Development of existential verbs ゐる / いる (居る), をる / おる (居る)


How did the verbs 居{ゐ}る / 居{い}る, 居{を}る / 居{お}る develop their function as
existential verbs?




OJ = Old Japanese (about 700 - 800)

EMJ = Early Middle Japanese (about 800 - 1200)

LMJ = Late Middle Japanese (about 1200 - 1600)

NJ = Modern (New) Japanese (since about 1600)

cNJ = contemporary Modern Japanese

Infinitive = [連用形]{れんようけい} / Continuative

Gerund = _te_ -form

* * *

Bjarke Frellesvig (2010, "A History of the Japanese Language", pages 350-352):

> 12.4 Existential verbs; _ar-_ , _i-_ , _or-_
>
> The main, neutral verb of existence in Japanese is _ar-_ which has been a
> prominent feature of the language since OJ, in more or less unchanged form
> and function. In addition to the uses as an existential verb, _ar-_ has
> through the history of the language had important grammatical functions
> (3.4.2.1.1), namely (a) to form stative constructions and (b) to form
> extended analytic forms with the adjectival and regular copula and the
> negative auxiliary. Since OJ _ar-_ has had a number of exalted or polite
> variants, e.g. OJ _mas-_ , _imas-_ , _pab(y)er-_ (not phonographically
> attested in OJ, cf. 3.4.2.1), EMJ _imase_ , _opase-_ (> _owase-_ ), LMJ
> _odyar-_ , _oryar-_ , _goza(a)r-_ (cf. 12.7.2), which have also been used in
> the grammatical functions of _ar-_.
>
> NJ has two more existential verbs, _i-_ and _or-_. In standard NJ, _i-_ is
> used mostly with animate subjects, whereas _ar-_ is used with inanimate
> subjects, and _or-_ is a humble synonym of _i-_ (although _or-_ is used in
> some inflected forms instead of _i-_ , e.g. infinitive _ori_ ). In other
> varieties of cNJ these verbs are used and distributed differently. For
> example, Kansai Japanese tends to use _or-_ as the neutral verb of existence
> with animate subjects.
>
> Statives have through the history of Japanese been formed by a verbal
> infinitive or gerund + _ar-_ (or another verb of existence), and in OJ, EMJ
> and early LMJ also by stative auxiliaries ( _-yer-_ and _-(I)tar-_ ), both
> of which incorporate _ar-_. As mentioned above, the EMJ stative auxiliary
> _-(I)tar-_ (< OJ _-(i)te ar-_ ) is reflected in the late LMJ and NJ past
> tense flective _-(I)ta_ (12.1.3). In standard NJ statives are generally
> formed by gerund + _i-_ ( _kaite iru_ 'is writing, has written', usually
> abbreviated _kaiteru_ ), whereas gerund + _ar-_ is only used as a restricted
> resultative stative construction ( _kaite aru_ 'has been written'). Again,
> other varieties form statives differently, in Kansai Japanese mostly by
> gerund + _or-_ ( _kaite oru_ , _kaitoru_ ). In some varieties of Japanese,
> statives include progressive function, but other dialects have separate
> expression of progressive, e.g. _kakyoru_ (<= _kaki oru_ ) 'is writing' in
> some varieties of Kansai, reflecting the OJ analytic progressive
> (3.1.4.7.4).
>
> The two existential verbs NJ _i-_ and _or-_ derive from OJ _wi-_ 'sit down,
> settle down' and _wor-_ 'be sitting', respectively. Kinsui's detailed study
> (2006) has shown (a) that these two verbs were not used as simple
> existentials until LMJ, and (b) that _wor-_ is the old lexicalized stative
> form of (an ancestor of) _wi-_ , paralleling the regular morphological OJ
> stative in _-yer-_ , e.g. _sakyer-_ 'be blooming' (< *saki ar-), _kyer-_ 'be
> wearing' (< *ki ar-), but reflecting a slightly different formation (e.g.
> *(w)u ar- or *wo ar-, attaching _ar-_ to the diachronic root of _wi-_ , not
> its infinitive). Thus, in OJ and EMJ _wi-_ and _wor-_ were used as lexical
> verbs, _wi-_ 'sit down' being the antonym of _tat-_ 'rise, arise, stand up',
> and _wor-_ 'be sitting' the antonym of _tater-_ 'be standing', the
> morphological stative of _tat-_. In addition, from EMJ a new regular stative
> was formed on _wi-_ by the EMJ stative auxiliary to give _wi-tar-_ 'be
> sitting' whose use gradually increased over _wor-_.
>
> In OJ, _wor-_ was used to form progressives, e.g. _tomosi wor-_ 'be
> lighting' (3.1.4.7.4). This use continued in EMJ, where _wor-_ was also,
> though more rarely, used with the gerund rather than the infinitive. From
> EMJ progressives were also formed with _wi-tar-_ , usually on the
> infinitive, but sometimes on the gerund (8.4.2.1). The fact that this use of
> _wor-_ and _wi-tar-_ to form progressives precedes their use as free
> existential verbs, with animate subjects, suggests that the use in
> progressive constructions formed the basis for the reinterpretation of
> _wor-_ and _wi-_ as existential verbs, that is to say, developments as shown
> in (16a).
>
> (16)
>
> | Lexical verb | Stative lexical verb form | Use in progressive
> constructions | Existential verb  
> ---|---|---|---|---  
> a. | _wi-_ 'sit' | _wor-_ 'be sitting down' | _mi wor-_ 'be seeing' | _or-_
> 'be'  
> |  | _wi-tar-_ 'be sitting down' | _mi witar-_ 'be seeing' | _itar-_ > _ita_
> > _i-_ 'be'  
> b. | _tat-_ 'stand up' | _tat-er-_ 'be standing' | _mi tater-_ 'be seeing' |  
> | _pus-_ 'lie down' | _pus-er-_ 'be lying down' | _mi puser-_ 'be seeing' |  
>  
> Note that the morphological statives of also _tat-_ 'stand up' and _pus-_
> 'lie down', _tater-_ 'be standing' and _puser-_ 'be lying', in EMJ were used
> in progressive constructions, but that they were not reinterpreted as
> existential verbs, (16b). This offers strong support for the development
> proposed here, from a stative lexical verb to use in progressive
> constructions and then further to an existential verb (as opposed to a
> course of development where the use as existential verb precedes the use in
> progressive constructions).
>
> Such a use of stative positional verbs in progressive constructions is found
> in other languages, for example Danish, where _ligge_ 'be lying', _sidde_
> 'sit, be sitting', _stå_ 'be standing' are used as exemplified in (17), with
> the positional meaning bleached or lost. Outside such constructions these
> verbs are lexical stative verbs, which cannot be used as existentials.
[code]

>     (17)  han  ligger    og   kører   rundt   i   sin  store bil
>           he   is lying  and  drives  around  in  his  big   car
>           'he is driving around in his big car'
>  
[/code]

>
> Already in OJ, _wor-_ was univerbated, incorporating the original morphology
> as part of the lexical stem. As stative _-(I)tar-_ changed from auxiliary to
> a flective (12.1.3.2), EMJ _wi-tar-_ > LMJ _i-tar-_ gave late LMJ _ita_ ,
> and it appears to have been the form _ita_ which was initially reinterpreted
> as a nonpast existential verb. In late LMJ there are uses of _ita_ in
> nonpast existential function and this is still found in cNJ dialects in
> northern Japan, but _ita_ was generally reformed to _i-_ , presumably
> because the morphology remained transparent and _ita_ does not conform to
> the basic stem shape of verbs.
>
> By the end of LMJ, _i-_ was firmly established as an existential verb with
> animate subjects and was also widely used in stative constructions, mostly
> following the gerund, but sometimes following the infinitive. At that point,
> however, it had not entirely replaced _ar-_ and its exalted and polite
> synomyms in these functions. _Ar-_ was still used with animate subjects in
> late LMJ, alongside _i-_ , but was eventually replaced by _i-_ to give the
> distribution we find today. The specialized use of _i-_ and _or-_ as
> existential verbs with animate subjects is probably a reflection of their
> original semantics, which were mainly agentive and volitional, and of their
> use in progressives. The spread of the originally progressive construction
> with _(w)ita(r-)_ to replace stative constructions in _ar-_ may be thought
> to be related to the change to a past tense marker of the stative auxiliary
> _-(I)tar-_ which incorporated _ar-_ and also had analytic variants with
> _ar-_ and its synonyms.
>
> Since _wor-_ started being replaced by the regular stative form _wi-tar-_ in
> early EMJ, _wor_ > _or-_ has been subject to various reinterpretations in
> different varieties, to a large extent in socio-linguistic terms, but _or-_
> has survived both in standard cNJ and in Kansai cNJ where, as mentioned
> above, it is in many varieties used as the neutral existential verb with
> animate subjects.

* * *

Regarding dating of phonemic change:

Bjarke Frellesvig (2010, "A History of the Japanese Language", page 207):

> Syllable initial /w/ was lost before /o/, completed around 1000. (...)
>
> The loss of /w/ before /i, e/ proceeded in two phases: in word medial
> position, concluded around 1100, e.g. (22); in word initial position,
> concluded around 1300, i.e. in the LMJ period, e.g. (23).

