No question: lexicalization and grammaticalization processes in the development of modal qualifier meanings

5. The emergence of adverb no question
The modal adverbial no question appears in the period between 1570 and 1640. Their meaning is epistemic, with this modal notion understood “not only ... from a truthfunctional point of view ... but from a rhetorical point of view” (Simon-Vandenbergen 2007: 30). The speaker certainty attaching to the propositions is variable, see-sawing between certainty, as in (31), and probability, as in (32), where modal will and in probability support a probability reading. All the adverbials have positive orientation.

(31) he will trade at sea as a merchant and hath innobled thereby that qualytye and will no question in probabilytye be much more powerfull at sea (PPCEME, 1570-1640)

(32) the most active or busie man that hath been or can bee, hath no question many vacant times of leisure (PPCEME, 1570-1640)

That the adverb emerges at this point pleads against the hypothesis of its development out of clausal structures. At that time, as shown in section 3.2, the different matrices with question did not show any specialization for negative contexts yet. In fact, there is not one single instance of a matrix containing no question before the first adverbial data. Hence, a more acceptable explanation for the adverb is a contemporaneous emergence with other adverbials containing the same noun. Without any question (33) and out of question (34) also occur for the first time between 1570 and 1640. They have a comparable meaning, signalling that the proposition they relate to is very likely or even certain.

(33) he that doth assemble Power, if the King doth command him upon his Allegiance to dissolve his Company, and he continue it, without any question it is High-Treason. (PPCEME, 1570-1640)

(34) Out of question they be innumerable which receiue helpe by going to the cunning men. (PPCEME, 1570-1640)

It therefore seems more plausible that no question, without question and out of question emerged by analogy with adverbials like no doubt, without doubt and out of doubt, as well as no way and no wonder, which are attested two to three centuries earlier in the OED and which were already entrenched in Early Modern English. They all instantiated the schema (Langacker 1999: 261-288) ‘negation + modal noun’.⁶ The presence of this set of similar adverbial constructions may well have triggered (Traugott 2008) the emergence of the adverbials with negation + question. The relations with the entrenched adverbials and amongst the various adverbials with question appear to have been complex. Without question and out of question all figure sentence-initially, while no question occurs exclusively in medial position in Early Modern English. It moved towards final position in Late Modern English, the position it typically takes in Present-day English. There are indications of a more specific relation of analogy between no doubt and no question on account of their similarity in terms of position and meaning. In Early Modern English, when no question emerged in medial position, no doubt had just moved to medial position from the initial position it occupied in Middle English, and both could convey either probability or certainty in that period (De Wolf 2010: 38).

In Present-day English, the adverbial form no question is relatively rare in comparison with the clausal structures, accounting for only 8.8 % as opposed to 91.2 % of clauses in our 250 token sample. All 22 hits in the sample are sentence-final, the position it had shifted to in Late Modern English. The majority of these examples are added as parentheticals, as in There will be changes on Saturday, no question (WB) (1). No question grants the proposition extra emphasis and in Present-day English always has the meaning of certainty, as shown by paraphrases such as absolutely or definitely.