2.1 An overview of constructicography

This section summarizes the theoretical background, advantages, challenges, methodological issues and diverse perspectives involved in the development of constructicons across languages. To illustrate the application of Construction Grammar in constructicography, a sample construction entry from the English Contructicon is examined.

First, it should be clarified that the term “constructicon”, like “grammar” and “lexicon”, has two meanings; it can refer to “a theoretical notion of a linguistic system” and “a corresponding descriptive resource” (Lyngfelt 2018: 2). The latter sense of constructicon as a reference work is related to constructicography. The central units of description in a constructicon are constructions, which are typically defined as “conventional, learned form-function pairings at varying levels of abstraction and complexity” (Goldberg 2013: 17). According to Construction Grammar theory, these pairings can account for the totality of linguistic knowledge and may essentially be any linguistic structure where a formal pattern (with syntactic, morphological, and phonological properties) is conventionally associated with a certain (semantic, pragmatic, or discourse-functional) meaning (Hilpert 2021). In the constructional view of language, lexicon and grammar are not seen as different in nature, but rather as two ends on a continuum; what lies in-between is “a vast range of patterns with varying degrees of schematicity and complexity, including idioms, word formation processes, and semi-fixed phrasal constructions” (Hilpert 2020: 107). Reports on constructicon projects (e.g. Lyngfelt et al. 2018; Perek & Patten 2019; Ziem et al. 2019; Ziem & Feldmüller 2023) highlight that their long-term goal is to cover the whole lexicon-grammar continuum; yet their first and primary focus is on capturing semi-schematic constructions that combine both lexical and grammatical properties. Such constructions are particularly interesting and challenging because, lying between grammar and lexicon, they have been overlooked and not considered within the scope of either grammar or lexicon.

A constructicon is much more than a dictionary + a grammar of a target language and can offer a number of advantages to the user. As Herbst (2019) notes, it provides information on all language aspects, uses a single terminological framework and links item-specific with generalized information. For example, the user can visit the entry for a specific verb, find its conventional patterns and then switch to the general description of the argument structure constructions (Herbst 2019: 6). At the same time a number of challenges arise for a constructicon; these are related to the access routes to the entries, the structure of the entries, and the presentation of the interconnections between constructions of different levels (Herbst 2019: 7). As Herbst (2019) explains, due to the different needs and skills of intended users, different access routes should be offered combining an alphabetical list of abstract constructions with lexical access strategies. As in any kind of reference work, the indented user profile and scope of the resource determine the design of the constructicon entries, the connections between the information provided in different entries and customization options.

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Figure 1

Intensifier V n to death construction: sample entry from the English Constructicon (2024)

Citation: Journal of Greek Linguistics 26, 1 (2026) ; 10.1163/15699846-02601005

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Several constructicon projects are currently under way for languages such as English (Perek & Patten 2019), German (Ziem et al. 2019; Ziem & Feldmüller 2023), Swedish (Lyngfelt et al. 2018), Portuguese (Torrent et al. 2018), Russian (Janda et al. 2020). Among these constructicon resources there are differences in description format, annotation technicalities, workflow, or scope. For example, the English constructicon combines the COBUILD grammar patterns with FrameNet semantic frames and has a pedagogical orientation, while the German constructicon relies on a robust computational infrastructure for an in-depth annotation of semantically or functionally related constructions but has no particular application-oriented purpose. Despite differences, constructicographic work generally involves collecting constructions from authentic language data (manually or automatically) or from secondary sources, such as dictionaries, grammars, and studies, and describing their special properties of form and meaning. Exploring linking strategies also seems to be a central concern for constructicon projects and involves two main directions: linking constructions with frames and linking constructions with each other in families by organizing construction entries in networks.

To illustrate these directions, Figure 1 presents an entry from the English Constructicon. Each entry in this database contains information about the form, meaning, and use of a particular construction. The construction described in Figure 1 has the form V n to death and is used as intensifier. The slots in the form of the construction are given roles (Agent, Patient), which are mentioned in the semantic definition of the construction. It is worth noting that the construction is linked to the FrameNet frame “Cause_change” as well as to related constructions. More precisely, the entry specifies what constructions it inherits from and the constructions that inherit from it, called “sub-constructions”. We can thus navigate the inheritance hierarchy of constructions, from more specific to more general ones, and vice-versa.

Overall, constructicon projects develop relationships with other resources (dictionaries, framenets) and constructional theory (Construction Grammar), and these relationships are bidirectional. To understand the interplay between constructicography and lexicography, we can consider, for example, Perek & Patten’s (2019) account of how the Collins COBUILD English Dictionary 2nd Edition was used as a source of lexico-grammatical information in developing the English Constructicon; the other side of the coin is evident in Croft & Sutton’s claim that “a more construction-oriented notation of lexical distributions in dictionaries can substantially increase their lexicographic value” (Croft & Sutton 2017: 11). As regards the interaction between constructicons and framenets, Boas et al. (2019) classify constructicons along a framenet-relatedness continuum (from framenet-derived to framenet-influenced resources) and point out the possibility for crosslinguistic comparison by connecting constructicons across languages via frames and for adapting framenet to better suit the needs of constructicons. Boas et al. (2019) further highlight the mutual beneficial relation between constructicography and Construction Grammar; constructicography, originally inspired by constructional research, also informs theory by showing in practice how to account for a language with Construction Grammar.

In the light of theoretical and application-related benefits gained from constructicography, this paper calls for utilizing constructional research in Modern Greek for developing a constructicon for that language, which is still missing from the growing network of constructicons. To pave the way, we demonstrate the process of compiling a constructicon entry for Greek data by first collecting constructions (from dictionaries and corpora), identifying their form-meaning properties, and linking them with frames and with each other in a construction family.

2.2 On exclamative constructions

This section refers to previous studies investigating exclamatives¹ within Construction Grammar in order to set the context for the analysis that follows. In this study, the umbrella term “interrogative-negative exclamative” refers to sentential exclamative structures that consist of a wh-question word, the negative particle δεν ‘not’ and a verb phrase (VP). We particularly focus on interrogative-negative exclamatives headed by pronouns (i.e. τι ‘what’, ποιος,-α,-ο ‘who/ which’, πόσος,-η,-ο ‘how much/ many’), as exemplified in (1)–(3) above. Based on the clearly delineable syntactic pattern, the three constructions under study can be schematized initially as [τι δεν VP], [ποιος,-α,-ο δεν VP], [πόσος,-η,-ο δεν VP], but are further elaborated with optional modification slots in the corpus data (Section 3.3). Structures like these are attested in English (e.g. How often have I not watched him!) and other languages like Italian, Spanish, Catalan (Yoon 2011: 31–33), but seem to have gone unnoticed in the literature on Greek.² In our attempt to document the individual and common properties of the Greek constructions under study, we take account of studies that identify features shared by exclamatives across languages.

In the constructional approach, exclamatives are viewed as a form-meaning pairing. Although formally there is a wide variety of structural realizations, functionally they share the expression of surprise and affective stance towards some propositional content; it is this shared semantic-pragmatic relationship that justifies the grouping of structurally different expressions such as It’s amazing how much he’s grown!; God, am I late!; They’re such idiots!; I can’t believe the nerve of some people!; It’s amazing the difference! (Michaelis & Lambrecht 1996). The core semantic and formal features of the exclamative construction are defined more precisely in Michaelis (2001) based on data from various languages. With regard to the semantico-pragmatic features, Michaelis (2001) specifies the notion of surprise as entailing a “noncanonicity judgement”³ on the part of the speaker, which adds a scalar implicature to a presupposed open proposition. In other words, the speaker’s purpose in exclaiming is to express their commitment and emotional reaction to a particular scalar degree which can be recovered from the context.

These semantic aspects motivate the contexts in which exclamatives appear. According to Michaelis (2001), recurrent formal features across languages include co-occurrence with interjections, subordination to factive epistemic verbs (e.g. It’s amazing how much noise they make), topic dislocation constructions (e.g. She’s pretty sharp, my mom), anaphoric degree adverbs (meaning ‘so’), question words (wh‑ words), noun phrase (NP) complements (e.g. I can’t believe the way they treat us.), ellipsis with NP s (e.g. The indignities that the world heaps on him!), inversion (e.g. Can this kid direct second unit!). Another observation about exclamatives concerns negation; as Schröder (2024) notes, while lexical negation is possible (e.g. How unhappy she was!), sentential negation (*What a tall man he is not!) is not acceptable because it would result in negating the presupposed proposition (Schröder 2024: 5). Besides these morpho-syntactic features, another aspect of form that distinguishes exclamatives is intonation; a falling tone is usually associated with exclamatives—referred to as “exclamatory fall” (Wells 2006: 59)—and differentiates them from interrogatives, which typically show a rising intonation.⁴

There are various perspectives from which exclamatives have been viewed by the linguistic community (for a review of relevant studies, see Chaibeddra 2020 and Schröder 2024). Among the issues that have become the center of attention (and contention) are factivity, degree interpretation, and emotional content (Villalba 2008). For instance, Trotzkea & Giannakidou (2021) challenge the notion of a factivity presupposition and argue that exclamatives convey a presupposition of “subjective veridicality anchored to the speaker, and assert the emotion (of surprise, amazement, or a negative emotion)” (Trotzkea & Giannakidou 2021: 1). The exact nature of surprise and high degree usually associated with exclamatives is also a prominent subject of discussion; for example, concepts such as “widening” (Zanuttini & Portner 2003) and “noteworthiness” (Nouwen & Chernilovskaya 2015) have been proposed in an attempt to capture the wide range of expressive attitudes (including unexpectedness, emotional reaction, extreme quality, amazement, awe, astonishment) covered by exclamatives. Interestingly, surprise is linked to a scale of unlikelihood, undesirability, or resentment in Yoon’s (2011) discussion of exclamatives which include a negative particle; this is not referred to as “expletive negation” but rather as “evaluative negation” that triggers a pragmatic effect reflecting the speaker’s emotional attitude towards a proposition.

In this context, the following corpus-based study aims to make a contribution to the theoretical discussion of exclamatives, examining data from a language which has not been widely researched in this respect, as well as to the practical development of a network of constructions.

3.1 Dictionary review

Patterns recorded in dictionaries can be used as “points of departure for identifying more general constructions” (Lyngfelt et al. 2018: 56). This observation proves useful in the case of the closed set of interrogative pronouns/ determiners in Modern Greek, which consists of τι ‘what’, ποιος, ‑α, ‑ο ‘who/ which’, and πόσος, ‑η, ‑ο ‘how much/ many’.⁵ In this section, we examine the entries for these lexical items in three comprehensive dictionaries of Modern Greek and find clues about a construction family. The three dictionaries examined are the Dictionary of Standard Modern Greek (DSMG) by the Institute of Modern Greek Studies, the Dictionary of Modern Greek (DMG) by G. Babiniotis, and the Handy Dictionary of the Modern Greek Language (HDMGL) by the Academy of Athens. Table 1 presents the information retrieved from the three dictionaries about the interrogative pronouns/determiners in the context of negation.

The relevant extracts from the entries for τι show that all three dictionaries record its use in the context of the negative particle δεν with the meaning ‘many things or everything’. However, this pattern is presented in different ways in the entries: as an illustrative example of the phrase τι και τι/και τι in DSMG, at a more general level as “question with negation” in DMG, and as an idiom of the form και τι δεν …! in HDMGL. The emphatic function of surprise is pointed out only in the third dictionary.

With regard to ποιος, ‑α, ‑ο, we observe that the first entry in Table 1, i.e. DSMG, records the use of this question word in interrogative negative sentences with the meaning “everyone” and provides an illustrative example as well as the proverb ποιος στραβός/τυφλός δε θέλει το φως του (‘who among the blind do not want their sight’). This multiword expression is the only relevant use found in the DMG entry, while relevant uses seem to be scattered through the whole entry in HDMGL. More precisely, the examples Και ποιος δεν κάνει λάθη/ δεν θέλει την ευτυχία! (‘After all, who doesn’t make mistakes/doesn’t want to be happy!’) appear with a gloss under the sense that generally refers to interrogative and exclamative sentences, while ποιος δεν θα ήθελε (‘who wouldn’t’) and ποιος στραβός/τυφλός δεν θέλει το φως του are listed among the fixed phrases with cross-references to other entries; in all cases the core meaning is “everyone”.

Lastly, as regards πόσος, ‑η, ‑ο, one of the dictionaries, i.e. DMG, records its use in interrogative-negative exclamatives through an example (Πόσες φορές δεν του είπα να προσέχει! ‘How many times have I told him to be careful!’) illustrating the meaning “too many times” and the plural colligation.

On the whole, what we observe is that uses recorded as proverbs (e.g. Ποιος στραβός/ τυφλός δε θέλει το φως του; in DSMG), constructional idioms (e.g. και τι δεν …! ‘you wouldn’t believe what’ in HDMGL), or mere examples (e.g. Πόσες φορές δεν του είπα να προσέχει! in DMG) provide clues to a more general emphatic pattern of the form “interrogative pronoun/determiner + δεν + VP”, which implies a large amount and the speaker’s emotional stance towards it. Variation in the lexicographic treatment of this pattern is due to the different levels of abstraction involved. To further investigate the form-meaning pairings hinted at by this dictionary review, we now turn to corpus data.

3.2 Corpus data

The corpus used for this study is the Hellenic National Corpus (HNC). This is a general language monitor corpus of almost 97 million running words of texts which have been written in Greek after 1990, are of high readability, and cover different publication media, genres, and topics. The HNC query system allows us to retrieve instances of the three interrogative pronouns in a negative context through a single targeted search. As shown in Figure 2, the search query used combines three criteria: the closed set of interrogative pronouns, the lemma δεν and the open grammatical category ‘verb’; a distance of up to 3 words is allowed between the criteria.

More than 3,000 examples were thus retrieved, which were then sifted through one by one to remove duplicate sentences, noise such as the relative pronoun ό,τι ‘whatever’, direct questions (e.g. Τι δεν σας αρέσει στα προγράμματα που παρακολουθείτε; ‘What don’t you like about the programs you watch?’) and indirect questions (e.g. Σε ερώτηση ποιοι δεν θα του επιτρέψουν να επέμβει, ο κ. B. απάντησε … ‘When asked who wouldn’t allow him to intervene, Mr. V. replied …’). After this noise was excluded, about 600 examples of interrogative-negative exclamatives remained. As shown in Table 2, from a quantitative perspective, the three general patterns under study are of similar frequency, and we now proceed to show that from a qualitative perspective they are also worthy of parallel treatment.

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Figure 2

The search query used in HNC

Citation: Journal of Greek Linguistics 26, 1 (2026) ; 10.1163/15699846-02601005

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3.3 Construction profiles

In this section, we identify the form and meaning properties of the three constructions based on the corpus data retrieved from HNC.

The first construction, [τι δεν VP], is illustrated in examples (4)–(7), and its properties are summarized in Table 3.

(4) Μέσα σε όλη αυτή την ατμόσφαιρα και με τα πνεύματα οξυμένα, τι δεν ειπώθηκε … (Sent_id: 704994)

Mesa

se

oli

afti

tin

atmosfera

kai

me

ta

pnevmata

oxymena,

ti

den

eipothike

Inside

in

all

this-F

the-F

atmosphere

and

with

the-PL

spirit-PL

sharpened

what

NEG

say- PASS-PST-3SG

‘In the midst of all this atmosphere and with heightened spirits, what wasn’t said …’

(5) Σκηνοθέτες και παραγωγοί συναγωνίζονται ποιος θα πρωτοπαρουσιάσει περισσότερες έξαλλες ερμηνευτικές και εμπορικές επιδιώξεις. Και τι δεν είδανε τα μάτια μας και τι δεν άκουσαν τα αυτιά μας. (Sent_id: 388362)

Skinothetes

kai

paragogoi

synagonizontai

poios

tha

protoparousiasei

perissoteres

exalles

ermineftikes

kai

emporikes

epidioxeis.

Kai

ti

den

eidane

ta

matia

mas

kai

ti

den

akousan

ta

aftia

mas.

Director-PL

and

producer-PL

compete-PRS-3PL

who

FUT

debut-FUT-3SG

more

wild

interpretive

and

commercial

aspiration-PL.

And

what

NEG

see-PST-3PL

the-PL

eye-PL

our

and

what

NEG

hear-PST-3PL

the-PL

ear-PL

our.

‘Directors and producers compete to see who will first present more wild interpretative and commercial aspirations. And what have our eyes not seen and what have our ears not heard.’

(6) Και τι δεν έκανε ο τετραπέρατος ο Ρεξ! Τούμπες, αγκαλιές, φιλιά. (Sent_id: 2818215)

Kai	ti	den	ekane	o	tetraperatos	o	Rex!	Toumpes,	agkalies,	filia.
And	what	NEG	do-PST-3SG	the-M	clever	the-M	Rex!	Somersault-PL,	hug-PL	kiss-PL.

‘And what didn’t clever Rex [dog] do! Somersaults, hugs, kisses.’

(7) Τι εισάγουμε από την Κίνα; Και τι δεν εισάγουμε, από κλιματιστικά, ενδύματα, υποδήματα, τσάντες μέχρι χριστουγεννιάτικα στολίδια. (Sent_id: 91052)

Ti

eisagoume

apo

tin

Kina?

Kai

ti

den

eisagoume,

apo

klimatistika,

endymata,

ypodimata,

tsantes,

mechri

xristougenniatika

stolidia.

What

import-PRS-1PL

from

the-F

China?

And

what

NEG

import-PRS-1PL

from

air conditioner-PL

clothing-PL

shoe-PL

bag-PL

to

Christmas

decoration-PL.

‘What do we import from China? And what don’t we import, from air conditioners, clothes, shoes, bags to Christmas decorations.’

Starting with the formal properties of the construction, the sequence τι δεν is not interrupted and is usually preceded by the null-content intensifier και (133 out of 171 hits). This particle is not used in the sense of ‘also’ but functions as a filler; it appears in sentence-initial position, bears no emphatic stress, and contributes only an exclamation mark (Canakis 1995: 45–46, 56). Although in this study prosodic features were not experimentally verified, the construction is expected to be characterized by the typical exclamative intonation pattern (fall) rather than the rising intonation of wh-questions, in line with cross-linguistic research (Wells 2006: 59). Semantically, the interrogative pronoun τι does not initiate a question and the particle δεν does not negate the verb which follows it, but is used as an intensifier that contributes to the (excessive) degree interpretation of the construction. The semantic frame evoked by the construction is Quantified_mass, which denotes quantities of a Mass or of Individuals (FrameNet).⁶ For example, in (4)–(7) the Quantity-denoting word is τι, while the frame element Mass is not explicitly expressed but existentially understood (Indefinite Null Instantiation).⁷ The hyperbolic interpretation of too many things being said (example 4), experienced (example 5), done (examples 6, 7), etc. is pragmatically derived through an expectation, or bias, on the part of the speaker toward an exaggerated answer to the question word τι (i.e. everything, anything). At the same time, the examples convey the speaker’s strong emotional reaction to a state of affairs that is perceived as a deviation from a norm. Overall, the exclamatory interpretation is due to the speaker’s perception of a quantity as exceeding what is considered reasonable or necessary, and the resulting expression of surprise—negative (in examples 4 and 5) or positive (in examples 6 and 7).

The second construction, [ποιος,-α,-ο δεν VP], is exemplified in (8)–(11), and its properties are summarized in Table 4.

(8) Και ποιος σκιέρ δεν θα ήθελε να μοιάσει στον Αλμπέρτο Τόμπα, τον Ιταλό πρωταθλητή που σαρώνει τις διακρίσεις στο άθλημα του χιονιού! (Sent_id: 1229461)

Kai

poios

skier

den

tha

ithele

na

moiasei

ston

Alberto

Tomba,

ton

Italo

protathliti

pou

saronei

tis

diakriseis

sto

athlima

tou

chioniou!

And

who

skier

NEG

COND

want-COND-3SG

to

be like-INF-3SG

to the-M

Alberto

Tomba,

the-M

Italian

champion

who

sweep-PRS-3SG

the-PL

award-PL

in the-PL

sport

the-GEN

snow-GEN

‘And who wouldn’t want to be like Alberto Tomba, the Italian champion who sweeps the awards in the snow sport!’

(9) Θα μου λείψει περισσότερο από όλα ο καφές! Και σε ποιον Έλληνα δεν θα έλειπε, άλλωστε. (Sent_id: 856049)

Tha

mou

leipsei

perissotero

apo

ola

o

kafes!

Kai

se

poion

Ellina

den

tha

eleipe,

alloste.

FUT

to me

miss-FUT-3SG

more

than

everything

the-M

coffee!

And

to

who-ACC

Greek

NEG

COND

miss-COND-3SG

besides.

‘I will miss coffee the most! And which Greek wouldn’t, after all?’

(10) Κι αλήθεια ποιος δεν έχει διαβάσει το ποίημα του Α. Βαλαωρίτη « Ο Καλογιάννης» ; (Sent_id: 4975458)

Ki

alitheia

poios

den

exei

diavasei

to

poiima

tou

A.

Valaoriti

“O

Kalogiannis”?

And

really

who

NEG

have-PRS-3SG

read-PRF

the-N

poem

the-M-GEN

A.

Valaoritis-GEN

“the-M

Kalogiannis”

‘And truly, who hasn’t read the poem “Kalogiannis” by A. Valaoritis?’

(11) Αν συνεχώς αναλύεις ή βαθμολογείς τη ζωή σου, πάντα θα βρίσκεις σφάλματα σε οτιδήποτε κάνεις. Εξάλλου ποιος δεν χρειάζεται βελτίωση; (Sent_id: 4401457)

An

synexos

analyeis

i

vathmologeis

ti

zoi

sou,

panta

tha

vriskeis

sfalmata

se

otidipote

kaneis.

Exallou

poios

den

xreiazetai

veltiosi?

If

constantly

analyse-PRS-2SG

or

grade- PRS-2SG

the-F

life

your,

always

FUT

find-FUT-2SG

mistake-PL

in

anything

do-PRS-2SG

Besides

who

NEG

need-PASS-3SG

improvement

‘If you constantly analyze or grade your life, you will always find faults in everything you do. After all, who doesn’t need improvement?’

The formal properties of the construction include an optional noun slot after the interrogative pronoun/determiner⁸ and a preference for the singular, masculine form ποιος (223 out of 232 hits). While among the punctuation marks used in (8)–(11) question marks also appear, the sentences cannot be interpreted as information-seeking interrogatives. The meaning of the construction cannot be deduced simply by adding up the meaning of the question word and the negative particle. Similarly to the τι δεν VP construction, the semantic frame evoked in this case is Quantified_mass. The Quantity-denoting word is ποιος, ‑α, ‑ο, and the frame element Individuals is expressed by the noun that follows ποιος, ‑α, ‑ο (in examples 8 and 9) or is unexpressed and existentially understood (in examples 10 and 11). The generic interpretation on a scale of likelihood is pragmatically derived through an expectation, or bias, on the part of the speaker toward an exaggerated answer to the question word ποιος, ‑α, ‑ο (i.e. everyone/ anyone). The hyperbolic force is enhanced by the particle δεν, which adds weight to the speaker’s surprise at the obviousness of an exceptional quality (of a skier in (8), coffee in (9), a poem in (10), and improvement in (11)). In line with Yoon’s (2011) discussion of evaluative negation in exclamatives, δεν is not seen as semantically empty but as triggering a likelihood scale and giving rise to emphatic/rhetorical effects. Filler και⁹ and additive markers in the immediate context (e.g. άλλωστε ‘besides’, εξάλλου ‘besides’, αλήθεια ‘truly’) emphasize the speaker’s emotional reaction to an exceptional quality. The additive markers also serve an argumentative function;¹⁰ they reinforce the argument presented by the speaker, thus creating the impression of absolute validity of the claims.

The third construction under study is [πόσος,-η,-ο δεν VP]. It is exemplified by (12)–(15) and its profile is provided in Table 5.

(12) Πόσα όμως παιδάκια δεν βρίσκουν σήμερα το θάνατο από την επιδημία τύφου που έχει ξεσπάσει! (Sent_id: 1078594)

Posa

omos

paidakia

den

vriskoun

simera

to

thanato

apo

tin

epidimia,

tifou

pou

exei

ksespasei!

How many

however

children

NEG

find-PRS-3PL

today

the-M

death

from

the-F

epidemic

typhus

that

have- PRS-3SG

break out-PRF

‘How many children, however, do not find death today from the typhus epidemic that has broken out!’

(13) Πόσες και πόσες φιλίες χρόνων δεν χάλασαν, πόσοι και πόσοι δεν έκοψαν την καλημέρα σε συγγενείς και γείτονες; (Sent_id: 3517609)

Poses

kai

poses

filies

xronon

den

xhlasan

posoi

kai

posoi

den

ekopsan

tin

kalimera

se

syngeneis

kai

geitones

How many

and

how many

friendship-PL

year-GEN-PL

NEG

ruin-PST-3PL

how many

and

how many

NEG

cut-PST-3PL

the

good morning

to

relative-PL

and

neighbor-PL

‘How many friendships of years were ruined, how many people stopped greeting their relatives and neighbors?’

(14) Πόσοι και πόσοι δεν θα έχουν σιγοτραγουδήσει παλιές ρομαντικές επιτυχίες του! (Sent_id: 841006)

Posoi	kai	posoi	den	tha	exoun	sigotragoudisei	palies	romantikes	epityxies	tou!
How many	and	how many	NEG	COND	have-COND-3PL	hum-PRF	old-PL	romantic-PL	hit-PL	his

‘How many people have not hummed his old romantic hits!’

(15) Μέσα στην παραζάλη και τον ίλιγγο του φόβου μας, πόσα και πόσα εγκλήματα δεν διαπράττουμε και πόση βία δεν αναπαράγουμε στην κάθε όψη της καθημερινότητάς μας. (Sent_id: 2546954)

Mesa

stin

parazali

kai

ton

ilingo

tou

fovou

mas,

posa

kai

posa

egklimata

den

diapratoume

kai

posi

via

den

anaparagoume

stin

kathe

opsi

tis

kathimerinotitas

mas

Inside

in-the-F

daze

and

the-M

dizziness

the-GEN-M

fear-GEN

our

how many

and

how many

crime-PL

NEG

commit-PRS-1PL

and

how much

violence

NEG

reproduce-PRS-1PL

in-the-F

every

aspect

the-GEN-F

everyday-life-GEN

our

‘In the daze and dizziness of our fear, how many crimes do we commit and how much violence do we reproduce in every aspect of our daily lives?’

The [πόσος,-η,-ο δεν VP] construction shares some properties of form with the ποιος,-α,-ο δεν VP construction, such as the exclamatory intonation and punctuation as well as the optional noun slot after the interrogative pronoun/ determiner. However, special features of this construction are the preference for the plural forms of the pronoun/determiner (188 out of 191 hits) and its frequent reduplication in a polysyndetic structure¹¹ (31 out of 191 hits). Reduplication (with the conjunction και standing between the interrogative pronouns/determiners), together with the emphatic particle δεν (encountered in the previous constructions as well), create a semantic prosody of intensification around the Quantity-denoting question word πόσος,-η,-ο.¹² As in the previous constructions, the semantic frame evoked is Quantified_mass.¹³ The frame element Individuals is expressed by the noun in plural that follows πόσος,-η,-ο (as in (12), (13): first occurrence, (15): first occurrence) or implied (INI as in (14), (13): second occurrence); alternatively, the frame element Mass is realized by a noun in singular (as in (15): second occurrence). The overall meaning of ‘too many/much’ is pragmatically derived through implicature in an emotionallycharged utterance. On the whole, the sequence πόσος,-η,-ο δεν VP cannot make sense as a question or a negation, nor as a question + negation; rather it makes sense if seen as a hyperbolic exclamation. It emphasizes the speaker’s perception of the frequency of events as exceeding a norm and expresses an exerted emotional state reflecting resentment and bitterness (due to the undesirability of events like death in (12) and (14), broken friendships in (13), crime and violence in (15)).

3.4 Construction family

The construction profiles built in Section 3.3 build on the “form”, “meaning”, and “description” information categories of a constructicon entry (as shown in Figure 1); the categories “inherits from” and “sub-constructions” are discussed in this section. As explained in Section 2.1, linking constructions with frames, on the one hand, and with each other, on the other hand, is of central concern in constructicography. Having discussed the semantic frame evoked by the constructions under study in Section 3.3, we proceed to demonstrate how they are linked together in a network of constructions.

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Figure 3

Partial network of exclamative constructions, focusing on interrogative-negative exclamatives headed by pronouns/determiners

Citation: Journal of Greek Linguistics 26, 1 (2026) ; 10.1163/15699846-02601005

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The family of interrogative-negative exclamatives seems to comprise constructions on different levels of granularity, as shown in Figure 3. The constructions examined so far ([τι δεν VP], [ποιος,-α,-ο δεν VP], [πόσος,-η,-ο δεν VP]) seem to reside in the middle area of the lexicon-grammar continuum, since they have open slots, with specific constraints on their fillers, and fixed lexical items, and their constituents contribute to, but do not entirely constitute, the overall meaning. Despite the variability in the emotional nuances expressed by the three constructions, they all evoke the Quantified_mass frame and implicitly express the speaker’s judgement that an amount is noteworthy (hyperbole of quantity).¹⁴ As explained in Section 3.3, the scalar reading is reinforced by emphatic devices in the immediate context, typically και in the first construction, additive markers in the second, and reduplication in the third.

At a more specific level, each one of the three constructions has sub-constructions (called “phraseological constructions” in the English Constructicon). Examples (16)–(18) illustrate the hypothetical phrase και τι δεν θα (έ)δινα, the metaphorical proverb ποιος τυφλός/ στραβός δεν θέλει το φως του, and the reduplicative expression πόσες και πόσες φορές δεν, respectively.

(16) Και τι δεν θα ‘δινα για μια αγκαλιά σου! (Sent_id: 3696576)

Kai	ti	den	tha	‘dina	gia	mia	agkalia	sou!
And	what	NEG	COND	give-COND-1SG	for	a	hug	your!

‘And what wouldn’t I give for a hug from you!’

(17) Εφόσον είναι καλοί—ποιος στραβός δεν θέλει το φως του—να τους κρατάει και να ανανεώνεται η θητεία τους. (Sent_id: 2002781)

Efoson

einai

kaloi

–poios

stravos

den

thelei

to

fos

tou–

na

tous

krataei

kai

na

ananeonetai

i

thiteia

tous.

Provided that

be-PRS-3PL

good

–who

blind

NEG

want-PRS-3SG

the

light

his–

to

them

keep-PRS-3SG

and

to

renew-PASS-PRS-3SG

the

term

their.

‘Since they are good—who among the blind do not want their sight—to keep them and renew their term.’

(18) Πόσες και πόσες φορές δεν άκουσα αυτή την κουβέντα από τη γιαγιά μου. (Sent_id: 5182934)

Poses

kai

poses

fores

den

akousa

afti

tin

kouventa

apo

ti

giagia

mou.

How many

and

how many

times

NEG

hear-PST-1SG

this-F

the-F

talk

from

the-F

grandmother

my.

‘How many times have I heard this talk from my grandmother.’

In addition to inheriting the form and meaning of their parent construction, the sub-constructions display idiosyncratic behaviour in their meaning or in the kind of words that appear in the open slots. For example, when [τι δεν VP] refers to a hypothetical state of affairs that deviates from a norm, the verb slot of the construction is typically occupied by θα + δίνω in imperfective past, and what is emphasized is the intensity of the wish as in 16). The proverb ποιος τυφλός/ στραβός δεν θέλει το φως του in (17) lies toward the fixed end of the idiomaticity continuum (Michaelis 2017) as it has almost no formal flexibility, while its meaning (‘everyone would like to have a serious problem solved’) can be computed if the meaning properties of the parent construction [ποιος,-α,-ο (N) δεν VP] are considered in light of the conceptual metaphor knowing is seeing (Lakoff 1993: 237). As regards the third sub-construction, in (18), it results from the strong collocational preference for the lexical item φορές,¹⁵ which recurrently appears in the (optional) noun slot of the construction [πόσος,-η,-ο (N) δεν VP] in a way that makes the reduplication of the Quantity-denoting question word more cohesive. On the whole, the sub-constructions have their own unique usage patterns and merit separate treatment.

At a more general level, we can argue for a superordinate construction that refers to the speaker’s emotional reaction to a very large quantity, and allows not only pronouns in the interrogative slot but also other question words like the adverbs πού (e.g. και πού δεν πήγε ‘and where not went’, meaning ‘everywhere’) and πότε (e.g. Και πότε δεν ήμασταν σε κρίση; ‘and when not were in crisis’, meaning ‘always’).¹⁶ If we take a look at the wider picture, we should consider the interrogative-negative exclamatives as part of a broader network of exclamative constructions. Despite, or in addition to, their idiosyncratic properties, the interrogative-negative exclamatives inherit features of form and meaning from the general exclamative construction. Formal features that seem to be inherited from the exclamative sentence type (Michaelis 2001) are degree words (like question words), a negated epistemic predicator (like I can’t believe, motivating the presence of the particle δεν), and a distinct intonation pattern. As regards meaning, when uttering exclamatives, speakers express their affective stance toward noncanonicity judgements which involve semantic scales (Michaelis 2001). This is in line with the interpretation of interrogative-negative exclamatives as expressing the speaker’s emotional reaction (surprise, resentment, or just noteworthiness) with regard to an excessive amount of things, people, events, etc.

To sum up, the above form-meaning pairs of varying degrees of idiomaticity are visualized as a structured network of constructions in Figure 3, according to the properties they share. If we compare the construction-based description in Figure 3 to the information derived from the dictionaries (Table 1), we notice that the patterns recorded in the dictionary entries tend to be too specific, while the variability and productivity revealed by the corpus analysis leads to more general constructicon entries. We also realize the great potential that a Greek constructicon would have with regard to the systematic coverage and interconnection of lexico-grammatical patterns in a more comprehensive representation of the language.