Topics in Anatolian Historical Grammar Prof. Dr. H. Craig Melchert

8
Mattyas Huggard
fifty-four ku- words show the following distribution as presented by
Goedegebuure (2009:947), and repeated here in table 1:
Table 1. Relationship between linear order and grammatical role of Hittite Q-word
questions
Position S O Obl Adv Total
Initial 6 0 1 12 19
Preverbal 1 5 2 27 35
Total 7 5 3 39 54
Notice that in (13) the wh-phrase kuzza is in the ablative case and appears in
the predicted position for an oblique object. In (14) and (16) kuwapi is an adverbial
wh-phrase and appears in the normal position adjoined to the verb phrase.
In (15) kuit is in the accusative case and again appears in the predicted basegenerated
position for an accusative object in an SOV language. According to
the cross-linguistic evidence and analysis cited in §2.1, Hittite patterns with
Mandarin Chinese: it is a wh-in-situ language in which the question words remain
in their base-generated position in unmarked interrogatives.
However, although wh-expressions do not undergo wh-movement in an interrogative
clause type, this does not prevent other types of movement from taking
place. Comparing Focus structure in Hittite declaratives and interrogatives,
Goedegebuure (2009) provides strong evidence that Hittite wh-phrases occur in a
pattern parallel to focused constituents in declarative sentences: the wh-word may
remain in situ or be focused, either in initial position (the Focus position, as
shown above in (4), which is lower than the C position) or preverbal position,
depending on the type of focus. Her results are summarized below in table 2:
Table 2. Focus scope and focus typology of Hittite Q-word questions
Position in the clause Template
Identification focus
Information Initial position nu ku- (…) V
Replacing/selecting/rejecting Preverbal nu (…) ku- V
Comment focus
Information, subject Q-word in situ S(O)V (nu) ku- (…) V
Information, object Q-word in situ (S)OV (nu) (…) ku- V
Reporting focus
Information, subject Q-word in situ S(O)V (nu) ku- (…) V