Frontmatter -- Contents -- List of abbreviations -- 1 Introduction: Converbs in diachronic, typological and areal perspective Part I: Converbs in the context of linguistic families -- 2 Same origin, different outcomes. The use of converbial forms with perception verbs in Italian and in the varieties of Northern Italy 3 The origins of the Greek Genitive Absolute: Nominal, participial or both? 4 Origin and aspect of the converb in Classical Armenian 5 From clause chaining to compound verb - On morphosyntactic, control and pragmatic properties of Indo-Aryan converbs in a diachronic perspective Part II: Converbial constructions and competing construction types -- 6 From masdar to converb and beyond: The gerund from Latin to Old French 7 Suffixaufnahme and non-canonical converbs in Georgian 8 The accusative absolute and gerundial constructions in Late Latin 9 Converbs and participles: The case of Ancient Greek 10 A comparative syntax of converbs and related categories in Indo-European 11 Syntactic behavior of canonical converbs and quasi-converbs in Uzbek Part III: The diachronic typology of converbs and their source constructions -- 12 The life cycle of converbs: A diachronic typology 13 The Czech converb confronted with its French and Polish counterparts: Investigation of diachronic factors shaping the properties of converbs 14 A comparative study of non-finite verb forms with narrative-chaining function in Hindi and Italian 15 A prefixed converbal structure in colloquial Arabic Subject index -- Language index