Journal of Historical Syntax

Antoine Viredaz. Part of the Special Collection "Latin and Sabellic relative clauses". The metre in which the first two Latin epic poems and certain Latin verse inscriptions dating mainly from the 3rd-2nd centuries BC were composed is called Saturnian. Both the exact boundaries of the Saturnian corpus and the primary principle of versification of this metre are debated. We can now be certain, however, that a set of eight Latin funerary or dedicatory inscriptions and around 80 epic fragments by Andronicus and Naevius are definitely Saturnian. Studying the linguistic variation within this limited corpus allows us to identify certain indications of metrical constraints. The aim of this paper is to examine whether the variations observed in relative constructions can be exploited for this purpose. I will therefore study the relative clauses attested in Saturnian texts from the epigraphic and literary traditions. It is my aim to highlight the variation in these texts with regard to the position of the relativiser and that of the relative clause. I will attempt to determine what conditions the appearance of different structural types of relative clauses. Two avenues will be explored: that of semantic differences (e.g. restrictive or non-restrictive relative clauses), and that of constraints related to literary genre or metre.