Predicative use of noun prepositional form “za + accusative” in history of the Russian language

The article discusses the predicative use of the noun prepositional-case form “za + accusative” in structures with semicopulative verbs in the Russian language of the XVIII-XIXth centuries. In the first half of the XVIIIth century this prepositional-case form is often found in structures with semicopulative verbs, expressing a shade of doubt used as a means of expressing modus. Its widespread use was due to the small spread of predicative instrumental case of the noun in predicative structures with semicopulative verbs. Since the mid XVIIIth century the instrumental case of the noun had quickly been replaced by the form “za + accusative”. The possibility of such replacement was due to the fact that the predicative instrumental case of the noun, displacing the predicative nominative case, allowed to express a wider range of predicate values associated with other values of the instrumental case, in particular, the value of comparison, the value of method and mode of action, which are close to the semantics of the prepositional-case form “za + accusative”. The replacement of the prepositional-case form “za + accusative” with the predicative instrumental case of the noun was proceeding till the XIXth century. The result of that process was the restriction of the predicative use of the form “za + accusative” with a very small circle of copulas ( slyt’, proslyt’, schitat’sya, pochitat’sya, pokazat’sya ). Cessation of using the prepositional-case form as part of the nominal predicate proceeded differently in combination with different semicopulative verbs: first of all, in the middle of the XVIIIth century the form stopped be used in constructions with copular verb sluzhit’-posluzhit’ ; the longest time it was kept in structures with semicopulative verbs meaning common opinion ( schitat’sya, pochitat’sya, polagat’sya, razumet’sya, chislit’sya, etc.). The latter was due to the fact that during the XVIIIth century semicopulative verbs with the meaning of common opinion were very often combined with various prepositional-case forms of the noun. In contemporary Russian the prepositional-case form “za + accusative” is a stylistic device that makes an utterance colloquial, archaic or ironic.