Clitic placement and grammaticalization in Portuguese

In this paper, we argue that the architecture of grammar proposed in Distributed Morphology can shed light on the diachronic shift that has occurred in Portuguese enclisis. Employing such a view of the architecture of grammar allows us to interpret this shift as a case of grammaticalization, thus broadening the treatment of this concept in the framework of generative grammar. In Modern European Portuguese, enclitic pronouns are more affix-like than proclitic pronouns, both syntactically and phonologically. We argue that enclisis in Modern Portuguese is due to Lowering, a post-syntactic incorporation process, whereas clitics in Classical Portuguese must be displaced from the beginning of an Intonational Phrase, and as such, enclisis in this language period is a result of Prosodic Inversion.