PASAR Y SENTAROS: ACCOUNTING FOR THE ALTERNATIVE VOSOTROS IMPERATIVE
David Eddington
University of New
Mexico
The
VOS form of Classical Latin is manifest in Contemporary Spanish in two distinct
ways. Vos in Spanish emerged from Latin
VOS as a second person singular manner of address, and differed from tú in that
the latter was more informal and employed with inferiors. In the seventeenth, and possibly as late as
the eighteenth century, the use of vos disappeared from many parts of the
Spanish speaking world (Lapesa 1984:579), although it is still widely used in
many areas of South and Central America (Rona 1967). Vosotros retained the plurality of Latin VOS to become an informal
manner of address. However, in
contemporary Peninsular Spanish it has lost a lot of ground to the ustedes form.
The only region to conserve the vosotros
form is Spain, yet even within Spain it is not universal; the western half of
Andalusia has lost it in favor of ustedes (Lapesa 1984:512). The imperative of Latin VOS was marked with
the verb-final morpheme -TE (AUDITE 'hear').
This morpheme, with the voicing of intervocalic /t/ and deletion of
final /-e/ common in the evolution of Spanish, became the final /-d/ morpheme
indicative of the vosotros imperative
(comed, bebed).
The objective of this paper is to examine
other varieties of this imperative, namely the vos imperative, and the final
/-r/ vosotros imperative, and to give
a morphophonemic explanation of why these varieties have arisen in contrast to
the final /-d/ variety of the standardized language. For clarity's sake I will define each of the imperative varieties
I will deal with. What will be referred
to as the -d variety imperative is the variety that is prescribed by
traditional grammars. In this variety a
/-d/ replaces the /-r/ of the infinitive in the following manner:
(1) a. decir > decid
b.
venir > venid
With reflexive verbs, however, the -d is omitted, most
likely to avoid confusion with the past participle:
(2) a. acercarse > acercaos
b.
divertirse > divertíos
The
vos imperative will be called the null variety since no word final morpheme
appears after the theme vowel:
(3) a. decir > decí
b.
venir > vení
Vos imperatives employ the reflexive pronoun te
in place of os:
(4) a. acercarse > acercate
b.
divertirse > divertite
The final -r variety does not differ from the infinitive
form of the verb, and the clitic pronoun os is added to the verb:
(5) acercarse > acercaros
Most of the recognition that the -r variety imperative
has recieved has been prescriptive in nature; it is recognized by the Royal
Spanish Academy only as a vulgar form of speech since it is not found in
literary works except as an imitation of uncultured speech (Real Academia
1985:460). However, indications are
that the -r variety is not uncommon in the peninsula. It has been documented in Aragón, Navarra, La Rioja and Andalucía
(Alvar, et al.1980: map 1837; Alvar et al. 1973: map 1.719), and I have observed it in varying degrees in the speech
of Spaniards from many regions, and social classes.
I
submit that the existence of the -r and null variety imperatives derived from
Latin -TE can
be explained by considering the frequency of the
consonant clusters that arise when the clitic pronouns are used in conjunction
with the imperative. The consonant
clusters formed by the combination of the final -d of the vosotros imperative and the initial consonants of the clitic
pronouns are highly anomalous in the Spanish lexicon, while consonant clusters
formed between the clitic pronouns and the final -r of the -r variety, as well
as those formed with the null variety imperative, are common clusters.
Consider
the consonant clusters that are formed with the final -d of the -d variety
imperative combined with the initial consonants of the clitic pronouns, (n-,
s-, l-, m-, t-). The clusters -dn-,
-ds-, -dl-, -dm-, and -dt are the possible combinations (i.e. dejádnoslo,
dádselo, bajadlo, ayudadme). Of the above clusters, -dt- may be excluded on pragmatic grounds
since it is not a viable option (i. e. *ponedte). When a Spanish speaker encounters one of the clusters from the -d
variety imperative, s/he is faced with a cluster which is highly anomalous
elsewhere in the language. These
anomalous clusters, -dn-, -ds-, -dl-, and -dm-, occur almost exclusively when
the -d variety imperative is combined with a clitic pronoun. The -r variety imperative, however, yields
the more common clusters -rn-, -rs-, -rl-, and -rm-. Along the same lines, the null variety imperative also yields the
more common clusters -Vn-, -Vs-, -Vl-, and -Vm-.
In
order to determine whether the clusters -dn-, -ds-, -dl-, and -dm- were as
uncommon as they appear I searched for words that contained them in the Alameda
and Cuetos (1995) frequency dictionary.
It was found that outside of -d imperatives, the cluster -dm- is found
in cadmio and the English loan word bádminton.
Other that those cases, only a few other words, all stemming from the
prefix ad-, were found: admitir, administrar, admonestación, admirar,
admonículo (and other words with the same roots). The rarity of the -dm- cluster is further demonstrated by the
fact that the /d/ in the above words is often deleted in popular speech:
(6) a. admitir [amitír]
b.
admonestación [amonestaθjón]
I argue that deletion is a way of bringing the odd
cluster into line with more natural clusters of the language. Much more common are words with the cluster
-rm- that occur in the -r variety imperative: ermitaño, hormiga, hormona,
hermosura, armada.
Outside
of the vosotros imperative, I found
no words that contained the cluster -dn-.
That -dn- is an anomaly in Spanish is also attested to
historically. Occasionally apocope of
atonic vowels in Latin should have yielded the cluster -dn- in Spanish,
however, -dn- was avoided by metathesis into -nd-:
(7) a. candado, *cadnado < CATENATU
b.
lindo, *lidmo < LEGITIMU
c.
rienda, *riedna < *RETINA
d.
serondo/seroño, *serodno < SEROTINU (Lloyd 205)
On the other hand, words that contain the cluster -rn-
of the -r variety imperative are abundant: carne, infierno, ternura, etc.
The
cluster -ds- is uncommon as is seen by the fact that so few words contain
it. Only the words ascribir, adsorber,
and adstrato and their morphemic relatives were found in the frequency
dictionary to contain the cluster -ds-.
Once again, -rs- is common where -ds- is not: curso, reverso, dorsal,
persona, etc. In the frequency
dictionary, adláteres is the only non-imperative containing the cluster
-dl-. Examples of the aversion to this
cluster can also be found historically.
In Golden Age Spanish, the anomalous cluster -dl- was eliminated by
metathesis of the elements of the cluster (Menéndez-Pidal 301):
(8) a. dadle > dalde
b. ponedlo > poneldo
Lloyd notes that this was indeed done to eliminate a
low frequency consonant cluster (1987: 360). In like manner, this cluster
suffered metathesis as Latin words developed into Spanish. When voicing of /t/ and loss of unstressed
vowels would have normally resulted in the formation of the cluster -dl-,
methathesis of the elements of this cluster yielded instead -ld-:
(9) a. CAPIT(U)LU > cabildo, *cabidlo
b.
SPAT(U)LA > espalda, *espadla
c.
TIT(U)LARE > tildar, *tidlar (Lathrop 136)
Thus
far, I have demonstrated that when a Spanish speaker uses the -r variety vosotros imperative instead of the -d
variety, it is done in order to avoid consonant clusters that are very unusual
in the language. The use of the null
variety in place of the -d variety similarly serves to eliminate these unusual
clusters. That they are unusual is
evidenced by their low frequency of occurrence within words. That they are
treated as unusual clusters when they fall between imperatives and clitic
pronouns is evidenced by the existence of the -r and null variety imperatives
which do not contain them. Metathesis
of the clusters -dl-, and -dn- as well as the frequent loss of /d/ in words
containing the cluster -dm- is further evidence that these clusters are odd.
The
crux of my argument rests on the assumption that the interplay between the
final -d of the imperative and the initial consonants of the clitic pronouns is
significant enough to allow the emergence of alternative imperative forms. This exact sort of interplay has been
thought to be responsible for the phonetic evolution of the clitic pronoun os
< VOS. The first instances of vos
losing its initial consonant to become modern os occurred immediately following
the final -d of the vosotros
imperative (Lathrop 1984: 155). The
resulting cluster, -dv-, was anomalous enough to pressure /b/ to drop resulting
in a much more normal consonant cluster.
From this post-imperative position, os < vos was then
generalized to all other positions in the language.
Besides
the uncommon consonant clusters discussed, the -d variety imperative is subject
to another force which could have led to the appearance of alternative
imperative forms. In syllable final
position [-ð] is subject to various modifications, and in -d variety
imperatives, /d/ always occurs in this weak position. In popular speech /d/ is often devoiced in syllable final
position, and when followed by a voiceless consonant (Alarcos Llorach 184):
(10) a. verdad [berðáθ]
b. ataúd [ataúθ]
Many speakers omit /d/ when it appears in final
absolute position, and when it is followed by a voiceless consonant: (Alarcos
Llorach 1974:185)
(11) a. Madrid > [maðrí]
b.
hermandad > [ermandá]
Moreover, in popular and unmonitored speech word final
[-ð] will be dropped even before voiced consonants:
(12) a. un ataud blanco [unataúßláŋko]
b.
la edad granuja [laeðáγranúxa]
It is
not surprising to see final -d become modified in final position given that the
only consonants that may occupy word final position in Spanish are /l, r, n, s,
?, d/, and in this position /d/ is realized as a fricative [ð], which makes it
anomalous in that it is the only voiced fricative that may occur in word final
position. The widespread tendency for
final [ð] to be deleted or modified in word final position must certainly have
had some bearing on the development of an imperative that lacks final [ð] such
as the null variety imperative of contemporary voseo.
Another
possible factor that should be mentioned to round out this discussion is that
of analogy. Spanish allows the
infinitive of the verb to be used as an imperative when the imperative is
directed to an unknown party. Such
unmarked imperatives are often found in the directions for household items,
recipes, and other commands directed at the general public (e.g. tirar de la
cadena, verter medio litro de agua).
Given the problems associated with the -d variety, it is likely that the
-r variety developed as a result of the analogical force exerted upon it by the
unmarked infinitival imperative.
The
-r and null variety imperatives in Spanish should not simply be attributed to
careless speech habits of the masses, but rather, to linguistic forces arising
from the structure of the language itself.
The phoneme /d/ is unstable in final position, and this comes to a head
in the -d variety imperative. Final
/-d/ is subject to devoicing and deletion, and in the case of voseo,
this deletion became generalized as the phonetically null imperative
morpheme. Consonant clusters formed
with the final /-d/ of the -d variety imperative and the initial consonants of
the clitic pronouns are highly anomalous in Spanish, while clusters formed
under the same conditions with the -r variety are more common. Finally, the widespread use of the
infinitive as an unmarked imperative may have been adopted as an alternative vosotros command form in order to avoid
the problems associated with the -d variety imperative.
Works Cited
Alameda, José
Ramón, and Fernando Cuetos. Diccionario de frecuencias de las unidades lingüísticas
del castellano. Oviedo, Spain: University of Oviedo Press, 1995.
Alarcos Llorach, Emilio. Fonología española. 4th ed. Madrid:
Gredos, 1974
Alvar, Manuel, A.
Llorente, T. Buesa, and Elena Alvar. Atlas lingúístico y etnográfico de
Aragón, Navarra y Rioja. Vol 12. Paracuellos del Jamara, Madrid:
Departamento de Geografía y Lingüística, Institución Fernando el Católico de la
Excma. Diputación Provincial de Zaragoza, 1980.
Alvar, Manuel, A.
Llorente, and G. Salvador. Atlas lingüístico y etnográfico de Andalucía.
Vol. 6. Granada: U. de Granada, Consejo Superior de Investigaciones
Científicas, 1973.
Lapesa, Rafael. Historia
de la lengua española. 9th ed. Madrid: Gredos, 1984.
Lathrop, Thomas A.
Curso de gramática histórica española. Juan Gutiérrez and Ana Blas,
trans. Barcelona: Editorial Ariel, 1984.
Lloyd, Paul M. From
Latin to Spanish. Philadelphia: The American Philosophical Society, 1987
[Spanish trans. and notes Adelino Alvarez, Madrid 1993, Gredos].
Menéndez-Pidal, R.
Manual de gramática histórica española. 18th Ed. Madrid: Espasa-Calpe,
1985.
Real Academia
Española. Esbozo de una nueva gramática de la lengua española. Madrid:
Espasa-Calpe, 1985.
Rona, José Pedro. Geografía
y morfología del "voseo". Pôrto Alegre: Pontíficia Universidade
Católica do Rio Grande do Sul, 1967.
© David Eddington. Circle of Linguistics
Applied to Communication/ Círculo de Lingüística Aplicada a la Comunicación 12,
November 2002. ISSN 1576-4737. Published
in Anuario de Estudios Filológicos 14, 1991, 125-130 (A morphophonemic
explanation of the ‘vos’ and final -r variety ‘vosotros’ imperative).
http://www.ucm.es/info/circulo/no12/eddington.htm