1. THE SENTENCE
0. Basic
elements in the sentence: a few examples
1. Order of phrases in the
sentence.
0. Basic elements of the sentence: a few examples.
b. The auxiliary verb carries the inflection, which in this case is specified for present tense, third person object, third person dative and third person subject. The subject gizona is marked for ergative case (morpheme k), the dative phrase is marked for dative case (morpheme i) and the object is marked for absolutive case (morpheme zero). The word order in (1c) is neutral.
1. Order of phrases in the sentence.
1.0. Neutral word order.
where the locative phrase San Martin kalean 'in San Martin
street', follows the ver
b. This is a possible word order if, as noted by the EGLU grammar, we get home and want to provide this information, which is entirely new to our listeners. In this case, we would be implicitely answering the question zer gertatu da? 'what happened?', which triggers neutral word order in the sentence, because the entire sentence is informationally relevant in this case.
1.1. Euskara is a free word order language.
b. umea erori da kalean
c. kalean erori da umea
b. erori da kalean umea
b. kalean du emakumeak gizona ikusiko
'It is in the street that the
woman will see the man'
c. *du emakumeak kalean gizona ikusiko
b. *erori umea da kalean
fallen child-the-A is street-in
c. *erori kalean da umea
d. *erori umea kalean da
1.2. Galdegaia: The informationally relevant phrase.
and all the word order variations in (10) would be felicitous answers to the question asked:
b. liburua eman dio umeari gizonak -
c. gizonak umeari, liburua eman dio
d. umeari gizonak, liburua eman dio
e. gizonak liburua eman dio umeari
f. umeari liburua eman dio gizonak
All the sentences in (10) have two common properties:
(II) The element providing the information requested is pronounced in the same phonological phrase as the verbal complex, without a break.
2. Absent phrases.
b. gizonak liburua eman dio
man-the-E book-the given has
'the man
gave a book (to someone)'
c. gizonak umeari eman dio
man-the-E man-the-D given has
'the man
gave (something) to the child'
2.1. In infinitival sentences.
b. [gizonari liburua ematea] nahi du umeak
man-the-D book-the
give-inf want has child-the-E
'The child wants [(someone) to give the
book to the man]'
c. [liburua ematea] nahi du umeak
book-the give-inf want has
child-the-E
'The child wants [(someone) to give the book (to someone)]'
d. [ematea] nahi du umeak
give-inf want has child-the-E
'The
child wants [(someone) to give (something)(to someone)]'
2.2. Absent phrases and galdegaia.
this sentence contains a second person singular pronoun zuk 'you' as subject. The pronoun agrees with the auxiliary, by means of the morpheme zu 'second person' that appears at the end of the inflected auxiliary. Now, if the relevant information of the sentence were the place where the event took place, we would be implicitely answering the question in (18a), and thus (18b) would be a felicitous answer, because the phrase kalean 'in the street' occupies the preverbal position, the galdegaia position:
b. kalean ikusi duzu umea
street-in seen have-you child-the-A
'you have seen the child in the street'
in (18b), the subject pronoun need not be manifest. It can be omitted. The object umea 'the child' need not be manifest either, although the example has chosen to express it. The relevant piece of information in (18b), the answer to (18a), is the phrase kalean 'in the street'. Now suppose we were asking who saw the child, as all the possible questions illustrated in (19) do:
b. nork ikusi du kalean umea?
c. umea kalean nork ikusi du?
d. kalean umea nork ikusi du?
e. nork ikusi du kalean?
f. kalean nork ikusi du?
the last two examples, (19e, f) would be felicitous if we knew that we were talking about a certain child. The answers to (19) must include an overtly expressed phrase corresponding to the entity that saw the child. In the case we are considering, the felicitous answers must include the second person pronoun zu 'you', as the examples in (20) show:
b. zuk ikusi duzu kalean umea
c. umea kalean zuk ikusi duzu
d. kalean umea zuk ikusi duzu
e. zuk ikusi duzu kalean
f. kalean zuk ikusi duzu
it would be totally unfelicitous to reply with sentences such as the ones in (21). The symbol # indicates that the sentence is a possible one in other situations, but is not felicitous as an answer to (21):
b. #ikusi duzu umea kalean
c. #umea kalean ikusi duzu
d. #kalean umea ikusi duzu
e. #umea ikusi duzu kalean
f. #kalean ikusi duzu umea
g. #ikusi duzu umea
h. #ikusi duzu kalean
i. #umea ikusi duzu
j. #kalean ikusi duzu
k. #ikusi duzu
2.3. Absent pronouns.
there are two absent pronouns in this sentence: the first person pronoun that is the subject of the sentence, and the second person pronoun that is the recipient of the present. They are manifest in the agreement morphology, as noted in the glosses: the morpheme t stands for the first person pronoun 'I', and the morpheme zu stands for the second person pronoun 'you'. The sentence in (22) is felicitous used as the beggining of a conversation, for example if I were entering your appartment for a visit. In this context, the entire sentence is informationally relevant, and the appropriate form is the one with the absent pronouns.
the only difference between (22) and (23) is the presence of the
first person pronoun ni 'I' in the second example. Note that
the pronoun could not be the galdegaia of the sentence, since
it does not appear immediately preceding the ver
b. This sentence would be felicitous if, for example, there were other people who had come or would come to visit, and I wanted to say something like 'as for me, I have brought you a present', in a situation where someone else might have just shown up to wish you good luck, or to do your groceries, or to tidy up your place... what (23) conveys in that case is that what I am doing is bringing you a present.
3.Types of sentences.
3.1. Declarative sentences.
3.2. Negative sentences.
b. emakumea ez dator
woman-the not come
'the woman is not coming'
The negation word ez is written separate from the inflected auxiliary or verb, but it is phonologically part of it and they cannot be separated by any other phrase. The only other elements that can appear between the negation word and the inflected verb are certain particles, such as omen, bide 'uncertain truth value' and ohi 'habituality', or the interrogative particles ote and al, as shown in (23):
b. emakumea ez bide da etorri
'apparently, the woman has not arrived'
c. emakumea ez ohi da etortzen
'the woman does not usually arrive'
d. ez ote dator emakumea?
'is the woman perhaps not coming?
e. emakumea ez al dator?
'is the woman not coming?'
3.2.1. Negation and word order.
b. emakumea ez da etorri
woman-the not is arrived
'the woman
hasn't arrived'
c. *emakumea etorri ez da
b. Finally, the ungrammatical example in (24c) shows that the order available ind eclarative sentences is not available in negative ones. Word orders like the one in (24c) are possible and sometimes obligatory in embedded negative sentences, and exclamative negative sentences, as the examples in (25) illustrate:
b. emakumea etorri ez bada
woman-the arrived not if-is
'if the
woman has not arrived'
c. etorriko ez da ba!
arrive-irr not is indeed
'will (she) not
come!'
(of course she will come!)
b.
a, e, i, o, u,
a, e, i, o, u,
ama meriendea biogu
mommy a snack we
need
txokolatea eta opiltxu
chocolate and
bread
bestelan eskolan ikasiko ez dogu
otherwise in school
learn not will we
b. This is illustrated in the examples in (26), where we use the negative version of sentence (1b) for illustration:
b. ez du emakumeak gizona ikusi
c. ez du gizona emakumeak ikusi
d. ez du emakumeak ikusi gizona
e. ez du gizona ikusi emakumeak
f. gizona ez du emakumeak ikusi
g. emakumeak gizona ez du ikusi
h. gizona emakumeak ez du ikusi
i. ez du ikusi emakumeak gizona
j. ez du ikusi gizona emakumeak
b. Any number of phrases can intervene between the negated auxiliary and the main verb, in any order (26a, b, c, d). Any number of phrases can precede the negated auxiliary, in any order (26a, f, g, h). Any number of phrases can follow the negated auxiliary, in any order (26d, e, i, j).
3.2.2. Negation and galdegaia.
There appear to be two galdegaia sites in negative sentences:
(I) one site follows the negated auxiliary or verb,
(II) the other one immediately precedes it. Let us consider them one at a time.
in this example, what is conveyed is that 'it is not the man that the woman has seen', and thus it is very naturally followed by an explanation that states what the woman has seen, as in (28):
in this position, the phrase is under the scope of negation, and negation and focus can be associated, yielding a contrastive reading.
a natural answer to this question is the sentence in (30):
where the phrase answering the question immediately precedes the negated auxiliary. This phrase must be pronounced with some stress and within the same phonological phrase as the negated auxiliary, as in the case of galdegaia in declarative sentences. In (30), there is no contrastive reading; what the sentence conveys is akin to 'it is Irune that I have not seen'. We may therefore say that this second galdegaia position is outside the scope of negation.
3.3. Interrogative sentences.
3.3.1. Yes/no questions.
b. etorri da emakumea?
both interrogatives are possible yes/no questions.
b. emakumea etorri al da?
3.3.2. Partial questions.
b. Nork ikusi du gizona?
Who-E seen has man-the
'who has seen the
man?'
c. Gizonak nori eman dio liburua?
man-the-E who-D given has book-the
'to whom has the man given the book?'
these question parallel the examples provided in (6) above.
3.4. Causative sentences are formed with the causative verb arazi (or eragin, in western varieties of the language), which is attached to the caused verb, as illustrated in the pair in (35):
b. irakasleak emakumeari liburua irakurrarazi dio
teacher-det-E woman-det-D book-det read-cause has
'The teacher has
made the woman read the book'
b. emakumeak umea etorrarazi du
woman-det-E child-det come-made has
'The woman has made the child come'
c. emakumeak umeari etorrarazi dio
woman-det-E child-det come-made
has
'The woman has made the child come'
3.5. Impersonal sentences in euskara are constructed by simply elliminating the ergative subject argument of a transitive sentence. The resulting sentence contains only the absolutive object phrase. This is illustrated in the pair in (37):
b. etxeak saltzen dira
house-detpl sell-impf are
'Houses are sold'