Thedevelopment of adjective and adverb grading in Romanian

The comparison of adjectives and adverbs has been described following the directions of evolution in Vulgar Latin, as well as the integrative trends in the context of the Romance languages, but without a detailed analysis. Leaving apart the theoretical goals, the present study is based on an updated understanding of the concepts involved in the category of grading, according to which it describes language constructions in the first three centuries texts. The main goal was giving examples of language constructions for the following types and subtypes of structures and elements: degrees of intensity (positive, intensive and absolute superlative), degrees of comparison (comparative of equality, comparative of superiority, comparative of inferiority and relative superlative); comparative semi-adverbs and means of expressing the comparative adverbial, as well as the extension of this syntactic position at the complex sentence level. After pointing out some regressive experiments, we tried to make a detailed and thorough correlation between the norms in the periods that were studied and the norm of contemporary standard Romanian.


Preliminaries
An overall description of the way that the category of grading has been expressed in Old Romanian, during a three century period (the 16 th century -the first half of the 18 th century), is necessary because the studies in the history of language and the linguistic researches on certain edited texts do not manage to examine the diversity of this issue.
It has to be pointed out that the theoretical aspects involved in this category are not entirely explained in the existent grammar researches.In some previous studies (cf.Găitănaru, 2013), the research has been based on the synchronic study of language; at that moment, some confirmations coming from the Old Romanian were necessary.
The present paper barely approaches the theoretical aspects, but it is focused on the complex means used to express the adjective and adverb gradation, both at the sentence (morphological and syntactic) level and at the complex sentence level.
A delimitation of the described language samples according to the century they belong to, in the context of multiple examples, was possible, but we preferred to quote diversified texts belonging to different periods, as this approach enlightens as to the continuity of the process.
The diachronic structures that have been described are the fundamental ones and they generally range into the coordinates which are established by comparing the norms of the respective period with the contemporary norm.

Latin
With adjectives and adverbs, there is a great difference to be noticed between the means of expressing the category of grading in Classical Latin and Romance languages (the situation is similar with Romanian, which is rather conservative due to the fact that it is situated in a lateral area).This happens because the system of Classical Latin was destabilised from inside, according to a determined structural dynamics, in favor of the analytic means used in colloquial Latin, the variant which represented the main agent in the Romanization process.
The specialists showed the reasons of these qualitative evolutions: "First of all, they can be explained by the general tendency in spoken language of using forms as clear and explicit as possible.Secondly, regarding the degrees of comparison, the affective factor is more powerfully involved (…) compared to the synthetic forms, which are fixed and lack expressivity, the analytic forms allowed a greater variety of means of expression" (Wald, 1965, p. 144).
The phenomenon, which was argued with many examples of language samples excerpted from different authors, was considered to be also a means of stylistic diversification: "New adverbs that bring a certain variation, as well as a more detailed signification are introduced to express the degrees of comparison" (Izverna-Tarabac, 2008, p. 150).
The well-known constraints of the classical system did not prove to be strong enough to resist against these challenges.Firstly, the markers of comparative and superlative, which were suffixes in their essence, did not seem to have had a degree of specificity high enough to allow them to persist as inflections; likewise, the language structures that gradation manifests by did not have an adequate frequency which would counterbalance the reduced degree of specificity.In contrast, "the periphrastic constructions with adverbs occurred in spoken language during the entire Latinity" (Wald, 1965, p. 144).They were preferred in Vulgar Latin, because the adverbial lexemes functioned as semantic intensifiers more powerful than the suffixes could have been, even if they were specialised.This happened due to the fact that gradation, in its nature, is a category with a great semantic importance and a weak grammar fixed pattern.
One of the important semantic aspects consists in the fact that, most of the times, any gradation (in Latin only the comparative and the superlative were considered as such) means relating the quality to two 'arguments' , as the equalization or hierarchy involve an extra focalization in the context.It must also be pointed out that the inferiority and the equality were expressed by means of the (semi)adverbs (minus, minime, tam…) in Classical Latin.Likewise, the adjectives with a vocalic theme such as idoneus, strenuus… were graded analytically: "Magis est l'adverbe employé normalement en latin classique pour former les comparatifs périphrastiques, comme maxime pour former les superlatifs" (dell, p. 378).The distinction between the adjectives with a vocalic theme and the others could not be strictly respected in the speaking clichés by the speakers, so the analytic forms extended: "Réservé d'abord a quelques adjectifs, dont le comparatif était inusité (type strenuus, idoneus), il s'est étendu à tous les autres, se substituant au comparatif en -ior, dont la valeur n'était pas nette et allait s'affaiblissant" (ibidem).
The grammarians have recorded many destabilizations of the system: "In time, Latin lost the conscience of the idea of comparative expressed by the suffixes *ero and *tero and it added the suffixes -ior and -ius: inf-er-ior, sup-er-ior, ex-ter-ior, in-ter-ior (from inter-us)" (Bujor & Chiriac, 1971, p. 50).
The diversification also occurs in contemporary Romanian, where many constructions with an adverb + preposition de + adjective (extrem de, excesiv de…), are used to express the absolute superlative and they present a nuanced expressivity which proves to be an obstacle against their turning into grammatical instruments (cf.galr I, p. 162).
With the Latin adverb, the terminations in the positive are less important.They are distributed according to the types of adjectives or nouns they attach to (avare, longe, facile, merito, falso, secreto, utiliter, prudenter, breviter, humanitus, penitus, raptim, furtim, privatim…).Most of the adverbs that do not involve conversion and that are not usually involved in comparison are included in this diversity: ferme, praesertim, omnino, aliter… Other forms can also occur: frustra, ita, quoque, solum… In the comparative, all of them adopt the termination of the comparative of neuter adjectives in the singular : crebrius, doctius, fecundius, miserius, pulchrius, saepius, tutius… In the superlative, the nominal inflection of the Instrumental -e was added after the suffix specific to the adjective synthetic form: aptissime, celerrime, doctissime, fortissime, longissime, pulcherrime, rarissime, saepissime, tutissime… In spite of these differences, it was noticed that: "The methods of forming the comparative and the superlative are the same as with adjectives" (Wald, 1965, p. 202).This remark is valid especially for the analytic forms in spoken Latin: "Likewise with the adjectives, with the adverbs the analytic comparison using magis and maxime, extended very much, especially in the late period, when the synthetic forms lost their value" (ibidem, p. 203).

Romanian
Romanian, as well as the other Romance languages, inherited the two values of grading in Vulgar Latin which existed also in Classical Latin: the comparative and the superlative.
A few successive changes occurred: a) The comparative and the superlative movement towards analytic forms made these meet the analytic forms expressing equality and inferiority.In Classical Latin the latter were not considered to be grammatical forms, still they were pretty frequent, and most of the times they were followed by the object of the comparative, introduced by quam, like the synthetic forms.In fact, it is interesting that Romanian took only magis from this system, which is not a proper adverb, as certain lexicologists consider, but a comparative form of magnus, that functioned alternatively together with plus and that was specialised for countable quantities for a while: "magis (arh.mage), adverb in the comparative form (superlative maxime), indicating the qualitative superiority, while plus -the quantitative one (dll, p. 791); "*mag-is, where -is is known to express the comparative and it can not be anything else but the reduced form of *-yos" (Bujor & Chiriac, 1971, p. 53).However, as Romanian did not take minor / minus it used the indefinite pronoun puțin, a variant of Vulgar Latin, which certain lexicographic works consider to have an unknown etymology (dex, p. 903), but which involves a reconstructed form, *pittinus / putinus (mda, p. 107; der, p. 649; cf.sp.pequeño).This does not represent an explanation of the fact that certain linguists consider the forms of inferiority to be "the attribute of those who use a cultivated variant of Romanian, of those who can speak also Western Romance languages (…).So, the comparative of inferiority (and the relative superlative) can be considered to have a cult origin (French -Italian), to be a recent comparative structure" (Niculescu, 1999, p. 184-185).Still, such forms can be found also in southern dialects: Nîsî easti ma puțînu bunî di nîsu; Paplu imnî ma puțînu ayonea di maea (Caragiu Marioțeanu & Saramandu, 2005, p. 180).
Besides, its occurrences in Old Daco-Romanian precede the alleged Romance influence.d) A real challenge for all the Romance languages, in general, and especially for Romanian consisted in dissociation of the relative superlative and the absolute superlative.In Latin, the opposition was realised contextually: senex omnium sapientissimus (relative superlative), femina pulcherrima (absolute superlative).The superlative forms with prefixes (vir praeclarus) did not usually occur with the adverbial of the superlative.Romance languages used the determination and, as the determination was analytical, the method integrated in the new system very well.Romanian, a Romance language where the article is enclitic (synthetic), adopted more solutions.Istro-Romanian used an over-segmental method, preserving the identity of the forms and moving the stress from the adjective (mai búr = comparative), to the semi-adverb (mái bur = superlative) (cf. Caragiu Marioțeanu, 1975, p. 200).
Aromanian turned the determination with a definite article into a grammatical instrument: Toma easti ma marli di noi; Maria cu Venera sîntu cama bunili feati di Verygia (ibidem, p. 240).Megleno-Romanian uses the same method as Aromanian (the enclitic article with the adjective in the comparative), but it innovates by adding the formant țel, țea, to it, so it uses the so-called demonstrative or adjectival article: tsela mai marli ra-nsurat (ibidem, p. 279).It must be noticed that, in many situations, the two articles were not used simultaneously, as one of them could be deleted in the expressions.
Daco-Romanian excludes the synthetic determination, which involves the definite article, although in the positive degree its redundant use is quite frequent in old texts: Domnul cel tarele (ph, 23/10); Dumnedzăule tarele, ascultă rruga mea (ph, 83/9).But the formant cel, cea, cei, cele, gets specialised and only the first element in the masculine/neuter is used for the relative superlative of the adverbs.

Degrees of intensity 3.1.1. Positive degree
With the adjective, the positive degree represents the basic form of the adjective and, regarding the grading, it does not present great changes during the evolution of Romanian.It is included in the logic scheme of the category at the same semantic level with the comparative of equality, expressing a quality equal to itself, not being compared to anything else.This is the reason why the comparative of equality can be used without the semi-adverbial expressions of comparison la fel de, tot așa de… This aspect was pointed out by the linguists: "…the facultative character and the status of the mark of the comparative of equality: the elements la fel de, tot așa de, tot atât de… are not compulsory and the occurrence of the comparative adverbial does not depend on them" (Zafiu, 2006, p. 216).In such sentences, there is an elliptic comparative, established by the comparison adverbial and not by a "compared positive" (galr I, p. 155): the positive degree expresses a mere quality, which is not compared.

Intensive degree
It is the middle degree in the configuration of intensity and, although it is often described by the grammarians (cf.Iordan & Robu, 1978, p. 343;Irimia, 2008, p. 101-102), it has not been individualised so it has not been dissociated from the comparative: on the one hand, the markers of the intensive degree are attached to those of the comparative and, on the other hand, there are means of intensification with the comparative, too.The most recent Academic Grammar describes the intensive constructions and the progressive constructions indistinctly, within the area of the comparative degree (cf.pp.157, 158), realised by a) mult mai, și mai, încă mai; b) tot mai, mereu mai, din ce în ce mai.In fact, in these series of formants, the first elements belong to the comparative (the structures can be followed by the adverbial of the comparative: Lucrează mult mai bine decît tine); the others belong to the intensive of superiority (= the progressive: Este din ce în ce mai informat) and of inferiority (= the regressive: Este din ce în ce mai puțin informat).It can be noticed that the last type of sentences can not contain an adverbial of comparison: *Este din ce în ce mai informat decît tine.
The constructions that belong to the intensive degree are characterised, as it has already been argued, by the impossibility of attaching the adverbial of the comparative.

Absolute superlative
It is the degree that expresses the greatest intensity of the quality (the absolute superlative) or its least variant ('the negative superlative': Irimia, 2008, p. 101;Dimitriu, 1999, p. 207-208).If the improper name of 'superlative of inferiority' were abandoned, the expression 'inverse absolute superlative' could be used.
During its development, Romanian used ways which existed in Vulgar Latin: the adverbs multum and forte, as well as the superlative prefix prea-.These, "in fact, play the role of some intensifiers" (Gafton, 2001, p. 108).
As the language samples show, the method is quite well represented, extending from the religious translations to other styles.However, because puțin was often used with adjective and adverb value, it could not be maintained.
In Vulgar Latin, the adverb forte replaced the classical adverb fortiter.It can be interpreted as a conversion of the adjective fortis, -e, which has its own degrees of comparison: fortior aetas, fortior numerus, fortissima ligna, forte et vehemens dicendi genus (dlf, p. 563).
The method consisting in repeating the adjective is considered to belong to the colloquial register and it occurs also in contemporary Romanian: Acea mare mare și largă, -aciia gadine ce nu li-i numărul, jigănii mici și mari (te, p. 202).

Degrees of comparison
They are disposed in a three element configuration: the comparative of equality, the comparative of inequality and the relative superlative.
At the complex sentence level, the comparative of equality clause is very frequent, it is rarely expresses by juxtaposition: Așa grăiți, așa faceți (cv, 60 r /3).The diversity of the connectors is as great as that in contemporary Romanian.

The comparative of inequality
As it has already been asserted, it presents the opposition superiority -inferiority.The semantic structure which it represents involves certain fundamental aspects: the comparison between two objects considering a quality (the homogeneous comparison), between two qualities of an object (the non-homogeneous comparison), the degree number comparison (quantitative).
Normally, the elements involved in comparison are arguments.As a result of certain transformations, the direct relation to certain circumstances can be achieved in comparison (the circumstance comparison).
As it may be noticed, the process of establishing the markers of the generalised comparison, expressed by the relative superlative, had not been over yet.

Concluzii
The description of the ways adjective and adverb grading manifests pointed out the directions of their development, beginning with the first texts, up to those in the first half of the 18 th century.Thus, a basis for relating them with the norm of contemporary standard Romanian has been offered.
These directions of evolution began to manifest in Vulgar Latin, which presented important differences from the Classical Latin and these were continued in every Romance language.
The diachronic description showed the difficult process of turning the markers involved in grading into grammatical instruments, as well as the stability degree of some connectors which are specific to the respective syntactic positions, generated at the sentence and at the complex sentence level.Definitely, it is expected to have a diversification of the nuances by new examples.