Johnson 2004 - CDLI - UCLA

turn to the locative approach as represented by Freeze (1992). Freeze begins by pointing
out that the existential “there” sentence in English is somewhat exceptional; the most
common pattern is one in which the basic structure consists of three parts: (i) a copula,
which may or may not be of the be.at' type, (ii) a theme, typically in the unmarked or
zero case, and (iii) a locative. The corresponding elements in Sumerian—at least with
respect to BNBV inal predicates—are: (i) the *bi-√ prefix as existential predicate, (ii) the
bare inalienable noun, and (iii) the locative-terminative case-marked noun.
Freeze then notes that these three components are commonly found in what are
generally thought of as three distinct constructions: the predicate locative construction
(“The book is on the bench”), the existential construction (“There is a book on the
bench”) and “have” constructions (“Lupe has a book”) (1992, 553). In general, the
“have” constructions pattern with the existential constructions and both can be
differentiated from the predicate locative on the basis of what is known as “locative
inversion” (The following example is from Hindi after Freeze 1992, 555; note that nasal
diacritics are omitted, see Freeze for the original form).
(47) a. mai hindustaan-mee thaa
I India-in Cop.Sg.Masc.Past
THEME LOCATIVE VERB
I was in India
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