Word order in formal Greek prose: gradation and discontinuity of salience

Résumé 0

The comparison of the prose used in two excerpts, one from Pericles’ first speech (Thuc., 1.144.2), the other from a contemporary Athenian decree (IG I3 127), shows that, from one text to the other, the difference in word order is insignificant, even from a rhythmic point of view. In fact, both types of texts belonged to the same art of eloquence practiced by the so-called pepaideumenoi, and not to the standard language of communication. In both there is a remarkable coincidence between (hyper)salient words and rhythmic effects: most of the rhythmic salience is located at the head and at the end of the three levels of the periodic sentence; sometimes also in the middle. This had the effect of indicating some of the pragmatically salient words, whether they exactly coincided with the rhythm or extended on either side. Our hypothesis is that salience can be graded according to approximately four degrees: (zero) SØ, (medium) S, (strong) S, ( hyper-) S+. Only markers can be SØ, while the other degrees can concern both topic(s) and focus, and at each level of the periodic sentence. The sporadic and isolated hypersalience can correspond to what was stylistically analyzed in Antiquity as prolepsis and hyperbaton. Both are the result of a constructed disorder: syntagms, or only their nuclei, are put outside clauses, which thus become discontinuous, or they can be disrupted by the insertion of a verb in the middle. In this context, the gradation of salience seems to be the most appropriate representation for describing the pragmatic structure of the periodic sentence and its components. This could be schematized as a curve of peaks and minimums, at intervals enhanced by ‘hyper-peaks’. The sporadic discontinuity is clearly made up of a hypersalience that contrast with the zero salience of the markers that propels it. The medium and high degrees of salience (S and S) seem to be of a pragmatic nature only, while hypersalience (S +) is also stylistic, that is to say more personal: it aimed at convincing ( docere), moving ( mouere) or even charming ( delectare) the audience and readers, to which effects acoustic and graphic aesthetic devices also contributed.