Constructions and polysemy of three Old Irish verbs

Abstract

This brief paper examines three constructions attested in the Old Irish glosses. The relationship between flagging of arguments (case marking and adpositions) and predicate meaning is addressed for two very frequent transitive verbs used in a metalinguistic sense, beirid fri/do ‘refer to’ and do·beir ar ‘put/say/write for’, and for a third verb, do·fich, usually translated with ‘punish’ or ‘avenge’ but whose valency pattern differs from that of English ‘punish’. The data from the glosses suggest variation in the selection of the preposition with beirid, consistency in the alignment of case marking with semantic roles for do·fich, and a possible semantic distinction between do·beir ar + dative ‘put, say for’ and do·beir ar + accusative ‘exchange’.