267
9.4 Accounting for the Development of What’s Morewhat’s more exhibit syntactic differences: What’s more is always parenthet-
ical while what’s more Adj is more often part of a comparative construction
( what’s more Adj than ...). Although what’s more begins as clause internal
with narrow scope over a phrasal category (NP, AdjP, PP, or VP), it gradually
acquires sentential scope, typically moving to sentence- initial position. Here
it has a conjunctive (additive, reinforcing) function. Note that the proportion
of clause- initial what’s more increases from 27 percent to 73 percent from the
seventeenth to the nineteenth century (see Figure 9.2 ). What’s more Adj does
not clearly follow the same path. Furthermore, is is typically contracted in the
what’s more construction but uncontracted in the what is more Adj construc-
tion, pointing to the fossilization of contracted what’s more in the comment-
clause function. Semantically, there seems little reason to suggest an elided
adjective in the case of parenthetical what’s more as well. The OED’s defi n-
ition of more as a pronoun with the sense ‘something of greater importance
or signifi cance’ (s.v. more, adj, pron., adv. n.^3 and prep., def. B 1c) points to
what’s more as a complete construction, without the necessity of postulating an
elliptical adjective. The nature of the speaker evaluation can always be inferred
from context.
An alternative set of constructions with which – which is more and which
is more Adj – arise, again simultaneously, or somewhat before, in the 1560s.
But the which is more (Adj) constructions may have a quite different syntactic
origin from the what’s more (Adj) constructions. The OED (s.v. which , pron.
and adj., def. III 11) suggests that which in this case is a nominal relative with
ellipsis of the antecedent, i.e., that which , one which , something which. It cites
example (15c) from Shakespeare and the following example:
(24) I had the loose Earth to carry out; and which was of more Importance , I had the
Seiling to prop up. (1719 Defoe, Life Robinson Crusoe 87 [OED])
Examples such as (15a) with an explicit antecedent ( that ) lend support to the
OED analysis; in that case, which is more is a restrictive relative clause modi-
fying that. Nonetheless, it is plausible that this construction may have con-
tributed in part to the rise of what’s more. Although which is more is typically
clause internal, which is more Adj can serve the same connective/ commentary
function in initial position as what’s more , as shown in examples (18) and (22).
Ultimately, the which construction falls out of use, as shown above, and the
OED suggests that which is replaced by what .
The development of what’s more as a comment clause exhibits signs of
grammaticalization, including decategorialization (from nominal relative
clause to particle- like status), loss of referential meaning (as the relative pro-
noun loses anaphoric reference), acquisition of pragmatic functions (commen-
tary and connective functions), and increasing subjectifi cation (expression