COGNITIVE VERBS IN SPANISH AND GREEK. TWO PATTERNS OF SEMANTIC EVOLUTION
Corresponding author:
[email protected]
Accepted
27 March 2026
Available Online
15 November 2015
Abstract
THIS ARTICLE AIMS TO PRESENT THE COGNITIVE FRAME O F VERBS WHICH DENOTE ‘THOUGHT’ (‘UNDERSTAND’, ‘KNOW ’, ‘THINK’), MAINLY IN GREEK AND SPANISH , CONSIDERED FROM A DIACHRONIC PERSPECTI VE. THE ETYMOLOGIC A NALYSIS AND THE THEO RETICAL BACKGROUND OF THIS INVESTIGATION (I.E. COGNITIVE SEMANTICS) HELPED US IDENTIF Y TWO MAIN SEMANTIC PATTERNS IN THE EVOL UTION OF COGNITIVE V ERBS. THESE PATTERNS ARE BASED ON TWO CONCEPTS, NAMELY ‘SI GHT’ AND ‘GRABBING’, WHICH DEVELOPED AN A BSTRACT SENSE. THUS, UNDERSTANDING, KNOWL EDGE OR THOUGHT COUL D BE CONSIDERED THE RESULT OF THE FOLLOWING SEMANTIC C HANGES: ‘I SEE’ > ‘I KNOW’ / ‘I UNDERSTAN D’ AND ‘I GOT (IT)’ > ‘I UNDERSTOOD’. THUS, W E CAN CONCLUDE THAT THE ABSTRACT AND COG NITIVE MEANINGS DEVELOPED FROM CONCRETE ONES, FOLLOWING A GENERAL PATTERN OF SEMANTIC EVOLUTION. INTERESTINGLY, THESE SEMANTIC SHIFTS ARE NOT ONLY DIACHRONICH . SYNCHRONICALLY, THESE TENDENCIES ARE EVIDENT IN THE CASE OF MANY VERBS AND CO LLOQUIAL EXPRESSIONS. MOREOVER, THESE TWO PATTERNS AND SEMANTI C SHIFTS, UNDERGONE BY THE VERBS OF COGNITION, CAN ALSO BE FOUND IN OTHER LANGUAGES, SUCH AS ROMANIAN, FRENCH, ENGLISH ETC., AND, THEREFORE THEY CAN BE CONSIDER ED GENERAL CROSS -LINGUISTIC PATTERNS OF SEMANTIC EVOLUTION. KEY-WORDS: VERBS OF COGNITIVE ATTITUDE, SEMANTIC CHANGES, DIACHRONIC COGNITIVE SEMANTICS, SPANISH, GREEK, EVOLUTION
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