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The Preposition A < AB and Its Use in La Divina Commedia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 December 2020

Antonio L. Mezzacappa
Antonio L. Mezzacappa*
Affiliation:
Northeastern University
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Extract

Scholars are now fairly well agreed that the Latin preposition ab, far from dying out, has remained extremely active in France and that the French à, when denoting separation, origin, causation, manner, means, agent, and accompaniment, is its direct descendant. And yet the theory still persists that in Italy this same preposition disappeared completely in the eighth century after the emergence of da and that the Italian a, regardless of its meaning, always corresponds to Latin ad. E. Richter believed that the use of a in stereotyped phrases like a destra, a malizia, a causa, a bello studio, etc., was borrowed from French or Provençal and that modal a (stare a testa china) and instrumental a (pregare a mani giunte) descended from Latin ad. As Muller says nothing about a, I take it that he, too, sees in it only a representative of ad. Likewise Graur, after stating that apud and ab have not survived in Italian, declares that it is a<ad which, besides denoting locality, introduces the instrument and agent.

Type
Research Article
Information
PMLA , Volume 57 , Issue 2 , June 1942 , pp. 327 - 342
Copyright
Copyright © Modern Language Association of America, 1942

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References

Note 1 in page 327 A. Guillemin, La Préposition “De” dans la littérature latine et en particulier dans la poésie latine de Lucrèce à Ausone. Thèse, Dijon (Chalon-sur-Saone: E. Bertrand, 1921).

Note 2 in page 327 E. Richter, Ab im Romanischen (Halle a. S.: M. Niemeyer, 1904), pp. 25–26.

Note 3 in page 327 H. F. Muller, A Chronology of Vulgar Latin (Halle (Saale): M. Niemeyer, 1929), p. 56.

Note 4 in page 327 A. Graur, Ab, ad, apud et cum en Latin de Gaule (Paris: Champion, 1932), pp. 20–25.

Note 5 in page 327 A. Graur, op. cit., p. 39.

Note 6 in page 328 Il Principe, a cura di G. Lisio (Firenze: Sansoni, 1921), pp. 25, 113, 114, 137, and 57.

Note 7 in page 328 Cf. Vandelli's revision of Scartazzini's Divina commedia (Milano: Hoepli, 1929), pp. 6, 62, 68, 148, etc.

Note 8 in page 328 Cf. Grandgent's revised edition of the Divine Comedy (Heath, 1933), pp. 89 and 632.

Note 9 in page 328 Inf., x, 6 and 126.

Note 10 in page 328 G. Gherardini, Voci e maniere di dire italiane, additate a' futuri vocabolaristi (Milano: G. B. Bianchi, 1838–40).

Note 11 in page 328 Cf. Novelle Scelte dal Decamerone, per cura di Raffaello Fornaciari (Firenze: Sansoni. 1930), p. 10, note 1.

Note 12 in page 328 Vocabolario della Crusca (Verona: Ramanzini, 1804–06).

Note 13 in page 329 G. Gherardini, op. cit., i, 37.

Note 14 in page 329 Ibid., p. 18.

Note 15 in page 329 Ibid., pp. 47–48.

Note 16 in page 329 E. Sicardi, Lingua italiana in Dante (Roma: Optima, 1928), pp. 53 and 63.

Note 17 in page 330 Trabalza e Allodoli, Grammatica degl'Italiani (Firenze: Le Monnier, 1935), p. 76.

Note 18 in page 330 Romanic Review, October, 1939, pp. 315–321.

Note 19 in page 330 Fornaciari, Sintassi italiana dell'uso moderno (Firenze:Sansoni, 1881), pp. 271 and 346.

Note 20 in page 330 E. Richter, op. cit., p. 59.

Note 21 in page 330 A. Graur, op. cit., pp. 36–39.

Note 22 in page 330 Lingua Nostra, Anno ii, pp. 15–18.

Note 23 in page 332 Grandgent, An Introduction to Vulgar Latin (Boston: Heath, 1907), p. 39.

Note 24 in page 332 Guillemin, op. cit.

Note 25 in page 332 Muller, op. cit., pp. 56–58.

Note 26 in page 332 Guillemin, op. cit.

Note 27 in page 333 Grandgent, An Introduction to Vulgar Latin (Heath, 1907), p. 44.

Note 28 in page 333 Richter, op. cit., pp. 25–26.

Note 29 in page 333 Muller, op. cit., p. 65.

Note 30 in page 333 Richter, op. cit., p. 44.

Note 31 in page 333 Ibid., p. 54.

Note 32 in page 334 Graur, op. cit., p. 36.

Note 33 in page 334 For other examples Cf. Guillemin, op. cit., pp. 13 and 25–30.

Note 34 in page 334 Ibid., pp. 12 and 45.

Note 35 in page 335 Ibid., pp. 18 and 47.

Note 36 in page 335 Ibid., pp. 22, 26, and 52.

Note 37 in page 335 Ibid., p. 42.

Note 38 in page 335 D. Pesavento, Manuale di un metodo comparativo per apprendere facilmente e solidamente come si suole nelle lingue vive la logica struttura delle due lingue italiana e latina ad un tempo (Padova: Tipografia del Seminario, 1867), p. 214.

Note 39 in page 336 Guillemin, op. cit., pp. 48–50.

Note 40 in page 336 D. Pesavento, op. cit., pp. 469–171.

Note 41 in page 337 Grandgent, An Introduction to Vulgar Latin (Heath, 1907), p. 43.

Note 42 in page 337 Guillemin, op. cit., p. 33, note 2.

Note 43 in page 337 Pesavento, op. cit., pp. 464 and 488.

Note 44 in page 337 Guillemin, op. cit., p. 65.

Note 45 in page 339 Guillemm, op. cit., p. 61; Muller, op. cit., p. 58.

Note 46 in page 339 Richter, op. cit., p. 44.

Note 47 in page 339 Muller, op. cit., p. 58.

Note 48 in page 340 Ibid., pp. 56–57.

Note 49 in page 341 Pesavento, op. cit., pp. 169 ff. and 455.