Possessive marking

[Gideon Goldenberg]

> Are there any languages that mark neither possessor
> nor possessee in a possessive construction? That is,
> does anybody say MANUEL FATHER to mean Manuel's father?
> (And languages that case-mark one of the NPs don't count.)
> David Beck

  The construction in Semitic languages which traditionally
has been termed "annexion", or "annexation", or (in Arabic)
"ida:fa", or (in Hebrew) "smikhut", where the possessum (the
head) is said to be in "status constructus" (or "construct
state"), is the "genitive construction" that expresses the
possession, and more generally  t h e  syntactical realization
of the attributive relation. The classical Common-Semitic
form of this construction marks the head by the "status
constructus" form, and the dependent (possessor &c.) by the
genitive-case form. This double-marking construction is well
known in Akkadian and Classical Arabic. With the erosion of
case-endings, it is the head that is marked, as is the most
commonly known case in all branches of Semitic. (Well, the
opposition between construct and absolute states can also be
neutralized.) With a pronominal possessor-expression the
morphological realization of the same relation is normal (like
"father-his"). Periphrastic genitive-constructions for saying
"Abraham's father" would take the form of "the father, that of
Abraham" or "his father, that of Abraham". Most interesting
are the various constructions common in Neo-Aramaic:
(a) retention and revival of possessum in status constructus +
possessor, i.e. head-marked; (b) analogous construction made
by the contraction of the periphrastic: "'father-that-of' +
possessor"; (c) with the relation marked on none of the
constituents: "father Abraham", "daughter king" (for "Abraham's
father", "the king's daughter" &c.
In Neo-Ethiopian languages you will find for "Abraham's father"
"'(that)of-Abraham' + father", for "my father" "'(that)of-I +
father" &c. with the former constituent enjoying full syntactic
autonomy.

A general question: Is this forum really meant to raise
questions the answers for which can be found by consulting
any standard grammar-book?

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Gideon Goldenberg, Dept. of Linguistics,
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mt. Scopus
IL-91905 Jerusalem, Israel
Home Address: 48 Ben-Maimon Avenue,
IL-92261 Jerusalem, Israel
Tel.& Fax: +972-2-5665135
E-mail: <msgidgol at pluto.mscc.huji.ac.il>
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==============================================
Gideon Goldenberg, Dept. of Linguistics,
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Mt. Scopus
IL-91905 Jerusalem, Israel
Home Address: 48 Ben-Maimon Avenue,
IL-92261 Jerusalem, Israel
Tel.& Fax: +972-2-5665135
E-mail: <msgidgol at pluto.mscc.huji.ac.il>
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