Cover not available

Article published In: A micro-perspective on Verb Second in Romance and Germanic
Edited by Christine Meklenborg Salvesen
[Linguistic Variation 19:1] 2019
► pp. 47–81

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
authorization required

More than one way out

On the factors influencing the loss of V to C movement

 | Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main
Published online: 24 September 2019
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/lv.16001.pol
Abstract
In this article I will show that there is not a single diachronic path that leads to the loss of the verb second property so that different languages can have different ways towards a non V2 grammar. I will also show that the progressive loss of subject inversion contexts is not the only factor that played a role in the change, because there are V2 languages in which nominal subject inversion was never attested but they are still V2, i.e. they have I to C movement. I will identify various factors which may play a role and are related to the type of verb second found in different languages. I will consider various types of factors and show that they can play a role or not in the loss of V2 depending on the type of V2 that the language displays. I will also identify an additional factor that has not been considered in the literature namely the type of complementizer system: a change in this area can contribute to destabilizing the V2 grammar.
Article outline
  • 1.Setting the problem
  • 2.V2 types
    • 2.1Combining with V2 and the split left periphery
    • 2.2The loss of V2: From Old to Renaissance Italian
    • 2.3What subject inversion tells us
  • 3.A wider perspective
    • 3.1Cimbrian
    • 3.2Plodarisch
    • 3.3The complex picture
  • 4.Old Italian
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
References (71)
References
Adams, Marianne. 1987. ‘From Old French to the Theory of pro-drop’, Natural Language and Linguistic Theory 51: 1–32. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Alber, Birgit. 1994. Indizi per l’esistenza di uno split-CP nelle lingue germaniche. In: G. Borgato (ed.), Teoria del linguaggio e analisi linguistica. XX Incontro di grammatica generativa, 3–23. Padova: Unipress.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Anderssen, Merete & Westergaard, Marit. 2010. Frequency and Economy in the Acquisition of Variable Word Order. Lingua: 2569–2588. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Belletti, Adriana. 2004. ‘Aspects of the low IP area’, In Luigi Rizzi (ed.), The Structure of CP and IP: The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, 16–51. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. The CP of clefts. Rivista di Grammatica Generativa 331. 191–204.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2013. Revisiting the CP of Clefts. In Günther Grewendorf & Thomas Ede Zimmermann: Discourse and Grammar. From Sentence Types to Lexical Categories, 91–114. Berlin: de Gruyter.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Benincà, Paola. 2006. A detailed map of the left periphery of Medieval Romance. In Raffaella Zanuttini (ed.), Crosslinguistic research in syntax and semantics: Negation, tense and clausal architecture, 53–86. Georgetown: Georgetown University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Benincà, Paola and Cecilia Poletto. 2004. Topic, Focus and V2: defining the CP sublayers. In Luigi Rizzi (ed.), The Structure of CP and IP: The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, 52–75. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bocci, Giuliano & Cecilia Poletto. 2016. Syntactic and Prosodic Effects of Information Structure in Romance. In Caroline Féry and Shinichiro Ishihara (eds), in Handout of Information structure, 642–662. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bidese, Ermenegildo. 2008. Die diachronische Syntax des Zimbrischen. Tuebingen: Günter Narr Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bidese, Ermenegildo & Alessandra Tomaselli. 2007. The loss of V2 phenomena in Cimbrian. Linguistische Berichte 2101. 209–228.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bidese, Ermenegildo, Andrea Padovan & Alessandra Tomaselli. 2013. Linguistische Berichte. Sonderheft 19.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2012. A binary system of complementizers in Cimbrian relative clauses. Working Papers in Scandinavian Syntax 901. 1–21.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Bosco, Ilaria. 1999. Christlike unt korze dottrina. Un’analisi sintattica della lingua cimbra del XVII secolo. Padova: Padova University dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cecchetto, Carlo. 2001. Proper Binding Condition Effects are Phase Impenetrability Condition Effects. In: Kim Minjoo &Uri Strauss, Proceedings of NELS 31, GLSA, University of Massachusetts, Amherst.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cocchi, G., and C. Poletto. 2007. Complementizer deletion and complementizer doubling, in C. Picchi and A. Pona (eds.), Proceedings of the XXXII Incontro di Grammatica generativa, Quaderni del Dipartimento di Linguistica – Università di Firenze, 49–62. Alessandria: Ed. dell’Ors.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Costa, João. 2001. The Emergence of Unmarked Word Order. In Geraldine Legendre, Jane Grimshaw, and Sten Vikner (eds), Optimality- Theoretic Syntax, 171–203. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cruschina, Silvio. 2011. Discourse-Related Features and Functional Projections. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fuss, Eric. 2003. On the historical core of V2 in Germanic. Nordic Journal of Linguistics 261. 195–231. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. Word order and language change. On the interface between syntax and morphology. Habilitationsschrift, Universität Frankfurt.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Giorgi, Alessandra & Fabio Pianesi. 1997. Tense and aspect: from semantics to morphosyntax. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Grewendorf, Günther & Cecilia Poletto. 2011. Hidden verb second: The case of Cimbrian. In Michael T. Putnam (ed.), Studies on German-Language islands, 301–46. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Grewendorf, Günther. 2008. The Left Clausal Periphery: Clitic Left Dislocation in Italian and Left Dislocation in German. In Benjamin Shaer, Philippa Cook, Werner Frey, and Claudia Maienborn (eds), Dislocated Elements in Discourse: Syntactic, Semantic, and Pragmatic Perspectives, 49–94. London: Routledge.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Haegeman, Liliane. 1997. Negative inversion and the structure of CP. Paper presented at the Linguistic Colloquium, University of Wuppertal.
Hoekstra, Eric. 1993. Dialectal variation inside CP as parametric variation, Linguistische Berichte 51.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kaiser, Georg A. 2002. Verbstellung und Verbstellungswandel in den romanischen Sprachen. Tübingen: Max Niemeyer Verlag. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
van Kampen, Jacqueline. 2010. Typological Guidance in the Acquisition of V2 Dutch. Lingua 120 (2): 264–83. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Kemenade, Ans van. 1987. Syntactic case and morphological case in the history of English. Dordrecht: Foris. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Jacobs, Joachim. 2015. Was für ein Hauptsatzphänomen ist V2? Talk delivered at the V2 Workshop Wuppertal 24.07.2015.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ledgeway, Adam. 2003. ‘Il sistema completivo dei dialetti meridionali. La doppia serie di complementatori’, Rivista Italiana di Dialettologia 271: 89–147.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2007. Old Neapolitan Word Order: Some Initial Observations. In A. L. Lepschy, A. Tosi (eds), Languages of Italy: Histories and dictionaries, Ravena, Longo, 119–146.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2008. Satisfying V2 in early romance: Merge vs. move. Journal of Linguistics 441. 437–470. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lightfoot, David. 1995. Why UG Needs a Learning Theory: Triggering Verb Movement. In Adrian Battye and Ian Roberts (eds), Clause Structure and Language Change, 31–52. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1999. The Development of language: Acquisition, change, and evolution. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006. How New Languages Emerge. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lightfoot, David & Marit Westergaard. 2007. Language Acquisition and Language Change: Interrelationships. In Language and Linguistics Compass 1 (5): 396–416. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lohnstein, Horst. In press. The grammatical basis of verb second – the case of German. In Rebecca Woods, Sam Wolfe & Theresa Biberauer, Rethinking Verb Second. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Manzini, Maria Rita & Leonardo Savoia. 2005. I dialetti italiani e romanci: morfosintassi generativa, vol. 31. Alessandria: Edizioni Dell’Orso.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Oniga, Renato. 2014. Latin. A linguistic introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Paoli, Sandra. 2007. The fine structure of the left periphery: COMPs and subjects: Evidence from Romance. Lingua 1171. 1057–1079. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Petrova, Svetlana. 2015. Free word order in Germanic: Insights from object order in Middle Low German. Linguistische Berichte 2441, 355–382.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poeppel, David & Kenneth Wexler. 1993. The Full Competence Hypothesis of Clause Structure in Early German. Language 691: 1–33. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poletto, Cecilia. 2000. The Higher Functional Field: Evidence from Northern Italian Dialects. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2001. Complementizer deletion and verb movement in standard Italian. In: Guglielmo Cinque & Giampaolo Salvi (eds.), Current Studies in Italian Syntax. Essays Offered to Lorenzo Renzi, 265–286. Amsterdam: Elsevier.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2002. The left-periphery of V2-Rhaetoromance dialects: A new view on V2 and V3. In Sief Barbiers, Leonie Cornips & Susanne van der Kleij (eds.), Syntactic microvariation, 214–42. Amsterdam: Meertens Institute.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2006. Parallel phases: A study of the high and low periphery of Old Italian. In Mara Frascarelli (ed.), Phases of interpretation, 261–95. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2014. Word order in Old Italian. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poletto, C. 2015. ‘Word order in the Old Italian DP’, in U. Shlonsky (ed.), The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, 109–127. Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poletto, Cecilia. 2016. Which clues for which V2. In Ermenegildo Bidese, Federica Cognola & Manuela Caterina Moroni (eds.), Theoretical approaches to linguistic variation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Poletto, Cecilia & Alessandra Tomaselli. 2002. La sintassi del soggetto nullo nelle isole tedescofone del Veneto: Cimbro e sappadino a confronto. In Gianna Marcato (ed.), La dialettologia oltre il 2001. Atti del convegno di Sappada/Plodn (Belluno) 1–5 Luglio 2001, 237–252. Padova: Padova Unipress.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Reis, Marga. 2016. Consecutive so … V2-clauses in German. In Ingo Reich und Augustin Speyer (eds), Co- and subordination in German and other languages, 285–318. Hamburg: Buske Verlag.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Renzi, Lorenzo & Giampaolo Salvi. 2010. Grammatica dell’Italiano Antico. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rinke, Esther. 2007. Syntaktische Variation aus synchronischer und diachronischer Perspektive. Frankfurt am Main: Vervuert. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Rizzi, Luigi. 1996. Residual Verb Second and the Wh-criterion. In Adriana Belletti and Luigi Rizzi (eds.), Parameters and Functional Heads. Essays in Comparative Syntax, 63–90. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 1997. The fine structure of the left periphery. In Liliane Haegeman (ed.), Elements of grammar: Handbook of generative grammar, 281–338. Dordrecht: Kluwer. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Roberts, Ian. 1993. Verbs and diachronic syntax: A comparative history of English and French. Dordrecht: Kluwer.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Roberts, I. 2004. The C-system in Brythonnic Celtic languages, V2, and the EPP. In Luigi Rizzi (ed.), The Structure of CP and IP: The Cartography of Syntactic Structures, 297–328. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schreiber, Nina. 2010. Zur historischen Entwicklung des Komplementierers dass im Germanischen. PhD Thesis University of Frankfurt.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Schwartz Bonnie, D. & Sten Vikner. 1989. All Verb Second Clauses are CPs. Working Papers in Scandinavian Syntax 431, 27–49.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Sitaridou, Ioanna. 2005. A corpus-based study of null subjects in Old French and Old Occitan. In Claus D. Putsch, Johannes Kabatek & Wolfgang Raible (eds.), Corpora and Diachronic Linguistics, 359–74. Tübingen: Narr.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vance, B. 1989. Null Subjects and Syntactic Change in Medieval French. Ph.D. Thesis, Cornell University.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vanelli, L. 1998. I dialetti italiani settentrionali nel panorama romanzo. Studi di sintassi e morfologia. Roma: Bulzoni.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Vikner, Sten. 1995. Verb Movement and Expletive Subjects in the Germanic Languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wanner, Dieter. 1995. Les subordonnées à double complémentateur en roman medieval. In Giovanni Ruffino (ed.), Atti del XXI Congresso Internazionale di Linguistica e Filologia Romanza, Section 1., 421–433.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Westergaard, Marit. 2008. Acquisition and Change: On the Robustness of the Triggering Experience for Word Order Cues. Lingua. vol. 118 (12). Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2009. Microvariation as diachrony: A view from acquisition. Journal of Comparative. Germanic Linguistics 121. 49–79. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. 2016. Word order and finiteness in acquisition: A study of English and Norwegian wh-questions. In Kristin Melum Eide (ed.) Finiteness Matters: On finiteness-related phenomena in natural languages, p. 255–286. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Wolfe, Sam. 2015. Microvariation in Medieval Romance syntax: A comparative approach. Cambridge: University of Cambridge dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yang, Charles. 2000. Knowledge and Learning in Natural Language. Massachusetts: Massachusetts Institute of Technology dissertation.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Zanuttini, Raffaella. (1997): Negation and Clausal Structure: A Comparative Study of Romance Languages. Oxford/New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (7)

Cited by seven other publications

Campeny, Afra Pujol i
2025. Fronting in Old Catalan: Asymmetries between Narration and Reported Speech1. Transactions of the Philological Society 123:1 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Pinzin, Francesco & Cecilia Poletto
2025. On postverbal subjects in Old Venetian. Linguistic Variation DOI logo
Goux, Mathieu
2024. Enjeux des corpus bilingues en diachronie longue : l’exemple du projet MICLE. Corpus :25 DOI logo
Tomaselli, Alessandra & Ermenegildo Bidese
2023. Fortune and Decay of Lexical Expletives in Germanic and Romance along the Adige River. Languages 8:1 ► pp. 44 ff. DOI logo
Tomaselli, Alessandra & Ermenegildo Bidese
2024. On the threefold typology of Scheinsubjekte . Evolutionary Linguistic Theory 6:1-2 ► pp. 158 ff. DOI logo
Rossi, Silvia & Cecilia Poletto
2022. Bare quantifiers and Verb Second. In Language Change at the Interfaces [Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today, 275], ► pp. 95 ff. DOI logo
Wolfe, Sam
2022. Microvariation and Change in the Romance Left Periphery. Probus 34:1 ► pp. 235 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 27 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue