汉语量词系统的建立与复数标记“们”的发展

The story of-men

类型学研究表明，量词系统和复数标记的分布有相当密切的关系。前者可以影响到后者能否附着在名词上。现代汉语通常只允许“-们”这个复数标记出现于定同位置而非名词位置，就是受到县词系统的影响。如果没有量同，复数标记通常都可以附着在名词上。英语就是一个例子。如果这种量词、复数标记互相影响的观察是对的，在量词系统还没真正稳当建立的早期汉语里，应该可以找到附着在名词上的复数标记。本文着重于“们”这个复数标记的发展。“们”在它的发展过程中受到量词系统建立的制约。它在十世纪到十五世纪之间，具有向一般名词复数标记发展的趋势。但是这一发展趋势受到另外一个重要语法事件──量词系统稳当建立──的制约。结果，“们”的发展逐渐规则化，退化掉了一些十五世纪之前已经发展出来的语法特征。

Typologically, there is a close relation between where a classifier occurs and where a plural marker appears. Modern Chinese allows the plural marker -men to occur with the elements that appear in a D(eterminer) position, not in an N Position, because of the intervention effect from a classifier. Without a classifier, a plural marker can be realized in an N position, just like the plural marker -s in English. This generalization predicts that earlier Chinese would allow a plural marker to be realized in the N position before the classifier system was established. Even though the plural infix -r- was a very good candidate too, this paper concentrates on the development of the plural marker -men. We show that the development of -men interacted with the development of the classifier system. The seemingly wider and more erratic distribution of men was gradually conStrained by the firmer development of classifiers. Many of the usages that did not follow from the nominal structures gradually disappeared