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coexisting case question

From:René Uittenbogaard <ruittenb@...>
Date:Monday, September 8, 2008, 22:36
My question concerns the case of which I've forgotten the name,
let me call it the "reverse genitive" case just for convenience.
The idea behind it was that the possessed thing is in the "reverse
genitive" case and the possessor in the appropriate case in the
sentence:

I-NOM look_at palace-ACC king-GEN.
I'm looking at the palace of the king.

vs.

I-NOM look_at palace-REVGEN king-ACC.
I'm looking at the palace of the king.


Now my question is: would it be very unlikely for a language to use
this "reverse genitive" case only for quantities, and the usual
genitive otherwise, so that the following constructs coexisted:

For "usual" genitives:
I-NOM hold book-ACC lady-GEN.
I am holding a book of the lady.

But for quantities:
I-NOM hold glass-REVGEN wine-ACC.
I am holding a glass of wine.

We might even label this last example as "quantitative case".
What's in a name, but it looks a lot more plausible like this :)

I-NOM hold glass-QUANT wine-ACC.
I am holding a glass of wine.

Thanks in advance,

René

Replies

Eugene Oh <un.doing@...>
Eric Christopherson <rakko@...>
R A Brown <ray@...>