Creation of Statistical Data

Once the entries in the Access database had been checked and the re-classifications completed, it was possible to begin the initial production of statistical data. Two sets of data were produced. The first, the B-Tables, contained data that was not differentiated according to the conditional periphrasis. Instead, data was generated to

Boccaccio, Giovanni, [1366], Lettera a Leonardo del Chiaro (Roberto Abbondanza, Una lettera autografa del Boccaccio nell'Archivio di Stato di Perugia, RAS, XXII, 1962, n. 3, pp. 227-32 [testo pp. 227-28].) [Boccaccio, Epist., 1366].

Teperto (Tiberto Galliziani ?), [1300], Lettera in prosa(a cura dell'Ufficio Filologico [d'Arco Silvio Avalle].) [Teperto, Lettera in prosa, XIII sm. (pis.)].

330_{Guittone d'Arezzo, [1294],Lettere in versi(Guittone d'Arezzo, Lettere, Edizione critica a cura di}

Claude Margueron, Bologna, Commissione per i testi di lingua, 1990, [testi: pp. 93, 99, 129-31, 136- 37, 181-83, 191-93, 298-300, 349].) [Guittone, Lettere in versi, a. 1294 (tosc.)].

331_{Cavalca, Domenico, [1342],Epistola di san Girolamo ad Eustochio volgarizzata(Volgarizzamento}

del Dialogo di san Gregorio e dell'Epistola di san Girolamo ad Eustochio, a cura di Giovanni Bottari, Pagliarini, Roma 1764, pp. 356-438.) [Cavalca, Ep. Eustochio, a. 1342 (pis.)].

332

Raimbaut de Vaqueiras, [1190],Testo bilingue [Contrasto bilingue] (Alberto Asor Rosa, Storia e antologia della letteratura italiana, Firenze, La Nuova Italia 1978, vol. I Le Origini, a cura di Roberto Antonelli, p. 163-167.) [Raimb. de Vaqueiras, Contrasto, c. 1190 (gen.)].

produce general statistics on the usage of the conditional (both paradigms) in the different variables. The second set of data, the C-Tables, was designed to provide information on the comparative distributions of the two conditional periphrases. As there was considerable variation in the numbers of attestations of each periphrasis contained within the different variables, direct comparison of the numbers of attestations would not have provided meaningful data. Instead, comparisons had to be made on the basis of averaged data for each variable and variant.

The B-Tables

The B-Tables comprised three spreadsheets, one for each of the variables area, genre and date, composed of 9 fields.333

· Column A contained the list of variants that were included in the variable.

· Column B, ‘No of texts’, listed the number of texts that were included in the variant. · Column C, ‘% of total’, calculated and displayed the percentage of the total texts that the variant contained.

· Column D, ‘Word count’, listed the number of words in all the texts in the variant. · Column E, ‘% of total’, calculated and displayed the percentage of the total words that the variant contained.

· Column F, ‘No of atts’, listed the number of attestations of the conditional to be found in the variant.

· Column G, ‘% total atts’, calculated and displayed the percentage of the total attestations that the variant contained.

· Column H, ‘Atts per 1,000 words’, calculated and displayed the number of attestations of both types of conditional periphrasis that the variant contained, based on the word count in column D.

· Column I, ‘% OVI texts cont conds’, calculated and displayed the percentage of texts in each variant in the OVI that contained attestations of the conditional. The number of texts the OVI contained in each variant was calculated according to the area and genre counts available on the website, and by running searches for all texts falling within a given time period. Where classifications had been merged, such as the

333_{All totals, such as total word counts, were calculated from the texts included in the database, unless}

explicitly signaled as referring to the OVI. The B-Tables are to be found as Appendix 6.

variantLIG PIEM, the number of texts in both the original variants were added together to give the total number of texts in the OVI encompassed by the new variant. The texts contained in the OVI in the variants STIL NOV, SIC TOSC and SCOL SIC were not included in the B-Tables for the variable area, as they did not appear in the OVI area counts. They were also excluded from the calculation of the number of texts appearing in the OVI from Tuscany and Florence, as they were not included in the total number of texts in the Access database from these areas.

The C-Tables

The aim of the C-Tables was to provide a format in which the data on the two periphrases could be easily compared. Consequently, they took the form of six spreadsheets, two spreadsheets for each variable, one for the data on the CANTARE HABEBAM periphrasis, and one for the data on the CANTARE HABUI periphrasis.334 In these tables, and the discussion of them below, C signified the particular conditional periphrasis under analysis: in the respective tables, it stood for either the attestations of the CANTARE HABEBAM periphrasis or the CANTARE HABUIperiphrasis. Along the top of every C-Table sheet were four pieces of information. These were the percentage of texts containing attestations of the periphrasis; the number of attestations of the periphrasis as a percentage of the total attestations; the number of attestations of the periphrasis per 1,000 words; and the total attestations of the periphrasis. The fields in the table were:

· Columns A to D: these columns in each spreadsheet were copied directly from Table B, both for ease of reference and because they were required for further calculations. · Column E, ‘Texts cont C’, listed the number of texts in each variant containing attestations of the particular periphrasis.

· Column F, ‘% texts in variant cont C’, calculated and displayed the percentage of texts in each variant containing attestations of the particular periphrasis.

· Column G, ‘Attestations of C’, listed the number of attestations of the particular periphrasis in each variant.

· Column H, ‘C per 1,000 words of variant’, calculated and displayed the mean number of attestations of the particular periphrasis per 1,000 words of text in each variant.

· Column I, ‘%C/conds in variant’, calculated and displayed the percentage of all the attestations in the variant that were of the particular periphrasis. For example, of 132 attestations of the conditional in ART TECN, 130 were attestations of the CANTARE HABUI periphrasis. Therefore, 130/132, or 98.49%, of ART TECN attestations were of the CANTARE HABUIperiphrasis, and the entry in Column I for ART TECN in the genre spreadsheet for theCANTARE HABUIperiphrasis was 98.48.

· Column J, ‘Texts cont both periphrases’, listed the number of texts in each variant that contained attestations of both the CANTARE HABEBAM periphrasis, and the CANTARE HABUIperiphrasis.

· Column L, ‘% texts cont both periphrases’, calculated and displayed the percentage of texts in the Access database that contained both periphrases.