FLOATING QUANTIFIERS IN OLD ENGLISH: A SYNTACTIC STUDY
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The article examines the syntax of Floating Quantifiers (FQs) in Old English. Diachronic data show that contemporary approaches to FQs cannot capture diverse properties displayed by these elements. Therefore the tripartite quantificational classification is proposed: Adjectival Quantifiers (AdjQs), which can float, are specifiers in structural terms. Inflectionally, they resemble adjectives. Pronominal Quantifiers (PQs) are classified as non-floating heads. Similar to pronouns, they can be used substantively. Finally, Adverbial Quantifiers (AdvQs) are dependent on the syntax of adverbs. This division follows the intuition of traditional grammarians (Mitchell 1985, Campbell 1959) who disperse quantifiers among adjectives, pronouns, and adverbs. Consequently, it is shown that, although the syntactic category of quantifiers must be recognized, the FQ is an epiphenomenon, the result of two kinds of movement: some so-called FQs are moved AdjQs, others are stranded PQs.
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