Traces of “crystallized” conceptual metaphors in ancient Indo-European languages. The relationship of language with space and body

The paper aims at discussing some cases of metaphorical linguistic expressions in some ancient Indo-European languages, in order to show how conceptual metaphors (in the sense of Lakoff and Johnson 1980) “materialize” in certain linguistic expressions through the use of concepts such as spatiality and embodiment. Furthermore, it will be observed that in some circumstances it is possible to imagine, already for the reconstructed linguistic phase, a polysemy of certain Proto-Indo-European (PIE) roots – usually interpreted as homonymic – precisely by virtue of the metaphorical logics mentioned above. The idea of a one-to-one correspondence between form and function of a linguistic sign and that of an intrinsic “naturalness” and “transparency” will also be object of reflections, in the light of the more general linguistic change process.