This thesis explores mood selection in Old Italian, describing the use of the subjunctive and indicative in complement clauses in non-literary Tuscan of the Quattrocento (1375-1499). Using Wandruszka’s (1991) model of the subjunctive, and a Tuscan corpus of merchant letters and ricordi, sermons and other religious writing, based on Tavoni’s (1992) hierarchy of non-literary Quattrocento writings, I quantitatively assess the factors that influence mood selection in complement clauses. I restrict my analysis to complement clauses so as to compare the findings with those of Stefinlongo’s (1977) and Vegnaduzzo’s (2000) similar corpus-based studies of mood selection in thirteenth-century Italian, where possible, in order to suggest any trends in the use of the subjunctive. While I find that the semantics of the governing lexical element still has the predominant influence on the mood of the complement clause in fifteenth-century Italian, I also find that other factors, such as clause type, person and number, and tense and aspect, have a significant role in the modal outcome of complement clauses. However, the influence of these other factors is neither categorical nor equal, and it may be collective in the case of co-present factors. By conducting a quantitative comparison of mood selection in a variety of text types, my study also investigates Stefinlongo’s hypothesis that subjunctive use is not influenced solely by semantic or syntactic factors but also by features at the level of text type. However, I find the modal influence of text type to be largely indirect, influencing the relative incidence of different semantic contexts which in turn influences the incidence of subjunctive and indicative in a text. The findings of this study serve to inform our understanding of the evolution of the subjunctive in Italian.

[pt] Recentemente têm-se colocado em questão o uso do subjuntivo na Língua Portuguesa falada no Brasil. Fala-se da morte do subjuntivo, assumindo-se como fato real a hipótese de que as modalidades tradicionalmente expressas por meio do subjuntivo não estão mais sendo expressas por meio deste, ou caminhando para tal fim. O presente estudo busca desmistificar tal assunto analisando o uso de modalidades expressas pelo subjuntivo e pelo infinitivo em orações completivas regidas por verbos não factivos situados nos campos semânticos vontade e pedido/recomendação. Analisam-se, assim, não apenas estruturas em que o subjuntivo e o infinitivo são usados para expressar tais modalidades, tendo-se como critério da escolha de cada modo os sujeitos das orações principais e suas subordinadas, como também estruturas com o uso de Estruturas Alternativas (EAs) para a expressão dessas. Uma vez que tal pesquisa tem como foco a descrição de regras da língua falada, optou-se por realizar tal sistematização de acordo com a Gramática Funcional do Discurso (GDF) e se ter como objeto de estudo o português distenso falado no Brasil, ou seja, o português efetivamente falado pela classe escolarizada brasileira e usado pela mídia. Desta maneira, pode-se contribuir para uma área da descrição da Língua Portuguesa que se encontra, em geral, pouco detalhada e desatualizada em Gramáticas Tradicionais e livros de Língua Portuguesa como Língua Materna e como Segunda Língua. / [en] The use of the subjunctive in spoken Brazilian Portuguese language has been much discussed in the last decades. Much is said about the death of the subjunctive, assuming as real the hypothesis that modalities traditionally expressed by the subjunctive are no longer being expressed by this mood, or on the way. This study aims to analyze the use of modalities expressed by the subjunctive and the infinitive in complement clauses selected by non-factive verbs of the volitive and request/recommendation semantic areas. Thus, in this dissertation, we analyze not only structures in which the subjunctive and the infinitive are used to express these modalities, considering the main and the subordinate clauses subjects as a criteria for mood choice, but also clauses in which these modalities are expressed with the use of Alternative Structures. Since this research focus on spoken language rules description, we did this systematization according to the Functional Discourse Grammar (FDG) and selected as object of study the Portuguese language Brazilian educated class and media use. That way, this dissertation contributes to an area of the Brazilian Portuguese language description that, in general, needs to be detailed and updated in Traditional Grammars and Portuguese language as native or second language books.

In complex clause constructions, the dependent clause can either precede or succeed the main clause. In a study on a selection of Indo-Aryan languages spoken on the Indian subcontinent (Hook 1987), a gradual transition between pre- and postposing languages was found, when moving from the southeast to the northwest in the area. In their relative vicinity in the Hindukush area, a sub-group of Indo-Aryan languages are spoken, commonly known by the tentative term “Dardic”. These languages are said to mainly have the dependent clause preceding the main clause (left-branching), and that this feature is shared by the neighbouring languages. This would mean a breach with the continuum described by Hook. In the present comparative study on the Dardic languages spoken in northern Pakistan, complex clauses of adverbial and complement types were studied in an attempt to confirm this proposition. The languages were found to have two competing branching structures where the indigenous, dominating left-branching structure possibly is being challenged by an imported right branching pattern, especially in complement clauses, possibly due to Persian or Urdu influence. A similar transition between more left-branching languages towards languages with a higher degree of right branching structures were found when moving from east to west in the geographical area studied. / I underordnande satskonstruktioner kan bisatsen antingen föregå eller följa på huvudsatsen. I en studie på ett urval indoariska språk som talas på den indiska subkontinenten (Hook 1987) fann man en gradvis skiftning mellan språk med bisatsen till vänster om huvudsatsen (vänsterställda), via språk som tillät båda placeringar av bisatsen, till språk som enbart hade bisatsen till höger om huvudsatsen (högerställda). Detta när man rörde sig från sydöstra Indien i riktning mot nordväst. I Hindukush-området, inte allt för långt ifrån denna region, talas en undergrupp av indoariska språk som länge gått under den provisoriska termen ”dardiska” språk. Om dessa språk har det hävdats att de har bisatsen till vänster om huvudsatsen, ett drag som också ska delas med närliggande språk i området. Om detta stämmer skulle det innebära en brytning av det kontinuum Hook beskrev. I denna jämförande studie på några indo-ariska språk som talas i norra Pakistan studerades underordnade adverbiala och nominala bisatser i ett försök att utreda om dessa verkligen är vänsterställda. Språken befanns ha två konkurrerande placeringsmönster där en inhemsk och starkt dominerande vänsterställd struktur eventuellt håller på att utmanas av en importerad högerställd struktur, särskilt i nominala objektsatser, som möjligen kommit in i språken via inflytande från persiska eller urdu. Ett kontinuum liknande Hooks mellan språk med primärt vänsterställda bisatser till språk med en allt högre andel högerställda bisatser hittades i en rörelse från öst till väst i området.