I'd say yes: in the same way as:

     <del>this text deletes a<add>prior</add>  addition</del>

expresses that the text that had been added first has been deleted 
afterwards.

I mean, doesn't the containment of the elements imply that the semantics 
(including that expressed in attributes) is inherited? Or is the 
inheritance of attribute semantics defined per attribute?

Ron

On 6/01/2012 10:13, Sebastian Rahtz wrote:
> I suspect  I know what people will think, but let me try anyway.
>
> Does
>
>       <tei:hi rend="subscript">b,<tei:hi rend="italic">i</tei:hi></tei:hi>;
>
> mean that the inner "i" is subscripted or not?
>