Calques

Translations

calco | calque | Lehnübersetzung

Article

Also called loan translation, a calque is a phenomenon of lexical interference consisting in a transfer of the content (signifié) of a linguistic sign from a model language to a target language, while the expression (signifiant) associated to it is made of linguistic material belonging to the target language. A calque is therefore different from a loanword, which consists of the transfer of a whole linguistic sign – i.e. both expression and content – from a model to a target language.

Although several subcategories of calques can be identified, which form a complex typology (cf. Cotticelli Kurras 2007, 95-96), all of them can basically be grouped into only two macro-categories: structural and semantic calques.

A structural calque involves the formation of a new expression (either a word, a phrase, or a more complex structure) in the target language, which receives the content transferred from the model language. Such a new expression copies the deep structure of the corresponding expression in the model language, with a more or less perfect match in the surface structure, translating however its constitutive elements with linguistic material of the target language (e.g. Ital. luna di miele < Eng. honeymoon; Eng. it goes without saying < Fr. il va sans dire; etc.).

A semantic calque (also called loan shift) simply consists in the transfer of a content from a model language, which comes to be associated with an already existing expression in the target language, which is regarded as matching the one of the model language either by formal similarity or by (partial) semantic coincidence. No word formation process is involved; it is basically a phenomenon of meaning extension triggered by language contact (e.g. Fr. souris, Sp. ratón, and Port. rato, all meaning ‘mouse’ [animal], received the new meaning ‘mouse’ [computer device] from Eng. mouse; Ital. suggestione, meaning ‘psychologic influence’, is also sporadically used with the meaning ‘advice’, based on Eng. suggestion).

The term calque may also refer to phenomena of grammatical interference consisting in the reproduction in a target language of morphological and syntactical structures proper of a given model language. Such phenomena may remain confined within a single text (e.g. a bilingual document that also provides the direct model) or become systematic in the target language.

For ancient languages, calques can be identified quite frequently, although identifying the language of origin and distinguishing it from the target language mostly depends on the amount of textual and contextual information about the two cultures and languages involved.

Examples

In the 2nd millennium Anatolia, we find several examples of structural calques in Hittite, mostly depending on Akkadian structures; see e.g. Hitt. šiyannaš per, lit. ‘house of seal’, i.e. ‘storehouse’ < Akk. bīt kunukkim ‘id.’ (Sum. É NA₄KIŠIB), as well as several compound profession nouns consisting of a genitive determining the noun išha- ‘lord’, which are regarded as depending on the Akkadian structure bēl ‘lord’ + genitive, e.g. Hitt. auriyaš išha-, lit. ‘lord of the watch-post’, i.e. ‘provincial governor’ < Akk. bēl madgalti ‘id.’; Hitt. hannešnaš išha-, lit. ‘lord of the judgement’, i.e. ‘legal opponent’ < Akk. bēl dīni ‘id.’ (cf. Dardano 2018, 357-358). Vice versa, the Akkadian phrase dāmī epēšu, lit. ‘to make blood’, i.e. ‘to commit murder’, only occurring in peripheral Akkadian, is probably a calque on the Hittite corresponding phrase ēšhar iya- ‘id.’ (cf. Dardano 2002, 349-352). Another example may be the unique Akkadian periphrastic perfect pahru ibbašû in the Akkadian version of the Edict of Telipinu, which perfectly calques the corresponding taruppanteš ešer ‘were united’ in the Hittite version.

Turning to the 1st millennium BCE, the Iron age Luwian noun wassinassi-/ussinassi-, lit. ‘(he) of the body’ (a genitival adjective built on wassina- ‘body’), i.e. ‘attendant, servant’, has been explained by Hawkins (2000, 349) as a calque on Akkad. ša rēši ‘(he) of the head > servant ‘.

As far as semantic calques are concerned, in the 2nd millennium we may quote some examples from Hittite: the legal meaning ‘to be found innocent’ of the Hittite verb parkuešš-, lit. ‘to become pure’, may depend on Akk. ebēbu; similarly, the Hittite antiyant-groom, formally a participle from anda iya- ‘to enter’, referring to the man that enters his wife’s family, is possibly based on the Mesopotamian erēbu-marriage (cf. Dardano 2018, 357).

As for the 1st millennium, in Lycian, the local adverb epi, etymologically matching Luw. āppi ‘again’ and Hitt.-Luw. āppa ‘back’, often means ‘upon’, a meaning probably depending on Greek ἐπί. The Lycian noun ahñta-, a lexicalised plural participle of the verb ‘to be’ with the meaning ‘property, possessions’, is usually explained as a calque on Greek ὄντα, οὐσία ‘id.’ (cf. Melchert 2014, 68).

As examples of grammatical calques, we may quote the several cases of double (or split) genitive construction occurring in Akkadian texts from Boğazköy, also without a direct model (cf. e.g. ša šunūti ṭēm=šunu, lit. ‘of them their strategy’, i.e. ‘their strategy’, in the Siege of Uršu text, KBo 1.11 obv.! 18’), which depend on the common OH structure involving the doubling of the genitive by a clitic possessive pronoun on the head noun (cf. e.g. ammel tuēggaš=miēš, lit. ‘of me my members’, in VBoT 58 i 24). For the 1st millennium BCE, we may consider the word order in the Luwian version of the bilingual inscription of KARATEPE, which often mirrors the Phoenician one (cf. Yakubovich 2015).

References

Cotticelli Kurras, P. (2007), Lessico di linguistica, Alessandria: Edizioni dell’Orso. Dardano, P. (2002), ‘La main est coupable’, ‘le sang devient abondant’: sur quelques expressions avec des noms de parties et d’éléments du corps humain dans la littérature juridico-politique de l’Ancien et du Moyen Royaume hittite, Orientalia N.S. 71/4, pp. 333-392. Dardano, P. (2018), Semitic influences in Anatolian languages, in Ł. Niesiołowski-Spanò and M. Węcowski (eds.), Change, Continuity, and Connectivity. North-Eastern Mediterranean at the turn of the Bronze Age and in the early Iron Age (Philippika 118), Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, pp. 345-375. Hawkins, J.D. (2000), Corpus of Hieroglyphic Luwian Inscriptions. Volume I. Inscriptions of the Iron Age (Studies in Indo-European Language and Culture 8.1), Berlin – New York: de Gruyter. Melchert, H.C. (2014), Greek and Lycian, in G.K. Giannakis (ed.), Encyclopedia of Ancient Greek Language and Linguistics, Vol. 2, Leiden – Boston: Brill, pp. 67-70. Yakubovich, I. (2015), Phoenician and Luwian in Early Iron Age Cilicia, Anatolian Studies 65, pp. 35-53.