2. THE NOUN PHRASE
1.
Noun Phrases: the basics.
2.
Nouns.
1. Noun phrases: the basics.
b. neska gazte hau
girl young this
'this young girl'
c. Bilboko zazpi gizon
Bilbo-from seven man
'seven men from
Bilbo'
d. azkarra den emakume-a
smart-the is-that woman-the
'the woman
that is smart'
(I) modifiers with the morpheme dun, which denotes a possesed entity,
(II) modifiers ending in the morpheme tar, which denote geographic origin, and
(III) modifiers without the morpheme tar which also denote geographic origin.
b. emakume diruduna
c. Gasteiztar laguna
Gasteiz-from friend-det
'the friend from
Gasteiz'
d. lagun Gasteiztarra
e. frantses liburua
French book-det
'a french book'
f. liburu frantsesa
2. Nouns.
(I) Noun phrases headed by common Nouns require Determiners, but
(II) Noun Phrases headed by proper Nouns don't occur with determiners.
2.1. Noun phrases headed by common Nouns require Determiners.
b. emakume gaztea etorri da
woman young the arrived is
'the young
woman has arrived'
2.2. Noun Phrases headed by proper Nouns cannot appear with a determiner:
b. *Irunea etorri da
Irune-det arrived is
b. Aspaldi ezagutu nuen Patxi bat
Long-ago known had-I Patxi one
'A Patxi that I knew long ago'
b. Josu Anderrik ikusi duzu?
Josu Ander-I seen have-you
'Have you
seen (any) Josu Ander?'
'Have you seen Josu Ander (at all)?'
c. Bada Garikoitzik hemen
yes-is Garikoitz-part here
'There are
Garikoitz here'
'There is (someone named) Garikoitz here'
b. Zenbait Irune
Some Irune
'Some Irune'
b. Irune gehien-ak
Irune most-thepl
'Most Irunes'
b. Irune(*rik) gehi-en-ak
Irune more-than-thepl
whereas comon nouns can optionally take the partitive marker, this is not
possible for a proper Noun in this construction.
b. Alex gaixo-a
Alex poor-det
'the poor Alex'
b. *Peru gure bat
Peru our one
'A Peru of ours'
c. gure Peru hau d. gure Peru bat
'This Peru of ours'
our Peru one
'A Peru of ours'
b. guk miresten genuen Irune gazte-a
we admiring 4E-havepst-Comp
Irune young-the
'The young Irune we admired'
2.3. Gender. There is no grammatical gender in the nominal system. The only area of Euskara grammar where gender morphology can be found is the familiar treatment in the verbal morphology. Nouns and adjectives have no distinct endings depending on gender.
3. Adjectives: Word order.
b. *zuri zaldi hau
3.1. Adjectives and their complements. Adjectives appear to have some difficulty taking syntactic complements in Euskara, that is, they do not easily take complements with which they make a separate constituent. For instance, constructions like 'a woman [proud of her work]' or 'a man [fond of his paintings]' are not possible:
b. a father proud *(of his son)
3.1.1. Participials. Participials can function as adjectives in Euskara, as the examples in (24) illustrate:
b. itsaso harrotua
sea swollen-det
'the swollen sea'
b. bere seme gudan hilei
her son war-in dead-det-D
'to her sons
dead in the war'
b. [harrak jotako] sagarra
worm-det-E
bitten-ta-ko apple-det
'the apple
eaten by the worm'
as we can see in the examples, these participial clauses have the ending
ta and to this ending the mofpheme ko is
attached. Therefore, they belong tot he class of ko
phrases, which are discussed immediately below.
4. Complements of the Noun:
4.1. 'ko' and 'ren' phrases.The morpheme ko can indicate location, and this is why it is sometimes referred to as a 'locative genitive', but as we will see location is not the only relation it can convey. However, one general guideline that is helpful in distinguishing the use of ko and ren phrases involves location: ko is attached to phrases that denote location, or phrases that denote a property. All other relations a phrase may bear with respect to a Noun are dealt with by means of the morpheme ren. Let us consider a few examples in detail. Consider first the examples in (27):
b. [margolari ezagun horren] erretratoa
painter known that-ren
portrait-det
'that (well)known painter's portrait'
b. [bihotz oneko] mutila
heart good-ko boy-det
'a good-hearted
boy'
the two examples illustrate ko phrases that convey properties which are predicated of the head Nouns, not locative relations.
b. [txoriak kabira ekarririko] abarra
bird-det-E nest-to
brought-rik-ko branch-det
'the branch brought to the nest by the bird'
4.2. Other: beste. This word, beste 'other', 'another', does not naturally fall under any of the categories we have considered so far. Distributional facts discriminate it from quantifiers, determiners and other complements of the Noun. Beste must always precede the Noun, never follow it:
b. *neska alai beste bat
girl happy other one
beste must always precede the numeral quantifier if there is one. But it seems that it can either precede or follow the ko and ren phrases.
b. amaren Bilboko beste hiru lagunak
d. beste amaren Bilboko hiru lagunak
e. *amaren Bilboko hiru beste lagunak
b. *beste [etorri den] lagun hori
b. Bilboko hiru lagun
b. beste Bilboko hiru neska
c. *hiru beste Bilboko neska
d. beste hiru Bilboko neska
b. beste hiru
other three
'another three'
c. beste hiruak
other three-detpl
'the other three'
b. *beste Bilbokoak
c. Mariren bestea
d. *beste Marirena
5. Quantifiers.
(5.1)
Numeral quantifiers;
(5.2)
Quantifiers that require a determiner;
(5.3)
Indefinite/determinerless quantifiers;
5.1. Numerals. Numeral quantifiers must appear in determinerless Noun Phrases when they are indefinite (38a), and with determiners when they are definite (38b, c). In this latter case, Noun phrases containing numeral quantifiers can accept either the determiner a or a demonstrative.
b. hiru txoriak
three bird-thepl
'the three bird'
c. hiru txori hauek
three bird thispl
'these three
bird'
b.*bat txori d. bi txori
one bird two bird
'two birds'
5.1.1. Ordinal quantifiers are built by attaching the suffix garren to the cardinal (40a,b), except for the case of 'first', which is not *batgarren but it is independently formed as lehen, lehenengo or lehendabiziko, depending on the dialect. Ordinal quantifiers always precede the Noun, even in the case of ordinals for 'first' and 'second', in all varieties of the language, as shown in examples (40c,d):
b. hirugarren leihoa
third window-the
'the third window'
c. lehenengo etxea
first house-the
'the first house'
d. bigarren leihoa
second window-the
'the second window'
5.1.2. Distributive quantifiers are built by attaching the suffix na to cardinal quantifiers: thus for instance, from sei 'six', the distributive seina 'six each' can be constructed, or from the cardinal bi 'two', the distributive bina 'two each'. Distributive quantifiers are placed wherever the cardinal they are formed upon is placed. Thus, the distributive bana 'one each', formed upon bat 'one', always follows the Noun, while seina 'six each', mentioned above, behaves like its cardinal sei and precedes the Noun:
b. musu bana
kiss one-each
'one kiss each'
(i) [NP2The women] bought [NP1three books] [NP2each]
(ii) [NP2The women] [NP2each] bought [NP1three books]
5.1.3. A partial list of numerals in Euskara. Here we provide a list of numerals in euskara, as well as instructions to construct numerals. First, let us consider the numbers up to twenty:
0 zero
1 bat
2 bi
3 hiru
4 lau
5 bost
6 sei
7
zazpi
8 zortzi
9 bederatzi
10 hamar
11 hamaika
12 hamabi
13 hamairu
14 hamalau
15 hamasei
17 hamazazpi
18
hamazortzi
19 hemeretzi
20 hogei
21 hogeita bat
22 hogeita bi...
and when we reach the munber thirty, we add twenty and ten:
30 hogeita hamar
31 hogeita hamaika...
up to number forty, which is something like 'again twenty':
41 berrogeita bat
42 berrogeita bi...
so you already know that fifty is 'forty and ten':
50 berrogeita hamar
51 berrogeita hamaika...
Now all you need to know is the numbers for sixty and eighty, which are translatable as 'three twenties' and 'four twenties', respectively:
60 irurogei
80 laurogei
So we are done up to ninety nine, which is, as you know now, laurogeita hemeretzi. Some numbers beyond this one are:
100 ehun 1.000 mila
200 berrehun 2.000 bimila
300 hirurehun 3.000
hirumila
400 laurehun 4.000 laumila...
500 bostehun 1.000.000 milioi
bat
600 seiehun 2.000.000 bi milioi/milioi bi
700 zazpiehun 3.000.000
hiru milioi
800 zortziehun
900 bederatziehun
2001 bi mila eta bat
1984 mila bederatziehun eta laurogeita lau
666
seiehun eta hirurogeita sei
77 hirurogeita hamazazpi
5.2.Quantifiers that require a determiner. The quantifiers guzti 'all', bakoitz 'each', and gehien 'most' require the presence of a determiner, as shown in (44):
b.lur guzti hau
earth all this
'all this earth'
c.*haur bakoitz hau
child each this
d.*haur bakoitz hauek
child each thispl
b. lur hau guztia
earth this all-det
'all this earth'
5.3. Determinerless quantifiers. The group of quantifiers that never take determiners is the group of indefinite quantifiers. Most of them cannot cooccur with any determiner:
b. ume asko
child many
'many children'
b. *zenbait gizon-a
some man-det
d. *ume asko-ak
child many-detpl
f. *ume asko-a
child many-det
b. irudimen gutxi
imagination little
'little imagination'
c. ikasle gutxi
students few
'few students'
d. edozein gona
whichever skirt
e. herrialde oro
country all
'all countries'
f. zenbat lagun
how many friend
'how many friends'
g. zein esku
which hand
this quantifier can occasionally take the determiner a as
well, in eastern varieties, but in this case it is not the equivalent of English
'a/the few...' but rather, a free variant of the down-entailing quantifier 'few'
illustrated in (50c).
6. Determiners.
b. [asto zahar] hau
[donkey old] this
'this old donkey'
6.1. The determiner 'a'. This determiner is also called 'article' in many descriptions of Euskara. As we will see in some detail, it is used in all environments where a definite article is required, but its usage goes well beyond the definite article, since it also heads generic and indefinite Noun Phrases, as well as some predicative phrases even when they do not contain Nouns. The determiner a appears to be the unmarked determiner, in the sense that it often surfaces in environments where other languages display determinerless Noun Phrases.
6.1.1. Definite Noun Phrases. The determiner a is used to convey definiteness, in Noun phrases containing common Nouns:
b. Euskal Herriko lehendakari-a
Basque Country-of president-the
'the president of the Basque Country'
6.1.2. Indefinite environments. There are many other
syntactic environments where this determiner is used despite the fact that the
phrase it heads is not definite. Among those cases we find the following:
6.1.2.1. Atributes. Many predicative atributes in Euskara require the determiner a. Predicates in copular sentences like the ones in (54), for instance, require the determiner a:
b.Miren irakasle-a da
Miren teacher-det is
'Miren is a teacher'
c.liburu hau interesgarri-a iruditzen zait
book this interesting-det
seems is-to me
'This book seems interesting to me'
6.1.2.2. Generic sentences always require the determiner a, whether their subjects are singular or plural:
b.Txakurr-ak ugaztun-ak dira
dog-detpl
mammal-detpl are
'Dogs are mammals'
6.1.2.3. Indefinite objects and subjects, which can often appear determinerless in many languages, also require the determiner a:
b.Zuek sagarr-ak jan dituzue
You-E apple-detpl eaten
have-you
'You have eaten apples'
c.Kamioi-ak etorri dira
truck-detpl arrived are
'Trucks have arrived'
6.1.2.4. Existential or presentational sentences, which involve an indefinite subject, bear the determiner a:
b.Badira sagu-ak etxe honetan
yes-are mouse-detpl house
this-in
'There are mice in this house'
6.2. Demonstratives. There are three demonstratives, hau 'this', hori 'that' and hura 'that (further)'. The demonstratives indicate varying degrees of proximity in either real or figurative space or time. Thus, hau is closer to the speaker, hori is closer to the entity addressed, and hura is not close to any of them.
zuhaitz hau 'this tree'
zuhaitz hori
'that tree'
zuhaitz hura 'that tree (farther)'
zuhaitz hauek 'these trees'
zuhaitz
horiek 'those trees'
zuhaitz haiek 'those trees
(farther)'
6.2.1. Emphatic demonstratives. Demonstratives have an emphatic form, which is constructed adding the morpheme xe, as shown in (59):
b. horixe esan dut nik
that-xe said have-I I-E
'that (is what) I
have said'
c. zuhaitz huraxe da aititek landatu zuena
tree that-xe is
grandfather-E planted had-that
'It is that tree that
grandfather planted'
there is a certain degree of variation among dialects regarding whether the morpheme xe is added before or after the case ending or the postposition if there is one, with the exception of ergative and genitive, where the morpheme is always inserted after the demonstrative but before the case ending:
b. honexen/horrexen/harexen arraina da freskuena
this-xe-gen/that-xe-gen/that-xe-gen fish is freshest-det
'this
one's/that one's/ fish is the freshest
b. hon-i-xe erosi diot arraina
this-D-xe bought have fish-det
'(it is) to this one (that) I have bought the fish'
6.2.2. Demonstratives used as pronouns. There are no distinct forms for third person pronouns in Euskara, and demonstratives are used as third person pronominals.
b. bera etorri da
that arrived is
'she/he/it arrived'
c. hark ikusi nau
that-E seen me-has
'she/he has seen me'
(I) if the antecendent and the demonstrative are in the same sentence, bera must be used, and not hura
(II) if the antecedent and the demonstrative are not in the same sentence, eastern varieties prefer hura whereas western varieties prefer bera if the antecedent has been mentioned. This western usage has two exceptions:
(a) if the sentence containing bera contains another Noun phrase that could count as its antecedent, hura is preferred even if its antecedent has beenmentioned previously in another sentence;
(b) if the antecedent of the demonstrative belongs to a group that has been mentioned.
7. Number.
7.1. Number and Determiners. The specification for number in the Noun Phrase belongs in the Determiner category and it is morfologically inseparable from it. Therefore, determinerless Noun Phrases cannot be marked for number even if they are semantically plural (63c). Only Noun Phrases that are headed by an overt determiner can have plural marking on them (63 b,d).
b. txakurr-ak d. lau txakurr-ak
dog-detpl four
dog-detpl
'the dogs' 'the four dogs'
7.2. Proximity plural determiner ok. The plural determiner ak has the variant ok, which indicates proximity in real or imaginary space or time. Thus, for instance, it is often used as the determiner of a vocative Noun phrase that refers to the audience addressed, for its proximity to the speaker:
b. egun-o-tan ez dugu berririk jaso
day-detpl-in not
have-we new-prt received
'we have not received news these days'
8. Pronouns.
8.1. Person pronouns. The basic paradigm of personal pronouns is the following:
8.1.1. Emphatic person pronouns. There is a second series of emphatic personal pronouns that can be used alone or following a basic person pronoun. The emphatic pronouns have different forms depending on the variety of Euskara:
emphatic of ni: neu,
nerau, nihaur.
emphatic of
hi: heu, herori,
hihaur.
emphatic of zu:
zeu, zerori, zuhaur.
emphatic of gu: geu,
gerok, guhaur.
emphatic of
zuek: zeuek, zerok,
zuihauk.
(I) they are used alone when the pronoun is the galdegaia of the sentence, especially if it is used contrastively (72)
b. zeuk agindu duzu
you ordered have
'you have ordered it'
b.*ez dun heuk ekarri
not have you-emph-E brought
(II) Emphatic pronouns are also used in other contrastive environments, typically in topic functions, even if they are not the galdegaia of the sentence, as in (74). When immediately following a normal pronoun they also constitute topics, equivalents of English 'as for me', as shown in (74b).
b. nik neuk, ez dakit zer egin
I-E I-emph-E not know what do
'as
for me, I don't know what to do'
Emphatic pronouns cannot be used as vocatives:
b. hi mutil, erdu hona!
'you boy, come here!'
8.2. Interrogative pronouns. Interrogative pronouns are used to construct partial questions. Here, we present the basic list of interrogative pronouns:
nor 'who'
zein 'which'
zer 'what'
nor nori nork
who who-dative who-ergative
zer zeri zerk
what what-dative what-ergative
zein zeini zeinek
which which-dative which-ergative
nor-en zer-tan zein-etatik
who-gen what-in which-from
'whose' 'in what' 'from which'
8.3. Indefinite pronouns derived from interrogatives. There
are several paradigms of indefinite pronouns that are formed taking the
interrogative pronoun as a base.
8.3.1. Existential indefinites. They are formed by adding
the morpheme bait: norbait 'someone',
zerbait 'something', nonbait 'somewhere'... in
western varieties, these are formed by repeating the interrogative and inserting
the conjunctive edo 'or': nor edo nor
'someone', zer edo zer 'something', non edo
non 'somewhere'.
8.3.2. Universal, free-choice indefinites. There are two ways to construct them:
(a) in western varieties, they are derived by prefixing edo to the interrogative: edonor 'whoever', edozer, 'whatever', edozein, 'whichever', edonon 'wherever' etc...
(b) in eastern varieties, they are derived by suffixing nahi to the interrogative pronoun: nornahi 'whoever', zernahi 'whatever', zeinhai 'whichever', nonahi 'wherever' etc...
b. edozer eros daiteke diru horrekin
anything buy can-be money
that-with
'anything can be bought with that money'
c. edonon aurkitzen dira bedar hauek
anywhere find-hab are grass
these
'these grass can be found anywhere'
8.3.3. Negative Polarity Items. They are formed by prefixing e or i to the interrogative pronoun:
inor anybody
ezer anything
inon anywhere
and they can be declined for case, or take postpositions in the same fashion that simple interrogatives do. Negative Polarity Items can only appear under the scope of downward entailing operators such as negation (77a) (Ladusaw (1979)), quantifiers such as gutxi 'few' (77b), conditionals (77c), and yes/no questions (77d), for instance:
b. ikasle gutxik ikasi dute ezer
student few-E learned have anything
'Few students have learned anything'
c. inon aurkitzen baduzu, harrituko naiz
anywhere find-hab
if-have-you, surprise-irr am
'if you find it anywhere, I will be
surprised'
d. inork ekarriko al du?
anyone-E bring-irr int has
'Will anyone
bring it?'
b. *zoriona inon dago
happiness-det anywhere is
b. inork esango luke erregearen alaba zarela!
anyone say-irr would
king-det-gen daughter-det are-that
'Anyone would say that you are the
king's daughter'
8.3.4. Plural Interrogatives. In western varieties mostly, interrogative pronouns can take the plural morpheme tzu to indicate plurality. The reader is invited to read again the considerations made regarding the relationship between number and the determiner class. Given what was said there, the presence of a plural morpheme that can be attached to interrogatives strengthens the hypothesis that determiners and pronouns in general constitute a natural class in Euskara.
nor 'who' nortzu 'who (plural)'
zer 'what' zertzu 'what (plural)'
zein 'which' zeintzu 'which (plural)'
8.4. Anaphors and reciprocals. Strictly speaking, there are no anaphoric pronouns in Euskara. Anaphors pronouns in Euskara, like in many other languages of the world, make reference to a body part. In the case of Euskara, the body part is the head. Hence, 'my own head' is the translation of the Noun phrase corresponding to English 'myself'. The anaphor is thus a determiner phrase headed by the determiner a. The determiner phrase contains a Noun phrase, headed by the Noun buru 'head'. This Noun phrase contains a genitive phrase which contains the relevant personal pronoun. This 'russian doll' structure is illustrated in (81):
[DP[NP[PP[DPpronoun]genitive] noun] determiner]
neure burua myself
heure burua
yourself
bere burua her/himself
geure
burua(k) ourselves
zeuen burua(k) yourselves
bere burua(k) themselves
b. Anek eta Jonek batak bestea maite dute
Ane-E and Jon-E one-det-E
other-det love have
'Ane and Jon love each other'
b. Ane eta Jon elkarrekin bizi dira
Ane and Jon each-other-with live
are
'Ane and Jon live with each other'
b. Jonek bere buruari hitz egiten dio sarri
Jon-E himself-D word
make-hab has-it-him often
'Jon often talks to himself'
b. bere buruari hitz egiten dio Jonek sarri
himself-D word make-hab
has-it-him Jon-E often
'Jon often talks to himself'
b. gu elkarrekin etorri gara
we each-other-with arrived are
'we
have arrived together (with each other)'
b. neure buruak agintzen dit zer egin eta zer ez
my-own head-E
order-hab has-me-it what do and what not
'My own self orders me what to
do and what not (to do)'
(i) gazte jentea
young people
'the young people'