Case syncretism

[Tibor Kiss]

Hi,

back home in Europe, the following problem amuses me:

There is a construction in (American) English, which I would call 'X
told Y told'-construction. (Perhaps it already has a different name, but
who cares ...)

An example is:

(1) How did you know? Your mam told my aunt told me.

My questions are a) does this construction work with prep datives as
well, as in (2), and b) is case syncretism required here, i.e. is (3)
grammatical or not?

(2) Well, how did you get it? Your aunt gave it to my aunt gave it to
me.

(3) How did he come to know? Your ma told me told him.

I suspect (3) to be out.

Thanks,

T.

=============================================================
Prof. Dr. Tibor Kiss -- Sprachwissenschaftliches Institut
Ruhr-Universität Bochum, D-44780 Bochum
+49-234-3225114 // +49-177-7468265 // +49-234-3214137 (fax)
What is present now will later be past.