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Re: Nouns with arguments, verbs without arguments

From:Roger Mills <romilly@...>
Date:Friday, April 11, 2003, 20:17
Mathias wrote:
> (A French linguistic book I have considers an impersonal verb system with
no
> verbal voice as "présentatif" ("here is X") or "existenciel" (there is X") > and "attributif" ("Y's X") by contrast to the usual "active" verbal system > ("X is/does/has Y (to Z)".) >
Interesting. Does it give any examples of a présentatif or an attributif? Existenciel I can understand-- that would be most weather-verbs (to rain, snow, thunder; windy, sunny etc.), all of which would require _yale_ 'there is' in Kash, and could optionally take _ada_ in Indonesian. Spanish is curious in this respect-- Tengo/tienes/tiene frio 'I'm/ you're/he's cold' (*estar/hacer) Hace frío 'It (the weather) is cold' (*tiene/está) (La sopa) está fría '(The soup) is cold' (*tiene/hace)

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Christophe Grandsire <christophe.grandsire@...>