Textual Deixis and the ‘Anchoring’ Use of the Latin Pronoun hic

What is it about?

This article evaluates the results of prior research on anaphoric reference in Latin, and tries to account for the various observations within a single explanatory framework. This framework combines insights from cognitive linguistic theory and from ongoing empirical research on the linguistic marking of discourse organization in Latin. After a brief discussion of recent cognitive linguistic views on the relation between deixis and anaphora, I concentrate on the various uses of the Latin demonstrative hic in Virgil’s Aeneid. The examples discussed show that hic’s deictic aspect of proximity can be discerned in all its uses, the variety of which can best be described in terms of a ‘cline’, running from canonical deixis to canonical anaphora. It is argued that in its anaphoricuse, Latin hic behaves as a linguistic ‘anchoring’ device, and is used as part of a communicative strategy referred to as ‘reculer pour mieux sauter’.

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