The nature of accessory terms in traditional grammatical nomenclature
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14393/LL63-v42-2026-05Keywords:
Accessory terms., Proposition, Grammatical nomenclature, Adnominal adjuncts, Adverbial adjunctsAbstract
This paper examines the notion of "accessory terms" in traditional Portuguese grammatical nomenclature, particularly adjectival and adverbial adjuncts, discussing the the vision that these terms would be "dispensable." We show that this conception derives from a historical and philosophical interpretation of the notion of accident, present in the grammatical tradition from Aristotle to Prisciano, including the Grammaire de Port-Royal and the Portuguese grammarian Soares Barbosa. Building on Aristotle's contribution, we argue that accidents (or accessory terms) are constituents that, while not essential to the definition of a proposition, can affect its truth value. Thus, the "secondary" nature of these terms does not imply that they are logically or semantically dispensable. Thus, we conclude that the adnominal and adverbial adjuncts were taken as secondary, and that they were eventually inferred to be dispensable, because, even if they were extracted, we are left with a construction that can be taken as, in Prisciano's words, a minimal proposition of the language with complete meaning, from which we can assess the truth value.
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