Internally Headed Relative Clauses in Akkadian - Cuneiform Digital ...

Internally Headed Relative Clauses in Akkadian:
Identifying Weak Quantification in the Construct State
(American Oriental Society Annual Meeting, Philadelphia, March 18, 2005)
Cale Johnson (cale@ucla.edu)
Cuneiform Digital Library Initiative, UCLA

What is an IHRC? (1)
(1) Externally Headed Relative Clause in English
[ DP The horse [ CP that the man bought]] was a good horse
[ DP HEAD [ CP RELATIVE]]
(2) Externally Headed Relative Clause in Quechua (Cole 1987, 277 apud Basilico 1996, 499)
[ DP [ CP nuna ranti-shaq-n] bestya] alli bestya-m ka-rqo-n
[ DP [ CP man buy-Perf-3] horse.Nom] good horse.Evid be-Past-3
[ DP [ CP RELATIVE] HEAD]
‘The horse that the man bought was a good horse’

What is an IHRC? (2)
(2) Externally Headed Relative Clause in Quechua (Cole 1987, 277 apud Basilico
1996, 499)
[ DP [ CP nuna ranti-shaq-n] bestya] alli bestya-m ka-rqo-n
[ DP [ CP man buy-Perf-3] horse.Nom] good horse.Evid be-Past-3
[ DP [ CP RELATIVE] HEAD]
‘The horse that the man bought was a good horse’
(3) Internally Headed Relative Clause in Quechua (Cole 1987, 277 apud Basilico
1996, 499)
[ CP nuna bestya-ta ranti-shaq-n] alli bestya-m ka-rqo-n
[ CP man horse-Acc buy-Perf-3 good horse-Evid be-Past-3
[ CP RELATIVE . . . HEAD . . .]
‘The horse that the man bought was a good horse’

Lakhota IHRCs: The definiteness effect in IHRCs
(4) Lakhota IHRC with indefinite determiner marking the head of the IHRC
(Williamson 1987, 171)
[ DP [ CP Mary [owiza wa] kage] ki] he ophewathu
[ DP [ CP Mary [quilt a] make] the] Dem I.buy
‘I bought the quilt that Mary made’
(5) Ungrammatical Lakhota IHRC with definite determiner in the same position
(Williamson 1987, 171)
**[ DP [ CP Mary [owiza ki] kage] ki] he ophewathu
**[ DP [ CP Mary [quilt the] make] the] Dem I.buy
‘I bought the quilt that Mary made’

The definiteness effect in English (cf. Hallman 2004)
(6) Weakly quantified nominals in English
There is/are {a fireman / three firemen / many firemen / firemen} available.
(7) Strongly quantified nominals in English (ungrammatical in existential sentence)
**There is/are {the fireman / every fireman / most firemen / Sheila} available
Weak quantifiers (grammatical in existential sentence):
• indefinite article “a fireman”
• cardinal numbers “three firemen”
• “a few firemen” / “many firemen”
• bare plurals “firemen”
Strong quantifiers (ungrammatical in existential sentence)
• definite article “the fireman”
• universal quantifiers “every fireman” / “all firemen”
• “most firemen”
• proper nouns “Sheila”

EHRC and IHRC in Korean
(8) Externally headed relative clause in Korean (Kim 2004, 39)
John-un [[e i tomangka-n]-un sey-myeng-uy totwuk i ]-ul capassta
PN-Top [[e i run.away-Impf]-Rel three-Cl-Gen thief]-Acc caught
‘John caught three thieves (out of possibly many more) who were running away’
(9) Internally headed relative clause in Korean (Kim 2004, 39)
John-un [[sey-myeng-uy totwuk-i tomangka-n]-un kes]-ul capasstaa
PN-Top [[three-Cl-Gen thief-Nom run.away-Impf]-Rel kes]-Acc caught
‘(Only) three thieves were running away and John caught all of them’

Lakhota IHRCs: The definiteness effect in IHRCs
(4) Lakhota IHRC with indefinite determiner marking the head of the IHRC
(Williamson 1987, 171)
[ DP [ CP Mary [owiza wa] kage] ki] he ophewathu
[ DP [ CP Mary [quilt a] make] the] Dem I.buy
‘I bought the quilt that Mary made’
(5) Ungrammatical Lakhota IHRC with definite determiner in the same position
(Williamson 1987, 171)
**[ DP [ CP Mary [owiza ki] kage] ki] he ophewathu
**[ DP [ CP Mary [quilt the] make] the] Dem I.buy
‘I bought the quilt that Mary made’

Construct state and the definiteness effect
(10) The construct state in Biblical Hebrew
be¢t ham-melek
house.Const Def-king
(11) The construct state in Akkadian
b®t ßarr-im
house.Const king-Gen
‘the house of the king’
(12) ßa genitive in Akkadian
b®t-um ßa ßarr-im
house-Nom Det/Rel king-Gen
‘a/the house of the king’
(13) DP-ßu ßa genitive in Akkadian
(Huehnergard 1989, 227)
b®s-su ßa ßarr-im
house-his Det/Rel king-Gen
‘the house of the king’

Hypothesis
• The head of a construct relative clause is non-specific and weakly quantified
• Construct relative clauses are internally headed relative clauses (whereas those using
the determinative-relative pronoun are, at least in the Old Babylonian period,
externally headed)
• The construct state indicates the head of the internally headed relative clause just as
the indefinite article does in Lakhota
Syntactic Tests
• The head of a construct relative should only be able to refer to cardinal amounts (cf.
the absolute state) and should not be able to pick a subset out of a larger, contextually
salient group since it is weakly quantified
• Anaphoric demonstratives (aw®lum ßu¢) should not be able to refer to the head of a
construct relative since it is non-specific

(14) CH §119, rev., iii 74 – iv 4
CH §119 (silver that . . .)
74. ßum-ma a-wi-lam If a claim has seized a man, and
75. e-ºi4-il-tum
76. is¬-ba-su2-ma
77. GEME2-su2 ßa DUMU.MEÍ ul-du-ßum He sells a female slave of his who has
78. a-na KU3.BABBAR it-ta-din given birth to children for him,
(iv)
1. KU3.BABBAR DAM.GAR3 iß-qu2-lu The (amount of) silver that the
trading-agent paid,
2. be-el GEME2 i-ßa-qal-ma The owner of the female slave will
3. GEME2-su2 i-pa-t¬ar2 (re)pay and he will set his female
slave free
(15) kasap tamka¢r-um ißqul-u
silver.Const trade.agent-Nom he.weighed-Sub
‘The (amount of) silver that the trade-agent paid (for the female slave)’

(16) CH §232, rev., xix 82-92
CH §232 (house that . . .)
82-83. ßum-ma NIG 2 .GUR 11 If he (= a builder)
83. u˙ 2 -ta-al-li-iq destroyed property,
84-85. mi-im-ma / ßa u 2 -˙al-li-qu 2 Whatever he destroyed,
86-87. i-ri-ab / u 3 aß-ßum E 2 i-pu-ßu He will replace, and because he built a house,
88-89. la u 2 -dan-ni-nu-ma / im-qu 2 -tu Did not strengthen it, and it fell down,
90-91. i-na NIG 2 .GUR 11 / ra-ma-ni-ßu Out of his own property,
92. E 2 im-qu 2 -tu i-ip-pe 2 -eß He will build a house (equivalent to)
the one that fell.
(17) ßumma [aw®lum] . . . , [aw®lum ßu¢] iddâk
‘If a man . . ., that man will be killed’
(18) aßßum . . . [(b®t) imqutu], [b®t imqutu] ippeß
‘Because the house . . . fell down, he will build a house (equivalent to) the house
that fell down’

(19) Stacked IHRCs in CH §232
b®t ®pußu
Stacked IHRCs
la¢ udanninu¢-ma
imqutu
(20) Mojave stacked IHRC (Munro 1976, 202 apud Basilico 1996, 516)
[[[tunay pi:pa º-u:yu:-n y] hatCoq k yo:-ny-C] poß kaºa:k-k]
[[[yesterday person I-see-Dem] dog bite-Dem-Subj] cat kick-Tns]
[[[The man I saw yesterday] whom the dog bit] kicked the cat]

Conclusions
• The construct state (like the absolute state in certain respects) codes non-specificity,
cardinality and weak quantification. In other words, the construct state requires
“identity of quantity” but not “identity of substance”
• Since the only kinds of relative clause that allow stacking are restrictive EHRCs
and IHRCs, the construct relative must be one of these two types, but the absence of
relativizers from the stacked Akkadian example indicates that it must be an IHRC
• The weak quantificational nature of the construct state allows it to act as an
indication of the head of the IHRC
Implications
• If the ßa relative derives historically from the construct relative, as suggested
by Deutscher (2001; 2002), this must have taken place through focalization: since
construct relatives are IHRCs and, consequently, definiteness effect environments,
only focus allows strongly quantified nouns to occur in a definiteness effect
environment.

Bibliography
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