The phonology and morphology of Filomeno Mata Totonac

6.2.3 Variable order among prefixes. The prefixes in the variable order zone include the
associative (position 6), the comitative (7), the instrumentals (8), the Round-trip and Pass-by
morphemes (9), and the reciprocal (10), all derivational; and one inflectional prefix from position
11, the plural object marker kaa- (all verbal morphemes are described in Chapters 4 and 5). The
other prefixes in position 11 have a strictly fixed order. This set of prefixes from position 6 to 11
generally occurs in the order given in Table 6.2, but they sometimes take a reversed order with
no difference in semantics. This is true of most adjacent pairs of these prefixes, and at times even
of non-adjacent prefixes. Even when the affixes exist in a scopal relationship, the reversal of
order cannot be used to indicate scope. Some free order pairs are more robust, able to occur in
reversed order with almost any stem; others are judged grammatical only with certain stems. The
sub-sections below provide more detail on the ordering possibilities in this zone.
Table 6.2 Prefix ordering zones
14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0
Fixed
Mood/Tense
Fixed
Person
Fixed
Counterexpectational
Fixed/Var
Person
Variable
Reciprocal
Variable
Associated Motion
Variable
Instrumental
Variable
Comitative
! #.-!
Variable
Associative
Scopal
Causative
Fixed
Locatives
Scopal
Body Parts
Scopal
Fixed
Middle
Voice/Inchoative
Distributive
6.2.3.1 Position 11 Object plural kaa-. This inflectional prefix can occur in reverse order with
Round-trip kii- with almost any stem, and with Pass-by tii- in some cases, both in position 9. (It
cannot co-occur with the adjacent reciprocal in position 10, because only subject affixes are
found on reciprocalized verbs.) The object plural marker is also sometimes considered
grammatical in reverse order with instrumental lii- in position 8, with the comitative in position
7, and with the associative maq- in position 6, with decreasing frequency as the distance from
position 11 increases. It is thus the most mobile of the affixes, able to take free order, at least in
some contexts, with all the other prefixes of this zone.
The placement of this inflectional prefix in a position with two other morphemes which do not
engage in variable ordering requires a few words of justification. In templatic morphology,
position slots are useful in describing non-semantic blocking of one affix by another. In this case,
OBJ.pl kaa- blocks the 3 rd person plural subject marker ta-, and is blocked by 2/1 laa-, which
appears when a 2 nd person subject verb has a 1 st plural object. In neither case is the suppression
semantically driven. Thus these three prefixes, which generally occur in the same place in the
pre-verbal string of affixes, are included in a single position, despite the different ordering
behavior.
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