Evidentiality and epistemic modality in witness testimony in the context of Italian criminal trials

Languages without grammatical evidentiality, such as Italian, often express the category of ‘information source’ using linguistic means that involve interactions between evidentiality and epistemic modality. This paper aims to investigate such interactions in the linguistic strategies adopted by various players in a criminal trial situation. In the context of a trial, both the expression of the source of information and the variation in the degree of the speakers’ commitment to what they are saying are key factors. This study is based on an analysis of one inferential and one reportive strategy in Italian, as they occur in the legal testimonies given in two different Italian trials. We will also discuss the rhetorical effects related to the underlying ambiguities between a purely evidential and an evidential/epistemic reading of the investigated strategies.