The phonology and morphology of Filomeno Mata Totonac

the core as the O argument is highly likely to have a human or animate referent and to share
object properties with the base object, as indicated by object agreement markers. Unlike the
prototype, both the comitative and the dative may also apply to transitive verbs, increasing their
valence.
While the comitative and the dative invariably transitivize the intransitives they affix to, the
instrumental, locatives and BPPs only occasionally do so. Instead, predicates derived with any
of the latter three categories of applicatives often retain their original valence, whether transitive
or intransitive. These affixes, then, function as applicatives only in a minority of the
constructions in which they appear; when they do so, the O argument they add to the core usually
has an inanimate referent. In some constructions with non-compositional semantics, the
instrumental and less commonly, the locatives may have a human referent, and in these cases
alone the applicative object is marked on the verb via object agreement affixes. Generally,
though, the inanimate objects found in instrumental and locative constructions reveal no sharing
of object properties with the base object. The evidence for the BPPs as applicatives is the most
meager, and the place of body parts on an animacy hierarchy is the most problematical. Body
parts naturally occur only with a possessor, and it is the possessor, not the possessum, which
receives object marking on many verbs derived with BPPs.
The applicatives of FM Totonac can be divided into two categories: those that always derive
transitives from intransitives, and generally have human referents that are referenced on the verb
through object agreement markers; and those that only occasionally transitivize the intransitives
to which they attach, rarely have human referents, and tend not to be marked on the verb.
Peterson (1999:34) accounts for the correlation between animacy of applicative objects and
possession of object properties as due to the necessity for the grammar to be able to access
entities of high topicality. The further correlation in FM Totonac between animacy/object
marking and robust applicative construction on the one hand, and lack of animacy/object
marking and sporadic applicative construction on the other hand may have the same explanation.
5.4.3 Summary of valence-increasing morphology. The morphology of Totonaco de Filomeno
Mata provides a variety of transitivizing constructions, including two causatives and five
different types of applicative. Unlike the prototypes discussed by Dixon & Aikhenvald (1997),
all of these may increase the valence of transitive and ditransitive, as well as intransitive verbs,
routinely allowing the marking of 3- and 4-arguments on the verb. Constructions with a
causative and multiple applicatives, such as the one shown in example 171, are possible.
171) kiliimaapuuwas%níi m pála
/kin-lii-maa-puu-was"-nii-IMPF pala/
1OBJ-INST-CAUS-LOC-dig-DAT-aa stick
‘he makes me dig a hole with a stick’
The readiness of FM Totonac to increase the valence of its verbs is typologically unusual.
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