Abstract

This paper deals with a very specific problem: the Ribagorzan participles in -áu, -éu, -íu, which had so far been interpreted as castilianisms. It suggests that they could be genuine forms resulting from the vowelization of voiced dental consonants from Latin -D-, which has been documented in medieval Ribagorzan speech, or from the final dental consonant from Latin -T-; besides, this does not seem to be a recent solution.

Abstract

The article offers a microsyntactic study about the clitics position in the sentences with impersonal existential verbs belonging to the class of caldre ‘to be necessary’. We contrast the behavior of this deontic verb in Old Catalan and in two present dialects: Ribagorçan Catalan and Central Catalan. It is shown that Ribagorçan dialect is parallel to Old Catalan: clitics related to the infinitive subordinated verb appear adjoined to caldre, in the main clause. This is the case of the clitic u (= «ho») in Old Catalan example «No u cal dir ara» (Roig, Spill, 7048) and its Ribagorçan equivalent: «No ho cal dir ara». However, in Central Catalan, there is not clitic climbing. Clitic objects of the infinitive verb have to remain in the subordinate clause: No cal dir-ho. This type of microcomparative analysis reveal itself as a proper way to establish a solid base for future studies on comparative syntax.

Abstract

The author analyzes the role of Ribagorzan varieties on the creation of normative Aragonese. It can be observed that most of the traits of such varieties fail to appear in the accepted rules; this seems to stem not only from linguistic criteria, but rather from attitudes of méfiance catalane. Over the past years, a number of voices have called for greater attention to Ribagorzan varieties within normative Aragonese.