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Abstract
Waltereit and Detges (2007), Travis (2005), and Ocampo (2006) hypothesize that the structure ser/estar + adverb/adjective is either the source or the catalyst for the development for the Spanish discourse markers (DMs) bien ‘well’, bueno ‘good’, and claro ‘clear’. The present study finds that both ser ‘to be’ and estar ‘to be’ played a role in the development of these DMs by analyzing data extracted from the 1200-1600s from the Corpus del Español (Davies 2002-). The study uses two structures in its searches. The first is bien, bueno, and claro in isolation. Each token in isolation is categorized according to its discursive role: adverb/adjective or DM. The second is ser/estar + {bien, bueno, claro} with the adjective appearing in pre-verbal and post-verbal positions with each token being categorized according to its discursive role: adverb/adjective or DM. The data indicate that in the 1200-1300s the structure ser + {bien, bueno, claro} in both the pre-verbal and post-verbal positions emerges exclusively. This structure mainly combines with the complementizer que and a subordinate clause, but some DM uses can be found with most of them having pre-verbal colocation of the adverb/adjective. By the 1400s, however, the structure estar + {bien, bueno, claro} emerges and by the 1500-1600s replaces ser + {bien, bueno, claro} as the main structure used as a DM (especially with pre-verbal colocation). Both structures appear with complementizers, but by the 1500-1600s ser + {bien, bueno, claro} mostly serves this role while estar + {bien, bueno, claro} with pre-verbal collocation operates primarily as a DM. It is only by the 1500-1600s that the first DM uses of bien, bueno, and claro occur without the presence of ser/estar. These findings align with Diaz’s (2016) timeline of the desemanticization and functional encroachment on ser exhibited by estar and suggest that ad derived DMs originate out of first combining with ser only to later be paired with estar before eventually appearing without a copular verb.