The Vocative Case : Romanian versus Latin

The vocative is a residuary case in most Indo-European languages, mirroring a particular Proto-Indo-European status. Its syntactical function is preserved in the descendant languages, but the morphological aspects are strongly simplified. In Latin, not unlike the cognate languages, the general tendency is toward a formal overlapping with the nominative case. The Romanian vocative is, in the Romance frame, surprisingly multifarious. It displays four distinct variants: desinence and intonation; desinence, intonation and prolongation of the final vowel; intonation and vowel prolongation; solely intonation. Old Romanian texts attest the tendency of gradually replacing the vocative form with the nominative form, perceived as more expressive. On the other hand, there is an observable development of the formal marks specific to this syntactical function; these marks are only partially inherited from Latin. In nowadays Romanian language the formal specificity of the vocative case is not diminishing – on the contrary, some colloquial vocative forms (not yet acceptable in the frame of the linguistic norm) emphasize an unambiguous linguistic will to maintain this case, while the general tendency is to reduce as much as possible the differences between the actual two cases of the Romanian language, nominative-accusative and genitive-dative.


Introduction
In the frame of comparative linguistics, the status of the vocative case imposes a definition in terms of a relic case, attesting the Proto-Indo-European stage of the first bifurcation in the name syntax, id est interpellation versus the rest of the nominal functions.The vocative is actually a formal relic and not a syntactic relic: in Latin it displays distinct marks only in a limited part of the thematic declension (the animated nouns ending in -us at the nominative case).The general trend is toward replacing it with the nominative form, syntactically enriched by the interpellation function.This trend has only one exception: the vocative Iuppiter (composed with the appellative pater, "father", attesting a non-etymological double -pp-, in order to increase the expressivity of this frequently used invocation) that became the regular nominative form in classical Latin); the Latin use of a vocative form with nominative function is comparable with its Romanian lexical equivalent, in baby talk: "Doamne-Doamne" (recurrently used as nominative-accusative).Some theoretical approaches point out the definition of the vocative case as non-syntactic (Pană Dindelegan 2010, 57) and, in its diachronic alternative, from the perspective of ancient languages, as exclamatory incident free proposition (Sluşanschi 1994, 33).It is somehow close to the syntactic function of the apposition (vide Tomescu 1998, 176), due to the fact that it preserves the independence with respect to the context, even if it receives an attribute or, on the contrary, functions as an apposition of another noun.The vocative communicates a relationship of interdependence with a certain part of the adjoining proposition, given the fact that, if it is to be considered a proposition, the ensemble is structured as two distinct propositions.The formal overlapping of nominative and vocative becomes the linguistic standard in the Romanian language (nevertheless in the frame of comparative linguistics), thanks to the similarities with the apposition.
Beyond the particularities of its syntactic function, the Romanian vocative displays its own formal marks, in four distinct variants: desinence and intonation; desinence, intonation and prolongation of the final vowel; intonation and vowel prolongation; solely intonation.
The third noteworthy occurrence in the book of Daniel is 10:11; the pericope does not include neither the phrase "son of human", nor a vocative (although the Theodotion version might include the Greek vocative aner, with short vowel and withdrawn accent, formally replaced by nominative, plausibly under the influence of an ambiguous appellative, Daniel, that lacks any mark of accentuation, as usually happens with the foreign names in Septuagint) -it nevertheless resembles some Ezekiel occurrences, including the exhortation to stay on his own feet: "Şi mi-a spus: «Daniele, eşti un om vrednic de milostivire (Greek ánthropos eleeinόs); cugetă la poruncile pe care eu le grăiesc către tine, şi stai pe locul tău, căci tocmai am fost trimis la tine!›»; in this case, the Theodotion version is different: "Şi mi-a spus: «Daniele, bărbat al doririlor (Greek anér epithymión), înţelege cuvintele pe care le voi rosti către tine, şi stai pe picioarele tale, căci acum am fost trimis la tine!»" In the book of Ezekiel, the phrase "son of human", in vocative (with the specific mark of the case), is attested in situations that might be divided into two series: in the first series, there are the direct commands, with or without the insertion of the personal pronoun, with or without an emphatic order of the words (the vocative in the first or the second position); in the second series are references to "son of human" in phatic expressions, with or without an emphatic order of words (the vocative in the first or the second position).
To this occurrences is to be added the deictic turn of phrase that includes the equivalent of the Greek particle idoú (based on an imperative form), meaning "here you are!", accompanied by a mark of coordination, as in 3:25 ("Şi tu, fiu al omului, iată: ţi s-au pus legători şi te vor lega cu ele").
The expected vocative form of this term in Romanian language, fiule ("son") is rarely attested in the old language (vide Bible of Bucharest, 1688), being relatively new.It emerged due to the fact that, simultaneously with the disappearance of the casual desinences, their role was fulfilled by the enclitic article: as soon as the nominal declension faded away, it was replaced by the declension of the article.The immediate advantage on the morphosyntactic level is the presence of a comprehensive paradigm, thanks to the complete series of casual forms.In some distinct conditions, it is obvious that the existence of this desinence (that has a phonetic consistency) has precisely phonetic origins: for the noun fiu, the addition of the vocative desinence directly to the lexical root creates a word that is too short and, implicitly, the final part of the word does not provide enough space for changing the tone (a necessary mark of interpellation): consequently, the enlarged form fiule becomes lexical norm.
The dictionary of the Romanian language (tome II.1, F-I, 1934) registers the sequence Prea bine, fiiule (Calendar 1844).The regular Latin inherited form, fii, is frequently used by Coresi; the old writings, on the other hand, attest the vocative fiule.All the same, the Coresi texts display nominative occurrences of this term with vocative function ("Fiu, lasă-ţi-se păcatele tale"); in contemporary language, it occurs with this function only when accompanied by the possessive adjective: fiul meu.
The Romanian language preserves some specific vocative desinences, consistent with the general trend of linguistic conservatism in the frame of Romance languages.Among the vocative desinences, some are inherited from Latin, probably as a result of Slavic enforcement (e.g.-e in masculine singular), some others are borrowed from Slavic (the feminine singular -o) and others are created in Romanian language: masculine singular -ule, coined on the enclitic article, masculine singular, -(u)l, enlarged with the specific vocative desinence, resulting in a complete paradigm of the masculine declension (with article), differentiating the cases of the singular (nominative-accusative: -ul, genitive-dative: -ului, vocative: -ule), nonetheless the vocative plural form, both in masculine and feminine nouns, -lor, formed by reusing the desinence for genitive-dative plural, with article, of the masculine nouns.The usual explanation for this astonishing form is a reinterpretation of the religious phrase "Vă spun vouă, fraţilor", "I tell you, brothers", throughout a gradual shift of dative to vocative, probably as a result of the fact that the concorded apposition (in dative case, in this example) became weak and finally disappeared.
There are circumstances (vide Vasiliu, 1956, 12-15) when both forms (-e, -ule) are preserved, with basically no differences of their meaning; there are solely some fine distinctions, brought by a certain affectivity attached to one of the forms, expressing irony, despise, hypocoristic appellation, e.g. the vocative forms of the nouns copil, băiat , poet ( "child", "boy", "poet").Some old terms are preserved only with the enlarged vocative form, which totally replaced the previous one, as in bât ("grandfather", a restricted term) or unchi ("oncle"): bâtule and unchiule replaced bâte and unche.
The preservation of vocative in Romanian language is fortified by the emergence of new morphological marks, well attested along the linguistic history.Despite the general tendency toward simplifying the nominal paradigm, by reducing as much as possible the differences between the actual two cases of the Romanian language (nominative-accusative and genitivedative), the presence of vocative case seems to get stronger, not only syntactically, but also morphologically.This surprising trend is perceptible in nowadays Romanian language, where the colloquial **dragelor and **dragele mele ("dear") is largely used as a feminine counterpart of dragilor and dragii mei, the correct form of vocative plural, both for masculine and feminine.