From: clayton stirling bartholomew (c.s.bartholomew@worldnet.att.net)
Date: Wed Jan 14 1998 - 06:06:16 EST
Carl William Conrad wrote:
>
>There's been in
> the discussion of such constructions as this a facile equation of
> NOMINATIVUS PENDENS and NOMINATIVUS ABSOLUTUS: I would distinguish sharply
> between the first, a construction wherein a nominative noun or pronoun
> does not fit syntactically into the remainder of the clause (or into
> anything else in the context), while I would only call "absolute" a
> construction involving at least two words, one a subject and the other a
> predicate word, normally a participle, the two elements together
> constituting the equivalent of an adverbial clause that relates not
> syntactically but logically to the main clause. So far as I can see, BDF
> 466 is talking about instances of NOMINATIVUS
> PENDENS--anacoluthons--rather than authentic absolute constructions. In
> fact, the whole section BDF ##466-470 is concerned with anacolutha and is
> so titled.
Carl has succeeded in exposing the source of my confusion on this topic. In
trying to understand the NOMINATIVUS ABSOLUTUS, I was looking for "an
adverbial clause that relates not
syntactically but logically to the main clause." In other words, I was using
the genitive absolute as my model and for this reason the discussions of the
NOMINATIVUS PENDENS/ABSOLUTUS didn't make any sense.
I took a look at the examples in Zerwick (#25-#31) and I could not find a
single example that fit the criteria specified by Carl. All of the examples
were "hanging nominatives" and none of them were performing an adverbial
function relative to the main clause. Zerwick introduces a term new to me,
"pendent case." I am not sure what this means. Zerwick also makes a big issue
out of NOMINATIVUS PENDENS being a semitic idiom, but that is another
question entirely.
-- Clayton Stirling Bartholomew Three Tree Point P.O. Box 255 Seahurst WA 98062
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