# Why French has adverbial pronouns



## Beachxhair

French, unlike Spanish (and other Romance languages, as far as I know....please enlighten me if I'm wrong here ) has adverbial pronouns that are cliticized to the verb, as in _j'y vais, j'en reviens, j'en souviens...._In Spanish, _y _translates just as an adverb, and _en _is translated by various disjunctive constructions, depending on the context (such as _de ello _in the case of _j'en souviens). _Also, in Spanish, isn't 'de ello' optional? _Me acuerdo (de ello)?_ In French, _en _is obligatory.

My question is how French developed adverbial pronouns, ie, how did the words come to have the usage (cliticized, obligatory in most cases) that they have? What qualities of the French language might have leant itself to _y _and _en _developing into adverbial pronouns in French, but not in Spanish (and other Romance languages )? Is it to do with the word stress pattern of French (at the end of the breath group)? 

Thanks for your responses


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## Aidanriley

Hello Bleachxhair, 

They do exist in another romance language, which is Catalan. They are hi and ne, 

Hi - denotes location (where one is, where something occurs, where one intends to go; in this case, we'll replace "XYZ Restraunt" with hi, and y, respectively.)


For example. 
-
Bob: Do you like XYZ restaurant?
Pau: Jo hi vaig cada dia (French: J'y vais chaque jour) (English: I go there every day.) 


> "Acckrdg to this Catalan-Spanish-French-German multilingual dictionary, (link below): "Representa una circumstància de lloc que denota on és o s'esdevé, cap a on va" My translation of it to English: "The definition is: It gives or repesents a notion of "place" which denotes where something is, occurs, or where it's going. headed."


-
By the way, if we look at the translation of "there is" in French, Catalan, Portugues, and, yes, Spanish, this may surprise you.
French: il y a
Catalan: Hi ha
Portuguese: Hà
Spanish: Ha_*y*_
-
In Portuguese, both this morning (there is) and (he has), are *hà*. In Spanish, *Hay* can only mea "there is". He has, is *Ha. * [ mysterious music playing ]
-
I know, it's incredible I was about to spot that. Ugh, _fine_, _*Swift *_did, as usual. 
-
*Beachxair*: 'Hi' also has quite a few other uses, in Catalan, but I know you're asking about French. In any case, if you'd like to keep analyzing the two, I'd be fun. Also, you should check out a region in Northern Catalonia, known as: Perpignan, (Perpinyà en català. The main language spoken there is French, according to the over-so-reputable Wikipedia,  It's true, actually; finding someone who speaks anything but French there was pretty hard when I was there, but eventually found a neighborhood that did speak Catalan. Except that it sounds just like French.

www.multilingue.cat, search "hi" in the Català box and cick the button. I can't get the direct link.


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## Ёж!

Beachxhair said:


> French, unlike Spanish (and other Romance languages, as far as I know....please enlighten me if I'm wrong here )


 You are forgetting about Italian (_ne_ and _ci_: _ne rivengo_ and _ci vado_). By the way, it's interesting to me how any way of answering your question can be proven... I believe there's no way, am I wrong?


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## Aidanriley

Ёж! said:


> You are forgetting Italian (_ne_ and _ci_: _ne rivengo_ and _ci vado_). By the way, it's interesting to me how any way of answering your question can be proven... I believe there's no way, am I wrong?



1. Sorry my Ialian's a bust rusty, since, you know, I don't speak it? 
2. Also, it's obvious what Bleachxhair meant to say..? What's the problem?


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## Ёж!

Aidanriley said:


> 1. Sorry my Ialian's a bust rusty, since, you know, I don't speak it?


 I don't either, I googled the examples. What you mean to say? I'm not trying to offend anyone, if inadvertently I did, then I apologize.


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## Aidanriley

Beach: I've sent a consultation to the governing Academy of Catalan, they often have resouces in French as well, as we wait for some amazingly kind French speaker to lend us a hand. 

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Ёж! said:


> I don't either, I googled the examples. What you mean to say? I'm not trying to offend anyone, if inadvertently I did, then I apologize.


I didn't forget to include Italian. I don't know Italian, can't explain it, etc. Don't worry about it, se acabó.

---



> By the way, it's interesting to me how any way of answering your question can be proven... I believe there's no way, am I wrong?


No way to find the answer to a question about the etymology of a few words, from a language which has a whole Acamdy at your disposal, for academic purposes like thisl? What do _you_ mean?


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## francisgranada

The the Italian "ne" and the Catalan/French "en" come from the Latin "inde" (meaning _of/from there_).  These pronuns were later "grammaticalized", i.e. in Catalan/French/Italian they refer generally to expressions in genitive case, typically introduced by the preposition_ de (di _in Italian_)_. 

In case of the French "y", Catalan "hi", Italian "ci" and "vi", Spanish archaical "y" (in _hay_) and "hi" (in _ahí, allí_) two Latin words seem to be taken in consideration: _ibi _(_in this place_) and _hic _(_here_). These pronuns were later "grammaticalized" in some Romance languages and they refer generally to expressions in dative case, typically introduced by the preposition_ a (ad__)_. In Other Romance languages they practically did not survive (as separate pronouns).


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## Ёж!

Aidanriley said:


> No way to find the answer to a question about the etymology of a few words, from a language which has a whole Acamdy at your disposal, for academic purposes like thisl? What do _you_ mean?


 Well, Beach's question was, as far as I understand, not about their etymology, but about the causes of their etymology, i.e. why it happened the way it happened. I doubt we can know or prove anything about this...


francisgranada said:


> The the Italian "ne" and the Catalan/French "en" come from the Latin "inde" (meaning _of/from there_).  These pronuns were later "grammaticalized", i.e. in Catalan/French/Italian they refer generally to expressions in genitive case, typically introduced by the preposition_ de (di _in Italian_)_.
> 
> In case of the French "y", Catalan "hi", Italian "ci" and "vi", Spanish archaical "y" (in _hay_) and "hi" (in _ahí, allí_) two Latin words seem to be taken in consideration: _ibi _(_in this place_) and _hic _(_here_). These pronuns were later "grammaticalized" in some Romance languages and they refer generally to expressions in dative case, typically introduced by the preposition_ a (ad__)_. In Other Romance languages they practically did not survive (as separate pronouns).


Thank you! Very interesting; I've always wondered about this myself, although not enough to ask question or find information.


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## merquiades

Old Spanish had _y_ which has still survived at the end of some verb forms and _ende_ which as far as I know has no vestiges in the current language.

The question is not why French and italian have adverbial pronouns, rather why did these useful pronouns die out in Spanish


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## nwon

I agree with merquiades. I learned French first as a child, and the lack of these pronouns has been a more or less constant pain in my Spanish-speaking life to date.


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## Beachxhair

merquiades said:


> Old Spanish had _y_ which has still survived at the end of some verb forms and _ende_ which as far as I know has no vestiges in the current language.
> 
> The question is not why French and italian have adverbial pronouns, rather why did these useful pronouns die out in Spanish


  I agree. After learning that other Romance languages _do _have adverbial pronouns, I realize that Spanish is the exception in this case, and it's always interesting to ask what makes the exception exempt from the rule. Does anyone have any theories as to why adverbial pronoun didn't survive in Spanish?


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## olaszinho

Beachxhair said:


> I agree. After learning that other Romance languages _do _have adverbial pronouns, I realize that Spanish is the exception in this case, and it's always interesting to ask what makes the exception exempt from the rule. Does anyone have any theories as to why adverbial pronoun didn't survive in Spanish?



Spanish is not the exception. Neither Portuguese nor Romanian has adverbial pronouns.


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## Beachxhair

olaszinho said:


> Spanish is not the exception. Neither Portuguese nor Romanian has adverbial pronouns.


 Sorry, I didn't know. Well I guess the question is why don't these three languages have adverbial pronouns?

Thanks


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## CapnPrep

Beachxhair said:


> Does anyone have any theories as to why adverbial pronoun didn't survive in Spanish?


You already started a thread about that: 
Disappearance of adverb y in Old Spanish

And there was already this EHL thread about the Romance adverbial pronouns in general:
Romance languages: ne/en, y/ci


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## francisgranada

By the way, it's interesting that in Italian the adverbial pronouns _ci _and _vi_ are used also as personal (unstressed) pronouns in the 1st and 2nd pers. plural (ci laviamo = nos lavamos, vi lavate = os laváis).  What is the reason for this phenomenon? Could _vi_ be interpreted erroneousely as a short form of _voi_? 

Another question: which adverb (if any ...) did correspond in old Spanish to the Itanian _ne_ and French/Catalan _en_?


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## CapnPrep

francisgranada said:


> By the way, it's interesting that in Italian the adverbial pronouns _ci _and _vi_ are used also as personal (unstressed) pronouns in the 1st and 2nd pers. plural (ci laviamo = nos lavamos, vi lavate = os laváis).  What is the reason for this phenomenon? Could _vi_ be interpreted erroneousely as a short form of _voi_?


See here:
Italian "ci"


francisgranada said:


> Another question: which adverb (if any ...) did correspond in old Spanish to the Itanian _ne_ and French/Catalan _en_?


It was _ende_, which still exists in the expression _por ende_.


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## francisgranada

Thank you .

For completeness, the Sardinian variants of the discussed adverbial pronouns are: bi (<ibi), nde (<inde).


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