Subjectification and conativity. Origins and development of the verbal construction tratar de+ infinitive

Abstract

Conative constructions have enjoyed considerable attention over the past decade from a typological perspective. However, the historical development of conativity in individual languages has been largely neglected to date. In this paper, we put forth an exhaustive diachronic analysis of the Spanish verbal construction tratar de + INF (currently ‘to attempt to INF’, whereby tratar originally means ‘handle’). We show that, unlike many periphrases, tratar de + INF does not originate in a single construction, but emerges via the conflation of separate members in a constructional network whose meanings slowly converged (in the manner of mutually supporting constructions) around a volitional meaning to generate a conative structure. The discussion sheds light on likely constructionalization paths for the development of conative meaning and highlights the role of non-periphrastic constructions as a principal means of conveying certain core modal contents in particular languages.