492.3.2 Meaning of Hwæt in Verse
Observing that hwæt in Old English occurs in almost every instance with a
fi rst- or second- person pronoun, we are reminded of the function expressed by
a number of pragmatic markers in Present- day English – most prominently you
know – of marking common ground. Thus, I argue that the function of hwæt
in Old English is to introduce shared information or knowledge, between poet
and audience or between one character and another. Moreover, understanding
hwæt as a pragmatic marker similar to you know rather than as an interjection
is a recognition that, unlike an interjection, it is not “holophrastic”; that is,
it does not function as an utterance on its own, equivalent to a full sentence
(e.g., Ouch! = That hurts .) (see Lenker 2012 : 334). Rather, like a pragmatic
marker, hwæt is a comment on the following sentence (cf. Garley , Slade , and
Terkourafi 2010 ).
2.3.2.1 Comparison with You Know in Present- Day English. Because
of the presence of the second- person you and the cognitive verb know , there
is general agreement that the core function of you know is to denote common
ground or to appeal to common knowledge (e.g., Crystal and Davy 1975 : 92– 95;
Schiffrin 1978: 122; Svartvik 1979 : 176; Quirk et al. 1985 : 1482; Biber et al.
1999 : 1077; Vincent , Darbarky , and Mettouchi 2009 : 209, 210– 211; Beeching
2016 : 97– 98). By means of the you know type of marker, Svartvik argues ( 1979 :
176), “a speaker can indicate that the content ... is regarded as part of the shared,
already negotiated, common ground.” With you know , “[t] he speaker strives
toward getting the addressee to cooperate and/ or to accept the propositional con-
tent of his utterance as mutual background knowledge” (Östman 1981 : 17). For
Schourup ( 1985 : 102), you know shows that there is no discrepancy between
the private world of the speaker and the other world of the hearer in respect to
their shared world. You know “enjoins the interlocutor to share or collude in the
speaker’s opinions” and has as its core function the creation of “common ground
between speakers – or, indeed ... fi ctive common ground” (Beeching 2016 : 98).
Like all pragmatic markers, you know is multifunctional, with its function
often correlating with position.^7 Holmes ( 1986 : 9) distinguishes between the
7 Crystal and Davy ( 1975 : 92– 95) associate the position of you know with both different into-
nation patterns and different meanings. For example, you know in medial position serves as
“a fresh attempt [by the speaker] to get his meaning across, or to explain some aspect of his
meaning further,” and in fi nal position it may indicate that the speaker knows something that the
hearer does not, it may invite the hearer to agree, it might be a check on the hearer’s understand-
ing, it may have its literal force, or it may express the speaker’s irritation at his or her inability
to express himself or herself or at the hearer’s inability to comprehend (the last two meanings
are also possible in medial position).
2.3 Exclamatory Hwæt in Verse