Romance Linguistics 2009

This study presents a synchronic and diachronic analysis of the French and Italian aspectualizers commencer and cominciare from the perspective of grammaticalization theory. They show properties of both full verbs and auxiliaries, and thus have traditionally proven difficult to analyze. It is argued that these aspectualizers are best explained by taking into account their historical development from Latin initiare “to initiate”. Synchronic and diachronic data are presented in order to locate the