3. CASES AND POSTPOSITIONS
1. Grammatical cases: the basics.
1.1. Absolutive case. Let us start with the case that seems easiest; the absolutive, also called the null case, or the unmarked case. A Noun phrase bears absolutive case under two conditions:
(II) if it is the object of a verb that takes at least two arguments, that
is, if it is the object of a transitive verb, as shown in (2b).
(2)
b. ehiztariak otsoa harrapatu du
hunter-det-E wolf-det caught has
'the hunter has caught a/the wolf'
Vocatives also take absolutive case, or at least they do not take any other visible case ending:
b. Eskerrik asko, alkate andrea!
thanks many mayor lady-det!
'Thank you, (lady) major!'
1.2. Ergative case. The morpheme for ergative case is, as we have seen, k. If the word it attaches to ends in a consonant, then an epenthetic vowel e is inserted, as illustrated in (4):
b. zazpi gizonek
seven man-E
'seven man (ergative)'
b. etxeko txakurrak ikusi gaitu
house-of dog-det-E seen us-has
'the dog of the house has seen us'
c. Mirenen anaiek ez dakite kanta hau
Miren-gen
brother-detpl-E not know song this
'Miren's brothers don't
know this song'
b. urak irakin du
water-det-E boiled has
'the water has boiled'
c. langileak lanean dihardu
worker-det-E work-in engages
'the
worker is (engaged in) work(ing)'
1.3. Dative case. The morpheme for the dative case is i. If it attaches to a base ending in a vowel, an epenthetic r is inserted. Consider the following examples:
b. etxeko txakurrari hezur bat eman diozu
house-of dog-det-D bone one
given have-it-you
'You have given a bone to the dog of the house'
c. Mirenen anaiei oparia ekarri diezu
Miren-gen
brother-detpl present-det brought have- them-you
'You have
brought a present to Miren's brothers'
b. Mikelek zezenari adarretatik eutsi dio
Mikel-E bull-det-D
horn-detpl-from held has-it-him
'Mikel held the bull from the
horns'
c. sugeak txoriari begiratu dio
snake-det-E bird-det-D look-at
has-it-it
'the snake has looked at the bird'
2. Partitive case.
2.1. Partitive as a polar determiner. Let us start our
discussion with a few examples of partitive case. In particular, we will
consider the example sentence in (9) in contrast to the example sentences in (7).
b. etxeko txakurrari hezurrik eman diozu?
house-of dog-det-D bone-prt
given have-it-you
'Have you given any bone to the dog of the house?'
c. Mirenen anaiei oparirik ekarri badiezu
Miren-gen
brother-detpl present-prt brought if-have- them-you
'If you
have brought any present to Miren's brothers'
(I) the first difference is that whereas the sentences in (9) are all
declarative, the sentences in (7) are negative (7a), interrogative (7b) and conditional (7c). What these three
have in common is that they are all downward
entailing environments.
(II) The second difference is that the objects of the three sentences in (9) do not have the same endings as the sentences in (7): whereas in (7a) and (7c) the object bears the determiner a, and in (7b) the object has the numeral bat 'one', in (9) they all have the partitive ending ik (with the epenthetic consonant r inserted in (7c)). Correlating with this difference in morphology, the meaning of the object has changed too, as the translations reflect.
dog-det-D bone-prt given have-it-I
b. *dirurik eskatu dut kalean
money-prt asked have-I street-in
yes-is bread-prt house this-in
'there is bread in this house'
b. bada zorionik munduan
yes-is happiness-prt world-in
'there is hapiness in the world
2.2. Partitive and absolutive. As it has been mentioned in
the introductory paragraph to this section, Noun phrases carrying the partitive
marker must meet the conditions for absolutive case assignment. That is, they
have to be either objects of transitive verbs, or subjects of intransitive
verbs. Consider (14), which consists of the negative versions of the examples
in (2):
b. ehiztariak ez du otsorik harrapatu
hunter-det-E not has wolf-prt
caught
'the hunter hasn't caught any wolf'
c. *ehiztaririk ez du otsorik/otsoa harrapatu
hunter-prt not has
wolf-prt/wolf-det caught
(I) either the partitive itself is a subvariety of absolutive case, and
this would account why it cannot be placed where other cases are required, or
(II) the partitive is not a variety of a case, but a type of determiner, which is incompatible with any overt case ending, and it can only appear in environments of absolutive case because this is the only case with no ending.
3. Postpositions.
3.1. Declension versus agglutination. Many descriptions of
Euskara state that Euskara has nominal declensions, and they
provide paradigms for them. We will not follow this practice here, since it is
by now agreed that the concept of declension is rather
misleading in order to describe the language. Euskara works more like a child's
construction game: phrases are constructuted by attaching elements, typically at
the end of the previous phrase. This way of constructing phrases by attaching
morphemes is known as agglutination. Euskara is therefore and
agglutinative language. We have seen in chapter 2 that
agglutination is the strategy for constructing Noun phrases. The same strategy
is used to mark these Noun phrases with a grammatical case, as shown above, and
this strategy is maintained when building postpositional phrases. Let us
consider a couple of examples:
b. [zazpi leiho]tatik
[seven window]from
'from seven windows'
3.2. Changes induced by morpheme merger. In some cases, the
merger of the last word of the Noun phrase and the postposition suffers
phonological processes that result in an output that is different from the mere
conjunction of the two words. we have already seen examples of this in our
discussion of examples (1b) and (7c), involving dative case.
(I) The plural
determiner ak becomes e when a
postposition follows it. Thus, for instance, the plural
lagunak and the instrumental postposition z
yield the form lagunez, where the change is
ak > e.
(II) When a merger involves a vowel-ending word and a vowel-initial postposition, te epenthetic consonant r is inserted. Recall the discussion of (1b) and (7c)
(III) When a merger involves a consonant-ending word and a consonant-initial postposition, the epenthetic vowel e is inserted. Thus, for instance, the combination of the Noun mutur 'snout, mouth' and the instrumental postposition z yields the form muturrez 'with the mouth (downward)'. It must be kept in ind that the dipthong au counts as a consonant in this respect: gau 'night' also becomes gauez after the addition of the instrumental postposition.
3.3. Locational postpositions. They involve postpositions whose function is to place their complement in some relation with space or time. The locational postpositions are six:
1. locative n 'in/on'
2. directional
ra 'to'
3. directional towards rantz
'towards'
4. directional (endpoint) raino 'up to'
5.
origin tik 'from'
6. genitive locative
ko 'of'
3.3.1. Animacy: the morpheme ga. Locational postpositions
differentiate between phrases headed by animate Nouns, and phrases headed by
inanimate Nouns. When a locational postposition takes an animate Noun phrase as
its complement, the morpheme ga is placed between the Noun
phrase and the postposition, as shown in (17):
b. adiskide leial-a-ga-n
friend loyal-det-ga-in
'in/on the/a
loyal friend'
c. adiskide leial-en-ga-n
friend loyal-detpl+gen-ga-in
'in/on (the) loyal friends'
b. bere burutazioetan murgildurik dago
her/his
thoughts-detpl-in immersed is
's/he is immersed in her/his
thoughts'
c. etxe hauek elkarrengandik hurbilegi daude
house these
each-other-gen-ga-from near-too are
'these houses are too near each
other'
b. alabetan bihurriena, neure Matxalen duzu
daughter-inpl
naughtiest, my Matxalen have-you
'of all daughters, the naughtiest is my
Matxalen'
(literally: 'in daughters, the naughtiest you have my
Matxalen')
3.3.2. Singular determiners versus others: the morpheme ta.
There is a second distinctive property of locational postpositions. Among
inanimate phrases, they distinguish those that have a singular determiner from
those that do not. Noun phrases that do not have a singular determiner must
carry the morpheme ta before the postposition. Let us see this
by means of an example. We will compare an inanimate phrase with a singular
determiner (21a), with another one that does not have a singular determiner
(21b):
b. [hiru argazki]ta-n
[three photo]ta-in
'in three photos'
b. Pirinioko mendi-o-ta-n
Pyrenees-of mountain-detpl-ta-in
'In the(se) mountains of the Pyrenees'
c. liburu zahar haue-ta-n
book old these-ta-in
'in these old
books'
3.4. Other postpositions. In what follows, we will list the
remaining postpositions, providing examples and stating, when necessary, what
changes may happen the merger of the postposition and the Noun phrase.
b. zazpi zapirekin
seven handkerchief-with
'with seven
handkerchiefs'
c. zenbait gizonekin
some men-with
'with some men'
d. Gasteizko lagunekin
Gasteiz friend-detpl-with
'with
the friends form Gasteiz'
b. hamaika oharrez jositako liburua
eleven note-ins sewed book-det
'a book full of notes'
(literally: 'a book sewed with eleven notes')
c. Bizkaiko mendiez mintzatu gara
Biscay-from
mountain-detpl-ins spoken are-we
'we have spoken of the
mountains of Biscay'
b. arrazoi birengatik ukatu didate dirulaguntza
reason
two-gen-because denied have-me-they grant-det
'they have denied the
grant to me because of two reasons'
c. gure adiskideengatik egingo dugu
our
frien-detpl-gen-because do-irr have-we
'we will do it for our
friends'
4. Goal entzat 'for': the usual epenthetic processes
apply when necessary.
b. bost mutilentzat dira mozorro horiek
five boy-for are costume
those
'those costumes are for five boys'
c. gure familiako umeentzat egingo dugu jaia
our family-from
child-detpl-for do-irr have-we party-det
'we will have a
party for the children in our family'