--- In
cybalist@yahoogroups.com, Andrew Jarrette <anjarrette@...>
wrote:
> I don't really understand the meaning of the "middle" voice. Most
dictionary definitions say it indicates a reflexive action. If this
is its meaning, why is it not called the "reflexive" voice?
The middle voice was used of a number of low-activity processes
comprising passive, reciprocity and reflexivity of all kinds. If the
subject is involved in some other way besides that of being the
actual doer the action is in the middle voice. That is the case with
pure passive or if the subject carries out the action in some
relation to himself (direct or indirect reflexive). The passive
meaning is the only function of the old middle forms in Gothic, and
also the passive of Old Irish is based on the middle, if in a more
archaic form than the deponent verbs which continue a kind of middle
inflection with a greater amount of adjustment to the active forms.
Languages that have replaced the expression of the passive with an
unambiguous form have often replaced the middle form with active
while sometimes keeping a passive meaning. German werden 'become' is
certainly from the middle voice of *wert- 'turn', and the ingressive
meaning of the old factitive formations with n-infix (-> n-suffix)
as Old Norse rodhna 'become red' is only understandable via a
passive or reflexive use of the old middle form which has taken on
active endings in Germanic, and the same has happened in Balto-
Slavic. It is customary for teachers to emphasize that the middle is
not a passive just because it has a wider functional range; that has
had the widespread effect of closing students' eyes to the fact that
the middle was in fact the normal expression of the passive, but
just had a wider range. But the fact that the passive meaning, or
something very close ot it, is needed to account for the function of
certain categories, some of which are even PIE, makes it imperative
that a function very close to the passive be accepted for PIE. The
most telling example is in my view the nasal present which must have
been originally causative, but has lost that meaning in PIE already;
that can only be understood via a passive-like meaning of its middle
voice (and subsequent transfer of its form to active inflection
because of the pragmatic function).
The "illustrative" effect of Eng. <the book sells well> is very
poor. In fact that is the opposite change. Since a book is in no
position to sell anything, there is no real need for a distinction
of verbal voice here, and so the active has been tolerated in such
instances. The functional attenuation of the IE middle has rather
moved from original passive in the direction of the active. With the
many medium tantum verbs it is just the way these particular verbs
are inflected.
Jens