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A micro-perspective on Verb Second in Romance and Germanic
Edited by Christine Meklenborg Salvesen
[Linguistic Variation 19:1] 2019
► pp. 47–81

More than one way out

On the factors influencing the loss of V to C movement

| Goethe-Universität Frankfurt am Main

In this article I will show that there is not a single diachronic path that leads to the loss of the verb second property so that different languages can have different ways towards a non V2 grammar. I will also show that the progressive loss of subject inversion contexts is not the only factor that played a role in the change, because there are V2 languages in which nominal subject inversion was never attested but they are still V2, i.e. they have I to C movement. I will identify various factors which may play a role and are related to the type of verb second found in different languages. I will consider various types of factors and show that they can play a role or not in the loss of V2 depending on the type of V2 that the language displays. I will also identify an additional factor that has not been considered in the literature namely the type of complementizer system: a change in this area can contribute to destabilizing the V2 grammar.

Keywords: verb second, split left periphery, null subjects, null topics, Old Romance
Article outline
  • 1.Setting the problem
  • 2.V2 types
    • 2.1Combining with V2 and the split left periphery
    • 2.2The loss of V2: From Old to Renaissance Italian
    • 2.3What subject inversion tells us
  • 3.A wider perspective
    • 3.1Cimbrian
    • 3.2Plodarisch
    • 3.3The complex picture
  • 4.Old Italian
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 24 September 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/lv.16001.pol
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