The paper addresses the question of how context enters conventional linguistic patterning and becomes part of the codified relationship between meaning and form in a given expression. Through a corpus-based investigation of textual material, the study focuses on the development of a particular set of participial expressions in Old Czech over the period of about 300 years. This chronological stretch allows us to capture both the synchronic variation for any given generation of speakers and the overall diachronic change. The discussion of theoretical issues is grounded in a Frame Semantic approach to meaning.
