Alle de brieven. Deel 9: 1692-1694

[p. 376]

Syntactic phenomena in the language of Antoni van Leeuwenhoek
Summary¹⁾

1. In the period from 1930 to 1950 four Dutch linguists have written about the language of Van Leeuwenhoek. Three of them, among them C.G.N. de Vooys, professor at Utrecht, directed their attention primarily at lexicological and dialectological features; G.S. Overdiep, professor at Groningen, also paid attention to syntax. In the conclusions two views were sharply opposed. Overdiep thought that Leeuwenhoek's sentence structure is ‘defective’ and results ‘from an apparently misunderstood ‘Dutch official style’’. The opinion of De Vooys is reflected in the statement of Miss Mendels, the linguistic annotator of the first four volumes of the Collected Letters, viz. that Leeuwenhoek ‘in his letters uses practically artless spoken language, covered with a thin veneer of written language’. This antithesis need not be irreconcilable, because each opinion is based on the study of an isolated aspect of Leeuwenhoek's language. Moreover syntax has received less attention than the use of words. However, in a Dutch investigation into syntactic phenomena occurring in extempore speech it is stated that the difference between spoken and written language consists in the syntax rather than anything else. In a formula that may be a little too extreme it can be said that in wellconsidered written language complicated sentence constructions are combined with careful use of words, while in spoken language simple constructions are combined with a good choice of words or slightly more complicated constructions with a less careful choice of words.

2. Now for Leeuwenhoek's language long and complicated sentence constructions are characteristic; short sentences are in a minority.

The simplest connection of clauses is coordination without a conjunction, as in the following:

... waar in ik kome te handelen, van de angel van de Mugge, namelijk dat de selve angel... in vier distincte angels bestaat (... in which I will deal with the sting of the Gnat, namely that the said sting... consists of four different stings). Dat ik de Linde Boomen hebbe geplant... (That I planted the Lime-trees...). Dat in yder welgemaakt Garst of Tarw al een Koorn-air geformeert is (That in each perfect grain of Barley or Wheat an ear of Corn is already formed.).

Still, this connection is not customary in spoken language; it originates rather from official style. The example given shows in particular that Leeuwenhoek

1) The division into sections corresponds to that in the Dutch article, except in Section 5, which is divided into only 2 sub-sections in the summary. The italics in the quotations are those of the author of the article.

[p. 377]

had found his model in the language of decrees and legal decisions. We are approaching the spoken language more closely when the coordination is brought about by means of the conjunctions en (and) or maar (but).

Relative connections of clauses also occur fairly frequently in spoken language, but the connection by means of welke (which) + a noun, as in

welke drukkinge ik zoo verre vervolg, tot dat de glase Tuba aan Q. komt te breken, in welke brekinge wij gewaar werden... enz. (which pressure I continue until the glass Tube breaks at Q, in which breaking we perceive... etc.)

has a more complicated structure and belongs rather to written language. This connection, too, has been found in seventeenth-century official language.

3. Leeuwenhoek evinces a certain preference for syntactic groups having a present participle for its nucleus. This is an indication that he conformed to the learned and solemn style of his time, which was influenced by Latin. Since he himself did not know Latin, he will also have become acquainted with the participial constructions largely in official or learned Dutch. In employing these constructions, however, he makes mistakes, as in the following sentence, in which participles replace the finite forms of the verb:

Daar nu het Manneke en Wijfke versamelt sijnde, het Wijfke Eyeren leggende, uyt de Eyeren Wormkens voortkomende, die groter werdende de gedaante van de Kik-vors aannemen,... enz. (Now since the Male and Female copulating, the Female laying Eggs, from the Eggs Worms coming forth which, when growing larger, assume the form of the Frog,... etc.).

We find in Leeuwenhoek all the customary types of participial constructions:

1. the present participle linked with the verb to be as an expression of the durative aspect. This corresponds to the English progressive form, e.g. luyden die den Haring waren vangende (people who were catching Herring).

2. participial constructions in which the (implied) subject of the participle is identical with the subject of the main clause, e.g. T'huys komende, examineerde ik mijn mede gebragte soorten (Coming home, I examined the species I had brought.). The meaning of these constructions is generally temporal or causal.

3. participial constructions without congruence of subjects (so-called dangling free-adjuncts). The (implied) subject of the participle may be the object of the predicate in the main clause or may be represented in some other way, e.g. in a possessive pronoun. The subject may also be lacking altogether, as in dit uytgestorte water wegende, was elf onsen swaer (this poured-out water was eleven ounces in weight).

In the present state of our knowledge of seventeenth-century Dutch it is impossible to tell whether this type was or was not considered correct in the seventeenth century.

4. The so-called absolute construction, the Dutch form of the Latin ablativus absolutus. E.g.:

Dese dierkens doot leggende, en van een gesepareert zijnde, sag ik met verwondering de lange en seer dunne staarten (These animalcules being dead, and being

[p. 378]

separated from each other, I saw to my astonishment the long and very thin tails).

It is a construction which frequently occurs in seventeenth-century Dutch, also in literary prose, but which is no longer productive in modern Dutch.

5. The latter, on the other hand, is the case indeed with the fifth type, viz. the attributive participle group, e.g.:

heb ik... de Klander, in 't glas beslooten zijnde, ge observeert (I observed the Calander, being enclosed in the glass tube).

This construction again is characteristic of written language.

4. Another construction borrowed from solemn written language is that consisting of an object followed by te (to) + infinitive, the construction which corresponds to and may be derived from the Latin accusativus cum infinitivo. E.g.:

ik bevond, de vogt swaar te wezen een sestiende deel van een once (I found the moisture to weigh one sixteenth of an ounce); verscheyde Genees-heeren en Heelmeesters seggen, veele ziektens veroorzaakt te werden door... (several Physicians and Surgeons assert many diseases to be caused by...).

This construction is often found with the verbs bevinden (to find), zeggen (to say, to state, to assert), oordelen (to judge, to think), zich inbeelden, zich imagineren (to imagine). By the side of this construction, however, we also find with these verbs, and even much more frequently, the ordinary construction with a that clause. A mixed form of the two constructions also occurs.

5.1. Leeuwenhoek wrote his letters to describe and explain things and to teach. This has left its mark on his style. The reflection of description is found in many relative clauses; of explanation in the numerous conditional and causal clauses; of teaching in the frequent use of deictic demonstrative pronouns, by means of which he refers to an argument which he develops immediately afterwards. E.g.:

Ik antwoorde dat die Wormkens op dese manier in de Kaas konden komen. De Wormkens komen seyde ik... (I replied that those little Worms could get into the Cheese in this way. I said that the little Worms get...).

The frequent occurrence of prolepsis also results from this. In this context the proleptic group may become practically dissociated from the syntactic construction, as in:

dese angels wanneermen die uijt de bije neemt, soo breecken veeltijts haar senutgens (these stings, when they are removed from the bees, their little sinews often break).

5.2. Leeuwenhoek's language naturally also shows features which are characteristic of seventeenth-century Dutch in general. We would mention the following:

[p. 379]

1. the use of the plural form of the verb with a subject in the singular or vice versa. E.g.:

want gelyk geen vuyle dampen (plur.),... onze huyt schade toe brengt (sing.) (for just as no foul vapours does damage to our skin).

Lack of congruence of (grammatical) number is also found in the following form:

Degeene (sing.) nu, die de Worm Wolf genaamt, van haar (plur.) Koorensolders wil weren,... (He who wishes to keep the Worm called Wolf from their corn-lofts...).

2. the use of a redundant negative in the sentence:

om dat het dierken... onmogelijk al de voetsame stoffe... niet kan ontfangen (because the animalcule... cannot impossibly receive all the nutrient matter...).

The two negatives do not cancel each other out.

6. A typical feature of Leeuwenhoek's style consists in the long and sometimes very long sentences. As a rule he incorporates a single idea or a single unit of observation in a single syntactic unit. In consequence of this we find in his letters sentences of more than 100 words, in one case even of 300 words.

Among these long sentences there are a great many whose construction is perfectly correct, a circumstance which has been ignored too much in the past, but in Leeuwenhoek's work we also come across numerous longer and shorter anacolutha, i.e. sentences, usually compound sentences, in which the writer failed to follow up an opening passage in accordance with the rules of syntax. Most of Leeuwenhoek's anacolutha arose from his need to say things quite clearly and to mention every relevant detail. In such cases he lost sight of the beginning of the sentence.

In Leeuwenhoek's anacolutha we can distinguish five types, which are merely enumerated here. For the examples, reference must be made to Section 6 of the Dutch text of this article.

1. The smallest deviation from the normal construction is found in sentences in which there has only occurred some confusion in the word order. In Dutch main clauses the order of subject and predicate differs from that in subordinate clauses. In Leeuwenhoek we repeatedly find the order of a main clause instead of the expected order of a subordinate clause, and vice versa.

2. Anacolutha of the second type are due to contamination of two synonymous formulations.

3. The third type is characterized by the sentence being abruptly broken off after it has begun and being started anew in a way that does not fit in with the preceding part of the sentence.

[p. 380]

4. The fourth type is the result of the fact that Leeuwenhoek allows a sentence-initial subclause or adjunct to become a large complex by addition of subordinate clauses and then treats this complex as a self-contained syntactic unit.

5. The most frequent type, finally, is formed by shorter or longer complexes of subordinate clauses without a main clause.

7. In an analysis of Leeuwenhoek's sentence structure the punctuation must not be neglected, since he repeatedly ends a sentence with a full stop, whilst the next sentence forms an obvious continuation of it. It appears that Leeuwenhoek follows the system of four symbols (full stop, comma, semi-colon, and colon) which began to be universally adopted in the seventeenth century, but he did not do so very consistently. Undoubtedly he was not aware that he might make the structure of his sentences more intelligible for the reader by means of punctuation.

8. Inquiry into this matter leads to the conclusion that Leeuwenhoek's language no doubt exhibits some phenomena which indicate that he based himself on the spoken language. On the other hand, however, he evidently aimed at a more complex structure such as is characteristic of the written language. As his model he chose the official language of his time, and this has had the result of curbing spontaneous and graphic qualities that must have characterized his speech with the shackles of the solemn written language.

It is hard to give an answer to the question as to whether we must call Leeuwenhoek's language ‘defective’, as did Overdiep, because we have too little information on the seventeenth-century syntactic norms. A good deal of comparative syntactic research will still be required before we can decide this question.

November 1973.

B.C. Damsteegt.