8 Case theory

A first look at case

o The basic purpose of case
o Case government
o Synthetic versus analytic case marking
Case features
Case licensing
o Spec-head licensing
o Head-spec licensing
o Head-comp licensing
o Nonstructural conditions on case licensing
o The dative-accusative distinction
Notes
Exercises and problems
Supplementary material
o Grammatical relations

This chapter is devoted to a discussion of case, a morphosyntactic property of

noun phrases. We begin by illustrating the basic purpose of case, which is to
identify a noun phrase's function or grammatical relation in the sentence (for
instance, whether a noun phrase is a subject or object). We also show that
particular lexical items can impose morphological case requirements on noun
phrases, a phenomenon known as case government. We then turn to how case is
expressed across languages, focusing on various Indo-European languages (the

language family to which English belongs). Universal Grammar allows case, just
like tense, to be expressed either synthetically (as suffixes on nouns) or
analytically (by means of prepositions or other syntactic heads that take an entire
noun phrase as their argument). As we will see, English allows both ways of
expressing case (just as it allows both ways of expressing tense in watched and will watch). It is possible to describe both expressions of case in a unitary
way by treating case as a feature on a noun phrase that is checked by a head. As
we will show, case checking is subject to structural as well as nonstructural
licensing conditions.
A first look at case
The basic purpose of case

In order to understand the purpose of case in human language, it is useful to

consider languages in which constituent order is not as fixed as it is in English. In
German, for instance, unlike English, the subject of an ordinary declarative
clause needn't precede the verb, as shown in (1) and (2) (we discuss the structure
of German sentences in more detail in a later chapter; for now, only the variable
constituent order is of interest). In the examples, boldface indicates the subject,
and italics indicates the object.
(1)

Der Mann sieht den Hund.

the man sees the dog
'The man sees the dog.'
Den Hund sieht der Mann.
the dog sees the man
same as (1a), not the same as (2a)
Der Hund sieht den Mann.
the dog sees the man
'The dog sees the man.'
Den Mann sieht der Hund.
the man sees the dog
same as (2a), not the same as (1a)

a. German
b.

(2)

a.
b.

Since German speakers can't rely on constituent order to identify subjects and
objects, how is it possible for them to keep track of which constituent expresses
whichgrammatical relation? The answer is that grammatical relations are encoded
in German in terms of morphological case marking. In particular, the subjects
of finite clauses in German appear in a particular form called
the nominative case, whereas objects generally appear in the accusative. (3)
gives a morphological analysis of the noun phrases in (1) and (2).
(3)

a.
b.

dthe
dthe

er
nom
en
acc

Mann,
man
Mann,
man

dthe
dthe

er
nom
en
acc

Hund
dog
Hund
dog

Notice that in (3), the distinction between nominative and accusative case is
marked once: on the head of the noun phrase (the determiner).
In certain exceptional cases in German, case distinctions are marked redundantly:
on the determiner as well on the noun. This is illustrated in (4). indicates a
zero nominative suffix; -(en) is the optional accusative suffix.
(4) a. Nominative

d- er
the nom
d-en
the acc

b. Accusative

Br- ,
bear nom,
Br-(en),
bear acc

d- er
the nom
d-en
the acc

Student-
student nom
Student-(en)
student acc

The redundant case marking in (4) is a historical relic from an earlier stage of
German where this pattern was more extensive. In certain languages, redundant
case marking on the determiner and the noun is the norm. This is illustrated for
modern Greek in (5).
(5) a. Modern Greek
b.

O
andr-as vlepi tthe.nom man nom sees the
'The man sees the dog.'
O
skil-os vlepi tthe.nom dog nom sees the
'The dog sees the man.'

o
skil-o.
acc dog acc
on andr-a.
acc man acc

Finally, case can be marked solely on the noun. This is illustrated in (6) for Latin,
a language without articles.
(6)

a. Latin
b.

Avus can-em videt.

grandfather nom dog acc sees
'The grandfather sees the dog.'
Can-is avum videt.
dog nom grandfather acc sees
'The dog sees the grandfather.'

To summarize the discussion in this section: noun phrases can be case-marked

either on the determiner, or on the noun, or redundantly on both. But regardless
of the particular pattern, case marking has the same basic purpose: it visibly
expresses a noun phrase's function in a sentence.
Case government
In many languages, a noun phrase's particular morphological case depends not
only on its function in the entire sentence, but also on which particular lexical
item it is most closely associated with. For instance, in German, the object in a
sentence appears in the dative or the accusative, 1 depending on the verb, as
illustrated in (7) and (8).

(7) a. Dative

ok

b. Accusative

(8) a. Accusative

ok

b. Dative

{ d- em Hund, d- er Frau } helfen

the dat dog
the dat woman help
'to help the { dog, woman }'
{ d- en Hund, d- ie Frau } helfen
the acc dog
the acc woman help
{ d- en Hund, d- ie Frau } untersttzen
the acc dog
the acc woman support
'to support the { dog, woman }'
{ d- em Hund, d- er Frau } untersttzen
the dat dog
the dat woman support

In traditional grammar, the verb is said to govern the case of the object. For
instance, helfen 'help' governs the dative, untersttzen 'support' governs the
accusative, and so on. An attractive hypothesis is that the morphological case that
a verb governs correlates with the verb's meaning, the idea being that variation in
case government as illustrated in (7) and (8) correlates with (possibly subtle)
differences in the semantics of helfen 'help' and untersttzen 'support'. One idea
that comes to mind, for instance, is thatuntersttzen 'support' is a simple
transitive verb, whereas helfen reflects the spellout of a VP shell CAUSE
someone GET help. Although we will not work out this idea in full in this
chapter, we present some related considerations concerning dative and accusative
case-marking in VP shells later on in the chapter.
Case government in Latin is illustrated in (9). As in German, each particular verb
governs the case of its object, but in Latin, the choice of case ranges over three
cases - dative, accusative, and ablative.
(9) a. Dative

b. Accusative
c. Ablative

{ femin-ae, *femin-am, *femin-a } { sub- venire, succurrere }

woman dat
acc
abl
under-come
underrun
'to help the woman'
{ femin-am, *femin-ae, *femin-a } ad-iuvare
woman acc
dat
abl to-support
'to support the woman'
{ femin-a, *femin-ae, *femin-am } frui
woman abl
dat
acc enjoy
'to enjoy the company of the woman'

In both German and Latin, prepositions resemble verbs in governing the case of
their complement. In German, prepositions govern the accusative, the dative, or
(rarely) the genitive; in Latin, they govern the ablative or the accusative.
(10) a. German

durch
d- ie Tr, bei d- er Kirche, whrend d- es
Krieges
through the acc door by the dat church
during the gen
war
'through the door, by/near the church, during the war'

b. Latin

de
sapienti-a, ad rip- am
about wisdom
abl to shore acc
'about wisdom, to the shore'

Finally, in both German and Latin, certain prepositions can govern more than one
case. In such cases, the accusative marks direction, and the other case (dative in
German, ablative in Latin) marks location.
(11) a. German

Latin

in { d- ie, *d- er } Bibliothek schicken; in { d- er,

*d- ie } Bibliothek arbeiten
in
the acc the dat library
send
in
the dat
the acc library
work
'to send into the library, to work in the library'
in { bibliothec-am, *bibliothec-a } mittere; in
{ bibliothec-a, *bibliothec-am } laborare
in
library
acc
abl send
in
library
abl
acc work
'to send into the library, to work in the library'

Synthetic versus analytic case marking

In the languages that we have been discussing so far, case is expressed

synthetically, by means of morphologically complex words. But Universal
Grammar also allows noun phrases to be marked for case analytically. The case
marker is then not an affix, but a relatively independent syntactic head. We
illustrate these two options of expressing case in connection with a brief
overview of case in the Indo-European language family, to which English
belongs.
Proto-Indo-European (PIE), the reconstructed ancestor of the IndoEuropean language family (which includes English) which was spoken thousands
of years ago, had eight cases, which were expressed synthetically. The
nominative marked the subject of finite clauses, the accusative and dative (and
perhaps other cases) marked objects (depending on the verb, as just discussed),
and the genitive indicated possession. The PIE ablative indicated the source of
movement (as in I drove from Chicago), the locative was used for locations (as
in I used to live in Chicago), and the instrumental marked instruments or means
(as in He cut it with his pocketknife). Finally, the vocative was used to address
persons (as in Hey, Tom, come on over here).
The original PIE case system is essentially preserved in Sanskrit, although the
distinction between the ablative and the genitive is somewhat obscured because
ablative and genitive forms were often homophonous in Sanskrit.
Such homophony among two or more case forms is called
case syncretism. Among living languages, the PIE system is best preserved in

the Baltic languages (Latvian and Lithuanian) and some Slavic languages (for
instance, Czech and Ukrainian). In these languages, the genitive and the ablative
have merged completely, leaving seven cases. In other words, in the history of
these languages, case syncretism affected all forms of the genitive and the
ablative, not just some of them, and so children learning the language no longer
had any evidence anywhere in the language for distinguishing between the two
cases. Several other Slavic languages, including Russian, have in addition almost
completely lost the vocative, leaving six cases. In Latin, the PIE ablative,
instrumental, and locative merged into a single case, called the ablative, which
serves all three functions, also leaving six cases. In Ancient Greek, the ablative,
instrumental, and locative were lost, leaving five cases. Old English had five
cases as well, having lost the ablative, locative, and vocative; in addition, the
instrumental had mostly merged with the dative. Another Germanic language,
modern German, retains four cases: nominative, dative, accusative, and an
increasingly moribund genitive. The developments just sketched for IndoEuropean are summarized in (12), where "R" and "---" indicate retention and
loss, respectively.
PIE,
Baltic,
Sanskri some
t
Slavic

(12)

Other
Slavic

Latin

Old
Ancien
Englis German
t Greek
h

Nominative

Dative

Accusative

Genitive

Ablative

---

---

---

Locative

---

---

---

---

mostly
merged
with
dative

---

---

---

merged merged
as
as
genitiv genitiv
e
e
R

merged
as
ablativ
e

Instrumenta
l

Vocative

---

Number of
distinct
cases

R
6

(13) shows the complete case paradigms for the Latin nouns femina 'woman'
and avus 'grandfather'. These two nouns are each representative of two
distinct declensions, or word classes. Latin had a total of five such word classes,
each of which was characterized by unique endings for combinations of case and
number. For instance, dative singular is marked by -ae on femina and by o on avus. In the remaining three declensions, the same combination happens to
be marked by the same suffix, namely -i(distinguishing three remaining
declensions, rather than collapsing them into one, is motivated by other
distinctions in the paradigms). For more details, take a look at Allen and
Greenough's New Latin Grammar, available through the Perseus project.
(13)

a- declension
'woman'
Sg
Pl

Latin

Nominative
Genitive
Dative
Accusative
Vocative
Ablative

femin-a
femin-ae
femin-ae
femin-am
femin-a
femin-a

femin-ae
femin-arum
femin-is
femin-as
femin-ae
femin-is

o- declension
'grandfather'
Sg
Pl
av-us
av-i
av-o
av-um
av-e
av-o

av-i
av-orum
av-is
av-os
av-i
av-is

As (13) shows, Latin exhibited some case syncretism. For instance, the genitive
and the dative singular are homophonous for femina 'woman', the dative and
ablative singular are homophonous for avus 'grandfather', and the dative and the
ablative plural are homophonous for both nouns.
In the descendants of Latin, the Romance languages, case continues to be
expressed synthetically on pronouns. For instance, the distinction between dative
and accusative pronouns is illustrated for French in (14). (Note that unstressed
pronouns in French are clitics; unlike full noun phrases, they precede the verb
they are construed with.)
(14)

a.
b.

Je
I
'I
Je
I
'I

veux
want
want
veux
want
want

leur
parler.
3.pl.dat talk
to talk to them.'
les
voir.
3.pl.acc see
to see them.'

With full noun phrases, however, the same distinction is expressed analytically
by the presence or absence of the case marker .
(15)

a.
b.

Je
I
'I
Je
I
'I

veux
want
want
veux
want
want

parler vos voisins.

talk
your neighbors
to talk to your neighbors'
voir vos voisins.
see your neighbors
to see your neighbors.'

The case marker is etymologically related to the spatial preposition 'to', but is
distinct from it. This is demonstrated by the fact that the pro-form for phrases in
which is a spatial preposition is not leur (or lui in the singular), as in (14a),
but y, just as it is for other spatial prepositions like dans 'in' or sur 'on'.
(16) a.

b.
(17) a.

b.

Nous avons envoy le vin Toulouse; mon ami

habite
Paris.
we
have sent
the wine to Toulouse my friend lives in
Paris
'We sent the wine to Toulouse; my friend lives in Paris.'
Nous y
avons envoy le vin; mon ami
y
habite.
we
there have sent
the wine my friend there lives
'We sent the wine there; my friend lives there.'
Le cadeau se
trouve dans mon sac; nous avons mis le
cadeau
sur la table.
the present refl finds in
my bag we
have put the present
on the table
'The present is (literally, finds itself) in the bag; we put the
present on the table.'
Le cadeau
s'
y
trouve; nous y
avons mis le cadeau.
the present refl there finds
we
there have put the present
'The present is there; we put the present there.'

As mentioned earlier, Old English had five cases, which are illustrated in (18) for
three declensions. As is evident, case syncretism is more extensive in Old English
than in Latin.

(18)

Old English

Nominative
Genitive
Dative
Instrumental
Accusative

Masculine
'fox'
Sg
Pl
fox
fox-es
fox-e
fox-e
fox

fox-as
fox-a
fox-um
fox-um
fox-as

Feminine
'learning'
Sg
Pl
lar
lar-e
lar-e
lar-e
lar-e

lar-a
lar-a
lar-um
lar-um
lar-a

Neuter
'animal'
Sg
deor
deor-es
deor-e
deor-e
deor

Pl
deor2
deor-a
deor-um
deor-um
deor

In the course of Middle English (1150-1500), the old genitive case suffixes were
lost, and their function was taken over by a syntactic head - the possessive
determiner 's (in the plural, the possessive is spelled out as a silent determiner
that is orthographically represented as an apostrophe). The old synthetic genitive
case is illustrated in (19). Recall that the thorn character () corresponds to
modern English 'th'.
(19)

e king-es suster of France (cmpeterb, 59.593)

the king gen sister of France
'the king of France's sister'

Although the change itself is not yet fully understood, it is clear that the modern
possessive marker is no longer a synthetic case suffix on a noun (N) (king), but
rather analytically case-marks an entire noun phrase (DP) (the king of France).
This is clear from the fact that it follows postnominal material like the
prepositional phrase of Francein the translation of (19). The difference between
the old synthetic genitive suffix and the analytical possessive determiner that
replaced it emerges even more sharply from the contrast in (20), where the
possessive determiner obligatorily follows an element that is not even a noun.
For clarity, the noun phrase that is case-marked by the possessive determiner is
underlined in (20b); the entire sequence in (20b) from the to cat is of course also
a noun phrase.
(20)

a.
b.

* the guy's that I used to go out with cat

the guy that I used to go out with 's cat

We ordinarily think of the possessive form of singular noun phrases as

containing 's. Under the analysis just given, however, the nominative, possessive,
and objective case of a full noun phrase are all homophonous in Modern English,
and the determiner 's in the king's is a case marker on a par with the
preposition of in of the king.

Although the possessive is marked analytically on full noun phrases, it continues

to be spelled out synthetically on pronouns (recall the similar analytic/synthetic
split between full noun phrases and pronouns in French). Much as the
combination of a verb like sing and a silent past tense morpheme is spelled out
as sang, a pronoun like we (or more precisely, the feature combination first
person plural) and possessive case is spelled out as our.
Beginning in late Old English (ca. 1000 C.E.), the distinction between the dative
and the accusative weakened, and the distinction was lost completely in the
course of Middle English (1150-1500). In what follows, we will refer to the case
that resulted from the merger as the objective. The distinction between

nominative and objective case continues to be expressed synthetically in modern

English on most ordinary pronouns, as illustrated in (21).
(21)

Nominative
1 sg
2 sg, pl
3 sg m, f, n
1 pl
3 pl

I
you
he, she, it
we
they

Objective
me
you
him, her, it
us
them

As the table shows, with the two pronouns you and it, the distinction between the
nominative and the objective has been lost, and this is also true for full noun
phrases. Finally, it is worth noting that despite the efforts of prescriptive
grammarians to keep a distinction alive between nominative who and
objective whom, the two forms have merged aswho. James Thurber has a
diabolically witty essay on the topic.
Case features
In this section, we introduce some concepts and syntactic conditions that enable
us to derive the distribution of the various case forms of noun phrases in English
and other languages. We begin by introducing the notion of case feature.
Consider the contrast between (22) and (23).
(22)

a.
b.
a.
b.

(23)

ok
ok
*
*

They will help her.

She will help them.
Them will help she.
Her will help they.

Why are the sentences in (23) ungrammatical? The answer is that noun phrases in
English are subject to the requirements in (24).
(24)

a.
b.

Subjects of finite clauses appear in the nominative.

Objects appear in the objective.

As is evident, both of the subjects in (23) are objective forms, and both of the
objects are nominative forms. Each of the sentences in (23) therefore contradicts
the requirements in (24) in two ways.

Now compare the examples in (22) and (23) with those in (25).
(25)

a.
b.

You will help her.

She will help you.

As we saw in (21), they and she exhibit distinct forms for the nominative and
objective, whereas you doesn't. But because case syncretism between the
nominative and the objective is not complete in English (in other words, because
at least some pronouns still have distinct forms for the two cases), we will
treat you as a nominative form in (25a), equivalent to they and she, but as an
objective form in (25b), equivalent to them and her. For the same reason, we treat
the noun phrase my big brother as a nominative form in (26a) and as an objective
form in (26b).
(26)

a.
b.

My big brother will help her.

She will help my big brother.

In order to disambiguate instances of case syncretism like you and my big

brother, it is useful to associate each noun phrase in a language with a case
feature. Each case feature has a value that is selected from among all the various
case forms in that language (regardless of whether the case forms are expressed
synthetically or analytically). In English, for instance, a case feature can assume
the value "nominative", "possessive," or "objective". In Russian, a case feature
has a choice among six values (nominative, genitive, dative, accusative, locative,
instrumental). If we need to represent a noun phrase's case feature, we can do so
by means of labels as in (27) and (28).
(27)

(28)

a.
b.
c.
a.
b.
c.

[DP-nom They ] will help [DP-obj her. ]

[DP-nom You ] will help [DP-obj her. ]
[DP-nom My big brother ] will help [DP-obj her. ]
[DP-nom She ] will help [DP-obj them. ]
[DP-nom She ] will help [DP-obj you. ]
[DP-nom She ] will help [DP-obj my big brother. ]

Case licensing

Earlier, we said that the purpose of case is to encode a noun phrase's function in
the sentence. In order to make the notion of function more precise, we can think
of each noun phrase in a sentence as being licensed by (= linked to) some
syntactic head. A common way of putting this is to say that the case feature on a
noun phrase needs to be checkedagainst a corresponding case feature on the
case-licensing head. In English, case-licensers must be either verbs or

prepositions, but there are languages that allow adjectives and nouns to be caselicensers as well. If the case features on the two participants in a checking
relationship don't match up (say, one is nominative and the other is accusative) or
if they don't stand in a one-to-one relationship (say, the case feature on a head
ends up checking case features on more than one noun phrase), then the sentence
is ungrammatical. On the other hand, if every case feature in a sentence stands in
a proper relationship with a matching partner, then all is well with the sentence as
far as case theory is concerned. A question that immediately comes to a
syntactician's mind is whether case checking is subject to structural constraints. If
so, we are of course interested in providing as general a formulation of those
constraints as possible.
There is reason to believe that there is more than one type of case checking. We
can distinguish between case licensing, which holds between a noun phrase and
a head external to the noun phrase (say, a verb or preposition), and case
agreement, which holds within a noun phrase (say, between a determiner and a
noun). In the current version of this book, we will discuss only case licensing. In
this section, we motivate various conditions (primarily structural, but also
nonstructural) on the relationship between the two participants in a case-licensing
relation. In the first half of the section, we present three structural configurations
in which case licensing is possible: the specifier-headconfiguration, the headspecifier configuration, and the head-complement configuration. Beginning in
the 1990's, attempts have been made to simplify the theory of case licensing by
identifying a single case-licensing configuration. For instance, it has been
proposed that complements of verbs are not directly licensed in the headcomplement configuration, but that the complement moves to the specifier of a
silent head, and that case is uniformly licensed in the specifier-head
configuration. The following discussion will remain somewhat agnostic on this
point. However, we will show that all three of the configurations mentioned
above are almost identical from a topological point of view. In the second half of
the section, we discuss three further nonstructural conditions on case
licensing: biuniqueness, exocentricity, and matching.
Spec-head licensing
In what follows, it's important to distinguish carefully between finite clauses on
the one hand and finite verbs on the other. In English, finite clauses are clauses
that can stand on their own. The clauses in (i)-(iii) are finite; the ones in (iv) are
not.
(i)

Finite clause Finite tense + finite verb

I [pres] do that; he

(ii) a. Finite clause Finite tense + finite

auxiliary + nonfinite verb
(present participle)
b. Finite clause Finite tense + finite
auxiliary + nonfinite verb
(past participle)
(iii)
(iv)

Finite clause Modal + nonfinite verb

(infinitive)
Nonfinite
Nonfinite verb, no finite
clause
auxiliary or modal

[pres] does that;

I [past] did that; he
[past] did that.
I [pres] am doing that; he [pres]
is doing that;
I [past] was doing that; he [past]
was doing that.
I [pres] have done that; he
[pres] has done that;
I [past] had done that; he [past]
had done that.
I will do that; he will do that.
to do that; to be doing that; to
have done that

Finite verbs are ones that aren't participles or infinitives (see Finiteness in
English for details). A finite clause always contains some finite Infl element, either
a finite tense morpheme (i, ii) or a modal (iii). A finite tense morpheme in turn is
always associated with a finite verb (i) or a finite auxiliary (ii). A modal, on the
other hand, is always associated with an infinitive.
From this it follows that if a clause contains a finite verb or a finite auxiliary, the
clause itself is finite. But if a clause contains a nonfinite verb, it needn't itself be
nonfinite. If it contains a modal, it is finite (iii); only if it doesn't is it nonfinite
(iv).

We begin by considering how case is licensed on the subjects of sentences. Since

subjects of sentences start out life as specifiers of verbs, one's first impulse might
be to propose that nominative case is checked by V. Although we will end up
rejecting this approach, let us pursue it for the moment in order to show why it is
unsatisfactory. The proposal is that what checks the nominative case of He (or
more precisely, its trace in Spec(VP)) is the finite verb understands in (29a) and
the bare (nonfinite) formunderstand in (29b). This putative checking relationship
is indicated by the red boxes. (We further assume that DPs whose case feature is
checked are free to move on to other positions in the sentence.)

(29) a.

b.

Finite clause, finite verb form

(to be revised!)

Finite clause, nonfinite verb form

(to be revised!)

Now if verbs were able to check nominative case, regardless of whether they are
finite or nonfinite, we would expect the nonfinite verb in the lower IP in (30) to
be able to check nominative case on the lower he, on a par with the nonfinite
verb in (29b).3

(30) *

Intended meaning: He claims that he understands Hegel.

However, (30) is completely ungrammatical. We therefore reject the idea that
nominative case is checked by V. We conclude instead that it is checked by finite
I. The contrast between (29) and (30) then follows directly since I is finite in (29)
([pres], does), but not in (30) (to).
Notice, by the way, that the ungrammaticality of (30) isn't due to semantic
anomaly, since the intended meaning is both expressible and semantically wellformed, as indicated by the gloss to (30). Neither is the ungrammaticality of (30)
due to the split infinitive, since (31) is as ungrammatical as (30).

(31)

One might attempt to rescue the idea that nominative case is checked by finite V
by replacing (32a) with (32b).
(32) a. Nominative case is checked by finite I.
b. Nominative case is licensed by finite V where possible (that is, in
clauses that contain a finite V), and by finite I otherwise.
Although there is no empirical argument against (32b), we reject it because it
violates conceptual economy. Our reasoning is as follows. A finite V in a clause
implies a finite I (in the form of a silent tense morpheme). The converse is not
true, however. Although a finite I in a clause is consistent with a finite V, as just
stated, it is also consistent with a nonfinite V (the finite I might be a modal).
Clauses with finite I thus form a proper superset of clauses with finite V. This
means that (32a) and (32b) are empirically equivalent. However, the statement in
(32b) is unnecessarily more cumbersome and therefore less preferable.
The upshot of the discussion so far is that the head that checks nominative case in
English is finite I, and that the licensing configuration for checking nominative
case in English is the specifier-head configuration. This is shown in (33) (which
supersedes (29)).4 The term 'specifier' is generally abbreviated to 'spec' (read as
'speck').

(33) a.

b.

Finite clause, finite verb form

(final)

Finite clause, nonfinite verb form

(final)

Nominative case is not the only case to be licensed in the spec-head

configuration in English. So is possessive case. Here, the case-checking head is
the possessive determiner ('s or its silent plural variant), as discussed earlier.
In possessive constructions like (i), there are two noun phrases: a lower
one (the possessor) and a higher one (the entire noun phrase that contains
both the possessor and the thing possessed).

(i)

(ii)

It is important to keep in mind that each of the two noun phrases has a
case feature of its own that needs to be checked. The lower DP has a
possessive case feature. The higher DP generally has a nominative or an
objective case feature, but it might itself bear a possessive case feature if
it is part of an even larger possessive construction, as it is in (ii).

(34) illustrates the spec-head configuration in its general form. The nodes that
bear the case features that need to be checked are the head X and its specifier YP.
The path between the two nodes is indicated in red; we return to some properties
of this path in connection with the two remaining case-licensing configurations
that we discuss (head-spec, head-complement).

(34)

Head-spec licensing

A second configuration that licenses case checking is head-spec licensing, which

we motivate on the basis of sentences like (35a).
(35)

a.
b.

He expected her to dislike him.

He expected that she would dislike him.

In both sentences, what is expected is a state of affairs (= a proposition). Given

the semantic parallel between the two sentences, it is reasonable to suppose
that expect in (35a) takes a single complement (the entire italicized sequence her
to dislike him), rather than a sequence of two complements (the DP her and some
constituent dominating to dislike him). Assuming that to is a nonfinite structural
counterpart of finite would leads us to give (35a) the structure in (36).

(36)

An additional reason for treating the noun phrase following expect as the subject
of a complement clause rather than as the object of the matrix clause concerns
sentences containing expletive there. Recall from Chapter 3 that
expletive there is licensed as the subject of a clause containing a verb of (coming
into) existence. If we treat the DP immediately following expect as a subject, the
parallel between (37a) and (37b) is expected and straightforward (as is the
parallel between (37) and (35)).
(37) a.
b.

He expected [IP there to be a fly in his soup ] .

He expected that [IP there would be a fly in his soup ] .

On the other hand, if we were to treat the postverbal DP as an object, we would

have to complicate our statement of how expletive there is licensed. Moreover,
even if we succeeded in formulating a descriptively adequate licensing condition,
we would still forfeit the structural parallel between (37a) and (37b).
Having motivated the structure in (36), let's now return to our main concern: how
objective case is licensed on the embedded subjects in (35a) and (37a). Consider
the schemas in (38).

(38)

a.

b.

Spec-head licensing

Head-spec licensing

Notice that the head-spec configuration in (38b) is the mirror image of the spechead configuration in (38a), already familiar from (34), in the following sense. In
both cases, the case-licensing configuration can be characterized as in (39).
(39)
a.
b.
c.
d.

A case-licensing configuration is defined as follows:

a head X
the nonterminal node closest to X (i.e., the intermediate projection X')
a node closest to X' that is distinct from X
the specifier of the node in (c)

The difference between spec-head and head-spec licensing simply concerns the
direction that the path takes in (39c). Spec-head licensing chooses the mother of
the head's intermediate projection; head-spec licensing chooses the daughter.
Given (39), we can say that objective case is checked on the complement subject
in an ECM construction by the matrix verb in the head-spec configuration.
It is standard to refer to the construction in (35a) and (37a) as the
Exceptional Case-Marking (ECM) construction. Given the analysis that
we have just presented, the term is a bit of a misnomer. If the
construction is indeed exceptional, it is not for structural reasons, but
because of the crosslinguistic rarity of heads that take IP complements
and are also able to check objective case. Because the term is prevalent in

the literature, we will continue to use 'ECM construction' to refer to the

construction in question and 'ECM verb' to refer to any verb with the two
properties just mentioned (takes IP complement, able to check objective
case).
ECM constructions are not the only ones where case is checked in a head-spec
configuration. The same configuration is also relevant for the constructions
discussed inChapter 7, VP shells and small clauses. In a language like English,
which does not distinguish between a dative and an accusative case, but has only
a single objective case, case checking proceeds along exactly the same lines as
described above. In (40a) (= (3) of Chapter 7), for instance, the head of the higher
VP checks objective case on the specifier of the lower VP. In (40b) (= (7a)
of Chapter 7), let checks objective case on the small clause subject there.
(40)

a.

b.

In languages with a dative-accusative distinction, case checking in VP shells and

small clauses is a bit more involved than in English, and we therefore defer
discussion of these constructions in these languages until the end of the chapter.
In concluding our discussion of the head-spec configuration, let us briefly return
to nominative case checking in English. In the previous section, we argued that
nominative case is licensed in Spec(IP) by the spec-head configuration. If this is
so, then subject movement in English can be derived from considerations of case
checking. In other words, the subject must move from Spec(VP) to Spec(IP)
because nominative case can't be checked in its original position. However, the
availability of head-spec licensing opens up the alternative that nominative case
is checked in the head-spec configuration. The case-checking head continues to
be finite I, for the reasons discussed earlier. If this possibility is correct, then
subject movement in English must be derived from considerations other than
case theory, such as predication. Given the word order facts of English, it is very
difficult to determine which of the two possibilities just outlined is correct.
Currently, many generative syntacticians take the (somewhat odd) position that
nominative case is checked in the spec-head configuration, but that subject
movement is motivated by considerations of predication.

Head-comp licensing
A third and final case licensing configuration arises in connection with simple
transitive sentences like (41).
(41)

a.

He expected her.

b.

Here, objective case on her is checked by the verb expected in the headcomplement configuration, schematically indicated in its general form in (42).

(42)

Notice that the head-complement configuration is a subconfiguration of the headspec configuration just discussed. This means that a general structural constraint
on case licensing, subsuming all three configurations discussed so far, can be
formulated as in (43).
(43)

Structural licensing condition:

The nodes bearing the case features in a case-checking relationship as well as the
nodes on the path connecting them must all be a (not necessarily proper) subset of
the set of nodes in (39).

The head in a case-licensing relationship always corresponds to the node

specified in (39a). The noun phrase corresponds to either (39c) (head-comp
licensing) or (39d) (spec-head licensing, head-spec licensing).
Nonstructural conditions
In what follows, we further illustrate the structural licensing condition on case
checking in (43), and we introduce three additional, nonstructural conditions on
case-licensing:biuniqueness, exocentricity, and matching.
First, consider (44), where we treat their as the spellout of they and possessive 's.

(44)

a.

He expected their approval.

b.

In (44), objective case on the higher boxed DP is checked by the

verb expected, being licensed by the head-comp relation between them.
Possessive case on the lower DP is checked by the possessive morpheme 's, being
licensed by the spec-head relation between them. So far, so good.
However, a question that arises in connection with the structure in (44) is what
rules out (45) (with the same intended meaning as (44)), where the objective case
feature onexpected checks the objective case feature on them in the head-spec
licensing configuration.
(45)

He expected them approval.

b.

The answer is as follows. Assume the case-checking relationship

between expected and the lower boxed DP them. This leaves the higher DP with a
case feature that must be checked. In principle, expected might check the case
feature on the higher DP in the head-complement configuration, but then a single
case feature (the one on expected) would then be checking more than one case
feature in the rest of the sentence. Conversely, any case feature on the silent
determiner would not get to participate in case-checking. Because (45) is

ungrammatical, we conclude that case-checking is subject to a condition as in

(46).
(46)

Biuniqueness condition:
Case features on heads and noun phrases stand in a one-to-one relationship.

Is there any head other than expected that the higher DP in (45) could enter into a
case-licensing relationship with? The only head that is close enough is the higher
DP's own head, the silent determiner. In particular, just as the head-spec
configuration is the mirror image of the spec-head configuration, so the relation
between the higher DP and its head would correspond to the mirror image of the
head-complement relationship.5 However, assuming a case-licensing relationship
between a phrase and its own head is not sensible given that the purpose of case
is to signal the relationship between a noun phrase and the rest of the sentence. In
other words, we will impose a further condition on case licensing along the lines
of (47).
(47)

Exocentricity condition:
Case licensing is a relationship between a head and an 'outside' noun
phrase (that is, a noun phrase distinct from any projection of the casechecking head).

For completeness, let us note that (45) is impossible even if we were to assume
that the silent D bears no case feature. This is because D heads that do not bear
case features (like a or the in English) don't license specifiers. In other words,
there are no elementary trees of the form in (48), which would be needed to
derive the higher DP in (45b).

(48)

An important joint consequence of the biuniqueness and exocentricity conditions

is given in (49).
(49)

Minimality condition on case licensing

When a case-checking head has the possibility in principle of entering
into a case-licensing relation with either of two noun phrases, it is the
minimal configuration (the one involving the shorter path) that is the
grammatical one.

The third and final nonstructural condition on case licensing is one already
mentioned informally at the very beginning of our discussion of case licensing.
For ease of reference, we now give it a name.
(50)

Matching condition:
A case feature on a head and the corresponding case feature on a noun
phrase must match in value.

In the remainder of this section, we illustrate the interplay of the various

conditions that we have proposed, both structural and nonstructural, with
reference to the German examples in (51). The verb kennen 'know' governs the
accusative, and the preposition mit 'with' governs the dative. (Unbelievable as it
may seem, German speakers, including children learning the language, really do
pay attention to the tiny difference between dem and den, and have been doing so
for centuries!)
(51)

a.
b. *
c. *
d. *

dthe
'to
dthe
dthe
dthe

en Mann
acc man
know the
em Mann
dat man
en Mann
acc man
em Mann
dat man

mit dwith the

man with
mit dwith the
mit dwith the
mit dwith the

em
dat
the
en
acc
en
acc
em
dat

Hut kennen
hat know
hat'
Hut kennen
hat know
Hut kennen
hat know
Hut kennen
hat know

The schematic structure for all four verb phrases is given in (52) (recall
from Chapter 4 that verbs are head-final in German, whereas (most) prepositions
are head-initial).

(52)

In (51a), kennen checks accusative case with the higher DP, and mit checks
dative case with the lower DP, each in the head-comp licensing configuration. In
other words, each head checks the case feature of the DP closest to it.
(51b) is ruled out because it violates the matching condition in (50). Specifically,
even though kennen and the higher DP would stand in a legitimate licensing
configuration (head-comp), the accusative case feature of kennen doesn't match
the dative case feature on the higher DP. Moreover, the accusative case feature
of kennen is unable to check the matching accusative case feature on the lower
DP, because the verb and the lower DP are too far apart (a checking relationship
between these two nodes would violate the structural licensing condition in (43)).
Analogous considerations hold for mit and its potential checking relationships
with the lower and higher DPs, respectively.
(51c) is ruled out as follows. Case checking on the higher DP is unproblematic;
accusative case is checked by kennen in the head-comp configuration. However,
case cannot be checked on the lower DP. Checking accusative case with mit in
the head-comp configuration would violate the matching condition (dative and
accusative don't match), and checking accusative case on the lower DP
with kennen would violate both the structural licensing condition and the
biuniqueness condition on case checking. (51d) is ruled out for analogous
reasons.
The dative-accusative distinction
In this section, as promised, we return to the issue of case checking in languages
that, unlike English, distinguish dative and accusative case.
(53) gives a double complement sentence in German. 6
(53)

dass ich
den
Roman an den
Jungen schicke
that I.nom the.acc novel to the.acc boy
send
'that I am sending the novel to the boy'

(54) gives the structure for (53); for completeness, we give the structures both
before and after GO moves to CAUSE.

(54) a.

b.

From (53), we conclude that CAUSE checks accusative case, and we would
therefore expect the recipient in the double object counterpart of (53) to appear in
the accusative case as well. But (55) shows that the recipient must instead appear
in the dative case.
(55) a.
b. *

dass ich
that I.nom
'that I am
dass ich
that I.nom

dem
the.dat
sending
den
the.acc

Jungen den
Roman
boy
the.acc novel
the boy the novel'
Jungen den
Roman
boy
the.acc novel

schicke
send
schicke
send

The structure for (55) is shown in (56); once again, we give both pre- and postmovement structures.

(56) a.

b.

The ungrammaticality of (55b) is reminiscent of the double o constraint of

Japanese mentioned in Chapter 7; recall the contrast in (57).
(57)
*

Hanako-ga Taroo-ni ringo-o

nom
dat apple acc
'that Hanako made Taroo eat an
Hanako-ga Taroo-o
ringo-o
nom
acc apple acc

tabe-sase-ta
eat caus past
apple'
tabe-sase-ta
eat caus past

koto
that
koto
that

However, the situation in the two languages is not completely identical; indeed,
the case marking facts for the German counterpart of (57) are exactly the reverse
of those in Japanese.
(58) a.
b. *

dass der
Stefan den
Manfred einen
that the.nom
the.acc
an.acc
'that Stefan made Manfred eat an apple'
dass der
Stefan dem
Manfred einen
that the.nom
the.dat
an.acc

Apfel essen liess

apple eat
made
Apfel essen liess
apple eat
made

The challenge facing us is how to make sense of three separate and apparently
contradictory case-marking facts:
1. the alternation between accusative and dative case-marking on the lower
specifier in (53) and (55),
2. the parallel constraint on double accusative marking in (55) and (57), and
3. the contrasting case-marking pattern between (57) and (58).
So far, we have been assuming that when a head and a noun phrase occur in some
case-licensing configuration, this state of affairs both licenses the noun phrase's
occurrence in its particular syntactic position (spec or comp position) and
determines the particular case that appears on the noun phrase (nominative,
accusative, etc.). Let us now weaken this latter assumption somewhat. In
particular, we will allow the case that appears on a noun phrase to be only
partially determined by the case features of the head that licenses its position in
the structure; the case can also reflect further details of the structure, including
the case features of other heads. In (53) and (54), case licensing proceeds as
before. GO takes a PP complement and has no case feature. Not surprisingly,
therefore, when GO adjoins to CAUSE, there is no effect on the accusative
feature of CAUSE, which we will assume gets shared by the V node formed by
adjunction (the V that dominates both GO and CAUSE in (54b)). In (55) and
(56), on the other hand, GET has an accusative feature of its own. What we
propose is that once GET adjoins to CAUSE, the presence of the case feature on
GET is able to change the value of the case feature on CAUSE from accusative to
dative. This dative feature then percolates up to the V node formed by adjunction
(the V dominating both GET and CAUSE in (56b)). Because small clauses are
structurally analogous to VP shells, moving the lower verb tabe- 'eat' to the
higher causative -sase- in the Japanese causative has the same effect, changing
the accusative case feature on -sase- to dative. This still leaves us with the casemarking contrast between (57) and (58). What could it be due to? Recall that
in the previous chapter, we motivated verb movement in the Japanese causative

on the grounds that the causative morpheme -sase- is a bound morpheme. The
German verb lassen 'let', on the other hand, is not a bound morpheme and there is
no reason to assume that the lower verb moves to it. We can therefore derive the
contrast between (57) and (58) by permitting case features to be changed in the
way that we have just proposed only in connection with the movement of a casechecking head. This is schematically illustrated in (59) (headedness irrelevant).

(59) a.

b.

No verb movement
Double accusative case
marking

Verb movement
Dative-accusative case marking

Case agreement

(coming eventually...)
Notes

1. A very small number of German verbs governs a third case, the genitive. We
don't discuss these verbs here, because they are felt to be archaic.
2. Note how the -s-less plural of deer, which is exceptional in modern English,
goes back to Old English, where it was simply the ordinary plural form for the
declension to which deor 'animal' belonged.
3. The structure in (30) is analogous to that of its grammatical counterpart, He
claims to understand Hegel. Details of the structure (for instance, the presence of
the CP) are motivated in the next chapter.
4. The spec-head configuration is also frequently, though somewhat misleadingly,
referred to as spec-head agreement. The reason for this is that subjects and verbs
of sentences, which are in the spec-head configuration in the VP, agree in number
(the man runs/*run; the men run/*runs). The reason that the term is misleading is
that morphological agreement doesn't necessarily imply a spec-head
configuration. For instance, determiners agree in number with the head of their

NP complement (that woman/*women; those women/*woman), but the D and the

N aren't in a spec-head configuration.
5. The relation between the silent determiner and the higher boxed DP in (44) is a
mirror image of the head-comp relation in the following sense. The path between
the silent determiner and its NP complement involves a first segment from D to
D' and a downward turn at D' to give the second segment from D' to NP. Now
imagine taking an upward turn at D'. The resulting second path segment ends at
the higher boxed DP.
6. We use subordinate clauses because German main clauses involve a
complication, already mentioned in Chapter 3, that is irrelevant here. See Chapter
14 for details.

Exercises and problems

Exercise 8.1

According to the analysis in the text, why are the sentences in (1)
ungrammatical?
(1)

a.
b.

*
*

He claims to he understand Hegel.

He claims he to understand Hegel.

Exercise 8.2

A. Using the grammar tool in ***, build a ternary-branching structure for (1) (=
(37a)) along the lines that was mentioned, but rejected, in the text.
(1)

He expected there to be a fly in his soup.

B. Given the ternary-branching structure, how would the licensing condition on

expletive there have to be reformulated?
Exercise 8.3
In the chapter, we stated that nouns and adjectives aren't case-licensers in
English. Provide evidence for that statement. One piece of evidence for each
category is sufficient.
Exercise 8.4

A. Using the grammar tool in x-bar ch8, build structures for the sentences in (1).
Originally a preposition, for in modern English can also be a
complementizer. Assume that the complementizer retains the caselicensing ability of the preposition.
(1) a.
b.
c.
d.
e.

I waited for her.

I waited for there to be a sale.
It would be convenient for daycare to be available for the children.
It would be convenient for the parents for daycare to be available.
I suspect the class to be difficult.

B. How is case checked on each of the DPs in (1)? Your answer should include
which case is checked, by what head, and in what configuration.
Exercise 8.5
As (1) illustrates, there are no ECM adjectives or nouns in English. Is this a
statistical accident, or is there a deeper reason?
(1)

a.
b.

* I was expectant there to be a problem.

* the expectation there to be a problem

Exercise 8.6

A. Using the grammar tool in Welsh case checking, build structures for the Welsh
sentences in (1) (data from Borsley and Roberts 1996:19, 31).
Emrys
ddraig.
(1) a. Gwelai
b.

see.conditional Emrys.nom dragon.obj

'Emrys would see a dragon.'
Disgwyliodd Emrys
i Megan
fynd
i Fangor.
expected
Emrys.nom to Megan.obj go.infinitive to Bangor.obj
'Emrys expected Megan to go to Bangor.'

B. How is case checked on each of the noun phrases in (1)? (As in English,
nominative case cannot be checked in nonfinite clauses in Welsh.) Your answer
should include which case is checked, by which head, and in which licensing
configuration.
C. Proto-Indo-European (the ancestor of Welsh) is reconstructed as having had
rich agreement, and so it presumably had verb raising. The Celtic languages,
which are descendants of Proto-Indo-European and to which Welsh belongs, have
lost agreement, yet they still exhibit verb raising. Why didn't the loss of

agreement lead to the loss of verb raising in Celtic as it did in Mainland

Scandinavian?
Exercise 8.7
Given the discussion in the textbook so far, exactly one of the following
statements is true. Which is it? Briefly explain your choice.
(1) a.
b.
c.
d.

All subjects are agents.

All agents are subjects.
All subjects check nominative case.
All noun phrases that check nominative case are subjects.

Exercise 8.8

Both sentences in (1) are intended to have the same meaning. In a sentence or
two, explain why they contrast in grammaticality.
(1)

a. ok
b. *

It appears that they may solve the problem.

Theyi appear that ti may solve the problem.

Problem 8.1

On the one hand, German appears to have a double accusative constraint ((55b) is
ungrammatical). On the other hand, it appears not to ((58a) is grammatical). Can
you resolve the paradox?
Problem 8.2

A. Use the grammar tool in x-bar ch8 to build structures for the gerunds in (1)
and (2). You can reuse structures for (1a,b) if you have already built them in
connection withExercise 5.8. On the basis of the structures you build, explain
how case is checked on the subjects of the gerunds (the noun phrases in
boldface). Your answer should include which case is checked, by what head, and
in what configuration.
(1b) and (2a) are not identical.
(1) a.
b.
(2) a.
b.
c.

I disapprove of Kim's impulsive hiring of incompetents.

I disapprove of Kim's impulsively hiring incompetents.
I disapprove of Kim impulsively hiring incompetents.
I'm concerned about there not being time.
I watched them running down the street.

B. Why are the sentences in (3) ungrammatical? Build trees if necessary, but
where possible you can explain your answer with reference to trees that you have
built for (A).
(3) a. * I disapprove of Kim's impulsive hiring incompetents.
b. * I disapprove of Kim impulsive hiring of incompetents.
C. Some speakers accept the gerunds in (4), though not the one in (5). Explain
how case is checked on the subject of the gerunds in (4), providing the usual
details, and also explain what rules out (5).
(4) a.
b.
c.
(5)
*

Kim impulsively hiring incompetents is unfortunate.

There not being time is unfortunate.
Them running down the street is unfortunate.
Kim impulsive hiring of incompetents is unfortunate.

D. Can the analysis that you propose in (C) be extended to cover the facts in both
(B) and (C)? Why or why not?
Problem 8.3
In the text, we list several conditions on case checking: the structural licensing
condition (43), the biuniqueness condition (46), the exocentricity condition (47),
and the matching condition (50). Is it possible to eliminate at least one of these?
For example, is it possible to derive the biuniqueness condition from the
structural licensing condition and the exocentricity condition?