[Lingtyp] Wh-in-situ postnominal relatives?

[Radek Simik]

Dear colleagues,

I’m hoping to get your advise on a question I have. According to WALS, the majority of languages keep their wh-words “in situ” (i.e., in an argument / non-initial position) in the clause, i.e., pattern 2 below is more common than pattern 1.

1. (I asked) [who Dave invited].
2. (I asked) [Dave invited who].

Concerning relative clauses, only a fraction of languages make use of interrogative(-like) wh-words to form them, English (and many other “European” languages) being an example:

3. The man [who Dave invited]… 

de Vries (2002; The syntax of relativization <https://www.lotpublications.nl/the-syntax-of-relativization-the-syntax-of-relativization>) has a sample of some 30 languages that relativize with the help of interrogative(-like) pronouns. My question is: Is anybody of you aware of a language that would (i) use interrogative(-like) pronouns for (postnominal, non-correlative) relativization, while at the same (ii) time keeping the pronoun “in situ”? I.e.,

4. The man [Dave invited who]… 

de Vries (2005; The fall and rise of universals on relativization <https://doi.org/10.22425/jul.2005.6.1.125>) notes two languages like that - Hindi and Bambara, although these languages use correlatives primarily and there are reasons to doubt that the existing examples satisfy both (i) and (ii) above (cf. Lehmann 1984; plus my p.c. with Valentin Vydrin).

One last remark, for clarification: The reason I say interrogative or interrogative-LIKE pronouns is that I’m interested both in languages that use interrogative pronouns for relativization (like English) and languages that use pronouns that are morphologically derived from interrogative pronouns, like Greek (interrogative ti vs. relative oti), etc.

I would greatly appreciate your help and expertise in finding relevant examples and references!

All the best,

Radek Šimík
(HU Berlin)
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