Re: THEORY: Can Ditransitive Verbs Agree With More Than Two Core Arguments?

--- In conlang@yahoogroups.com, Henrik Theiling <theiling@A...> wrote:
> Hi!
>
> Chris Bates <chris.maths_student@N...> writes:
<... snip ...>
> >
> > Counter-Example: Basque
>
> And many others, e.g. Georgian and Modern Spoken French, to give more
> examples.
>
> That universal is hardly even a vague rule, I think, as many languages
> have agreement with indirect objects on their verbs.  But ok, they are
> not the majority of language. :-)
>
> **Henrik
Thanks, Henrik.  I don't believe in that rule either (at least not any
more, if I ever did); but I don't understand why your counterexamples
are counterexamples.

As for Georgian:  Among the languages which I have encountered that
have poly-personal agreement; it was the first for which the grammarian
used the term "poly-personal".
I don't know Georgian and I guess I just need to see an example like
the Basque example Chris gave.

As for Modern Spoken French:  I can actually get along in Montreal or
Istanbul on my French, which is not very good but apparently better
than just speaking English louder and louder.  So I am *really*
surprised that you say there are productive examples in Modern
Colloquial French of ditransitive clauses where the verb must agree
with both objects.  Maybe I'm just thinking of them wrong?  Show me
some examples and explain why they are agreeing with both objects.

Perhaps the source of my difficulty in seeing French as a counter-
example is related to my difficulty understanding the difference
between "agreement" and "cross-reference".  Maybe your French
examples "cross-reference" one of the objects, rather than "agreeing"
with both, and I'm just color-blind to seeing it as an example without
your help.

(Or of course, I could just be dense.)

-----

Thanks again for the help from all who have answered.

Tom H.C. in MI

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