנָ ֽיו such as the Biblical qeṭanna šeb-ba-banot (small.F.SG קטנה שבבנות Chr. 21:17) or the Rabbinic 2) that in-the-girls) ‘the smallest of the girls’ (m.Shabbat 8:4) are occasionally used as well. However, their distribution is sporadic and is restricted to liter- ary and highly formal style (Glinert 1989:214, 2013:799). Syntactically, the classical constructions are less flexible than the modern ones, as they do not allow the degree comparison of an adjective independently of a noun, but require explicit reference to the comparison class. The use of a degree word to express the superlative first emerged in Hebrew in the medieval period due to the contact with Arabic on the one hand and with dialects of Latin origin on the other hand. A vast corpus of translations from Arabic gave rise to an Arabicized Hebrew style, imbued with Arabic features, particularly in the fields of syntax, phraseology, and the lexicon (Hopkins 2013). Since in Arabic the superlative is a distinct category, trans- lators’ attempts to render it in Hebrew gave rise to a variety of non-classical constructions (Goshen-Gottstein 2006:95–96). One of these solutions was the common cross-linguistic strategy of deriving the superlative from the comparative through the use of the definite article (Bobaljik 2012:52–54), namely, ADJ—yoter+ADJ—ha-yoter+ADJ (e.g., mešubaħ ‘of high quality’—yoter mešubaħ ‘of higher quality’—ha-yoter mešubaħ ‘of highest quality’) (Goshen- Gottstein 2006:96; Simon Hopkins, personal communication). This particular strategy became popular among medieval Hebrew writers in Christian lands as well, and became the main strategy to express the superlative in written Hebrew in the following generations. The popularity of the ha-yoter+ADJ construction among medieval Hebrew writers is best attributed to the approximate correspondence with the parallel paradigm in the contact languages. In Arabic, the use of the definite article is one of several strategies to form the superlative, and in dialects of Latin origin this strategy is the default option (e.g., French grand—plus grand—le plus grand) (compare Shatil 2014:294–296). The emergence of adjective degree words in medieval Hebrew may therefore be explained as contact-induced in two respects: (a) the contact languages raised the need for a specific, fixed construction to express the superlative; and (b) their employment of the definite