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CHAPTER VIII.

CONCESSIVE USE OF PHRASES AND SINGLE WORDS.

However largely Old English may, in some respects, have been influenced by Latin syntax, and in spite of the existence of pregnant adverbs such as unpances, the substitution of participles or other condensed expressions for full clauses never became the dominant characteristic of the language. This is especially true of concessive constructions; notwithstanding the large adoption of the absolute and of the appositive participle, condensed concessions are somewhat rare. Considerable interest, however, attaches to some of the phrase-constructions which may be found, because of their persistence in the modern speech.

PREPOSITIONAL PHRASES.

In Modern English the concessive use of prepositional phrases has become a conspicuous feature of the language. We have a number of definitely concessive prepositions; and the use of all or some similar emphatic word often lends a concessive meaning to with and for. In Old English such constructions also appear, but in less variety, and in less frequent use. The concessive phrases found in Old English prose may be grouped under two heads: those in which the preposition itself has or approaches concessive meaning; and those which, without any

particular concessive coloring in the preposition, stand in a concessive relation to the context.

A. Without Concessive Meaning in the Preposition.

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Those phrases which receive a secondary tinge of concessive meaning may be compared to temporal and modal clauses with concessive force. In the following sentence the concessive relation is not very distinctly marked: Bo. 67. 4 Hwæt, ealle men witan þæt se Seneca was Nerone 7 Papinianus Antonie pa weorðestan 7 þa leofostan... þeah buton alcre scylde wurdon fordone. It would be possible to translate literally and yet, without any fault, they were destroyed.' But there is clearly something more implied, and Sedgefield rightly translates: though void of offense.' In the following passage, the phrase corresponds to a temporal-concessive clause: BH. 20. 30 Ɖæt se ylca wer ... an easpring of drigre eorðan gebiddende up gelædde 7 ænne æcer of dam gewinne his agenre handa ofer þa tid das sæwetes onfeng (ultra tempus serendi...). The phrase is more purely concessive in the next example: Mart. 20. 11, 12 ond seo gesiho him was on swa micelre gemynde þæt he on pam miclan wintres cele, ponne he ymb þæt þohte oððe spræc, ponne aswætte he eall, ond eft on pære miclan sumeres hate, ponne he his siðfæt gemunde, þonne ablacode he eall ond abifode. Very similar is another wundrode se dema þæs

on-phrase: LS. 1. 276. 203 pa wifes anrædnysse, þæt heo nolde andettan on swa earfopum witum; that she would not confess even under such torture.' An instrumental on takes a concessive shading in one passage: Guth. 146. 20 þa wæs he at nextan... to halgum mynstre gelæd, to þon þæt hine mæssepreostas and bisceopas wið þa

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wodnysse þwean and clænsian sceoldon. And hi hwæþere on menigum þingum ne mihton þa yfelan mægn þæs arwyrgdan gastes ofadrifan; though they tried many expedients.' The Latin original had a very different clause, containing neither instrument nor concession: Cum vero nullus eorum pestiferum funesti spiritus virus exstinguere valuisset.

In the following Biblical quotation, a definite concessive construction in the Latin is ignored: Quot. 167.6 Gif hi nellað gelyfan Moysen and þam witegum, ne gecyrrað hi to dædbote purh nanes geedcucodes mannes mynegunge (L. 16. 31; Vulg.: neque si quis ex mortuis resurrexerit credent). The turn of the sentence is altogether different from the Latin; purh is used in a pregnant sense-'even through'; and the negative nanes adds weight to the phrase.

In this whole group of constructions, the syntactical value of adjectives and adverbs is to be noticed. The relation of the phrase to the sentence, the marking of the contrast which constitutes the concessive relation, is enforced by intensives of one kind and another: alcre, swa, menigum, nanes, perhaps also miclan. The relation, in fact, is bound up with the substance of the phrase, as is well illustrated by the use of the word menigum.

B. With Concessive Meaning in the Preposition. Although Old English prepositions may sometimes convey the concessive idea, there are no such distinctively concessive prepositions as modern notwithstanding and in spite of. Even those which may be called

1 Goodwin translates: 'with many expedients.' (The AS. Prose Version of the Life of St. Guthlac, ed. Goodwin, London, 1848, p. 59.)

concessive are simply prepositions of more general meaning adapted to the purpose. We find them also, like those already discussed, depending upon the aid of emphatic adverbs and adjectives. This is notably true of for, which from Old English times to the present has usually required all or any to give it the meaning in spite of."

1. for.

The various meanings of this preposition illustrate the close relation of the concessive to the causal idea. Einenkel's analysis of the concessive for (Streifzüge, p. 141), though too abstract to represent any conscious. mental process in speaker or writer, states the case as it appears upon reflection. He derives the concessive use of for from the causal, . . . indem der Substantivbegriff, selbst in seiner Verallgemeinerung als Causa, die in der Aussage gegebene Tatsache nicht umändern kann, also diese Tatsache trotz dieser Causa sich vollzieht oder bestehen bleibt.' In Old English we find a number of instances in which the meaning wavers between the causal and the concessive, but not many instances of clearly defined concessive use. Belden, in his treatment of Old English for (Prepositions, pp. 61 ff.) does not name its concessive sense, though he points out that, as causal particle, it is frequently found with verbs of fearing, dreading, etc., and in negative sententes. He cites ÆH. 1. 108. 22 And deah pa heard-heortan Iudei noldon for eallum Jam tacnum þone soðan Scyppend tocnawan; which Thorpe translates: . . . would not for all those signs acknowledge. . . This seems to me a true concessive phrase; it was in spite of the signs shown them that the Jews remained stubborn. But, so far as its syntax is concerned, the phrase differs from an ordinary causal

one only in being placed in a negative sentence and in containing the emphatic adjective all. The case is clearer when the sentence is positive. The following passage is the one usually cited to illustrate concessive for in Old English: Chron. 136. 17 hi lagon ute pa ealne pone herfest on fyrdinge ongean pone here, ac hit naht ne beheold pe ma pe hit oftor ær dyde. Ac for eallum þissum se here ferde swa he sylf wolde. Here the concessive sentence simply amplifies the fact already stated: ac hit naht ne beheold ... In one case we have what the German grammarians term 'ineffective cause' expressed by the predicate, naht ne beheold; in the other it is subordinated and expressed in the preposition for.

Since the idea of ineffective cause' is involved also in negative sentences with causal for, it is evidently difficult to mark boundaries. But the distinction, so far as it is a useful one at all, may be stated thus the negative causal sentence simply denies that a given effect has followed a given cause; the concessive sentence lays stress on the potency of a given cause to produce a certain effect, which has nevertheless not followed it. This stress gives a different meaning to the particle. For is causal in this passage: Bo. 69. 4 nan mon ne bio mid rihte for oðres gode ne for his cræftu no þy mærra ne no þy geheredra. In the following sentences, for may well be interpreted as concessive, but there is nothing to mark its meaning very definitely: LæcB. 108. 9 Gif hit nelle for pisum læcedome batian, wyl on meolcum þa readan gearwan; S.Mar. 10. 71 Ne for þæs hælendes infare næs se cæstel hire mægeðhades ne hire eadmodnyssen gewämmed. Even when the for-phrase is balanced by such compar

1 See, for example, this excellent outline: Hupe, Die Präposition for (Anglia 12. 388-395).

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