Abstract
Albanian possesses eight different lexemes built to a radical element vetë, with meanings ranging from ‘person’, ‘self’, ‘own’ to ‘only’ and ‘apart’. The aim of this paper is to clarify the distribution and meaning of these words in Old Albanian, in particular, in texts from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. I also discuss the etymology of these various stems, though the ultimate origin of vet(ë) cannot be established.
1 Introduction
The oldest extensive texts in Albanian date from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. All textual evidence from between 1462 (date of the first Albanian sentence preserved) and 1800 is defined as Old Albanian (Rusakov 2018) but diachronic changes can be observed within this period. Albanian is split into two major dialect groups, Geg and Tosk, but this division is unevenly reflected in the older sources, with Old Geg being better represented than Old Tosk before 1750.
As yet, no complete grammatical description of Old Albanian is forthcoming. A first summarizing introduction is Matzinger 2006, whereas a detailed survey of the verb can be found in Fiedler 2004 and Schumacher & Matzinger 2013. The derivational morphology of nouns is described by Matzinger 2016, and the inflectional morphology of adjectives by Paci 2011. De Vaan & Joseph (forthcoming) will offer a more detailed grammatical description of the language of the documents until 1700.
In this paper I discuss the semantics and morphosyntax of the Old Albanian lexemes built from the stem vetë ‘self’. A joint discussion of these words allows for a better understanding of their function in the language and creates a more reliable basis for etymological considerations. For a general survey of reflexivity in Old Albanian, see de Vaan (forthcoming).
The paper is built up as follows. Section 2 presents the Modern Albanian situation as regards the morphological items containing the element vet- and introduces the main terminology. In the subsequent sections, the Old Albanian evidence is discussed:1 the noun vetë ‘person’ (section 3), the identifier vetë ‘self’ (4), the reflexive pronoun (5), which comes in a simplex variant vetë(he) (5.1) and a reduplicated variant vetëvetë(he) (5.2), the adverbial reflexive vetiu ‘by oneself’ (6), the possessive adjective i vetë ‘own’ (7), the adjective i vetëmë ‘the only one’ (8), and the adverb and preposition veçë ‘only, except’ (9). Section 10 is dedicated to a summary and an etymological discussion.
2 The Modern Albanian situation and terminology
To a large extent, the element vet- is found in the modern standard language and dialects in the same categories as in Old Albanian, but there are some formal, semantic, and syntacic differences. In this section, I summarize the main elements of the modern language, since the grammar of Modern Albanian is naturally better understood. The different lexemes are mostly ordered according to their (historical) morphological complexity.2
2.1 vetë ‘person’
The noun vetë, definite singular veta ‘person’, plural veta ‘persons’, has feminine gender. It mainly occurs in the plural (example from FShS, p. 1444):
(1)
darkë
për
dhjetë
veta
dinner
for
ten
person.acc.pl
‘a dinner for ten persons.’
2.2 The identifier vetë ‘self’
In the words of Buchholz & Fiedler (1987: 283), vetë “emphasizes that a specific person him/herself is the agent or patient of the action”. It thus corresponds to German selbst, selber, or Russian sam, both of which can be rendered in English by ‘him-, her-, itself’ in adnominal (as in The president himself opened the meeting) and adverbial (as in John has painted the house himself) function.3
This vetë is termed “identifizierendes Pronomen” by Buchholz & Fiedler (op. cit.), “identificatif” and “identificateur” by Kurtiade (1991: 187), and ‘strengthening or identifying’ by Bokshi (2004: 152). In typological literature, there is a discussion about how to interpret the grammatical status of such words and by which name to refer to them. Many publications use the term ‘intensifying’ or ‘intensifier’, e.g., König & Siemund 2000, 2013, König & Gast 2006, Puddu 2005, and Constantinou 2014, whereas Gast & Siemund 2006 term them ‘self-intensifiers’. König & Siemund (2000) define such words as follows: “Adnominal intensifiers relate a center X (referent of the focus) to a periphery of alternative values.” Their use signals the (explicitly mentioned or implied) existence of alternative referents. This pragmatic analysis provides us with a convenient, scalar interpretation of the referent context for the words in question, but I object to the term ‘intensifier’. ‘Intensity’ can easily be interpreted as a subjective phenomenon used to convey plurality or distributionality of action (as with the ‘intensive verbs’ of Sanskrit); or as a particular, emotionally motivated kind of emphasis that may be accompanied by paralinguistic signals such as pitch of voice, loudness, mimics, and gestures. As I see it, the main function of adnominal and adverbial self is to single out one alternative, that is, to identify a referent in a potentially ambiguous situation. This agrees with the name ‘identifier’ given to Albanian vetë by Buchholz & Fiedler and Kurtiade. I therefore propose the shorthand ‘identifier’ or idtf for adnominal and adverbial vetë. Note that deictic pronouns conveying identity are often built from the same stem as identifiers, such as German derselbe, Russian (tot že) samyj, Ancient Greek ho autós > hautós ‘the same’.
Modern Albanian vetë is used uninflected. It mainly occurs after a personal pronoun or before a noun but can also fill the agent slot on its own. It usually refers to persons, but non-personal reference can also be found. Beside subject coreference, we much more rarely find coreference with an object, as in example (5). The examples are taken from Buchholz & Fiedler (1987: 283):
(2)
Ajo
vetë
më
tha.
she.nom
idtf
me.dat
say.aor.3sg
‘She told me herself.’
(3)
Erdhi
vetë.
come.aor.3sg
idtf
‘He came himself.’
(4)
E
tregon
vetë
puna.
it
show.prs.3sg
idtf
work.nom.def
‘The work itself shows it.’
(5)
Skhova
e
bisedova
me
vetë
drejtorin.
go.aor.1sg
and
talk.aor.1sg
with
idtf
director.acc.sg.def
‘I went and spoke to the director himself.’
The identifier is also found in compounds in the meaning ‘self-, auto-’, where it is very productive: vetëdije ‘consciousness’, lit. ‘self-knowledge’; vetëlind ‘to be innate’, lit. ‘self-born’; vetëshërbim ‘self-service’, etc.
2.3 The reflexive vetja ‘oneself’
Unlike English, but like many other languages, Albanian formally distinguishes between introverted and extroverted verbs (Haiman 1983: 803, Haspelmath 2008: 40). In order to signal introverted (usually self-directed) actions, such as ‘put on clothes’, ‘wash oneself’, ‘get up’, ‘rejoice’, as well as passives, impersonals, and facilitatives, Albanian uses the verbal category of the nonactive voice (nact). Depending on verbal tense and mood, the nonactive is marked by synthetic endings, by the invariant particule u, or by the intransitive auxiliary ‘be’. To signal subject coreference with extroverted (other-directed) actions, Albanian uses the stressed reflexive marker vetja. Since vetja has more phonological body than the nonactive verb markers, Albanian confirms the cross-linguistic observation that “verbs with higher frequency of reflexive use show shorter reflexive-marking forms than verbs with lower frequency of reflexive use” (Haspelmath 2008: 47). The nonactive voice will not be discussed further in this paper.
The reflexive marker may occur in all case forms, even in the nominative: nominative vetja, accusative veten, prepositional vete, genitive-dative-ablative vetes. At the synchronic level, this inflection is identical to that of feminine nouns with an indefinite nom.sg. in -e, definite -ja. Indeed, syntactically vetja functions as a noun (Sh. Demiraj 1993: 181–182). For the Arvanitic dialects in Greece, Sasse (1991: 147) writes: “Ein Reflexivpronomen im eigentlichen Sinne existiert nicht. Statt dessen wird das Substantiv vétëhe-a f. verwendet, das regelmäßig nach Typ B dekliniert wird.” Here are four examples with different case forms, nominative, accusative, dative, and ablative:
(6)
Asaj
i
duket
vetja
shumë
e
bukur.
she.dat
her.dat
seem.prs.nact.3sg
refl.nom
very
art
beautiful
‘She feels very beautiful.’ (lit. ‘To her, herself seems very beautiful’; the German translation by Buchholz & Fielder is ‘Sie kommt sich sehr schön vor’)
(7)
Vjedhësi
kështu
e
zbuloi
veten.
thief.nom.def
thus
him.acc
reveal.aor.3sg
refl.acc
‘In this way the thief revealed himself.’
(8)
Ti
duhet
t=i
japësh
zemër
vetes.
you.nom
must.3sg.nact
sbjv=dat
give.sbjv.2sg
heart.acc
refl.dat
‘You must take heart.’
(9)
ndaj
vetes
towards
refl.abl
‘towards oneself’
Like nouns, the reflexive can be combined, with feminine agreement, with a possessive adjective of any person:
(10)
Unë
për
veten
time
s=dua
asgjë.
I
for
refl.acc
my.acc.sg.f
neg=want.1sg
anything
‘I don’t want anything for myself.’
2.4 The reduplicated reflexive vetvetja ‘oneself’
MoAlb. vetvetja represents a reduplicated variant of the simple reflexive vetja. Buchholz & Fiedler (1987: 281) define the function of vetvetja as “emphasizing the reflexive”, Kurtiade (1991: 175) as “reinforcing the reflexive.”
(11)
Pse
është
e
vështirë
të
jesh
vetvetja?4
Why
be.prs.3sg
art
difficult
sbjv
be.sbjv.2sg
refl.emph.nom
‘Why is it difficult to be yourself?’
(12)
Gënjen
vetveten
lie.prs.3sg
refl.emph.acc
‘He is lying to himself’, ‘He is kidding himself’
Similar instances of complex reflexives with emphatic or disambiguating function can be found in other Indo-European languages, for instance, Latin sēsē ‘oneself’ and Old High German selboselbo ‘one and the same, identical’. In Ancient Greek, repetition of the pronoun autós led to a univerbated reflexive pronoun with single stress autos=autón in Doric and Boeotian dialects, with petrification of the first member in the nominative singular masculine form autos and inflexion on the second member. Further reduction of the first member yielded aut=autón and aus=autón ‘oneself’ (Bechtel 1921: 278, 1923: 124–125, 255–256, 403, 488, Buck 1955: 99, Chantraine 1984: 142, Schwyzer 1950: 196–197). An example of a complex reflexive that does not involve reduplication is provided by Bulgarian, with the accusative sèbe si and the dative na/za sèbe si (Nicolova 2017: 229–237).5
2.5 The adverb vetíu ‘by itself, by oneself, by nature’
(13)
Plaga
u
mbyll
vetiu.
wound.nom.def
nact
close.aor.3sg
self.adv
‘The wound healed by itself.’
See section 6 for an explanation of the morphology of this adverb.
2.6 The reflexive possessive adjective i, e vet ‘one’s own’
The reflexive possessive adjective refers to the phrasal subject, which can be of any person or number (Buchholz & Fiedler 1987: 291–292, Kurtiade 1991):
(14)
Agimi
i
dha
mësuesit
ekzemplarin
e
vet
Agim
him.dat
give.aor.3sg
teacher.dat.def
copy.acc.def
art
refl.poss
‘Agim gave his (own) copy to his teacher.’
Interestingly, possessive i, e vet is absent from Tosk dialects. Its restriction to Geg may be due to its rise in Geg in the post-Proto-Albanian period or to its complete loss from Tosk dialects.
2.7 vetëm ‘only one’
The adjective i, e vetëm ‘single, only one; alone’ (Buchholz & Fiedler 1987: 393) is inflected like any linking adjective, with the linker art i or e (for masculine respectively feminine agreement) preceding the adjective, which itself may follow or precede its head. The examples below are taken from FShS, p. 1446:
(15)
motra
e
vetme
sister.nom.def
art
only.f.sg
‘the only sister’
(16)
Delen
e
vetme
e
ha
ujku.
sheep.acc.def
art
only.f.sg
it
eat.3sg
wolf.nom.def
‘A single sheep gets eaten by the wolf.’ (lit. ‘A single sheep, the wolf eats it.’)
(17)
e
vetmja
dëshmi
që
njihet
art
only.nom.f.def
testimony.nom
that
know.3sg.nact
‘the only testimony that is known’
Unpreceded by the linker, vetëm functions as an adverb meaning ‘only’:
(18)
Banonte
vetëm.
live.ipf.3sg
alone
‘He was living alone.’
(19)
Vetëm
ajo
e
di.
only
she.nom
it
know.3sg
‘Only she knows.’
2.8 veç ‘apart’
The adverb veç means ‘apart, separately; only, just’. It can also function as a conjunction meaning ‘except that, but’ and as a preposition (+ abl) ‘apart from, besides’ (Buchholz & Fiedler 1987: 393). Examples (20) to (23) are taken from FShS, p. 1428, example (24) from Buchholz & Fiedler:
(20)
I
vuri
veç.
they.acc
put.aor.3sg
apart
‘He set them apart.’
(21)
veç
e
veç
apart
and
apart
‘one by one’
(22)
Foli
mjaft
mirë
veç
pak
shpejt.
speak.aor.3sg
enough
well
except
little
fast
‘He talked well enough, only a little fast.’
(23)
veç
kësaj
except
this.abl.sg.f
‘apart from this’
A formal variant is veçse, which includes the conjunction se ‘that’:
(24)
S=kishin
kaluar
veç=se
pak
minuta.
neg=have.ipf.3pl
pass.ptc
except=that
few
minute.pl
‘Only a few minutes had passed.’
3 OAlb. vetë ‘person’
In sections 3 to 9, I discuss the Old Albanian evidence. The order of presentation is the same as for the Modern Albanian data.
In the plural, vetë can mean ‘people’ and ‘persons’, as in Buzuku shumë vetë ‘many people’, shumë vetëve ‘to many people’, të dëshmuomitë e dy vetëve ‘the testimonies of two persons’, Budi ndë tre vetë ‘in three persons’. The noun agrees in gender with the masculine forms of the numerals ‘two’ and ‘three’ (masc. dy, tre, as opposed to fem. dȳ, trī), in contrast with the feminine gender of vetë in the modern standard language. The switch to the feminine may have been caused by morphological analogy, since nouns with a singular in -ë and a plural in -a are mostly feminine in the modern language. The original masculine gender of vetë is confirmed by the pronoun këta in the following passage from Bogdani:
(25) Pjetër Bogdani, Cuneus Prophetarum 1.10.15:
ndë
këta
tre
vetë
të
Hyjit
among
this.ins.pl.m
three.m
person.ins.pl
art
God.gen.def
‘among these three persons of God’
From Budi on, we can occasionally find the singular of vetë:
(26) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 28, ll. 17–18:
ãshtë
i
treti
vetë
n=cë
Shëndrītatit
be.3sg
art.m
third.nom.m.def
person
from=art.f
holy.trinity.abl.def
‘it is the third person in the Holy Trinity’
4 The OAlb. identifier vetë
The identifier vetë ‘self’ remains uninflected for case, gender and number, and is exclusively found as an adjunct to the subject. Here are some attestations showing the six different persons to which vetë can refer:
(27) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 203, l. 8:
as
mun
i
kujtonj
u
vetë
neg
can.1sg
them
remember.sbjv.1sg
I
idtf
1sg ‘nor can I remember them myself’
In (28), the Albanian text has changed the Latin original (which uses the ablative a temet ipso ‘of yourself’) into a subject construction:
(28) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 68v, l. 45:
a
ti
e
thuo
vetë
këta
q
you
it
say.2sg
idtf
this.acc.pl.m
2sg ‘Are you saying this yourself?’ (Lat. a temet ipso hoc dicis, Joh. 18:34)
(29) Luca Matranga, Dottrina Cristiana fol. 17r:
krietë
e
asaj
ishtë
vetë
Krishti
head.nom.def
art
she.gen
be.3sg
idtf
Christ.nom.def
3sg ‘the head of which is Christ himself’ (It. il capo della quale è l’istesso Christo)
(30) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 57r, ll. 75–76:
ai
vetë
të
flasë
he.nom
idtf
pcl
speak.3sg.sbjv
3sg ‘Let him speak for himself’ (Lat. ipse de se loquatur, Joh. 9:21)
In (31), the identifier does not translate a Latin word but is added by the translator, stressing the identity of the referent with that of the gerund tue pasunë thanë:
(31) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 79r, ll. 29–31:
tue
pasunë
thanë
këto
kafshë,
ata
tue
pām,
vetë
u
ëngriti
nalt
gdv
have.ptc
say.ptc
this.acc.pl.f
thing.acc.pl
they.nom
gdv
see.ptc
idtf
nact
raise.aor.3sg
up
3sg ‘when he had said these things, while they looked on, he himself was raised up’
(Lat. cum haec dixisset videntibus illis elevatus est, Acts 1:9)
(32) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 53v, l. 65:
përse
na
vetë
gjegjm
for
we
idtf
hear.aor.1pl
1pl ‘for we ourselves have heard’ (Lat. ipsi enim audivimus, Joh. 4:42)
Also in (33), Alb. vetë does not translate a specific word in Latin:
(33) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 74r, ll. 42–43:
ju
vetë
dini
se
qish
fjalë
u
bā
you.pl
idtf
know.2pl
that
which
word.nom
nact
do.aor.3sg
2pl ‘You yourselves know which word has been done’ (Lat. vos scitis quod factum est verbum, Acts 10:37)
(34) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 145, l. 9:
posikūr
t=i
kishnë
ata
vetë
vrām
like
sbjv=them.acc
have.ipf.3pl
they
idtf
kill.ptc
3pl ‘as if they themselves had killed them’
Nonsubject coreference of the identifier vetë is only found in two passages, one in Matranga and one in Buzuku. In (35), vetë krishnë corresponds with Italian il medesimo christo, though it may be argued that for a speaker of Albanian the translation is ambiguous, since tue dhënë vetë krishnë may also be interpreted as ‘while himself offering Christ’:
(35) Luca Matranga, Dottrina Christiana fol. 39v:
ishtë
bashkë
kurmi
i
tinëzot,
tue
dhënë
vetë
krishnë
për
të
gjallët
e
për
të
vdekurit
be.3sg
together
sacrifice.nom.def
art
our.Lord.gen
gdv
give.ptc
idtf
Christ.acc.def
for
art
alive.ins.pl.def
and
for
art
dead.ins.pl.def
3sg ‘it is at the same time the sacrifice of our Lord, while offering Christ himself for the living and for the dead’ ≈ It. (è) insieme sacrifitio, oferendo il medesimo christo per li vivi e per li morti.
In (36), vetë is—uniquely in Old Albanian—governed by the preposition për, which usually takes accusative or instrumental objects. Syntactically, then, this occurrence of vetë should be regarded as an instance of the reflexive ‘oneself’ which is discussed in the next sections:
(36) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 56v, ll. 29–30:
u
për
vetë
ën
vetëhej
nukë
jam
ardhunë
I
for
idtf
from
refl.abl
not
be.1sg
come.ptc
‘I for myself have not come of my own accord’ (Lat. a me ipso non veni, Joh. 7:28)
5 The OAlb. reflexive
The reflexive pronoun is used to signal coreference of nonsubject arguments (direct and indirect objects, satellites) with the subject. The root morpheme of the reflexive is OAlb. /vetë/, which either replaces its final /ë/ by /ī/, viz. in one of the genitive-dative variants, or is followed by a second element /he/, to which case endings can be attached. Furthermore, /vetë/ can be preceded by a copying morpheme /vetë/ (reduced to /vet/ in some authors after 1700). Table 1 presents a survey of the attested forms; between brackets, the authors are indicated in whose texts the relevant forms are found. For the genitive-dative form and for the accusative-instrumental form, the texts display two variants, marked as (1) and (2).
Table 1
Summary of the simple and reduplicated forms of the reflexive pronoun as found in texts dated from 1555 to the early eighteenth century
|
Case |
Simplex |
Reduplicated |
|---|---|---|
|
gen / dat (1) |
vetī (Buz., Budi, Bgd.), veti (Kuv.) |
vetëvetī (Buz., Budi), vetveti (Kuv.) |
|
gen / dat (2) |
vetëhesë (Budi, Bgd.) |
vetëvetëhesë (Budi, Bgd.) |
|
acc / ins (1) |
vetëhe (Budi, Bdh., Bgd., Kuv.), vetëhē (Bgd.) |
– |
|
acc / ins (2) |
vetëhenë (Buz. Matr. Budi Bdh. Bgd.), vetëhen (Kuv.), vetëghen, vetghen (Var.) |
vetëvetëhenë (Buz. Budi Bgd.), vetvetëhen (Kuv.) |
|
abl |
vetëhej (Buz. Budi Bdh. Bgd.), vetëhi (Kuv.) |
vetëvetëhej (Buz.), vetvetëhi (Kuv.) |
Abbreviations of authors and years of attestation: Buz. = Buzuku (1555), Budi = Budi (1618–1621), Bdh. = Bardhi (1635), Bgd. = Bogdani (1685), Kuv. = Kuvendi i Arbenit (1706), Matr. = Matranga (1592), Var. = Variboba (1762)
The /ë/ of vetëhe- can be lost by syncope. Schumacher (in Schumacher & Matzinger 2013: 273) has shown that syncope of unstressed schwa first shows up in Budi’s language and becomes more general in Old Geg and Old Tosk after 1700. This tendency is confirmed by the reflexive, where syncope first affects Bardhi’s accusative-instrumental vethe, vethenë, and ablative vethej, beside the unsyncopated forms. Subsequently, syncope appears in Kazazi (1743, Geg) acc. vethen, vetvethen, abl. vetje, and Variboba (1762, Tosk) acc. vetghen /vethen/ (line 3676).
The endings of /vetëhe-/ partly correspond to the endings for definite singular feminine nouns ending in a vowel, viz. genitive-dative -së and accusative -në. The ablative ending -j of the reflexive vetëhej does not exactly match the definite ablative ending -jet in feminine stems, but there are indications that the latter was a remake of earlier -j, to which -et was added as found in the feminine ë-stems (farë, abl.def. faret). In that case, vetëhej continues the more original ablative ending.
The competition between the two accusative and instrumental forms vetëhe and vetëhenë is most easily understood as that between indefinite and definite forms of a noun *he. Since unlike vetī,6 the competing genitive-dative form vetëhesë is not yet attested in Buzuku, vetī must be the older variant and vetëhesë a novel creation. The ending -ī can synchronically be linked to the possessive adjective tī ‘his’ and to the genitive-dative of demonstratives, këtī ‘of/to this’, atī, tī ‘of/to that’.
The distribution of simple and reduplicated variants of the reflexive pronoun has not yet been established and will be the focus of the following sections. Section 5.1 discusses the pragmatics of the simple variant vetë in the texts by Buzuku, Budi, and Bogdani, whereas 5.2 turns to vetëvetë in those same authors.
5.1 Simplex vetë in Buzuku and beyond
Three case forms are attested in Buzuku: genitive-dative vetī, accusative vetëhenë and ablative vetëhej. These simple forms of the reflexive vet(ë) are mostly found with unmarked, that is, nonemphatic subject coreference, functioning as the direct or indirect object of the verb or as a prepositional object according to Old Albanian phraseology.
5.1.1 vetī in Buzuku
The genitive-dative form vetī occurs 14 times in Buzuku’s Missale. In 10 instances, vetī refers to the beneficiary of the main verb (3×, viz. of ‘to put’ and ‘to make’) or of a noun (7×, viz. of ‘gift’, ‘husband, wife’, ‘servant’, and ‘help’):
(37) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 97v, ll. 48–49:
Ajo
bani
vetī
petëka
she
make.aor.3sg
refl.dat
clothes.acc.pl
‘She made clothing for herself’ (Lat. vestem fecit sibi, Prov. 31:22)
(38) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 51v, ll. 58–60:
një
detorës
erdh
me
më
marrë
dy
të
mī
bij
për
sherbëtorë
vetī
one
creditor.nom
come.aor.3sg
with
me.dat
take.ptc
two
art
my
son.acc.pl
for
servant.acc.pl
refl.dat
‘a creditor has come to take away two of my sons to serve him’ (lit.: ‘as servants to himself’) (Lat. creditor venit ut tollat duos filios meos ad serviendum sibi, 2 Kings 4:1)
In four instances, vetī is governed by a preposition taking the dative, viz. përqark ‘around’, afërë ‘close to’, përpara ‘before’ and kondra ‘against’:
(39) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 42v, ll. 1–3:
Kur
ti
ban
lëmoshënënë
mos
bierë
tronbetësë
përpara
vetī.
when
you
do.2sg
charity.acc
not
hit.imp.2sg
trumpet.gen.def
before
refl.dat
‘When you do charity, do not sound the trumpet for yourself’ (Lat. cum ergo facies elemosynam noli tuba canere ante te, Mat. 6:2)
(40) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 83v, ll. 63–64:
ai
i
pāligj
qi
ju
e
kini
kondra
vetī
he
art
devil.nom
rel
you
him.acc
have.2pl
against
refl.dat
‘that devil that you have against you’ (Lat. adversarius vester diabolus ‘your adversary the devil’, 1 Peter 5:8)
5.1.2 vetëhenë in Buzuku
I have counted 91 occurrences of the accusative-instrumental vetëhenë in Buzuku. Seven occurrences represent a direct object. In some of them, there is an explicit contrast between two direct objects, so that vetëhenë may be argued to have contrastive focus (nrs. 42–44):
(41) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 79r, ll. 9–10:
e
qi
vetëhenë
atyne
dëftou
and
rel
refl.acc
they.dat
show.aor.3sg
‘and who showed himself to them’ (Lat. quibus et praebuit se ipsum, Acts 1:3)
(42) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 22v, ll. 75–76:
tjetërë
tue
qellunë
dhunë
vetëhenë
tue
lëvduom
other.acc.sg
gdv
insult.ptc
shame.acc
refl.acc
gdv
praise.ptc
‘while insulting the other, while praising oneself’ (Lat. alterum conviciando et teipsum laudando)
(43) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 61r, ll. 89–90:
përse
ti
tue
klenë
nierī
ban
vetëhenë
Zotynë
because
you
gdv
be.ptc
man.nom
make.2sg
refl.acc
God.acc
‘because you, while being a man, make yourself God’ (Lat. quia tu homo cum sis facis te ipsum Deum, Joh. 10:33)
(44) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 65v, ll. 23–25:
Ai
të
tjerë
shelboi
a
s=mundë
shelbonjë
edhe
vetëhenë.
he
art
other.acc.pl
save.aor.3sg
but
not=posb
save.sbjv.3sg
also
refl.acc
‘He has saved others, but he cannot also save himself’ (Lat. alios salvos fecit, se ipsum non potest salvum facere, Mat. 27:42)
The remaining 84 occurrences are found after the prepositions ëndë ‘in’, ëndër ‘among’, ëndënë ‘under’, ëndaj ‘near’, ënbë ‘on’, ëm/ën (which are reduced variants of ëndë and ënbë), me ‘with’, për ‘for’, and përënbī ‘on’, which otherwise govern the instrumental and/or accusative case. The OAlb. pronoun does not always translate a Latin reflexive, but may also render Latin pronouns such as mē or no explicit Latin referent at all. Therefore, the refl was a nonfocused, obligatory component of Old Albanian syntax.
(45) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 41v, ll. 68–69:
qi
kam
sherbëtorë
për
ëndënë
vetëhenë
rel
have.1sg
servant.acc.pl
for
under
refl.acc
‘I who have servants under myself’ (Lat. habens sub me milites, Mat. 8:9)
(46) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 69v, ll. 45–46:
pema
të
ketë
farënë
e
saj
ëndë
vetëhenë
përënbī
dhēt
fruit-tree.nom.def
sbjv
have.sbjv.3sg
seed.acc.sg.def
art
her.poss
on
refl.acc
on
earth.ins.def
‘that the fruit-tree may have its seed in itself on the earth’ (Lat. lignum pomiferum (…) cuius semen in semet ipso sit super terram, Gen. 1:11)
(47) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 47r, ll. 38–39:
E
thoshnë
ëndër
vetëhenë
Xhudhītë
and
say.ipf.3pl
among
refl.acc
Jew.nom.pl.def
‘And the Jews said among themselves’ (Lat. dicebant ergo Iudaei, Joh. 8:22)
(48) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 50v, ll. 87–88:
merr
me
vetëhenë
shtatë
të
tjera
shpirtëna
take.3sg
with
refl.acc
seven
art
other.pl.f
spirit.acc.pl
‘he takes with him seven other spirits’ (Lat. adsumit septem alios spiritus, Luke 11:26)
(49) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 81r, ll. 74–75:
grishi
Jezu
ën
vetëhenë
të
dǖ-ënbë-dhietët
Apostoj
call.aor.3sg
Jesus
to
refl.acc
art
twelve.pl
apostle.acc.pl
‘Jesus summoned the twelve apostles’ (Lat. convocatis autem duodecim apostolis, Luke 9:1)
A rare instance of nonsubject coreferential vetëhenë is (50). Whereas the Latin text leaves no doubt that the referent of eo is someone else than the Lord, the translator ignores this information for no apparent reason:
(50) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 67r, ll. 1–3:
Zotynë
i
vu
përënbī
vetëhenë
gjithë
të
këqiatë
tonë
Our.Lord.nom
him.dat
lay.aor.3sg
on
refl.acc
all
art
bad.acc.pl.f.def
our.pl.f
‘the Lordi has laid on himj all our bad things’ (Lat. Dominus posuit in eo iniquitatem omnium nostrum ‘the Lord has laid on him the iniquity of us all’, Isaia 53:6)
5.1.3 vetëhej in Buzuku
The ablative form is attested 17 times in the Missale, always after the preposition ën ‘from’. Again we find an instance where the Albanian reflexive does not translate an explicit word from the Latin original (52):
(51) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 56r, ll. 86–87:
o
se
u
në
flas
ën
vetëhej
or
that
I
if
speak.prs.1sg
from
refl.abl
‘or whether I speak of myself’ (Lat. an ego a me ipso loquar, Joh. 7:17)
(52) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 69v, l. 71:
qi
ujënatë
dhanë
ën
vetëhej
rel
water.nom. pl.def
give.aor.3pl
from
refl.abl
‘which the waters brought forth by themselves’ (Lat. quam produxerant aquae, Gen. 1:21)
(53) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 96v, l. 56:
ajo
ën
vetëhej
u
ënçil
she
from
refl.abl
nact
open.aor.3sg
‘it opened by itself’ (Lat. quae ultro aperta est eis, Acts 12:10)
Another example of ën vetëhej was cited in (36) above.
5.1.4 The simplex forms in Budi and Bogdani
Of the two competing forms vetëhe and vetëhenë, in Budi’s texts the shorter form only occurs as a prepositional object (318×), whereas the longer one is found in nearly equal numbers as a direct object (39×) and after prepositions (32×). The functional contrast between the two forms is even more evident in Bogdani’s Cuneus Prophetarum, where vetëhe and its phonological variant vetëhē only occur after prepositions (131×), but vetëhenë (21×) is the only variant that occurs as a direct object. This distribution would be understandable if vetëhe was inflected as a nominal stem in -e, with acc.sg. indefinite in -e and acc.sg. definite in -enë, since the accusative-instrumental prepositions more often govern the indefinite form.
As to the competition between vetī and vetëhesë, the number of occurrences (3×) in Budi is too low to draw any conclusions. In Bogdani, the numbers are also relatively low, but it is clear that vetī is nearly only found after prepositions, whereas vetëhesë can also function as an indirect object.
5.2 Reduplicated vetëvet(ë) in Old Albanian
Since there is no discernible grammatical or syntactic difference between the simple and reduplicated reflexive, reduplication probably has a pragmatic function. The most straightforward assumption is that it signals contrastive focus, as it does in Modern Albanian (see section 2.4 above). Two concrete situations may account for the large majority of the attestations: 1. The reflexive refers to one member of a pair of alternatives, which is explicitly contrasted with the other; 2. The reflexive has a pragmatically uncommon or unexpected referent in the given situation, as in ‘to talk to oneself’ (as opposed to the more usual talking to another person) or ‘to kill oneself’ (as opposed to killing someone else).7 Both situations are instantiations of the concept of contrastive focus. Below, the evidence will be presented by author according to this distinction.
5.2.1 The evidence from Buzuku’s Missale
Buzuku’s text contains 7 occurrences of the genitive-dative vetëvetī, 37 of the accusative-instrumental vetëvetëhenë, and 7 of the ablative vetëvetëhej. In the following subsections I provide a selection of examples.
5.2.1.1 With explicit evocation of a referential alternative
(54) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 67r, ll. 86–88:
Përse
na
në
banjim
gjyq
vetëvetī,
nukë
ishim
gjykuom;
e
qysh
na
jemi
gjykuom
ën
sine
Zot,
na
jemi
ëndishkuom.
for
we
if
do.ipf.1pl
judgement
refl.dat
not
be.ipf.1pl
judge.ptc
and
while
we
be.1pl
judge.ptc
by
our.abl
Lord
we
be.1pl
chastise.ptc
‘For if we would judge ourselves, we would not be judged; and while we are judged by our Lord, we are chastised’ (Lat. Quod si nosmet ipsos diiudicaremus non utique iudicaremur. Dum iudicamur autem a Domino corripimur, 1 Cor. 11:31–32)
(55) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 109v, ll. 61–64:
korpi
yji
anshtë
shtëpia
e
t=ënbetunit
të
Shpirtit
shenjëtë,
qi
ju
e
kini
ën
sinë
Zot
e
ju
nukë
ini
të
vetëvetī
body.nom.def
your.pl
be.3sg
house.nom.def
and
art=abode.nom.def
art
spirit.gen.def
holy
rel
you
it.acc
have.2pl
from
our.abl
Lord
and
you
not
be.2pl
art
refl.gen
‘your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, whom you have from our Lord, and you are not your own’ (Lat. membra vestra templum est Spiritus Sancti qui in vobis est quem habetis a Deo et non estis vestri, 1 Cor. 6:19)
(56) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 22r, ll. 62–64:
këtu
fëjen
nierī
kur
shoqnë
e
fqinjënë
nukë
e
do
porsi
vetëvetëhenë
here
sin.prs.3sg
man.nom
when
friend.acc.def
and
neighbour.acc.def
not
him.acc
want.3sg
like.adv
refl.acc
‘here sins a man when he does not like his friend and neighbour as himself’ (cf. Lat. diliges proximum tuum sicut te ipsum, Mt. 19:19; diliges proximum tuum tamquam te ipsum, Mk. 12:31)
(57) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 32v, ll. 58–62:
E
muo
asgjā
nukë
anshtë
se
u
të
jēm
gjykuom
ën
jush
o
ën
gjyqit
së
kësaj
jete;
ma
as
u
vetëvetëhenë
nukë
gjykonj
and
me.dat
nothing
not
be.3sg
that
I
sbjv
be.sbjv.1sg
judge.ptc
by
you.abl
or
by
judge.abl.sg
art
this.gen.sg.f
life.gen
but
not
I
refl.acc
not
judge.prs.1sg
‘and it is all the same to me whether I be judged by you or by a judge of this life; but neither do I judge myself’ (Lat. Mihi autem pro minimo est ut a vobis iudicer, aut ab humano die: sed neque me ipsum iudico, 1 Cor. 4:3)
(58) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 38v, ll. 3–5:
bani
të
keni
paq
me
gjithë
kana
tue
mos
bām
vendetë
për
vetëvetëhenë
make.imp.2pl
sbjv
have.sbjv.2pl
peace
with
all
someone.acc
gdv
not
make.ptc
revenge
for
refl.acc
‘Make sure you have peace with everyone, without taking revenge for yourselves’ (Lat. cum omnibus hominibus pacem habentes. non vosmet ipsos defendentes, Rom. 12:18)
(59) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 59v, ll. 73–79:
A
mundë
të
jēsh
ti
mā
i
madh
se
përindi
ynë
Abraami
e
ai
vdiq,
e
profetëtë
e
por
vdiqnë?
Kë
vetëvetëhenë
ban?
q
posb
sbjv
be.sbjv.2sg
you
more
art
big
than
parent.nom.def
our
Abraham.def
and
he
die.aor.3sg
art
prophet.pl.def
and
conn
die.aor.3pl
who.acc
refl.acc
make.2sg
(60)
E
u
përgjegj
Jezu:
u
në
madhështonj
vetëvetëhenë
lavdi
em
asgjā
nukë
anshtë;
Ati
em
anshtë
ai
qi
muo
përlëvdon
and
them.dat
answer.aor.3sg
Jesus
I
if
glorify.prs.1sg
refl.acc
praise.nom.def
my
nothing
not
be.3sg
father.nom.def
my
be.3sg
he
rel
me.acc
glorify.3sg
‘Can you be greater than our father Abraham, and he died? and the prophets also died? Whom do you make yourself? And Jesus answered them: If I glorify myself, my glory is nothing at all; It is my father who glorifies me.’ (Lat. Numquid tu maior es patre nostro Abraham qui mortuus est? et prophetae mortui sunt? quem te ipsum facis? Respondit Iesus si ego glorifico me ipsum gloria mea nihil est. Est Pater meus qui glorificat me, Joh. 8:53–54)
(61) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 78r, ll. 35–37:
ai
të
mos
flasë
ën
vetëvetëhej
por
gjithë
ato
kafshë
qi
të
ketë
gjegjunë
të
flasë
he
sbjv
neg
speak.sbjv.3sg
of
refl.abl
but
all
that.pl.f
thing.pl
rel
sbjv
have.sbjv.3sg
hear.ptc
sbjv
speak.sbjv.3sg
‘he will not speak of himself, but whichever things he will hear, he will say.’ (Lat. non loquetur a semet ipso sed quaecumque audiet loquetur, John 16:13)
(62) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 95r, ll. 59–62:
Fjalëtë
qi
u
juve
thom
ën
vetëvetëhej
u
nukë
i
flas;
por
Ati
qi
ëndë
muo
anshtë
ai
ban
vepëratë
word.acc.pl.def
rel
I
you.pl.dat
say.1sg
of
refl.abl
I
not
them.acc
speak.1sg
but
father.nom.def
rel
in
me.ins
be.3sg
he
do.3sg
work.acc.pl.def
‘The words that I say to you, I speak not of myself. But the Father who is in me, he does the works.’ (Lat. Verba quae ego loquor vobis a me ipso non loquor; Pater autem in me manens ipse facit opera, Joh. 14:10)
(63) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 56r, ll. 87–90:
Ai
qi
flet
ën
vetëvetëhej
ai
lypën
lavdinë
për
vetëhenë
e
ai
qi
lypën
lavdinë
e
atī
qi
e
kā
dërguom
kȳ
anshtë
i
dërejtë
he
rel
talk.3sg
of
refl.abl
he
seek.3sg
praise.acc.def
for
refl.acc
and
he
rel
seek.3sg
praise.acc.def
art
he.gen
rel
him.acc
have.3sg
send.ptc
this.nom.m
be.3sg
art
right
‘He who speaks of himself, he is seeking glory for himself; and he who seeks the glory of him who sent him, he is true.’ (Lat. Qui a semet ipso loquitur gloriam propriam quaerit; qui autem quaerit gloriam eius qui misit illum hic verax est, Joh. 7:17–18)
5.2.1.2 Unexpected subject coreference
In the following passages, an explicit referential alternative is not immediately visible. Rather, the reduplicated reflexive must be evoked by the larger context of the phrases in question.
(64) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 16v, ll. 29–31:
u
të
rëfyenj
tinë
Zot
të
pāligjetë
e
mī
kondra
vetëvetī
I
sbjv
tell.1sg
our.dat
Lord
art
error.pl.def
art
my
against
refl.dat
‘I will confess to you, our Lord, my errors against myself’ (Lat. confitebor scelus meum domino, Psalm 31:5)
The phrase quoted in (65) is the climax of a series of questions put to John the Baptist by the Jewish leaders and answered in the negative by John: “I am not the Messiah”, “I am not Elijah”, “I am not Prophet”. Finally, the leaders ask, “So who are you? Give us an answer to take back to those who sent us.” Then follows their concluding question:
(65) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 30v, l. 83:
Qish
ti
vetëvetī
thuo
se
je?
What
you
refl.dat
say.2sg
that
be.2sg
‘What do you say of yourself that you are?’ (Lat. Quid dicis de te ipso?, Joh. 1:21–22)
Latin ipse is also present in the original of the Albanian translations in (66)–(68):
Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 50v, ll. 63–67:
(66)
Gjithë
regjënī
e
përdame
kondra
vetëvetëhej
të
faronetë
shtëpia
të
bierë
përënbī
shtëpīt.
E
Satanosi
all
kingdom.nom
art
divide.ptc
against
refl.abl
sbjv
destroy.nact.3sg
house.nom.def
sbjv
fall.3sg
on
house.ins
and
Satan.nom.def
(67)
kondra
vetëvetī
në
kloftë
dām
si
të
jesë
regjënia
e
tī
against
refl.dat
if
be.opt.3sg
divide.ptc
how
sbjv
stay.sbjv.3sg
kingdom.nom.def
art
his
‘Every kingdom divided against itself will be destroyed, house will fall upon house. And if Satan be also divided against himself, how shall his kingdom stand?’ (Lat. omne regnum in se ipsum divisum desolatur et domus supra domum cadet. Si autem et Satanas in se ipsum divisus est quomodo stabit regnum ipsius, Luke 11:17–18)
(68) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 59r, ll. 70–72:
I
thanë
atī
Farizejtë:
Ti
dëshmon
vetëvetī
e
të
dëshmuomitë
tat
s’
anshtë
të
vërtetë
him.dat
say.aor.3pl
he.dat
Pharisee.pl.def
you
testify.2sg
refl.dat
and
art
testimony.nom.def
your.sg.n
not
be.3sg
art
true.nom
‘The Pharisees said to him: You give testimony of yourself; and your testimony is not true.’ (Lat. Dixerunt ergo ei Pharisaei: tu de te ipso testimonium perhibes testimonium tuum non est verum, Joh. 8:13)
In (69), the simple reflexive vetëhenë, which does not translate a Latin word but is required in Old Albanian as the coreferential object of ëndër ‘among’, contrasts with reduplicated vetëvetëhenë rendering sēmet ipsum ‘himself’ with the focus particle -met:
(69) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 47r, ll. 38–40:
E
thoshnë
ëndër
vetëhenë
Xhudhītë
Ai
të
ënvrase
vetëvetëhenë
and
say.ipf.3pl
among
refl.acc
Jew.pl.def
he
sbjv
kill.sbjv.3sg
refl.acc
‘And the Jews were saying among themselves: Will he kill himself?’ (Lat. dicebant ergo Iudaei numquid interficiet semet ipsum, Joh. 8:22)
In (70), the presence of reduplicated vetëvetëhenë translating Latin sē ‘himself’ can be contrasted with (43) ti … ban vetëhenë Zotynë ‘you make yourself God’, with a simple reflexive:
(70) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 68v, ll. 87–90:
porsi
anshtë
ligjja
jonë
ai
të
vdesë
përse
ai
bani
vetëvetëhenë
se
anshtë
Biri
i
tinë
Zot
like
is.3sg
law.nom.def
our.f.sg
he
sbjv
die.sbjv.3sg
because
he
make.aor.3sg
refl.acc
that
be.3sg
son.nom.def
art
our.gen
Lord
‘such as our law is he ought to die, because he made himself to be the son of our Lord.’ (Lat. nos legem habemus et secundum legem debet mori quia Filium Dei se fecit, Joh. 19:7)
Several additional examples follow in (71) to (78). In the case of the object form vetëvetëhenë, the difference with the simplex vetëhenë is not easy to grasp. The reduplicated dative and ablative forms given here may be linked to the presence of the focus particle -met in the Latin original.
(71) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 38r, ll. 87–88:
Vëllazënë
mos
banī
të
ditunë
ju
ën
vetëvetëhej
brother.pl
not
make.nact.2pl
art
know.ptc
you.nom
to
refl.abl
‘Brethren: do not think of yourselves as wise’ (= ‘do not be conceited’) (Lat. Nolite esse prudentes apud vosmet ipsos, Romans 12:16)
(72) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 47r, ll. 28–30:
Zot
soliçitou
e
ban
mos
vono
ën
vetëvetëhej
Lord.nom
care.nact.imp.2sg
and
do.imp
not
tarry.imp
on
refl.abl
‘O Lord, take care and act, do not tarry, for your own sake’ (Lat. Domine, adtende et fac ne moreris propter temet ipsum, Daniel 9:19)
Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 78r, ll. 57–66:
(73)
ini
bāsa
ën
së
bāmëshit
e
jo
ën
fjalëshit
tue
gjegjunë
ju
tue
majshtruom
vetëvetëhenë
Përse
n’
be.imp.2pl
doer.pl
of
art
act.abl.pl.def
and
not
of
word.abl.pl.def
gdv
hear.ptc
you
gdv
deceive.ptc
refl.acc
For
if
(74)
anshtë
kush
(…)
pā
vetëvetëhenë
e
vote
e
be.3sg
who
see.aor.3sg
refl.acc
and
go.aor.3sg
and
(75)
u
harruo
ën
vetëvetëhej
si
kle
nact
forget.aor.3sg
of
refl.abl
how
be.aor.3sg
‘you must be doers of the acts and not hearing the words, you who deceive yourselves. For if there is someone (…), he has seen himself and has gone away and has forgotten of himself what kind of man he was.’ (Lat. Estote autem factores verbi et non auditores tantum, fallentes vosmet ipsos. Quia si quis (…), consideravit enim se et abiit et statim oblitus est qualis fuerit, Jas. 1:22–24)
(76) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 56r, ll. 65–67:
ban
të
të
bierë
ëndë
mend
ën
Abraamit
e
Izakut
ën
Izraelit
sherbëtorëtë
e
tū
qi
ti
atyne
pate
bām
bē
ën
vetëvetëhej
do.imp.2sg
sbjv
you.dat
hit.imp.2sg
in
mind
of
Abraham.abl.def
and
Isaac.abl.def
of
Israel.abl.def
servant.pl.def
art
your.pl
rel
you
them.dat
have.aor.2sg
do.ptc
oath.acc
of
refl.abl
‘Remember Abraham and Isaac, [also] Israel, your servants, to whom you have sworn by your own self’ (Lat. Recordare Abraham Isaac et Israhel servorum tuorum quibus iurasti per temet ipsum, Ex. 32:13)
(77) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 83r, ll. 61–62:
E
pr=ashtu
të
përuonjë
nierī
vetëvetëhenë
and
for=thus
sbjv
prove.sbjv.3sg
sbjv
refl.acc
‘But let a man prove himself’ (Lat. Probet autem se ipsum homo, 1 Cor. 11:28)
(78) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 103v, ll. 81–84:
Në
do
kush
me
ardhunë
ënbas
meje
ai
lanë
vetëvetëhenë
e
marrë
kryqnë
e
tī
e
muo
ëndjekë
if
want.3sg
someone
inf
come.ptc
after
me.abl
he
leave.sbjv.3sg
refl.acc
and
take.sbjv.3sg
cross.acc.def
art
his
and
me.acc
follow.sbjv.3sg
‘If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me.’ (Lat. si quis vult post me venire abneget semet ipsum et tollat crucem suam et sequatur me, Mt. 16:24)
5.2.2 vetëvetë- in Budi and Bogdani
In Budi’s writings, we find 5 occurrences of the genitive-dative vetëvetī, 9 of vetëvetëhesë, and 62 of the accusative-instrumental vetëvetëhenë. Bogdani’s Cuneus Prophetarum contains only four occurrences of vetëvetëhesë and two of vetëvetëhenë.
5.2.2.1 With explicit evocation of referential alternative
Explicit evocation of the referential alternative is the rule. Here is a representative selection of examples:
(79) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 140, l. 12:
kanë
me
zanë
fīll
me
mallëkuom
vetëvetëhenë
e
gjithë
kafshëtë
have.3pl
inf
take.ptc
beginning
inf
curse.ptc
refl.acc
and
all
creature.pl.def
‘they will start to curse themselves and all creatures’
(80) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 277, l. 13:
ashtu
qi
aspak
të
mos
bahetë
causa
e
ndōnjī
skandulliximi
ō
e
vetëvetī
ō
e
tjetër=kūjnāj
thus
rel
not.at.all
sbjv
not
do.nact.3sg
cause
art
some
misbehaviour.gen
or
art
refl.gen
or
art
other=someone.gen
‘so that it cannot become the cause for any scandalous behaviour either for oneself or for anybody else’
(81) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 20, ll. 7–9:
t=i
pagëzojsh
pā
vūm
m
perikullë
të
shëlbuomitë
e
tyne
ende
të
vetëvetëhesë
sbjv=them.acc
baptize.sbjv.2sg
without
put.ptc
in
danger.acc
art.n
salvation.sg.def
art
their
also
art
refl.gen
‘you must baptize them without jeopardizing their as well as your own salvation’
(82) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 190, l. 1:
a
përmeton
tashti
(…)
se
kie
me
e
dashunë
e
me
e
ruojtunë
e
me
i
pruojtunë
posikūr
vetëvetëhesë
q
promise.2sg
now
that
have.2sg
inf
him.acc
love.ptc
and
inf
him
protect.ptc
and
inf
him.dat
defend.ptc
like
refl.dat
‘do you promise now (…) that you will love him and protect him and defend him like yourself’
(83) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 149, l. 2:
Përse
u
keshë
me
thanë
jo
kūj
tjetëri
por
vetëvetëhesë
because
I
have.ipf.2sg
inf
say.ptc
not
who.dat
other.dat
but
refl.dat
‘Because I would say it not to anyone else, but to myself’
(84) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 167, l. 28:
të
kietë
kujdes
me
e
armatisunë
vetëvetëhenë
e
zemërënë
e
vet
sbjv
have.sbjv.3sg
care.acc
inf
him.acc
prepare.ptc
refl.acc
and
heart.acc.def
art
own
‘he must take care to prepare himself and his own heart’
(85) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 199, l. 20:
banetë
gjakës
e
mixori
i
vetëvetëhesë
e
i
shpīrtit
vet
do.nact.3sg
killer
and
executioner.def
art
refl.gen
and
art
soul.gen.def
own
‘he becomes a killer and the executioner of himself and of his own soul’
(86) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 208, l. 12:
me
ntruom
jo
veçëse
vetëvetëhenë
e
ditënë
e
natënë
e
horënë
e
çasnë
(…)
po
ashtu
ende
gjithë
sā
të
pëlqyeme
kafshë
të
tjera
inf
curse.ptc
not
only
refl.acc
and
day.acc
and
night.acc
and
hour.acc
and
minute.acc
but
thus
also
all
so.much
art
pleasing
creature.pl
art
other.pl.f
‘to curse not only themselves each day and night and hour and minute (…) but also all other pretty creatures’
(87) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 227, l. 22:
duoj
e
shoqnë
e
fqinjënë
tande
posikundrëse
vetëvetëhenë
love.imp.2sg
art
friend.acc.def
and
neighbour.acc.def
your.acc.m
like
refl.acc
‘love thy friend and neighbour as thyself’
(88) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 383, ll. 4–5:
mbasi
traditoj
Krishtnë
e
mëshëriershim
qiti
litārrë
n
qafë
e
mbyti
vetëvetëhenë
after
betray.aor.3sg
Christ.acc
art
merciful
tie.aor.3sg
rope.acc.def
on
neck
and
kill.aor.3sg
refl.acc
‘after he betrayed the merciful Christ, he tied the rope around his neck and killed himself’
(89) Pjetër Bogdani, Cuneus Prophetarum 1.1.3:
ai
bani
neve
e
jo
na
vetëvetëhenë
he
make.aor.3sg
we.acc
and
not
we
refl.acc
‘he has made us, and not we ourselves’ (Lat. ipse fecit nos, et non ipsi nos. Psalm 99)
5.2.2.2 Unexpected subject coreference
The pragmatic variant in which vetëvet- does not explicitly refer to one of a contrasted pair of referents is much less frequent with Budi and Bogdani than in Buzuku’s Missale.
(90) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 65, l. 18:
jemi
të
zotë
me
ndimuom
vetëvetī
ende
ata
be.1pl
art
capable
inf
help.ptc
refl.dat
also
they.acc
‘we are capable of helping them too by ourselves’
(91) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 199, l. 16:
një
e
madhe
rrasë
me
të
cīt
(…)
mbërshel
vetëvetī
derënë
e
parrīsit
one
art
big.sg.f
rock
with
art
which.ins
close.aor.3sg
refl.dat
door.acc.def
art
paradise.gen.def
‘a large rock with which (…) he closes for himself the door to paradise’
Pjetër Bogdani, Cuneus Prophetarum 1.83.14:
(92)
Gjytetja
mixoreja
e
vetëvetëhesë
a
të
vinte
moti
i
sajnaj
e
qi
bani
idhujtë
kundrë
city.nom
executioner
art
refl.gen
so
sbjv
come.ipf.3sg
time.nom.def
art
her
and
rel
make.aor.3sg
idol.pl.def
against
(93)
vetëvetëhesë
për
t=u
pëgām
refl.dat
for
art=nact
defile.ptc
‘The city that is its own executioner, that her time may come, and [the city] that has made idols against itself to defile itself’ = Lat. civitas effundens sanguinem in medio sui, ut veniat tempus eius, et quae fecit idola contra semetipsum, ut pollueretur (Ezechiel 22:3)
(94) Pjetër Bogdani, Cuneus Prophetarum 2.160.21:
Aty
zmīrkëqijtë
kanë
me
brītunë
vetëvetëhesë
mushkënītë
nd’
ata
Terr
there
envier.pl.def
have.3pl
inf
gnaw.ptc
refl.gen
lung.pl.def
in
that
darkness
‘There the enviers will endlessly gnaw at themselves at their lungs in the dark’ (= It. ivi l’invidiosi si rodono à se medesimi le viscere in quelle tenebre)
(95) Pjetër Bogdani, Cuneus Prophetarum 2.1.1:
Mbi
si
e
pat
bam
nierinë
(…)
të
zotnë
gjithë
kreatyrëvet
desh
ende
me=i
falë
vetëvetëhenë
on
from
him
have.aor.3sg
make.ptc
man.acc.def
art
lord.acc.def
all
creature.gen.pl.def
want.aor.3sg
also
inf=him.dat
offer.ptc
refl.acc
‘Besides having made man (…) Lord over all creatures, he also wanted to offer himself to him’ (= It. oltre d’haver fatto l’huomo (…) Signore di tutte le creature; volle anche donarli se stesso)
5.3 Summary on vetë versus vetëvetëhe in Buzuku, Budi and Bogdani
There is a positive correlation between the use of vetëvet(ë) and the presence of contrastive focus. In a large number of occurrences, the reduplicated reflexive has as its referent one member of an oppositional pair of contextual referents, as in ‘yourself’ versus ‘your friend or neighbour’. As to Buzuku’s text, we may also observe the frequency of the emphatic particle -met in the Latin phrases which were translated by Buzuku, but this is not by itself a sufficient prediction, since there are also a few phrases where -met is translated by a simple reflexive.
Wherever an explicit binary contrast cannot be detected, I surmise that the reduplicated reflexive highlights unexpected subject coreference. This solution may be unsatisfactory in that we cannot test this assumption in any meaningful way, Old Albanian being a dead language; but it seems a likely assumption that reduplication has an emphatic function.
Some nonreduplicated instances of vetëhenë belie the distributional ratio described here, since they occur in contexts with contrastive focus (nrs. 42–44). For the moment it remains unclear whether this reflects a more original situation, which held before the rise of the reduplicated variant, or whether there was a pragmatic reason for the occurrence of these simplex forms that escapes us now.
There exists an inverse proportion of vetëhenë and vetëvetëhenë in Buzuku’s Missale with regard to their syntactic position. Table 2 shows that the simple form is preferentially found after prepositions (84 out of 91 prepositional object forms), whereas the reduplicated reflexive is mainly found as a direct object (30 out of 37 direct object forms).
Table 2
Syntactic position of the acc.-ins. of the reflexive in Buzuku’s Missale
|
Direct object |
Prepositional object |
Total |
|
|---|---|---|---|
|
vetëhenë |
7 |
84 |
91 |
|
vetëvetëhenë |
30 |
7 |
37 |
|
Total |
37 |
91 |
128 |
Whereas the larger proportion of prepositional objects as a whole may partly be due to a skewed proportion in the Latin source text, the fact remains that vetëvetëhenë is much better represented among the direct object forms. I take this to reflect a syntactic reality of the target language Old Albanian. As argued above (section 5.1.2), the use of the Albanian reflexive seems to be obligatory in many expressions even where it does not translate a Latin pronoun; but nonfocused, the simple reflexive suffices. On the contrary, the reduplicated variant was the preferred choice in situations where the reflexive is governed by a verb, which in many cases coincides with its conveying unexpected or contrastive information, that is, of extroverted verbs. In the case of ‘standard’ or expected information, the use of nonactive verb forms (typically for introverted actions) would have sufficed.
6 The OAlb. adverb ‘by oneself’
The adverbial reflexive vetiu ‘by/for oneself’, reduplicated vetëvetiu, is first found in Budi’s texts:
(96) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 115, l. 26:
ndë
mos
muntë
ai
vetiu
me
e
bām
if
neg
posb
he.nom
refl.adv
inf
it
do.ptc
‘if he cannot do it by himself’
(97) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 193, l. 28:
atyne
qi
vetiu
s
kanë
trajtuom
they.gen
rel
refl.adv
neg
have.3pl
prepare.ptc
‘of those who by themselves have not prepared it’
This form lives on in the Modern Albanian adverb vetiu (= trisyllabic /veˈtiu/) ‘by itself, by oneself, spontaneously’. Vetiu may have arisen from the reinterpretation of the genitive-dative vetī ‘of oneself, for oneself’ as a nominative of the masculine class of nouns ending in stressed -í, such as OAlb. nierí ‘man’, barí ‘shepherd’. To this form, the productive genitive-dative ending -u was then added (cf. Topalli 2017: 1563). Note that in (96) and (97) an interpretation as a dative remains possible.
7 The OAlb. possessive adjective
The possessive adjective i, e vet ‘one’s own’ is only found with third-person referents in Old Albanian, though it seems likely that it could also refer to the first and second persons, as is possible in Modern Albanian (cf. Kurtiade 1991). The Old Albanian restriction may be due to the influence of the Latin text models, since Latin suus can only refer to the third person. Proclitic i, e links vet to its head noun except in the genitive-dative, which does not take the linker. The linker is inflected for case and, in the nominative singular, for gender. The adjective itself remains uninflected, except for a few forms in Bogdani (acc.sg.m.f. të vetnë, abl.sg.f. së vetje, abl.pl. së vetsh). I refrain from giving text examples here.
Sporadically, a substantivized variant ‘one’s own’ can be found, at least in the accusative singular. In (98), vednë shows voice assimilation of t to the following n:
(98) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 22v, ll. 27–28:
ai
qi
kā
të
vednë
e
pur
bie
ëndë
kuat
me
tjetërë
he
rel
have.3sg
art
own.acc.def
and
still
fall.3sg
in
sin
with
other.acc
‘he who has his own [wife] and still falls into sin with another’ (Lat. et ille qui habet propriam et tamen cadet in peccatum cum alia)
(99) Pjetër Budi, Speculum Confessionis p. 392, l. 1:
po
gjithëkūjnāj
epni
të
vetnë
but
everyone.dat
give.imp.pl
art
own.acc.def
‘but you must give everyone his/her own’
(100) Pjetër Budi, Rituale Romanum p. 222, ll. 12–13:
luletë
e
degetë
e
bekuome
t=i
mbānë
i
cīcilli
të
vetnë
n
dorë
flower.pl.def
and
branch.pl.def
art
bless.ptc.pl
sbjv=them
hold.3pl
art
each.nom
art
own.acc.def
in
hand.ins
‘blessed flowers and branches they must hold, each his own one in their hand’
8 OAlb. i vetëmë ‘the only one’
OAlb. i vetëmë ‘the only one, single, simple; the same’ contains the suffix -më which derives adjectives from adverbs, as in Buzuku ëmprapa ‘back’ → ëmprapëmë, ëmprabëmë ‘last’, sod ‘today’ → sodm ‘of today’ (Matzinger 2016: 342–346). The derivational basis seems to have been the identifier vetë ‘self’, which is uninflected and may for that reason have acquired the deadverbial suffix. Similar adjectival derivatives of identifiers can be found in other languages, e.g., Middle and Modern High German selbig ‘the same’. In Buzuku, the adjective mostly translates Latin solus, unus, unicus, singularis ‘only, single’, as in examples (101–102), but also idem ‘the same’, as in (103):
(101) Luca Matranga, Dottrina Christiana fol. 13v:
me
një
të
vetëmë
vlemë
të
tij
with
one
art
only.ins
will.ins
art
he.gen
‘with his mere will’
(102) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 76v, ll. 64–65:
jo
ëndë
ujë
të
vetëmë
por
ëndë
ujë
e
ëndë
gjak
not
in
water.ins
art
only.ins
but
in
water
and
in
blood
‘not in water alone, but in water and blood’ (Lat. non in aqua solum sed in aqua et sanguine, 1 Ep.Joh. 5:6)
(103) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 80r, ll. 9–11:
ishnë
gjithë
dishipujtë
njëi
zemëre
ënb=atë
vend
të
vetëmë
be.ipf.3pl
all
pupil.pl.def
one.gen
heart.gen
at=that.ins
place
art
same
‘all disciples were together in that same place’ (= Lat. erant omnes pariter in eodem loco, Acts 2:1)
A noteworthy feature of vetëmë is that it sometimes occurs without the linking article, viz. when used as a predicative adjective in the nominative: Tǖ vetëmë rāe ëndë kuat ‘you alone have fallen into sin’ (Gjon Buzuku, Missale, fol. 17r), Nukë anshtë mirë me klenë nierī vetëmë ‘It is not good if man is alone’ (Missale, fol. 26r), ishnjinë dishipujtë ëndë barkë per viedmis detit, e Jezü vetëmë ën dhē ‘the disciples were on the boat in the middle of the sea, and Jesus [was] alone on land’ (Missale, fol. 42v). Such behavior is rare in Albanian linking adjectives (cf. Buchholz & Fiedler 1987: 316, who give the example of plaku i sëmurë ‘the sick old man’ vs. plaku është sëmurë ‘the old man is sick’).
9 OAlb. veçë ‘only’
In Buzuku, the adverb veçë ‘only’ is found four times and only followed by the conjunction se, with the meaning ‘except for’. In three instances, the main clause contains an explicit negation:
(104) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 97r, ll. 24–25:
as
ëndonjë
ën
Apostojshit
pāë
veçë
se
Jakobnë
not
someone
from
apostle.abl.pl.def
see.aor.1sg
except
that
James.acc.def
‘I did not see any of the apostles save James.’ (Lat. alium autem apostolorum vidi neminem nisi Iacobum, Galat. 1:19)
(105) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 86r, ll. 30–31:
as
kush
mundë
thoetë
Zot
Jezu
veçë
se
për
Shpirt
shenjët
not
who
posb
say.sbjv.3sg
Lord
Jesus
except
that
by
Spirit
holy
‘no-one can say Lord Jesus except by the Holy Ghost.’ (Lat. nemo potest dicere Dominus Iesus nisi in Spiritu Sancto, 1 Cor. 12:3)
(106) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 107r, ll. 68–69:
mā
gjā
nukë
vijen
veçë
se
me
u
qitunë
jashtë
more
thing
not
be.worth.3sg
except
that
inf
nact
throw.ptc
outside
‘It is good for nothing anymore but to be cast out’ (Lat. ad nihilum valet ultra nisi ut mittatur foras, Mat. 5:13)
In (107) there is no explicit negation, but two items beside veçë express negative polarity:
(107) Gjon Buzuku, Missale fol. 110r, l. 75:
veçë
se
u
qyqe
vetëmë
shpëtova
except
that
I
lonely
alone
escape.aor.1sg
‘only I all alone have escaped’ (Lat. effugi ego solus, Job 1:19)
Budi has the same constructions of negation + veçë and negation + veçë se. In addition, we now find veçë without additional conjunction, meaning ‘only’:
(108) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 177, ll. 9–12:
veçë
ti
(…)
o
zoti
im
except
you
oh
Lord.nom.def
my
‘Only you (…), oh my Lord’
Budi is the first author to use veçë + ablative as a preposition meaning ‘except for, but’:
(109) Pjetër Budi, Dottrina Christiana p. 54, l. 22:
prāshtu
mos
kīj
e
mos
adhëro
tietër
zot
veçë
meje
therefore
not
have.imp.2sg
and
not
worship.imp.2sg
other
Lord.acc
except
me.abl
‘Therefore do not have and do not worship another Lord but me!’
10 Summary and etymology
Table 3 contains a brief survey of the different Old Albanian lexemes reviewed in this paper, including a grammatical gloss, their meaning, and the first text of attestation.
Table 3
Survey of the Old Albanian lexemes discussed in this paper
|
Form |
Category |
Meaning |
First attestation |
|---|---|---|---|
|
vetë |
sbs |
person |
Buzuku |
|
vetë |
idtf |
self |
Buzuku |
|
vetë, vetī, vetë-he- |
refl |
oneself |
Buzuku |
|
vetëvetë, vetëvetë-he- |
refl |
oneself (contrastive focus) |
Buzuku |
|
vetiu |
adv |
by oneself |
Budi |
|
vet (i, e) |
adj |
one’s own |
Buzuku |
|
vetëmë (i, e) |
adj |
the only one |
Buzuku |
|
veçë |
adv |
only |
Buzuku |
It remains to be discussed how these forms are historically related and to which Proto-Albanian and Pre-Proto-Albanian forms vetë and -he may go back.
10.1 Semantic reconstruction
The basic form vetë occurs as the identifier ‘self’ and as a reflexive ‘oneself’. For two reasons it seems likely that the idtf function preceded the use as a refl: because Old Albanian adds -he to explicitly distinguish the reflexive from the identifier, and because, in many languages in which idtf is identical to refl, the grammaticalization path led from idtf to refl (König & Siemund 2000).
As regards the simple and reduplicated forms of the reflexive vetë, a number of distributional facts may be relevant for the historical analysis.
-
The element -he behaves as a feminine noun that has been compounded with vetë.
-
This feminine noun takes indefinite (-he) and definite forms (-henë, -hesë, -hej).
-
The genitive-dative vetëhesë is not used by Buzuku, who knows only vetī. This suggests that vetī is an older form than vetëhesë.
-
The uninflected identifier vetë is twice attested as a reflexive: once in Buzuku, as a prepositional object (36); and once in Matranga, as a direct object (35). Though the evidence is meagre, this usage of vetë may be a remnant of an earlier stage in which accusative-instrumental vetë was the usual or even the only form of the reflexive (i.e., before -he was suffixed to it).
-
The genitive-dative vetī formally corresponds to vetë in the same way as do the pronominal genitives atī, këtī to the accusatives atë ‘that’, këtë ‘this’. This parallelism lends further support to the view that, at a stage previous to the suffixation of -he, the reflexive paradigm consisted (at least) of acc.-ins. vetë and gen.-dat. vetī.
-
The accusative-instrumental vetëhe is absent from Buzuku and Matranga, who know only vetëhenë. In Budi and Bogdani, vetëhe is typically used after prepositions, whereas vetëhenë is mainly used as a direct object. It is as yet unclear which conclusion should be drawn from this distribution: for instance, whether vetëhe had disappeared from the dialect of Buzuku altogether or whether he merely generalized the use of vetëhenë after prepositions.
Table 4 displays the evidence for the reflexive, including the two hapax forms of vetë in Buzuku and Matranga, reorganized according to the presence or absence of reduplication and the second element -he.
Whereas the derivation of the adjectives vetëmë ‘only’ and vet ‘own’ from vetë ‘self’ poses no serious semantic problems, we must briefly dwell on the adverb veçë ‘only’, since there is no synchronic pattern in Old Albanian that builds adverbs by means of a suffix -shë or -ë. B. Demiraj (1997: 416) derives veçë from an ablative plural *vet-ë(š)-, but this leaves the final -ë of veçë unexplained. Furthermore, since vetë otherwise only ever has singular forms, the existence of an earlier ablative plural remains uncertain. Topalli (2017: 1552) explains veçë as a compound of *ve- or vetë plus the particle and conjunction çë ‘what, that’ (= MoAlb. çë and që, cf. Çabej 2006: 264–265). This etymology is more promising: univerbation and syncope would have changed *vetë *çë ‘by itself that’ to *vetçë, which is phonologically equivalent to veçë. This etymology would also explain why Budi, unlike Buzuku, can use veçë without se ‘that’: the conjunction *çë was part of the word veçë from the start.
Table 4
Attested forms of vetë and vetëhe in Old Albanian, with indication of the first author where they are found. The grey fields indicate irrelevant options for the given stems.
|
vetë |
vetë-he |
|||
|---|---|---|---|---|
|
Simple |
Reduplicated |
Simple |
Reduplicated |
|
|
acc.-ins. |
vetë 2× |
unattested |
||
|
gen.-dat. |
vetī Buz.+ |
vetëvetī Buz.+ |
||
|
acc.-ins. indef. |
vetëhe Budi+ |
unattested |
||
|
acc.-ins. def. |
vetëhenë Buz.+ |
vetëvetëhenë Buz.+ |
||
|
gen.-dat. def. |
vetëhesë Budi+ |
vetëvetëhesë Budi+ |
||
|
abl. def. |
vetëhej Buz.+ |
vetëvetëhej Buz.+ |
||
Finally, we must discuss the historical-semantic relationship between vetë ‘self’ and vetë ‘person’: was one derived from the other, or did they both develop from a third meaning? A shift from ‘self’ to ‘person’ would imply the affixless (re)lexification of a grammeme, whereas a semantic shift from ‘person’ to ‘self’ seems possible in theory but I have not come across any parallels for it. A third option is that vetë originally meant ‘body’ or a specific body part, because words for ‘self’ are often derived from body parts or from ‘body’ (cf. WALS, chapter 47). ‘Body’ can also shift to ‘person’, witness the various colexifications of ‘body’ and ‘person’ attested in the CLICS database (Rzymski & Tresoldi et al. 2020, subgraph ‘Person’). Thus, based on the semantic data alone, the most straightforward option would be that vetë originally meant ‘body’, but of course this is only one possible scenario.
10.2 The formal etymology of vetë
There is no complete agreement on the formal etymology of vetë, which most scholars derive from the PIE pronominal reflexive acc. *swe, dat. *swoi (Demiraj 1997: 416, Topalli 2017: 1562–1563).8 The sequence ve- can reflect PIE forms in initial *w- or *sw-, Ancient Greek (non-Ionic-Attic) w-, or Latin v-, plus a vocalic reflex of PIE *ei, *oi, *ai, *ō, or of *a plus i-mutation. Initial ve- may furthermore continue the diphthongized reflex of Proto-Albanian and Latin *ō-, as in Old Geg verbënë ‘blind’ < *orban-, cf. Schumacher & Matzinger 2013: 225. For vetë we may probably exclude reconstructions with i-mutation of *a since -të does not typically cause i-mutation, but this still leaves a high number of potential reconstructions for ve-.
Whereas Klingenschmitt (1994: 241, 242 fn. 14) reconstructs PIE *sweitā-, Orel (1998: 498) and Schumacher & Matzinger (2013: 251) posit a preform *swaitā- ‘selfness’ based on PIE *swoi. A suffix in *t after the reflexive pronominals *swe or *swoi is found in several branches of Indo-European, for instance, in Avestan xvatō ‘of one’s own accord’ (< PIIr. *swatas < PIE *swetos) and xvaētu- ‘relative’ (< PIIr. *swai-tu-), Greek etós ‘in vain’ (if from *swetos ‘by itself’ as per Beekes & van Beek 2010: 476), étēs (< *wétās) ‘clansman, citizen’, and Lithuanian svẽčias ‘guest’ (< *swetios). In view of such parallels, PIE *swoi-t-, PAlb. *swait- may be regarded as a likely basis for vetë. The ending -ë may have several different origins, which is why I prefer not to claim any certainty on the exact suffix behind -të, other than that it contained a *t.
Language-internally, vetë is often connected with the particle u, which obligatorily accompanies nonactive finite verb forms in the aorist, optative, and imperative as well as several nonfinite constructions, e.g., Buz. 2sg. imperative kthe u ‘turn around!’, infinitive me u kujtuom ‘to remember’. This particle probably represents the reduced variant of an earlier lexeme, for which Schumacher (2013: 48) explicitly mentions *swoi and *swe as possible preforms. A direct etymological connection can only be made between u and the element ve- in vetë, not with the word vetë as a whole. This opens up another perspective.
As seen by Topalli (2017: 1562), vetë may alternatively be analyzed as a compound of a lexeme ve plus an (unstressed) lexeme të. A compound origin from a reflexive and a demonstrative pronoun could be compared, structurally, with Ancient Greek heautón ‘himself’ < hé + autós ‘self’ (Puddu 2005, Mocciaro 2014). This view would allow us to regard the unstressed nonactive particle u as a reduced form of the (preform of) the element ve-. Also, the genitive-dative vetī may then be explained as an analogical creation beside vetë on the model of the genitive-dative forms atī ‘of him’, këtī ‘of this’ beside the accusatives atë, këtë. Of course, this analogy could also have applied if vetë was not of compound origin but simply happened to acquire a phonological shape vetë which reminded speakers of atë and këtë.
10.3 The etymology of -he
We have established that vetëhe behaves as an indefinite accusative singular of a feminine noun in -e while vetëhenë, -hesë and -hej show features of a definite singular feminine noun, the indefinite singular of which would be *he. Topalli (2017: 1562) argues that the consonant h might be a hiatus filler between unstressed ë and stressed e, but this seems very improbable. Intervocalic h may synchronically be interpreted as a hiatus filler before e in the nonactive paradigm of vocalic verb stems, e.g., Old Geg mbahetë ‘is held’ (mbā ‘to hold’), dihetë ‘it is known’ (di ‘to know’), but the origin of this h is disputed. Schumacher & Matzinger (2013: 131) propose that h arose regularly from Indo-European *sk in the nonactive forms of OAlb. do ‘to wish, want’, e.g., 3sg. pres. nonact. *dus-ske-toi, whence OAlb. duhetë. This hypothesis remains to be confirmed. The main difference between the nonactive h-forms and vetëhe- is the presence of schwa in the latter. In fact, h does not occur anywhere in Albanian as a hiatus filler between unstressed ë and a full vowel, and if such a sequence had arisen at an earlier stage, the two vowels would surely have contracted to a single one. Therefore, h in vetëhe probably continues the Proto-Albanian consonant which resulted from PIE *sk. In view of the crosslinguistic tendency to express reflexives by means of words for ‘body’, the element -he may well represent an old noun, and vetëhe an original compound meaning ‘self-form’ or ‘self-body’.
On the ultimate origin of the element -he we can only make an educated guess. It is attractive to connect it with OAlb. hie ‘shade, shadow; phantom’ (nom. indef. hie, nom. def. hieja, ins. def. hiet, MoAlb. hije ‘shade’, in Arbëresh dialects also ‘beauty’), for which most scholars reconstruct Proto-Albanian *skijā- (Demiraj 1997: 201, Neri 2023). Its original meaning is usually assumed to be ‘shade’ because the cognate words in Greek, Tocharian, and Indo-Iranian also mean ‘shade’. But an earlier or concomitant meaning may have been ‘appearance’ (a parallel for the semantic shift from ‘appear, shine’ to ‘shade’ is found in German Schemen ‘ghost’ from *skim- ‘appear, shine’), which would have been petrified in vetëhe. The meaning ‘appearance’ then yielded ‘beauty’ in Arbëresh but changed to ‘shade, phantom’ in mainland Albanian. The formal variation between hie and -he cannot be reduced to a single, stressed Proto-Albanian form, but one might envisage the coexistence of earlier ablaut variants in the sense that the preform *ski(j)ā-, which yielded OAlb. hie, co-occurred with *skei- or *skai-, whence OAlb. he-.
Acknowledgments
For comments on a first version of this paper I am indebted to my colleagues Alexander Herren, Leonid Kulikov, Gerard Spaans, and Sergio Neri. The usual disclaimers apply.
The following text editions and numerations are used. For Gjon Buzuku’s Missale from 1555, I have used the diplomatic online edition prepared in 2000–2002 by Wolfgang Hock for the TITUS website (
Grammatical glosses follow the Leipzig glossing rules, with the exception of the following: nact = nonactive, opt = optative, posb = possibilitative, ptc = participle, sbs = substantive. In nouns, Albanian distinguishes between indefinite and definite forms; only the definite variants are marked in glossing.
The term ‘adverbial intensifier’ is used by König & Siemund (2000 & 2013) as opposed to ‘actor-oriented intensifiers’, which Gast & Siemund (2006) prefer.
Phrase found online at
Note that the reduplicated variants cannot be identified with “heavy” reflexives in the sense of Smith (2004) and Haspelmath (2008), who use the term ‘heavy reflexive’ for expressions as English himself, Dutch zichzelf, Russian sebja, which grammatically contrast with other, phonologically shorter constructions expressing introverted reflexivity (English zero, Dutch zich, Russian -sja).
Vetī is also used by Bogdani as an instrumental, which must be a secondary development.
I owe this second suggestion to Leonid Kulikov (p.c.).
Quite differently, Mann (1977: 121) “equates” vetë with Greek autós ‘self’, but according to our present knowledge, a preform in *aut- would yield OAlb. at-, or, with i-mutation, et-. Bokshi (2004: 154) explains ve- from PIE *swōm, a form that cannot be justified in the context of PIE morphology.
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