Abdelkader Fassi Fehri Arabic Modifying Adjectives and DP Structures

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ARABIC MODIFYING ADJECTIVES AND

DP STRUCTURES*
Abdelkader Fassi Fehri
Abstract. Important characteristics of the Arabic adjectival system are

investigated, in view of the question of how the DP system is organized. A first
series of issues include: (a) how adjective serialization observes quasi-universal
hierarchical ordering restrictions (or their mirror image order), (b) how
adjectives and other modifiers and determiners alternate in postnominal and
prenominal positions, and (c) how distributional classes of adjectives relate to
attributive/predicative, or head/modifier uses. A second series concerns (d)
inflectional properties of adjectives (including Case, Definiteness, and Number
and Gender features), and their Head/Spec dependent status. Such questions
are approached through postulating an articulated (fissioned) DP structure.
Structural grounds are provided for checking various inflectional features in
hierarchically ordered, but autonomous DP domains. AP (or A) movement, as
well as N and Possessor raisings, are independently motivated. Cross-linguistic
variation follows, depending on whether all, some, or none of these processes
are involved, to yield convergent derivations. APs (along with NPs) are treated
as DPs, taking into account their inflectional and interpretational behaviours.
Definiteness inheritance and Genitive checking are reanalyzed in view of new
empirical and theoretical considerations of synthetic possessive structures.
1. Introduction
The study of the system of adjectival modification, in addition to its
importance in its own right, is essential for clarifying how the internal
structure of nominal phrases is articulated, and what appropriate paral-
lelisms should be established between DP/NP and CP/IP. In investigating
the internal syntax of modifying adjectival constructions in Arabic,
evidence can be provided for the need of independent AP (or A) raising,
as well as N and Possessor raisings.1 Order variation across languages is
then characterized depending on (a) how much use is made of these
movement processes for (re-) ordering constituents, and (b) how high the
targeted positions are located in the structure.
In line with Chomsky's (1995) Attract movement theory, I argue that it
* The content of this work has been presented in various forms at the 11th Symposium on
Arabic Linguistics held at Emory University, Atlanta (March 1997), at the GLOW 20
Workshops (IERA, Rabat, April 1997), the MIT Linglunch (September 1997), and the LSM
annual meeting (IERA, Rabat, February 1998). I would like to thank the audiences there,
and acknowledge helpful comments and remarks by Ken Hale, Noam Chomsky, Richie
Kayne, Anders Holmberg, David Pesetsky, Pino Longobardi, Morris Halle, Noriaki Yusa,
Hyon Sook Choe, and two Studia Linguistica reviewers. The usual disclaimers apply.
1
The term Arabic is used in the text to designate Standard Arabic, the unique official
language through the Arab world (with only minor regional variation). Spoken Arabic
dialects exhibit more significant variation.
Studia Linguistica 53(2) 1999, pp. 105±154. # The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.
Published by Blackwell Publishers, 108 Cowley Road, Oxford OX4 1JF, UK, and
350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA
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106 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri
is the strength of the various features in D which triggers A or N raising

to D, on the one hand, and AP or Possessor raisings to Spec D, on the
other.2 A feature-based split (or fission) of D structure aÁ la Bittner & Hale
(1996a) and Lamontagne & Travis (1987) is then postulated, to account
for various principled distributions.3 Hierarchical prominence and mirror
image ordering restrictions are derived from a base structure in which
multiple APs originate as multiple Specs.4 The latter are locally moved to
higher functional Specs, thus creating only standard minimal links.5
Adjectives (like nouns) are inherently endowed with Case, Def(initeness),
and Number (= Nb) and Gender (= Gr) features, and they project as DPs.
They then receive modificational or non-modificational interpretations,
depending on the structures in which they are found.
Contrary to the traditionally spread view that Arabic adjectives are only
postnominal, it is shown that the latter can also be prenominal. The analysis
of adjectival synthetic genitives (= SGAs) is typically unified with that of
nominal synthetic possessives and/or partitives (= SGNs). Furthermore,
Genitive checking is argued to take place in the DP domain, whereas Def
inheritance is shown to apply in some SGs, but not all of them. Postnominal
AP order is derived, through antisymmetrical left movement aÁ la Kayne
(1994), which observes the Minimal Link Condition (= MLC).6
The paper is organized as follows. In section 2, I provide a brief
description of the essential properties and alternatives involved in the
syntax of Arabic adjectives, and argue for the existence of prenominal
adjectives. In section 3, I investigate the structure of postnominal
adjectives, and the mechanisms involved in deriving their mirror image
(= MIO). In section 4, I propose an analysis of synthetic possessives
which is based on a fissioned DP architecture.7 In section 5, I show why
APs should be analyzed as DPs. Finally, I discuss some consequences of
the approach adopted in section 6. The latter concern crosslinguistic
movement variation, the article content, Genitive checking, adjectival
mixed order distributions, as well as competing proposals for dealing with
Def inheritance.
2
Chomsky (p. 297) defines Attract as follows:
K attracts F if F is the closest feature that can enter into a checking relation with a
sublabel of K.
3
In Bittner & Hale (1996a), Case and Def are realized on independent syntactic heads
(namely K and D). I assume that both heads are Ds, as will be made clear below. Other work
has directly or indirectly assumed a similar split (see e.g. Holmberg 1993 and Giusti 1995).
4
On the Multiple Spec hypothesis, see Chomsky (1995) and references cited there.
5
Cinque (1994a) argues that adjectives are specifiers, rather than heads of F. But as we
will see, Arabic exploits both options.
6
Chomsky (p. 311) provides the following definition of MLC:
K attracts A only if there is no B, B closer to K than A, such that K attract B.
7
On split or fissioned categories, in syntax, see Chomsky (1995), Fassi Fehri (1996), and
McGinnis (1995). For a quite different view of fissioning and movement, see Nash &
Rouveret (1997). As for Halle & Marante (1993), they propose a strictly morphological view
of fission.
# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 107
2. Adjective classes and their distributions

Although Arabic modifying adjectives occur productively in postnominal
positions, and adjective serialization observes a mirror image ordering of
that found in A-N languages, Arabic can be argued to be a A-N
language.8 This typology is supported by (a) the distributional properties
of attributive adjectives (which differ significantly from those of predi-
cative adjectives, even though both types are normally placed postnom-
inally), (b) the prenominal positioning of various determiners (including
numerals, quantifiers, and demonstratives), which conform to non-MIO
universal restrictions, and (c) the existence of prenonimal adjectives.
2.1 Serialized postnominal ordering

Arabic adjectives occur normally in postnominal positions. There, they
agree in Def, Case, and Nb/Gr with the head noun they modify. They also
observe hierarchical prominence restrictions on serialized ordering docu-
mented for other languages. The following examples illustrate some of
these properties.
(1) l-kitaab-u l-?axdar-u s-sagÇiir-u
Ç
the-book-nom the-green-nom ÇÇ
the-little-nom
`The little green book'
(2) sÏaay-un siiniiy-un ?axdar-u jayyid-un
Ç
tea-nom Chinese-nom Ç
green-nom excelllent-nom
Àn excellent green Chinese tea'
(3) ?-al¹ ab-u bi-l-kurat-i l-kabiirat-i l-jamiilat-i
I-play with-the-ball-gen the-big-gen the-beautiful-gen
Ì play with the beautiful big ball.'
In (1), the adjective carries the definite article (in addition to Case and
Nb/Gr features) in agreement with the modified noun, whereas the
adjective in (2) is indefinite. The construction (3) shows how the genitive
case on the head spreads to all adjectives. Furthermore, the order of
adjectives observed is the mirror image of that found with attributive
adjectives in English or French, for example:
(4) a beautiful big (round) red ball
(5) un joli gros ballon (rond) rouge
Indeed, a number of authors have claimed that the relative ordering of the
different classes of adjectives is by and large the same across languages.
8
I have shown elsewhere that Arabic is an Adv-V language, and that adverbs are
specifiers of extended functional projections of verbs (cf. Fassi Fehri 1997a, b, which
builds on Cinque's (1994b, 1997) theoretical and empirical motivations). Functional
parallelisms are then established between nominal and verbal modifiers.

Consider e.g. the serialized ordering prominence restriction on object

denoting nominal adjectives in (6), proposed in Sproat and Shih (1988,
1990), and that on event nominal adjectives in (7), found in Cinque
(1994a).9
(6) object denoting: quality 4 size 4 shape 4 color 4 provenance
(7) event nominals: speaker oriented 4 subject oriented 4 {manner,
thematic}
These orderings are observed by attributive adjectives in direct A-N
languages like Germanic, or indirect A-N languages like Romance. The
mirror image of this order (i.e. N-A) is observed in V final languages like
Indonesian and Thai.10
In examples (1)±(3), we have seen that the ordering restriction in (6) is
respected with object denoting nominals, although in MIO. The same is
true of event nominals with regard to (7):
(8) l-hujuum-u l-?amiriikiyy-u l-wahsÏiyy-u l-baliid-u l-muhtamal-u
Ç
the-attack the-American the-salvage Ç
the-stupid the-probable
`The probable stupid salvage American attack'
(9) l-intiqaad-u l-?amiriikiyy-u sÏ-sÏadiid-u li-l-muqaawamat-i
the-criticism the-American the-violent of-the-resistance-gen
`The violent American criticism of the resistance'
Here too, the order is also a MIO. It contrasts with the order found in
Romance, in which postnominal adjectives occur in the nominal (non-
inverted) order, although N raises also above (some) adjectives, as shown
by Cinque (1994a). The following Italian examples illustrate this vari-
ation.11
(10) la sola grande invasione italiane dell' Albania
`the single big Italian invasion of Albania'
(11) la probabile goffa reazione immediata alla tua lettera
`the probable clumsy immediate reaction to your letter'
Spanish, however, as described by Bosque and Picallo (1996), instanti-
ates a case of a Romance language in which the order of adjectives is
inverted, unlike what happened in Italian or French. This is illustrated by
(12) for object denoting nominal constructions (= (1b) and (48a) in BP),
and (13) for event nominal ones (= their (26a) ):
9
Cf. e.g. Sproat & Shih's (1990) AOR given in (i), based on ideas found in Bloomfield
(1933), Whorf (1945), Quirk et al. (1972), and other references cited there:
(i) Restrictions on the ordering of multiple adjectival modifiers ± henceforth AOR ±
obtain iff the adjectives involved are hierarchical direct modifiers. (= their (8) ).
Cf. also Cinque (1994a) for restrictions on event nominal modification.
10
These restrictions are also observed in Celtic, as argued e.g. by Rouveret (1994) for Welsh.
11
The terminology indirect A-N languages applies to languages in which N has raised past
A at PF, although A is prenominal at base structure.

(12) a. una comedia musical americana

a comedy musical American
Àn American musical comedy'
b. una guerra religiosa fratricida devastadora
a war religious fratricidal devastating
À devastating fratricidal religious war'
(13) produccioÂn marisquera gallega
production shellfish Galician
`Galician shellfish production'
It is important to note that although these adjectives occur post-
nominally (whether in MIO or not), they are interpreted as attributive,
as has been argued e.g. by Cinque (1994a) and Bosque & Picallo (1996)
for Romance. The same is true of Arabic adjectives. When relevant
ordering restrictions are observed, their interpretation is attributive.
Other orders are possible, but they are associated with a different
interpretation. Thus observing strict ordering restrictions can be taken
as a diagnostic for attributive reading, whereas other orders are
(nominally) associated with predicative reading.12 In the next subsec-
tion, I will examine distributional and interpretive evidence supporting
this view.13 14
12
The attributive vs. predicative distinction of adjectives is a classical one (see e.g.
Bolinger 1967 and Hawkins 1983, among others). Other (quite) equivalent terminologies
used in the literature are: direct vs. indirect, restrictive vs. non-restrictive, and intersective vs.
non-intersective. Furthermore, order has been reported to vary depending on what Sproat &
Shih (1990) call `the discourse relevant class' to which the speaker wishes to refer, hence the
contrast between e.g. `small brown dogs' and `brown small dogs'. For relevant discussion,
see also Crisma (1993, 1995).
13
Note that other orders (which do not observe MIO) are not possible with attributive
interpretation, although they may have predicative or focus readings (together with comma
intonation), as illustrated by the following counterparts of (1), (2), and (8):
(i) l-kitaab-u s-sagÇiir-u l-?axdar-u
ÇÇ
the-book the-little Ç
the-green
`The little book which is green'
(ii) sÏaay-un jayyid-un siiniiy-un
tea Ç
excellent Chinese
Àn excellent tea which is Chinese'
(iii) l-hujuum-u l-wahsÏiyy-u l-?amiriikiyy-u
Ç
the-attack the-salvage the-American
`The salvage attack which is American'
See the following subsections for further clarifications.
14
Sproat & Shih (1988) treat Arabic postnominal adjectives as indirect modifiers (the
equivalent of predicatives in our terminology), and they claim that these adjectives are not
subject to their AOR ordering restrictions. According to their informant, no order of
postnominal adjectives is basic. But this description is incorrect. On the other hand, they
take the placement of the synthetic possessor (before adjectives) and the occurrence of two
separate articles on nouns and adjectives to be indications of indirect modification. But see
below for a different interpretation of these facts.

2.2. Further features of attributives

Consider first the case of typical attributives, which occur only prenom-
inally in English, such as those in (14):
(14) a. the alleged murder
b. the former president
These adjectives cannot be used predicatively, e.g. as a complement of a
copula, hence the ungrammaticality of (15):
(15) a. *The murderer is alleged
b. *The president is former
Their exact Arabic counterparts, which also fail predicativity tests, occur
(only) postnominally, hence the following contrasts:
(16) a. l-qaatil-u l-maz¹ uum-u
the-killer-nom the-alleged-nom
`The alleged killer'
b. l-mudiir-u s-saabiq-u
the-director-nom the-former-nom
`The former director'
c. l-xamiis-u l-faarit-u
Ç
the-thursday-nom the-last-nom
`Last Thursday'
(17) a. *l-qaatil-u maz¹ uum-un
the-killer-nom alleged-nom
`The killer is alleged.'
b. *l-mudiir-u saabiq-u-n
the-director-nom former-nom
`The director is former.'
c. *l-xamiis-u faaritu-n
the-thursday-nom last-nom Ç
`Thursday is last.'
The fact that typical attributives are placed (only) postnominally is a clear
indication that postnominal positioning is not a characteristic property of
predicative adjectives.15
But although attributive adjectives occur productively in postnominal
positions, they are still distinguishable from predicative ones on other
grounds. One important distributional distinction between the two classes
has to do with their placement with respect to the complement of the head
noun they are modifying: attributives must be placed before that com-
15
Note that even the counterparts of adjective-noun compounds in English exhibit
postnominal adjective ordering:
(i) l-bayt-u l-?abyad-u
Ç
the-house-nom the white-nom
`The White House'

plement, whereas predicatives occur after it. Thus the contrasts in (18)
and (19) show that attributives must precede complements:
(18) a. l-mudiir-u s-saabiq-u li-l-maktab-i
the-director-nom the-former-nom of-the-office-gen
`The former director of the office'
b. *l-mudiir-u li-l-maktab-i s-saabiq-u
(19) a. s-sabab-u r-ra?iisiyy-u li-stiqaalati-hi
the-reason-nom the-main-nom of-resignation-his
`The main reason of his resignation'
b. *s-sabab-u li-stiqaalati-hi r-ra?iisiyy-u
On the other hand, predicative adjectives must follow the complement.
Compare the following pair of constructions:
(20) a. muhaarabat-u l-hukuumat-i l-muntadarat-u
Ç
fighting-nom Ç
the-government-gen ÅÇ
the-expected-nom
li-l-irtsÏaa?-i
of-the-corruption
`The expecting fighting of the corruption by the government'
b. muhaarabat-u l-hukuumat-i li-l-irtisÏaa?-i
Ç
fighting-nom Ç
the-government-gen of-the-corruption
l-muntadarat-u
ÅÇ
the-expected-nom
`The fighting of the corruption by the government, which is
expected'
In (20a), the AP has only an attributive reading, while in (20b) it has only
a predicative reading. As the English translation shows, the interpretation
of (20b) is close to that of a reduced non-restrictive relative clause.
Likewise, in analytic possessive constructions, attributive adjectives
must precede both the possessor and the complement, whereas predicative
adjectives follow both of them:16
(21) a. l-hujuum-u sÏ-sÏadiid-u l-muhtamal-u li-?amiriikaa
Ç
the-attack-nom the-violent-nom the-probable-nom of-America
¹ alaa l-muqaawamat-i
on the-resistance
`The probable violent attack of the resistance by the U.S.'
b. l-hujuum-u sÏ-sÏadiid-u li-?amiriikaa ¹ alaa l-muqaawamat-i
the-attack-nom the-violent of-America on the-resistance
l-muhtamal-u
Ç
the-probable-nom
`The violent attack of the resistance by the US, which his
probable'
16
Constructions like (21) are productive in Modern Standard Arabic, although their
grammaticality is questionable in Classical Arabic. See Fassi Fehri (1993) for a discussion.
See also Sibawayhi (8th cent.) and Wright (1858/1974).

A further distinction between attributives and predicatives suggests

that they branch differently in the base structure. If attributive APs are
left branch specifiers, as in Cinque (1994a), and predicate APs are on the
right branch of N, then we expect them to exhibit a different behaviour
with respect to a well-known restriction on left branch maximal XPs,
namely their inability to take complements to the right. This expectation
is borne out. Consider the following contrasts:
(22) a. s-suhufiyy-u t-tawiil-u l-faransiyy-u
ÇÇ Ç
the-journalist-nom ÇÇ
the-tall-nom the-French-nom
l-?asl-i
Ç
the-original-gen
`The tall journalist who is of French origin'
b. *s-suhufiyy-u l-faransiyy-u l-?asl-i
ÇÇ Ç
the-journalist-nom Ç
the-French-nom the-original-gen
t-tawiil-u
Çthe-tall-nom
Ç
(23) s-suhufiyy-u l-faransiyy-u t-tawiil-u

ÇÇ Ç
the-journalist-nom ÇÇ
the-French-nom the-tall-nom
`The tall French journalist'
According to the hierarchy in (6), the order in (23) and (22b) is the normal
order of attributives. However, the only possible order when the adjective
takes a complement is (22a). In that order, the first adjective is interpreted
as attributive, and the second one as predicative. The order in (22b) is
excluded if we assume that the left branch specifiers cannot branch to the
right, and that predicative adjectives are lower in the structure than
attributives are.17
Summarizing what has been said so far, there is clear evidence that
both attributive and predicative adjectives can be postnominal, although
they belong to different distributional and interpretive classes. One
particular diagnostic which discriminates the two classes is whether
they comply (or not) with strict ordering restrictions. In the next subsec-
tion, I will show that Arabic determiners which occur prenominally
typically observe these ordering restrictions, without MIO effects. In
subsection 2.4, I provide evidence for the existence of prenominal
adjectives in Arabic. The properties of the constructions to be analyzed
corroborate the view that Arabic is an A-N language, and that nominal
determiners have a prenominal origin.
17
The argumentation based on the Left Branch Condition is adapted from Cinque
(1994a). See also Emonds (1978, 1985) for relevant properties of the latter condition.

2.3. Prenominal determiners

The placement of numerals supports the view that ordering within DP
observes strict hierarchical prominence. When numerals occur prenom-
inally, ordinals must precede cardinals.18
(24) a. ?awwal-u xams-i muhaadaraat-in
first-nom Ç Ç
five-gen lectures-gen
`The first five lectures'
b. *xams-u ?awwal-i muhaadaraat-in
five-nom first-gen Ç Ç
lectures-gen
`The five first lectures'
Furthermore, as (25) and (26) illustrate, when prenominal and postnom-
inal adjectives are combined, the prenominal `space' observes the order-
ing of the hierarchy, while the postnominal `space' observes its mirror
image:
(25) ?awwal-u xams-i suhuf-in faransiyyat-in masÏhuurat-in
Ç Ç
first-nom five-gen newspapers-gen French-gen famous-gen
`The first five famous French newspapers'
(26) taalit-u hujuum-in ?amiriikiyy-in muhtamal-in ¹ alaa
Åthird-nom
Å Ç
attack-gen American-gen probable-gen on
s-suudaan
the-Sudan-gen
`The third probable American attack of Sudan'
Numerals provide only an instance of prenominal determiners and/or
modifiers which observe `direct' hierarchical prominence. Quantifiers and
demonstratives represent other well-known instances in traditional gram-
mars:
(27) kull-u haadaa l-kalaami
all-nom this Å the-speech-gen
Àll this speech'
(28) kull-u talaatat-i rijaal-in
every-nom Åthree-gen
Å men-gen
Èvery three men'
In these constructions, quantifiers and demonstratives occur prenomin-
ally, and the normal (partial) prenominal ordering is as stated in (29),
when the placement of adjectives is taken into account:
(29) Q 4 Dem 4 Ord 4 Card 4 A 4 N
18
Observe that a prenominal adjective enters necessarily into a synthetic genitive
relation with the adjective or the noun following it. See subsection 2.4 and section 5
for discussion.

Note, however, that these determiners (and/or modifiers) can also

occur postnominally. In that case, they observe MIO. For example,
when numerals are placed postnominally, ordinals occur after cardinals:
(30) a. l-muhaadaraat-u l-xams-u l-?uulaa
Ç Ç
the-lectures-nom the-five-nom the-first
`The first five lectures'
b. ?? l-muhaadaraat-u l-?uulaaa l-xams-u
Ç Ç
the-lectures-nom the-first the-first-nom
`The five first lectures'
Moreover, the classes of adjectives listed in (6) and (7) occur before
numerals:
(31) l-kutub-u l-faransiyyat-u l-xamsat-u l-?uulaa
the books-nom the-French-nom the-five-nom the-first
`The first five French books'
(32) l-hujuum-u l-?amiriikiyy-u l-muhtamal-u
Ç
the-attack-nom the-American-nom the-probable-nom
t-taalit-u
Åthe-third-nom
Å Å
`The third probable American attack'
Note that although scrambling of this order is possible, as in (33) and
(34), this order involves different interpretations (including predicative
and focus ingredients):
(33) a. ?? l-kutub-u l-xamsat-u l-?uulaa l-faransiyyat-u
the-books-nom the-five-nom the-first the-French-nom
`The first five books which are French'
b. ?? l-hujuum-u l-muhtamal-u t-taalit-u
Ç
the-attack-nom the-probable-nom Åthe-third-nom
Å Å
l-?amiriikiyy-u
the-American-nom
`The third probable attack, which is American'
The question marks do not indicate that the constructions are ill-
formed, but only that they should have a non-attributive (and/or
focused) interpretation. Furthermore, the facts observed indicate that
the canonical order (basically (29) ) is respected in the prenominal
space, whereas the postnominal space conforms to MIO, as stated in
(34):19
(34) N 4 A 4 Num 4Card 4 Ord 4 Dem 4 Q
19
See Fassi Fehri (1997b) for details.

2.4. Prenominal adjectives

Arabic adjectives occur essentially in postnominal positions. But there are
quite productive cases in which adjectives occur prenominally, as in the
following examples:
(35) ?akal-tu ladiida t-ta¹ aam-i
ate-I Å Å
delicious-acc Çthe-food-gen
Ç
Ì ate the delicious (of the) food.'
(36) ?-aqra?-u jadiid-a l-kutub-i
I-read new-acc the-books-gen
Ì read the new (of the) books.'
(37) yahdutu haadaa fii muxtalif-i l-mayaadiin-i
Ç Å this Å
happens in various-gen the-fields-gen
`This happens in various fields' (literally: in the various of the
fields).
In these constructions, the adjective is heading a synthetic genitive (= SG).
It receives external structural Case, whereas the nominal complement
receives Genitive.20 Furthermore and quite unexpectedly, the construc-
tions behave more like nominal than adjective SGs.
First, they occur in DP (not AP) positions, and they are interchange-
able with other DPs, headed by nouns. Thus the following N headed
constructions are equivalent to their above counterparts:
(35) a. ?akal-tu t-ta¹ aam-a l-ladiid-a
ate-I Çthe-food-acc
Ç Å Å
the-delicious-acc
Ì ate the delicious food.'
(36) a. ?-aqra?-u l-kutub-a l-jadiid-at-a
I-read the-books-acc the-new-fem-acc
Ì read the new books.'
(37) a. yahdutu haadaa fii l-mayaadiin-i l-muxtalif-at-i
Ç Å this Å
happens in the-fields-gen the-various-fem-gen
`This happens in various fields.'
Constructions (35)±(37) can be distinguished from (35a)±(37a) in that the
former, but not the latter, have a sort of partitive reading (although the
two constructions may be equivalent in use and actual interpretation).
Second, the SG phrase is definite, indicating that Def inheritance has
taken place there. The definite character of the phrase becomes clear
when it is modified by a definite relative, for example, as (38) illustrates:21
20
It is also worth noting that the adjective is in a neutral form, which does not agree in Gr
and Nb with the nominal complement, a situation which recalls that of VS order agreement
properties.
21
Def inheritance is presumably forced due to the Definiteness Partitive Constraint,
recently discussed in e.g. de Hoop (1997).

(38) a. ladiid-u t-ta¹ aam-i lladii ?akal-tu-hu

Å Å
delicious-nom Çthe-food-gen
Ç Å ate-I-it
that
`The delicious food that I ate'
b. muxtalif-u l-mayaadiin-i llatii yahdutu haadaa fii-haa
Ç Å this Å in-them
various-nom the-fields-gen that happens
`The various fields in which this happens'
But adjectival SGs do not have these properties. In addition to the fact
that they occur only in AP positions, they do not trigger Def inheritance
(see Fassi Fehri 1993). In order to be definite, an adjectival head must
carry a definite article, as exemplified in (39):
(39) bahat-tu ¹ ani l-jamiil-i l-wajh-i
Ç Å Å for the-nice-gen the-face-gen
looked-I
Ì looked for the one with a nice face.'
But the adjectival head of the prenominal adjectival SG cannot carry the
article, hence the ungrammaticality of (40):22
(40) *bahat-tu ¹ ani l-waafir-i l-ihtiraam-i
ÅÅ
looked-I Ç
for the-plentiful-gen the-respect-gen
Intended to mean: Ì looked for the plentiful (of the) respect.'
A third piece of evidence indicating that the construction is nominal,
and not adjectival, is provided by the fact that it is not compatible with
the use of adverbs, as illustrated by the following contrast:
(41) a. ?-ukinnu la-hu l-ihtiraam-a l-waafir-a jidd-an
Ç
I-entertain for-him the-respect-acc the-plentiful-acc lot-acc
Ì have a very plentiful respect for him.'
b. *?-ukinnu la-hu waafir-a l-ihtiraam-i jidd-an
Ç
I-entertain for-him plentiful-acc the-respect-gen lot-acc
Ì have plenty of respect for him.'
In (41a), the adjective is compatible with a degree adverbial, but in (41b), it
is not. In fact, the adjective there is heading a DP which receives a partitive
interpretation (i.e. `the plentiful of the respect'), and is not different from
nouns heading partitives, which exclude adverb modifiers.23
22
(40) is obviously excluded only in the relevant interpretation. The other interpretation
(i.e. Ì looked for who is with plenty of respect') is possible, but irrelevant for the discussion.
23
See Fassi Fehri (1990, 1997c). A further test is provided by preadjectival negation (like
gÇayr), which is possible with postnominal, but not prenominal adjectives:
(i) ?akal-tu t-ta¹aam-a gÇayr-a l-ladiid-i
ate-I ÇÇ
the-food-acc Å Å
non-acc the-delicious-gen
Ì ate the non-delicious food.'
(ii) *?akal-tu gÇayr-a ladiid-i t-ta¹aami-i
ate-I Å Å
non-acc delicious-gen ÇÇ
the-food-gen
Note also that prenominal adjectives can occur in a series, provided they observe genitival
relations, as already observed. This is illustrated in the following examples:

Further cases of prenominal adjectives are provided by superlatives,

which occur only prenominally. Superlatives come in two forms, exem-
plified in (42):
(42) a. jaa?a ?ahsan-u lugÇawiyy-in
Ç
came best-nom linguist-gen
`The best linguist came.'
b. jaa?a ?ahsan-u l-lugÇawiyy-ii-na
Ç
came best-nom the-linguists-gen
`The best of the linguists came.'
Superlatives can be interpreted as partitive SGs, and they behave exactly
like other prenominal adjectives for the relevant properties, including
distribution and Def inheritance.
Adjective and determiner uses in prenominal positions with the proper-
ties discussed support the view that Arabic is underlyingly a A-N
language. In the next section, I propose an analysis of the structure of
attributive APs, which implements the view that they originate in
prenominal positions. Postnominal placement is then derived, through
appropriate movement mechanisms.
3. An antisymmetrical structure of adjectival constructions

3.1 Ordering and left branching specifiers
I have shown earlier that prenominal and postnominal determiners and
APs observe ordering hierarchical restrictions (eventually in MIO), and
that `mixed' cases also comply with these ordering restrictions quite
systematically. Consider example (25) above, repeated here as (43), and
the construction (44):
(43) ?awwal-u xams-i suhuf-in faransiyyat-in masÏhuurat-in
Ç Ç
first-nom five-gen newspapers-gen French-gen famous-gen
`The first five famous French newspapers'
(44) kull-u talaatat-i kutub-in xadraa?-a masÏhuurat-in
Ç
every-nom three-gen books-gen green-gen famous-gen
Èvery three famous green books'
For the sake of concreteness, let us assume, following essentially Cinque
(1994a, 1996), that nominal modifiers (like verbal ones) are generated in
(iii) jayyid-u qadiim-i l-manaazil-i

best-nom old-gen the-houses-gen
`The best of the old (of the) houses'
(iv) sagÇiir-u kibaar-i l-¹ulamaa?-i
Ç
little-nom big-gen the-scholars-gen
`The little of the big (of the) scholars'

the Spec of a functional projection F, of which the NP is a complement.

Given the orderings observed, two solutions suggest themselves:
(a) specifiers are generated both to the left and to the right of their
heads: surface ordering restrictions are then directly accounted for;
(b) specifiers are generated only to the left of their heads: only surface
ordering restrictions on prenominal modification are then directly
accounted for, and postnominal modification must be derived
through movement operations.
The (a) option is less restrictive than (b), and hence less theoretically
attractive. If we adhere to Kayne's (1994) antisymmetrical restrictive
theory of phrase structure (= AS), then (b) is the only option.24 Further-
more, (a) appears to be hardly maintainable on empirical grounds. If both
orders of specifiers are possible (in the same language), then it is not clear
how the restrictions in (6) and (7) and their MIO can be adequately and
simply formulated, nor is it clear how the correlated properties of these
alternating orders can be naturally treated. As it will turn out, the left
specifier hypothesis embodied in (b) (= LSH henceforth) provides an
appropriate and motivated solution for dealing with MIO and mixed
order cases.25
3.2. Deriving MIO and variation

Cinque (1996) put forth a proposal (inspired by Kayne's AS), according
to which all adjectives and modifiers (whether prenominal or postnom-
inal) are generated as left specifiers of N, in conformity with the ordering
hierarchies (stated above).26 The N-A order is then obtained either
24
In his AS, Kayne proposes that the antisymmetry of linear order be matched by an
antisymmetry in underlying hierarchical structure, through asymmetric c-command. Given
then two nonterminals X and Y and the terminals they dominate x and y, ìf X
asymmetrically c-commands Y, x precedes y'. Kayne's AS is based on his Linear Cor-
respondence Axiom (= LCA):
(i) LCA
d (A) is linear ordering of T.
where d is the nonterminal-to-terminal dominance relation, A is a set of pairs of nonterminals
(in which the first asymmetrically c-commands the second), and T the set of terminals.
If asymmetric c-command maps to linear precedence, then specifiers (or adjuncts) which
asymmetrically c-command their heads necessarily precede them, and heads which asymme-
trically c-command their complements necessarily precede them. This is how a strictly rigid
Spec 4 Head 4 Comp order is respected.
25
Other difficulties for the (a) assumption arise from the right/left asymmetry in order
variation stated in Greenberg's (1966) Universal 20, according to which the order to the right
is (relatively) `free', whereas the one to the left is severely constrained. See footnote 26.
26
Cinque (1996) exploits a number of left/right asymmetries in favour of AS. He observes,
for example, that while the order and its mirror image is found to the right of N (in addition
to other variation), the order to the left of N is severely constrained. For example,
Greenberg's (1966) Universal 20 expresses a right/left asymmetry which is accommodated
naturally in the AS system:
Greenberg's (1966) Universal 20

through (a) N or (b) NP movement, targeting higher left located heads or

specifiers, respectively. According to Cinque (1996), N raising occurs in
prepositional (or A-N) languages (with no MIO effect because adjectives
do not move), and NP raising occurs in postpositioning (or N-A)
languages (with the effects of pied piping APs, and placing them in
MIO).
To see how Cinque's approach derives MIO through XP raising (in
postpositional languages), consider a construction like (45), and its
presumed base structure (46):27
(45) l-hujuum-u l-?amiriikiyy-u l-wahsÏiyy-u l-muhtamal-u
Ç
the-attack the-American the-salvage Ç
the-probable
`The probable salvage American attack'
(46) np 3
l-muhtamal
. np 2
.ˇ
l-wahsii np 1
l-?amirikii NP
l-hujuum
In order to derive the right surface order, the NP is first moved to the left
of the lowest AP, then the whole AP (containing NP) to the left of the
most proximate higher AP, and so on. Adjectival MIO and N placement
before adjectives are then accounted for. The movement proceeds as
indicated in (46a):
When any or all of the items (demonstrative, numeral, and descriptive adjective) precede the
noun, they are always found in that order. If they follow, the order is either the same or its
exact opposite.
`The left/right asymmetry', says Cinque, `consists in the fact that while to the right of the
N both the order Dem(onstrative) Num(eral) A(djective), and its mirror-image, A Num
Dem, are possible, to the left of the N only the order Dem Num A is attested.' (Cinque
1996:453)
27
I have used np as a category projection which includes AP as its specifier, instead of
using (less neutral) designated aspectuo-temporal functional categories like those used by
Cinque (1995, 1997) for adverbs, leaving the matter for future research. In (46a), NP has
moved first to the left of np1, thus forming np1'. The latter moves to the left of np2, creating
np2', which later moves to the left of np3.

(46a) np 3,
np 2, k np 3
np1, j np 2 l-muhtamal
. np 2, k
NPi .ˇ
np1 l-wahsii np1, j ek
l-hujuumi l-?amirikii NPi ej
ei
Note, however, that NP raising (as described) cannot be adequately applied

to Arabic. Since Arabic is not a postpositional (N-A) language, as I have
argued, we expect, following Cinque's lines, that only N raising should be
relevant to it. This is in fact correct, since it is widely acknowledged in the
literature that N raising (to D) is necessary for deriving word order in
Arabic DPs.28 But postulating the existence of a NP raising process makes
the wrong predictions with respect to ordering in complex cases. For
example, it predicts that the DP complement in the possessive DPs in
(20a) (repeated here as (47) for convenience) should be pied piped, and be
placed higher than attributive APs. This prediction is not borne out:
(47) muhaarabat-u l-hukuumat-i l-muntadarat-u
Ç
fighting-nom Ç
the-governmeent-gen ÅÇ
the-expected-nom
li-l-irtisÏaa?-i
of-the-corruption
`The expected fighting of the corruption by the government'
As observed above, (47) is the only possible order with attributive APs. In
that order, the complement must be left behind the possessor (which
raises), and APs surface higher than the complement. Recall that the order
in (20b), repeated here as (47a), can only be associated with predicative
interpretation (which presumably arises from right branching):
(47) a. muhaarabat-u l-hukuumat-i li-l-irtisÏaa?-i
Ç
fighting-nom Ç
the-government-gen of-the-corruption
l-muntadarat-u
ÅÇ
the-expected-nom
`The fighting of the corruption by the government, which is
expected'
28
See references in footnote 33 below.

Thus in order to derive the surface order in (47), and maintain LSH, it is
necessary to postulate independent processes of N and Possessor raisings.
This is in fact the solution that I adopt in the following subsection, where
these two separate movements are given independent motivation.
If N and Possessor raise independently, then no solution for Arabic
adjectival MIO is readily available in Cinque's (1996) X' type variation.
An alternative option that suggests itself is to postulate independent AP
(or A) raising, a process which is able to reorder the series of adjectives. A
first piece of evidence for the existence of such a process is provided in the
following subsection, where structures of postnominal adjectives are
examined.
3.3. Raising postnominal APs

In approach aÁ la Cinque (1996), adjectives do not move, be they in N-type
or NP-type raising languages. In the latter case, they are only pied piped
inside a NP which contains them, as exhibited in the structure (46a)
above. In this subsection, I would like to provide evidence that adjectives
move, and that their movement is independent of that of NP or Possessor.
MIO is then seen as an effect of AP movement. The latter is motivated by
the richness of the inflectional properties of Arabic adjectives, which
match the strength of identical features in the DP domain. APs then
target DP, to check their agreeing Case, article, and phi-features against
those of a higher functional head, which could arguably be (a segment of)
D. I will designate this D with a small d, for ease of reference, giving this
notation no theoretical content.
3.3.1. Checking Def, Case, and Agr on adjectives. As exemplified thor-

oughly above, postnominal adjectives carry Def, Case, and Nb/Gr
features which are identical to those on the head noun. Suppose that in
order to check the values of these features against those of the noun, APs
must raise from the position in which they are generated to that of a Spec
of a functional projection F. Call the features involved Agr features. If the
F projection is identified as (a segment of) D, then D might be said to
have strong Agr features.29
A preliminary independent evidence of AP raising is provided by the
placement of adverbial modifiers of adjectives, which are located after the
AP, as in (48):
(48) a. l-xabar-u l-mudaa¹ u mu?axxar-an
Å
the-news the-broadcast late-acc
`the lately broadcast news'
29
The proper identification of the F category is not a trivial matter. I will follow
Chomsky's (1995) logic on the matter, keeping in line with minimalist conceptual require-
ments.

b. l-hukm-u ma¹ ruufun musbaqan

Ç
the-judgement known advanced-acc
`The judgement is known in advance.'
If the adverbial in (48) is originally generated as a Spec of the AP (which it
modifies), then the pre-adverbial position of the AP there is presumably
derived via raising the AP to the left of the complex AP.
Further evidence for AP raising is provided by the existence of
constructions like (21a) above, repeated here as (49), for convenience:
(49) l-hujuum-u sÏ-sÏadiid-u l-muhtamal-u li-?amiriikaa
Ç
the-attack-nom the-violent-nom the-probable-nom of-America
¹ alaa l-muqaawamat-i
on the-resistance
`The probable violent attack of the resistance by the U.S.'
In this construction, the manner AP is placed higher than the modal
AP and the possessor, both of which are found higher than the AP in
the base structure. This indicates that the position of the AP here is
derived.
On the other hand, the contrast in (50) indicates that adjectives
(carrying articles and other agreeing features) cannot raise higher than
nouns:
(50) a. l-bint-u l-jamiilat-u
the-girl the-beautiful
`The beautiful girl'
b. *l-jamiilat-u l-bint-u
the-beautiful th-girl
It suggests that the AP raises to a functional projection which is found
lower than the D (or its segment) in which N is located. Let us designate
the projections involved by dp and DP, respectively. If AP raises to Spec
dp, then N raises to D, which then yields (50a). Moreover, if the possessor
in a SG like (47) is in Spec DP1 (as I will show below), then the head N is
in a higher (segment of) D, presumably D2.
Assuming that the APs raise to dp, and that Possessor and N raise to
DP1 and DP2, respectively, we are now able to address the following
questions: (a) how do the many adjectives raise, and (b) how does MIO
obtain?
3.3.2. Deriving multiple AP structures. Suppose that APs originate as

left specifiers, and that the multiple movement of APs is targeting one
and the same cluster of features, so-called Agr features, which are
located in dp. The question is then how these APs move, without
producing minimality violations on movement, and at the same time be
able to surface in the right (MIO) order. If APs (like possessors) are
generated as left specifiers of NP or np (possibly in a np shell

structure), presumably because they form a unique (though complex)
thematico-aspectual category with N and its other arguments, then
assuming a multiple Spec structure, the highest AP (in the hierarchy) is
generated higher in the left branch, although it surfaces to the extreme
right of N. The base structure of a construction like (49) is then
depicted in (51):
(51) np 3
l-muhtamal
. np 2
li-?amirikaa np1
ˇ ˇ
s-sadiid NP
l-hujuum
Given this structure, AP movement can then proceed as follows: the

highest AP3 moves first to the Spec dp1 (targeting Agr there), then AP2
moves to the Spec of the newly formed category, targeting dp2, and so on.
The movement process appears then to be operating in a nesting manner,
from the closest lexically filled Spec to the nearest Spec DP, created by
move a. Furthermore, the movement appears to avoid Specs which are
already filled by traces, and to `jump over' filled Specs which do not form
a chain with Spec dp. This multiple movement process (from top to
bottom) makes multiple checking possible, because the AP moved creates
a chain link between the trace it leaves in its original position and its
landing site. The movement of the lower AP then becomes possible
because it operates in a local manner to the Spec of the newly formed
category, jumping over only the chain of the Specs which are coindexed.
The resulting structure is given in (52).30
30
I have used dp to host AP movement, and DP to host NP (or N movement), only for
convenience sake, and with no theoretical intention. As for np, it is intended to be a thematic
extension of NP, recalling the VP/vp extension.

(52) DP
D dp 2
ˇˇ
l-hujuumi s-sadiid j dp1
l-muhtamal
. k np 3
ek np 2
li-?amirikaa np1
ej ei
Let us call the mode of movement involved in (52) the External Spec
Derivation (= ESD). ESD might be compared to a competitive alternative
in which the movement proceeds through a (created) Spec which is
internal to the AP, which is itself a Spec of np. This Internal Spec
Derivation (= ISD) has been adopted by Bosque & Picallo (1996) for
Spanish, following suggestions in Kayne (1994). ISD may or may not be
adequate, depending on various theoretical considerations, in particular
how locality and cyclicity are construed. For example, limiting the
domain of feature checking to a strictly local relation between a Spec
and its Head (as in ESD) appears to be much simpler and more restrictive
than the more complex Spec of Spec option (embodied in ISD). I will then
adopt ESD for the sake of simplicity and concreteness, pending further
research on the matter.31
Summarizing, I have shown that there is evidence for AP movement in
Arabic, and that the latter operates through external specifiers. In
section 5, evidence is provided for the existence of A movement in
prenominal modifying constructions, hence corroborating the view that
adjectives move (be they heads or maximal XPs). Before that, however, I
examine in section 4 how the synthetic possessive structure is organized,
and how both AP and Possessor movements take place, without inducing
minimality violations.
31
The movement operations used in ESD observe the Extension Condition proposed in
Chomsky (1995, pp. 190±191 and 327±329), which derives strict cyclicity, whereas ISD does
not.

4. Possessive structure and movement processes

In this section, I present an analysis of the structure of Arabic synthetic
genitive possessives (the so-called construct states in the Afroasiatic
literature). The latter is framed in minimalist terms, along Chomsky's
(1995) theoretical lines. It relies on two essential assumptions: (a)
Possessor movement is motivated by Def checking, and (b) N to D
movement takes place for Case reasons.32
Any analysis of SG will have to take into account the following
essential (and well-known) features:
(a) the head N is DP initial
(b) the head N is marked by the Case assigned to the whole DP
(c) the possessor occurs after N, and before modifying adjectives
(d) the possessor is marked with (a non-prepositional) Genitive case
(e) the head N cannot carry the article
(f) the head N is interpreted as definite or indefinite, depending on the
Def feature value of the possessor.
These properties are instantiated in (53):
(53) a. htaraqa-t daar-u r-rajul-i l-waasi¹ a-t-u
Ç
burned-fem house-nom the-man-gen the-large-fem-nom
`The man's large house burned.'
b. htaraqa-t daar-u rajul-in waasi¹ a-t-un
Ç
burned-fem house-nom man-gen large-fem-nom
À man's large house burned.'
In both constructions, the head N daar satisfies the (a), (b), and (e)
requirements, and the possessor the (d) requirement. Moreover, the head
N is definite in (53a), and indefinite in (53b), since the adjective (which
agrees with it) carries the (suffixed) definite article in (53a), but lacks it in
(53b). This is presumably a consequence of (f).
Previous analyses of nominal SG in Arabic, Hebrew, and Berber have
agreed that its derivation involves N to D raising. As for the possessor, it is
either originally placed or raised to a position higher than that of APs.
Thus a construction like (53a) is derived from the original base structure
(54), by raising N to D, and placing the possessor in a Spec which is higher
than that in which APs are located. The resulting structure is then (54a).33
32
Most analyses of Arabic (or Semitic) found in the literature are pre-minimalist, to my
knowledge, with the exception of Longobardi (1996).
33
For various proposals, see Fassi Fehri (1987, 1993), Ritter (1987, 1991), Ouhalla (1988,
1996), Mohammad (1988), Siloni (1994), Borer (1996), and Longobardi (1994, 1996).
I have taken both AP and Possessor to be specifiers of NP/np at the base, to simplify the
picture, although this question is a matter of divergence. Moreover, the use of FP is intended
to be neutral with respect to the disputed identity of the category which hosts the possessor
(AGRP, in e.g. Siloni 1994 and Longobardi 1996 or PossP, in Fassi Fehri 1993). The
generation of the possessor inside the NP/np extension parallels that of the generation of the

(54) DP
D np 2
r-rajul-i np 1
l-waasi a NP
daar-u
,
(54a) DP
D FP
daar-u i r-rajul-i k np 2
ek np 1
.
l-waasi a j NP
ei
Divergences, however, become clear when authors address various prob-

lems, among which are the following:
(g) how is Def inheritance (as described in (f) ) derived?

(h) what is the motivation of possessor movement?
(i) what is the landing site of the possessor?
(j) what is the motivation for N raising?
(k) what is the exact landing site of N raising?
(l) how is the restriction in (e) accounted for?
(m) how is Genitive assigned/checked?
(n) is there a link between Genitive assignment/checking and N-to-D
raising, and what is its nature?
subject inside VP/vp. The positioning of some `high' adjectives (e.g. modal adjectives) after
the possessor in constructions like (65) below might be taken as evidence that the possessor
has raised, since it is lower than those adjectives at the base (see structure (66) ).

4.1. Def inheritance and strength of Def

Consider the question raised in (g), in connection with property (f).
Suppose that the possessor in (53) has raised from the position in which it
was originally generated to a higher Spec of a functional projection, and
that the head N has raised higher, as is currently assumed. It is reasonable
to think that in SGs with property (f), the possessor is placed in Spec D,
because the head D has a (strong) Def feature to check, assuming a
feature attraction theory of movement, aÁ la Chomsky (1995). The head N
(which moves to D) ìnherits' the Def value of the possessor, in a Spec-
head DP configuration. Consequently, Def inheritance obtains (natu-
rally) in a DP domain.
Suppose that the possessor in (53) is located in Spec D1 since it targets
Def (a feature of D1), if APs are located in Spec d1 (which contains Agr,
as argued above). Then N must land higher than DP1. Standard analyses
of SG assume that D is the highest functional projection of DP (to which
N is adjoined by virtue of being initial (property (a) ), and they also
assume that the possessor surfaces in a Spec AGR, which is lower than D.
Consequently, they take Def inheritance to occur in the AGR domain.
But this localization of Def inheritance (as `parasitic' on AGR) does not
appear to be motivated.34 For example, the possessor and possessee agree
only in Def, and do not agree in Case or phi-features, thus suggesting that
these features are split (or fissioned), and checked in autonomous
domains, a fact which is corroborated by the difference in the content
of agreement between adjectives and nouns. If the possessor has moved to
Spec D1, targeting a strong Def feature, then N moves presumably to a
higher D2, being attracted by a feature which remains to be determined,
but which is different from Def.
If D1 has a strong Def feature, then it can be checked either via
realization as an article, or via attraction of a possessor DP to its Spec.35
Both situations are found. But note that when D1 is realized as an article,
the possessor cannot move to its Spec anymore, because that movement is
no longer motivated. The complementary distribution between possessors
and realized articles in the same DP domain (property (e) ), is then
accounted for by the non-availability of a derivational source for a D-
N Poss structure like that in (55):
34
See Siloni (1994) and Longobardi (1996) for such a proposal. Longobardi assumes that
Def checking occurs in D, although Def inheritance takes place in the AGR domain. Borer
(1996), on the other hand, assumes that a feature percolation mechanism is needed for Def
matching. For criticism of these approaches, see section 6.
35
I am following here ideas by Holmberg & Sandstrom (1996 = HS henceforth), Delsing
(1993), and Holmberg (1993). HS assume the following checking principle (their (11b) ):
(i) A strong feature of a functional category F is checked off if a phonetically licit
category with a matching feature is adjoined to F, or placed in Spec F.

(55) *d-daar-u -r-rajul-i

the-house-nom the-man-gen
However, in order to rule out (55) completely, as a potential surface
output, we must also rule out another derivational source, namely that in
which the noun carrying the article is positioned in some higher D, and
the possessor is placed in some relatively lower DP projection. The latter
option is available for adjectival SG (as we will see in section 5), and it is
also available for nominal possessives in languages like Icelandic, for
example (see Holmberg & Sandstrom 1996 and Tarald 1990), or Greek
(see Alexiadou & Wilder 1977 and Androutsopoulou 1995) ). Yet this
option is excluded for Arabic nominal SGs (for reasons given in section 6).
4.2. N to D2 and strong Case

If both Def inheritance and Def checking take place in the DP1 domain,
then we have to look for the identity of the head targeted by N. Current
analyses motivate N to D movement by a Def feature property.36 But if
Def specification is a property of D1 (not D2, in which N lands), then that
motivation cannot be maintained. An option that suggests itself is that N
is moving to the upper D3 for Case reasons. It is reasonable to think that
N raises to a K head, where K is a case head category, as in Bittner &
Hale (1996a, b), and Lamontagne & Travis (1987). For conceptual
reasons, however, I will explore a notational variant of this proposal, in
which N raises to a D head, which contains a Case attracting feature.
Adopting an idea put forth by Holmberg & Sandstrom (1996), let us
assume that D has a Case feature which may vary in strength, and that
the strength can be exploited not only in clausal structure, but also in the
internal NP structure. Suppose then that Arabic D2 has a strong Case
feature, which attracts a Case-bearing N, to check its feature. For Case
purposes, N-D2 movement occurs, and the case feature on N is checked
against the feature on D2.37
Assuming then a split or fissioned D (with a number of segments), an
expanded inflectional structure for a construction (53) is something like
(56):
36
The affixal nature of D and its Def content have been advocated to motivate the
movement (see Fassi Fehri 1987, Ritter 1987, Mohammad 1988, and Ouhalla 1988, among
others). Longobardi (1996) advocates the strength of N features in D.
37
HS contrast basically Scandinavian languages that allow N-Poss constructions (like
Icelandic) with those that do not (like Norwegian and other Mainland Scandinavian), and
attribute the variation to the strength of Case in D. They also discuss the problem of N-D-
Poss, and take the variation (attributed to the strength of Def in D) to a minor parameter. In
their system, Case and Def conflate under a single segment category D, while I take the two
features to be located into separate categories. The strength of the Case feature on D
correlates with the morphological `richness' of case on N (dragged by D), and the absence of
a free article (for such a correlation, see HS 1996; see also Giusti 1995).

(56) DP2
D DP1
daar-u i r-rajul-i k dp
l-waasi a j np 2
ek np 1
ej ei
In this configuration, N has raised to D2, and the possessor to Spec D1.
The possessor in Spec D1 transmits its Def feature value to D1 (containing
the head moving N) via Spec-Head, and that feature in turn is carried
along to D2. The head D2 of DP2 is then equipped with the relevant value
of the Def feature for appropriate interpretation. The small dp is
introduced to host the moved AP, in line with the ESD analysis argued
for above.
The fissioned D hypothesis receives further support when the structure
of SGs is examined more closely. It thus turns out that Def inheritance
does not necessarily take place in all SG cases, contrary to the widely
spread view embodied in the property (f) above. Such considerations are
examined in the next subsection.
4.3. Definiteness in SG and N movement

Definiteness appeals to two distinct notions: one has to do with individual
or unique reference, and the other with familiarity.38 It can be noticed (after
Holmberg 1993) that genitive constructions without adjective modifiers do
not induce individual reference, and they can function as predicates. This
observation is illustrated by the following Arabic examples:
(57) a. haadaa ?ax-ii
this Å brother-mine
`This is my brother.'
b. haadaa bayt-u r-rajul-i
this Å house-nom the-man-gen
`This is the man's house.'
38
See Heim (1982) and Renaud (1996), among others.

(58) a. haadaa ?ax-ii wa haadaa (?ayd-an) ?ax-ii

this Å brother-mine and this Å Ç
(also) brother-mine
`This is my brother and this is (also) my brother.'
b. haadaa bayt-u r-rajul-i wa-haadaa (?ayd-an)
this Å house-nom the-man-gen and-thisÅ Ç
(also)
bayt-u r-rajul-i
house-nom the-man-gen
`This is the man's house and this is (also) the man's house.'
The use of SGs as predicates in (57) and (58) indicates that the nominal
projection there is not a saturated DP, assuming that predication requires
an open constituent (as in Higginbotham 1985 and Rothstein 1983). On
the other hand, the fact that (58) is well-formed indicates that individual
reference is not necessarily obtained in genitive constructions.
Suppose we interpret the grammaticality of (58) as follows. If the
head N there is not definite (because it has no individual reference),
then the possessor could not have raised to Spec D1 (if Def inheritance
is an automatic consequence of that raising). N, which raises to D2 (for
case reasons), does not then inherit Def from any intermediate D
(which agrees with the possessor in the Def value).
If N is in D in (57)±(58), although it is not definite, and N is also in
D in (53), although it is definite, then the two possessors cannot be
located in the same Spec position, and the two Ns cannot be located in
the same D chains. If N in (53) is in (a high) D2, and the possessor in
Spec D1, then the DP projection is a saturated category.39 In (57)±(58),
however, the open character of the phrase (and the absence of indi-
vidual reference) suggests that the chain of Ds in which N is contained
has no Def feature value, and that possessor raising has not occurred
there. In other words, predicate (or indefinite) nominals have `less'
features and trigger less movement than do argumental nominals. This
can be executed by taking predicates/indefinites to project no Def-DP
(or DP1) for SGs.
Predicative adjectives appear to behave exactly like indefinite nominal
possessives in (57)±(58). Adjectives move over adverbs (which modify
them) and their genitive subject, as illustrated in (59):
(59) danan-tu r-rajul-a tawiil-a l-qaamat-i jidd-an
ÅÇ
thought-I the-man-acc Çtall-acc the-height-gen lot-acc
Ì thought the man (to be of) a very tall height.'
In (59), the adjective (which is indefinite) moves presumably to D, to
check its Case and Def features, from an original AP head position.40 The
39
The saturation obtains presumably via possessor raising and Def activation along the
lines discussed in section 6.
40
I am assuming that adjectives do not differ from nouns in receiving Case and Def
specification, and that they are also DPs. See section 5 below.

entire predicate phrase carries accusative case, but its internal subject
receives Genitive. The adjective is not definite, and has inherited no Def
from its genitive complement. If it were to function as a modifier of a
definite noun, then it must bear a definite article, as (60) illustrates:
(60) ra?ay-tu r-rajul-a t-tawiil-a l-qaamat-i
saw-I the-man-acc Çthe-tall-acc
Ç the-height-gen
Ì saw the man with a tall height.'
Thus in the case of predicative adjectives, no Def inheritance occurs
either, presumably because the possessor DP has not raised to Spec D (or
more precisely to Spec D1). I will return to the structure of modifying
adjectives like those involved in (60) and (53) in section 5.
4.4. Partitives
More evidence for the absence of Def inheritance in SG structures comes
from partitive SG constructions. The latter are exemplified in (61)±(62):
(61) ?ahad-u r-rijaal-i raja¹ a
Ç
one-nom the-men-gen came.back
Òne of the men came back.'
(62) kull-u r-rijaal-i raja¹ uu
all-nom the-men-gen came.back
Àll (of) the men came back.'
These constructions have presumably the same structure as possessive
SGs, as proposed by traditional Arabic grammars. However, in addi-
tion to differing from (true) possessives in interpretation, partitives
differ from the latter in some (apparently) puzzling and interesting
properties.
First, the head of the partitive SG in the examples mentioned cannot
be modified. Only the complement can, as the following contrast
indicates:
(63) a. *?ahad-u r-rijaal-i t-tawiil-u raja¹ a
Ç
one-nom the-men-gen Çthe-tall-nom
Ç came.back
Intended to mean: òne tall of the men came back.'
b. ?ahad-u r-rijaal-i t-tiwaali raja¹ a
Ç
one-nom the-men-gen Çthe-tall.pl.-gen
Ç came.back
Òne of the tall men came back.'
This property is strikingly characteristic of partitive SGs, which differ in
this respect from possessives (as we have seen above). It suggests that the
partitive head and its Spec cannot raise in the structure as high as those of
(modified) possessives. If this is true, then there is no reason to think that
the head of the partitive SG has ever inherited Def from its `possessor'.
This expectation appears to be borne out.
Consider again (61). An analytic partitive equivalent to this construc-

tion with an indefinite head is possible, but a definite head equivalent is
ungrammatical:
(64) a. ?ahad-un mina r-rijaal-i raja¹ a
Ç
one-nom of the-men-gen came.back
Òne of the men came back.'
b. *l-?ahad-u mina r-rijaal-i raja¹ a
Ç
the-one-nom of the-men-gen came.back
The ungrammaticality of (64b) suggests that no derivational source with a
definite head is available for the partitive in this case. Furthermore, the
equivalence of (64a) and (61) casts serious doubt on the definite nature of
the head in the latter case. It is then reasonable to think that no Def
inheritance takes place in partitive SGs.41
To sum up, I have shown that synthetic possessive and partitive
structures involve split DP projections, and they differ in interpretation
depending on where the head N and the possessor surface. In the next
subsection, I address the question of how possessors and APs land in the
right positions, without mismatches of movement or violations of minim-
ality requirements.
4.5. Possessor and AP raisings without minimality violations

Consider how the possessor moves. Assuming that it is generated higher
than some `lower' APs (e.g. manner), and lower than some `higher' APs
(e.g. speaker-oriented) in the base structure, although it surfaces higher
than all APs, then this ordering can be explained if we assume (as
explained above) that Possessor movement is targeting Spec D1 (in
which the Def feature is checked). Furthermore, the latter Spec is
higher than any Spec which is targeted by any AP, since APs land in
Spec d. Typically, even when crossing is involved (e.g. when the possessor
is `sandwiched' between lower and higher APs), the outcome of the
movement is uniformly the same, and the possessor must be placed
higher than all APs.
Consider a complex SG involving more than one modification, as in
(65), and its plausible base structure (66):
41
There are SG partitives which have analytic counterparts, like the following:
(i) tulut-u r-rijaal-i
Åthird-nom
Å the-men-gen
`The third of the men'
(ii) t-tulut-u mina r-rijaal-i
ÅÅ Å
third-nom of the-men-gen
`The third of the men'
These contrasts, as well as the question why Definiteness is forced in some SG partitives,
need further research.

(65) hujuum-u ?amiriikaa sÏ-sÏadiid-u l-muhtamal-u ¹ alaa

Ç
attack-nom America the-violent-nom the-probable-nom on
l-muqaawamat-i
the-resistance
`The probable violent attack of the resistance by the U.S.A.'
(66) np 3
l-muhtamal
. np 2
?amirikaa np 1
ˇ ˇ
s-sadiid NP
N PP
hujuum alaa l-muqaawama
If the possessor moves directly to Spec D1, then the operation appears to
be violating Relativized Minimality. One way out is to allow movement
through equidistance, and move first the APs (starting from the highest),
until the dp cycle is completed. Then the possessor moves in one step to
Spec DP1, jumping over only the chains formed between APs and Specs
of dp. The resulting structure is as exhibited in (67):

(67) DP2
D DP1
hujuumii ?amirikaak dp 2
ˇ ˇ
s-sadiidj dp 1
l-muhtamal
. l np 3
el np 2
ek np 1
ej NP
N PP
ei alaa l-muqaawama
In this analysis, Possessor and APs raise independently, through Specs

which involve different features (Def and Agr, respectively). The move-
ment then no longer violates locality restrictions on movement, once
chain formation and feature targeting are interconnected.
A potential alternative to the one-step direct movement of Possessor
(to Spec D1) is to move it first to the Spec of the lowest AP. The latter
which moves further up pied pipes it to the left of the highest AP, and so
on. When AP movement is completed, the possessor then èscapes' to
Spec D1. This looks like a simpler analysis at first glance, but it is not so.
In fact, it faces a serious problem: if the possessor raises through Spec AP,
why does not it agree in Case and Def with the head noun, just like other
APs do? In order to avoid potential mismatches of agreement, I have
relied on the idea that the series of APs form a sort of a single clustered
Spec, which can be jumped over by the possessor, without inducing
locality violations, and that any AP would be `close' enough to the Spec it
is moving to.
A further alternative to moving N, AP, and Possessor separately, as I
have done, is to first move all the complements to the left of the NP,
then move the (whole) NP (except the complements) to the left of the
lower AP, and proceed with a Cinquean XP type movement to obtain
MIO. As far as I can tell, however, this approach does not make the
movement depend on the properties of the various NP constituents in
languages. As we will see in section 6, crosslinguistic variation suggests
that these processes do occur separately, in lines with what happens in
Arabic.
Note, finally, that object denoting nominals do not differ from eventive
ones in that the same processes apply with multiple AP structures, along
the lines suggested above.
5. Adjectives as DPs
5.1. The structure of prenominal adjectives
As observed earlier in subsection 2.4 above, prenominal adjective
constructions behave in essential ways like nominal SGs. Moreover,
they are either interpreted like partitives or like normal postnominal
adjective constructions. It is then reasonable to think that the adjective
and its complement originate as head and Spec of AP, respectively, and
they undergo essentially the same operations which apply to the two
constituents of a nominal SG in the DP domain. Thus an àdjectival'
possessive in (35) above, repeated here as (68), would have a basic
structure like (69):
(68) ?akal-tu ladiid-a t-ta¹ aam-i
ate-I Å Å
delicious-acc Çthe-food-gen
Ç
Ì ate the delicious (of the) food.'
(69) IP/ap
t-ta
. . aam ladiid
The adjective ladiid, being a head, incorporates first into D1, and then
Å Å
into D2, just like a `normal' N in a nominal SG does. The two-step
movement is motivated by the split/fissioned functions of D, Def and
Case, respectively. The NP t-ta¹aam moves through Specs, receiving
Genitive case, and surfacingÇ in
Ç Spec DP , to check Def in D . Def
1 1
inheritance is then expected. The surface structure is then as follows:

(70) DP2
D DP1
ladiid i t-ta
. . aamj D'
D1 IP/ap
ei ej ei
If this analysis is correct, then adjectives can also inherit Def from D, and
get somehow `nominalized' by D. Note that the (Def) D on the adjective
can be taken as `referential', inducing typically individuation, just as a
nominal D does. No expletive interpretation is workable here. Further
clarification on article properties are provided in the next subsection.
5.2. The adjectival article and its origin

Arabic appears to differ significantly from languages like English or
French in that both the head noun and the modifying adjective carry
(definite) articles, as the examples above show. This difference, I will
claim, is only superficial, and APs need to be headed by articles, just like
NPs are. If adjectives are DPs, then we expect them to behave like
nominal DPs in essential aspects. On the other hand, differences between
the two constructions have to be addressed.
In line with Szabolcsi (1987, 1994), Kayne (1994), and Smith (1964), let
us assume that D and C are parallel, and that D (even in ordinary noun
phrases) is a clausal determiner. Kayne (1994) has argued (on the basis of
a number of distributional contrasts within Germanic and Romance noun
phrase structures) that adjectives, relative clauses, and possessives are
basically IP/CP complements (of D). His analysis stemmed from the
essential observation that the D-N sequence in noun phrases does not
form a constituent. Therefore all phrases (including N, and except D) are
generated inside IP/CP (which is a complement of D), and then raised
(including the `head' N of the relative clause). If the adjective construction
is a reduced relative or CP, and the article is a clausal determiner, then it is
conceivable that the sources of the two determiners are both clausal, as
illustrated in (71a), the base structure of (71):42
(71) r-rajul-u t-tawiil-u
the-man-nom Çthe-tall-nom
Ç
`The tall man'
42
At S-structure, the adjective incorporates into C/D, and the head noun into D.

(71a) DP
D CP/DP
[l-] C/D IP
r-rajul tawiil
.
In Kayne's clausal system, however, nothing forces this `double DP'
structure, and nothing ensures Def agreement between the two DPs.43
But suppose, in line with Kayne's system, that the base structure of
attributive adjective modification is essentially (71a), where two D heads
and two Spec Ds must be involved (although they may form only
segments of the same category, along the lines to be explained below).
If articles are morphologically prefixed on nouns as well as on adjectives
in the base, then the syntactic distribution of these two categories will
depend on the nature of their inflectional and interpretational properties.
The needed derived structure is then (72):
(72) DP
D dp
r-rajulj t-tawiil
.. i np
ei NP
ej
43
Alexiadou & Wilder (1997), who also assume that the origin of Def is a syntactic D,
claim that Kayne's treatment of adjectives as reduced relatives make available (at least) two
determiner sources: one is the determiner of the external DP (which contains the relative
clause), and the other is the determiner of the DP subject of the AP, contained in CP (see
their structures (45) and (46) ). But to my knowledge, Kayne's analysis does not allow such
interpretation. See e.g. his analysis of `le livre jaune' on p. 101 (with no article on the DP
which is internal to CP). See also his structure (57) on p. 97 for `the book sent to me', and his
assumption that `book' there receives Case through incorporation with `the' (p. 98). As far as
I understand it, Kayne postulates only one D in (headed) relative clauses, which is equated
with C, and the nominal head of the relative clause, which originates in the internal IP
without determiner, raises to the domain of the external D/C. The only way then to ensure
the existence of two Ds (and their agreement) is to assume that in (headed) relative clauses
two base generated DPs (one internal to IP, and one external to it) come to interact in
various ways at PF.

Let us now assume that the `small clause' in this structure is of an

identificational type, rather than a predicational type. In the former case,
both the subject and the predicate of the copulative (or nominal) clause
are definite (and hence saturated categories), and one saturated category
is ìdentified' with the other, rather than `predicated' of it (predicates
being open, as already explained). The two (small clause) nominal
sentences are given in (73) and (74), respectively:
(73) ?? r-rajul-u (huwa) t-tawiil-u
the-man-nom (he) Çthe-tall-nom
Ç
`The man is the tall.'
(74) r-rajul-u tawiil-un
the-man-nom Çtall-nom
`The man is tall.'
Although (73) appears at first glance to be bad as an identificational
sentence, it is not so with appropriate intonation break. Insertion of
inflectional huwa makes it better.
If attributive adjectives are derived from a predicate position, along
Kayne's proposal, and if nominal clauses (in which they originate) are
either identificational (definite) or predicational (indefinite), then we
expect both types to be relevant for building modification structures. If
attributive APs are then generated as predicates, possibly in Spec posi-
tions, as a sort of ìnverse' identificational clauses, in lines with the LSH,
then we expect them to surface with articles. Moreover, the agreement in
Def between adjectives and nouns can be thought of as resulting from
embedding the two categories in a single functional DP domain, in which
the same values of features must be matched.44
The identificational hypothesis is further corroborated by the beha-
viour of demonstratives. Thus like (73) and (74), the construction in (75)
is ambiguous between a noun phrase reading and a sentential reading
(intonation apart):
(75) a. haadaa (huwa) l-walad-u
this Å (he) the-child
`This (is) the child.'
b. haadaa (huwa) l-mas?uul-u
this Å (he) the-responsible
`This (is) the responsible.'
44
One consequence of this view is that the attributive AP can be found in an ìnverse'
structural position of that of the predicate, i.e. as a Spec, rather than a head, of the
predication, a well-known property of identificational sentences (see Moro 1991 and Milsark
1976, among others). This appears to be in fact the system proposed by Cinque (1996), in
which APs are Specs of NPs, a proposal which appears to be in contradiction to Kayne's,
although it is not, if APs are interpreted as predicates.

It is unreasonable to think that the N bearing the article in the construc-

tion (75a), when interpreted as a noun phrase, behaves like the `nomina-
lized' adjective in (75b). In both sentence and noun phrase cases (i.e. as
predicates or attributes), the definite phrases have an identificational
(predicative) origin.
It is striking that although the interpretation in these cases is always
definite, English and French dispense with the definite article, an option
which is impossible in Arabic:
(76) this (*the) man
(77) ce (*le) jardin
This optionality amounts to basically having an optionally realized
modifying definite article. In Arabic, however, the definite modifying
article must be realized.45
5.3. Modifying and non-modifying D

We have seen that Arabic articles can have two different uses: as heads of
non-modifying saturated categories (whether nominal or adjectival), or
heads of modifying non-saturated categories (be they nominal or adjecti-
val). Let us call the first use a referential use, and the second an anaphoric
use. If D is anaphoric, then we expect it to be bound by another D, in a
minimal domain. This expectation is borne out, and the two Ds on the
noun and the adjective are coindexed. Agreement in features are pre-
sumably a consequence of coindexation.46
The `scope' ordering of the two Ds (attached to N and A) can be
naturally related to the interpretation of the DP. Suppose that in order
45
I assume e.g. that the derived structure of a demonstrative construction like (75a) is the
following:
(i)
DP
,
haadaa i D
D IP
l-walad j e i ej
Other identificational/predicational source alternations include the following pairs:

(ii) all men
(iii) all the men
(iv) John is the president
(v) John is president
Note, by way of comparison, that adjectives (normally) precede nouns in Germanic and
(some) Romance, and adjectives precede possessors in Celtic. In these languages, however,
adjectives do not carry articles. This situation contrasts with that found in languages like e.g.
Greek, where the adjective carrying the article must (normally) follow the noun.
46
Scope is presumably conditioned by c-command, which then motivates that ordering.

to be interpreted as an argument, a DP has to be saturated or closed

off. A DP is normally saturated if its Spec contains a realized DP
possessor which closes off the open position in the DP, or an empty
pronominal (licensed by an article) which has the same function (see
e.g. Higginbotham 1985, Holmberg 1993, and Campbell 1993, 1996,
among others). In the case of modifying adjectives, the open position in
AP is first identified with the variable in NP, and cannot be closed off
by its D. Otherwise, the result will be non-interpretable. The anaphoric
nature of D on adjectives follows. When D is anaphoric, then it has to
be c-commanded by a referential or pronominal D, and it is coindexed
with it. Likewise, a similar function can be performed by the possessor,
which is placed in the domain of the higher D, presumably for scope
reasons.47
5.4. Crosslinguistic evidence

I have assumed, following Szabolcsi (1987, 1994), Abney (1987), Kayne
(1994), and Smith (1964/1969), among others, that the article is essentially
a clausal determiner, which can come to be affixed on nouns and
adjectives alike (be they predicates or arguments), and that adjective
modification (and/or prediction) licenses two determiner sources. This
view has been supported by various modification and predication phe-
nomena in Standard Arabic, but similar phenomena are in fact widely
spread cross-linguistically. For example, Greek, Rumanian, Scandina-
vian, and Cushitic express articles on modifying adjectives (see Alexiadou
& Wilder 1997, Dobrovie-Sorin 1987, Holmberg & Sandstrom 1996 and
Delsing 1993, and Lecarme 1996, respectively). In French, double deter-
miners occur with superlatives, as in (78), or epithets, as in (79):
47
Among the questions which remains to be addressed is how to account for the fixed
ordering of relative clauses (whether restrictive, as in (i)±(ii), or non-restrictive, as in (iii) ).
The latter are located after all simple adjectives and modifiers:
(i) l-kitaab-u s-sagÇiir-u lladii qara?-tu-hu
ÇÇ
the-book-nom the-little-nom thatÅ read-I-it
`The little book that I read'
(ii) l-kutub-u t-talaatat-u llatii ra?ay-tu-haa
ÅÅ Å
the-books-nom the-three-nom that read-I-them
`The three books that I read'
(iii) kitaab-u l-¹aqqad-i haadaa lladii qara?-tu-hu
book-nom al-Aqqad-gen this Å Å read-I-it
that
`This book of al-Aqqad that I read'
Orders in which the relative clause precedes modifiers are ill-formed:
(iv) *l-kitaab-u lladii qara?-tu-hu s-sagÇiir-u
the-book-nom that Å read-I-it ÇÇ
the-little-nom
(v) *l-kutub-u llatii ra?ay-tu-haa t-talaatat-u
ÅÅ
the-books-nom that read-I-them the-three-nom Å
(vi) *kitaab-u l-¹aqqad-i lladii qara?-tu-hu haadaa
book-nom al-Aqqad-gen that Å read-I-it this Å
See Fassi Fehri (1997a, b) for suggestive solutions.

(78) le repas le plus deÂlicieux

the meal the most delicious
`the most delicious meal'
(79) l'imbeÂcile de Pierre
the idiot of Pierre
`that idiot Pierre'
In Moroccan Arabic, there is also a Def agreement between the head
noun and the adjective or the relative marker heading the relative clause,
as is illustrated by the following examples:
(80) a. r-rajel t-twiil

the-man Çthe-tall
Ç
`The tall man'
b. r-rajel lli jaa
the-man that came
`The man who came'
(81) a. rajel twiil

man Çtall
À tall man'
b. rajel jaa
man came
À man who came'
Furthermore, possessive structures are also used as epithets (which
involve double determiners), hence the ambiguity of a construction like
(82):
(82) l-kelb d-hmed

Ç
the-dog of-Hmed
a. `Hmed's dog'
b. `that jerk Hmed'
These alternative uses of possessives (as nominal expressions or as

attributes) become less surprising or accidental once adjectives are
taken to be DPs.
6. Consequences and further discussions

6.1. Def inheritance and SGN structure
Observing that articles occur on Hebrew adjectives and demonstratives,
and assuming that such occurrences do not correlate with semantic
values, Borer (1988, 1996) claims that Def is a (base-generated) feature
on N in Semitic, and that D has no Def specification. Def is inherited by
D only from a moved N which is specified for Def.48 Borer also assumes
that the salient feature of the nominal construct state (= our SGN) is that
its N head is generated without Def specification. Since both D (in
general) and (the head) N in SGN have no Def specification, syntactic
incorporation (or merger) of N-to-N is required, where the second N
(heading the complement) has Def specification, and it transmits its
feature to the head N via a complex mechanism of percolation. Then
the N-N complex substitutes for D, to make it (in)definite.49
In addition to appealing to a very complex route to ensure Def
inheritance, Borer's analysis embodies a number of claims that are
questionable:
(a) the claim that the article is not a functional affix (and/or a D head, or
that D is empty), but only a lexical feature of N;
(b) the claim that adjectives do not need articles; the claim that the head
N of the SGN and that of its complement form a unique head at S-
structure;
(c) the obligatory Def inheritance in SGN, since the only way for the
head N of SGN to inherit a Def value is via incorporation with the
head N of the complement (which is marked for Def).
If (a) and (c) were true, then we would expect the (definite) SGN and
the N carrying the article to have basically the same distribution. This
expectation is not borne out. As a matter of fact, there is evidence that the
two phrases exhibit different distributional behaviours. For example,
prenominal demonstratives cooccur only with head nouns on which a
definite article is realized, but they cannot be constructed with a (definite)
SGN. The latter is treated like bare common nouns (with no article), as in
(83a), or bare proper names, as in (83b), which cannot cooccur with a
prenominal demonstrative:
(83) a. *haadaa rajul-un
Å
this-nom man-nom
b. *haadaa zayd-un
Å
this-nom Zayd-nom
c. *haadaa bayt-u r-rajul-i
Å
this-nom house-nom the-man-gen
Intended to mean: `this house of the man'
Likewise, demonstratives can precede only nouns bearing articles
(whether common or proper):
48
See Borer (1996), p. 53. The author resorts to morphological `secondary percolation'
and `feature sharing' mechanisms (see p. 56). I have already called into question the
morphological nature of Def inheritance.
49
In contrast to Semitic, English (and more generally Germanic) has a D specified for the
Def feature, and hence no CSN is possible. For a different view, see Longobardi (1994,
1996).

(84) a. haadaa r-rajul-u

Å
this-nom the-man-nom
`This man'
b. haadaa l-?azraq-u
Å
this-nom the-Azraq-nom (blue)
`This Azraq'
The contrast between (83c) and (84a) suggests that two different syntactic
classes of DPs can be distinguished, depending on the presence or absence
of a realized D (and/or article). This distributional distinction cuts across
the proper/common noun distinction.50
A similar behaviour is observed in vocative constructions. In the latter,
SGNs, like bare proper names or bare common nouns, can be used, but
nouns with definite articles cannot:
(85) a. yaa rajul-u
Hey man-nom
b. yaa ?azraq-u
Hey Azraq-nom
c. yaa zayd-u
Hey Zayd-nom
d. yaa bn-a ?ax-ii
Hey son-acc brother-mine
`Hey son of my brother'
(86) a. *yaa r-rajul-u
Hey the-man-nom
b. *yaa l-?azraq-u
Hey the-Azraq-nom
It is significant that a proper name loses its article when constructed in the
vocative, as the contrast between (85b) and (86b) illustrates. These
limitations on demonstrative and vocative constructions indicate that
the two distributional classes of constituents involved are differentiated
on the basis of whether their head occurs with a realized article or not. If
the article is treated as a D head (or realizing the Def feature on D), then
these distributional differences are expected.
Further evidence for taking the article to be an affix (or realizing/
checking a feature on D), rather than a feature on N (with an empty D) is
50
Note that demonstratives can occur with CSNs or bare proper names, provided they
are postnominal:
(i) bayt-u r-rajul-i haadaa
Å
house-nom the-man-gen this-nom
`This house of the man'
(ii) zayd-un haadaa
Å
Zayd-nom this-nom
`This Zayd'

its incompatibility with the occurrence of a Genitive possessor.51 If the

Def feature is treated as a D head, then the complementary distribution
between its realization and that of the genitive possessor can be taken as a
complementarity between Head and Spec realization of the same DP
category, along the lines suggested above.
Consider now the claim that the article on the adjective is not an affix
(and hence only a manifestation of a sort of morphological concord; as
embodied in (b) ). As we have seen above, the distribution of articles and
their interpretation are regulated by syntactic considerations, be they on
adjectives or on nouns. For example, the article occurs with postnominal
adjectives, but is physically absent on prenominal ones. The same
behaviour is observed with numerals, which may or may not bear articles,
depending on whether they are postnominal or prenominal. Quantifiers
also behave along the same lines (in essential respects). Adjectives,
numerals, and quantifiers do not differ therefore from common nouns
with respect to article distributions. Furthermore, the interpretation of
articles on nouns does not differ from that on adjectives, once we take
into consideration the syntactically driven distinction between referential
and anaphoric uses of articles in both cases.
Finally, let us turn to the correlation of N-N incorporation and Def
inheritance (as postulated in (c) and (d) above). As shown in Fassi Fehri
(1993), the (phonologically strict) adjacency of the head noun and the
possessor is not observed in Arabic. Likewise, adjectives intervene
between head nouns and possessors in Celtic, as will be explained
below, in subsection 6.3. Moreover, if what has been said in subsection
4.3 is correct, then Def inheritance is not forced in all SGN cases.
Therefore, these observations provide reasonable grounds for treating
the article as realizing/checking the D head, and taking Def inheritance
(when it occurs) to be a structural effect of the higher positions in which
the head N and the possessor are found.
6.2. Genitive case

Let us start with the idea that Genitive is a structural case, which is
assigned/checked under a Spec-Head relation by a functional head (as in
Fassi Fehri 1993, Siloni 1994, Ouhalla 1996, and Longobardi 1996,
among others). If Nom(inative) and Gen(itive) are structurally parallel,
then if Nom is checked in Spec TP (in a system such as Chomsky's 1995 in
which AGR is not part of the categorial inventory), then Gen is
presumably checked in Spec DP (as has been argued for in Fassi Fehri
1993), and not in Spec of AGR (as proposed by Siloni, Ouhalla, and
Longobardi 1996, among others). In this view, DP (or one of its
51
As is known, this incompatibility is not true in all languages (see e.g. Rumanian,
Somali, Hungarian, Icelandic, Italian, among other languages).

segments) is parallel to TP, in that the two categories are endowed with a
D feature, through which Cases of external arguments (i.e. possessors and
subjects) are checked. Note that since parallels between DP and CP are
also widely established in the literature, this further strengthens the need
for a layerly fissioned DP, which would then be the equivalent counter-
part of the TP/CP extension.
If Gen is checked in Spec DP, then a number of questions arise:
(a) At which level does the checking take place, is it at PF or at LF?

(b) Where is the Gen DP located, in view of other (segments of) DPs?
Concerning question (a), there are enough reasons to think that Gen is
checked by PF. We have seen above that SGs like (20a) differ from
analytic genitives like (21a) in that overt Possessor raising has occurred in
the latter, but not in the former, and that the placement of APs depends
on whether the mentioned process takes place or not. It is then reasonable
to think that, at least in these SGs, the possessor raises. But up till now,
we have assumed that Possessor raising is triggered by Def, typically in
cases where Def inheritance occurs. There are, however, instances of
adjectival as well as nominal SGs, in which there is no Def inheritance, yet
the possessor could be argued to have moved.
Consider the following event nominal SGs:
(87) nasÏr-u l-xabar-i ¹ amd-an l-yawm-a xata?-un
publication-nom the-news-gen deliberately today Ç
mistake-nom
`The publication of the news deliberately today is a mistake.'
(88) nasÏr-u xabar-in kaadib-in tama¹ an fii
Å
publication-nom the-news-gen false-gen Çpurposing in
stigÇlaali-hi xata?-un
Ç
exploiting-it mistake-nom
`The publication of a false news in order to exploit that is a
mistake.'
(89) nasÏr-u s-sahiifat-i l-xabar-a ¹ amd-an
ÇÇ Ç
publication-nom the-newspaper-gen the-news-acc deliberately
xata?-un
Ç
mistake-nom
`The deliberate publication of the news by the newspaper is a
mistake.'
In these constructions, the possessor has moved over all adverbs, includ-
ing subject-oriented adverbs, which are presumably generated higher than
the subject/possessor at the base structure. On the other hand, there is no
reason to think that the eventive head N has ever inherited any Def
feature from the possessor, since it is impossible to modify this head by
nominal modifiers such as adjectives or relative clauses:
(90) *?idaa¹ at-u l-xabar-i l-mutasarri¹ at-u ¹ amd-an

Å
broadcasting.f.-nom the-news-gen the-hasty.f.-nom deliberately
xata?-un
Ç
mistake-nom
Intended to mean: `the hasty broadcasting of the news deliberately
is a mistake.'
The absence of evidence for Def inheritance, the presence of adverb
modification, in addition to case alternations of the understood NP object
l-xabar in (87) and (89) suggest that the movement process takes place
there for Case reasons, to check Gen, and not to check Def.
Assuming then that Gen checking occurs at PF in Spec DP, triggered
by a D feature of D (namely Gen), the next question to address is where
Gen DP is located, in particular with regard to Def DP (in which Def
agreement is checked), or Agr DP (in which APs are located). Our answer
must take into account two previous observations: (a) that agreeing
adjectives can never precede nouns (i.e. *D-A D-N order is impossible),
and (b) that APs can never precede genitive possessors (i.e. *(D-N) A
GenPoss order is impossible).
Having these two observations in mind, a plausible solution is to
assume that Gen is checked at the lowest (segment of) DP projection,
where Agr DP for APs is higher. When APs are generated, Possessor has
to raise higher (in order to meet restriction (b) ), presumably for refer-
ential reasons, which have been already advocated above, to exclude the
order in (a). If this is true, then Possessor may or may not undergo double
raising (for Gen and/or Def checking).
Longobardi (1996) assumes (after Siloni 1994) that the possessor is in
AGRGen, and that its case is checked there. Furthermore, N moves to D,
to check its [ Def] feature, but its movement is also necessary to check
Gen (via a sort of head government). As for Def inheritance, it takes place
in Spec AGR, but its effect is carried on to N by stipulating that Gen can
only be checked if AGRGen, which is moved to D, has inherited a Def
feature through Spec Head agreement.52 This `detour' to Def and Case
checking in SGs and their linkage do not appear to be motivated. In my
system, there is no direct or necessary correlation between agreement in
Def and that in Gen, although it is plausible that N to D incorporation is
playing a role in licensing the latter, in much the same lines as those
52
To quote: `suppose [that the article feature] . . . in Semitic is strong [. . . then] it has to be
checked before Spell Out, triggering overt movement. Suppose also that AgrG may inherit
the definiteness value of the genitive argument in its Spec and that the raising of the noun to
D takes place in the following way: N first adjoins to AgrG and then the new complex so
formed adjoins to (or substitutes for D). Now the condition on the identification of D will be
satisfied: the raising of the lexical noun [. . .] will be functionally motivated and licensed by
the need to check the [+ article] feature and the presence of a prepositionless Genitive is
explained by the fact that this operation can be performed only by dragging to D an AgrG
being in a Spec-Head relation with a Genitive argument' (Longobardi 1996, p. 32).

proposed by Bittner & Hale (1996a, b).53 Thus the dissociation of Gen
and Def in adjectival SGs falls out naturally from my system, but not
from that of Longobardi.
6.3. A comparison with Welsh

I have taken Possessor movement to operate independently from AP
movement and N movement, and I have assumed that there is no (whole)
NP movement involved, which would move both the possessor and the
head N, and would pied pipe the AP, on its way to DP. Two essential
reasons are behind this approach. First, objects, complements and relative
clauses are left behind N and Possessor, thus suggesting that no (whole)
NP movement is involved. Second, there are cases where possessors are left
behind, suggesting that N movement is not linked to Possessor movement.
Crosslinguistic variation provides motivation in favour of this analysis.
Thus English and Arabic stand to the extremes, since English makes use of
none of these processes, while Arabic has all of them. In Romance, Spanish
uses N movement and A movement, but not Poss movement, but these
movements do not appear to reach D (see Bosque & Picallo 1996). In
French, only (a short) N movement is used, but no A movement is
documented (see Cinque 1994a). Finally, Celtic which is known to be
both V-initial and N-initial like Arabic (and more generally Semitic)
provides another interesting case for comparison, since N undergoes a
long movement to D, but no A movement or Poss movement occurs.
As a matter of fact, Welsh, as described by e.g. Rouveret (1994),
exhibits strikingly contrastive properties of nominal modifying construc-
tions, when compared to those found in Arabic. First, the serialization of
adjectives observes direct ordering prominence, with no MIO, although
adjectives are postnominal, as illustrated in (91):
(91) y cwpan mawr gwyrdd Sieineaidd
the cup big green Chinese
`The big green Chinese cup'
53
Bittner & Hale (1996a, b) propose a `Case binding' theory in which Case is assigned by
a head which delimits a small clause, and in which Case competition plays an important role.
They define Case binding as follows (their (22) ):
(i) Case binding
Let a be a head that delimits a small clause, and let b be an argument. Then a Case-binds b,
and b's head, iff
a. a locally c-commands b;
b. a governs a Case competitor for b.
They also assume the following general conventions for (direct) Case realizations (their (9) ):
(ii) If a Case-binds an overt empty-headed KP b, then the empty K of b is realized as
a. ERG, if a is I (or D);
b. ACC, if a is V (or P) and has an adjoined D.
I assume that the incorporated D (in N-AGR-K) qualifies as a (pseudo-argument) Case
competitor, and enables K-D to assign Genitive.

The order observed thus suggests that only N to D raising has occurred,
and that APs surface in their initial hierarchical order.
Second, adjectives are located after the head noun and before the
possessor, even in SGs, as (92) indicates:
(92) merch bert brenhines ddoeth
daughter beautiful queen wise
`The beautiful daughter of a wise queen'
The order exhibited here suggests that the possessor has not moved from
its base position.
Third, Welsh adjectives do not have their own (independent) article, as
observed in these examples. The order is then D-N-A, a distribution
which cannot be found in Arabic, as already explained above. The
poorness of inflection of Welsh adjectives then correlates with the absence
of A movement.
6.4. Mixed order cases

Consider now examples of mixed orders like those in (43) and (44) above,
where numerals and quantifiers are prenominal, and attributive adjectives
are postnominal. These cases provide instances of ìntermediate' deriva-
tions, where various nominal constituents (including the head N and the
modifying AP) are located (in MIO) to the right of various prenominal
constituents (which observe direct hierarchical ordering). They provide
further support for the view that N raising, Poss raising, and AP raising
are involved in the derivation of Arabic noun phrases.54
As already explained, evidence for Possessor raising is provided by the
positioning of the (genitive) possessor, which is found necessarily preced-
ing adjectives. Evidence for A (or AP) raising is provided (among other
things) by the fact that adjectives occur postnominally in MIO, although
they occur prenominally in the original order. Finally, evidence for N
raising is provided by the fact that the possessor is located to its right. In
order to maintain the leftness view of postnominal modifiers (or LSH), it
is essential that the division between the prenominal space and the
postnominal one be strictly hierarchical. Thus if a modifier X is included
in the postnominal space (and hence undergoes leftward raising), then
any modifier Y which is included in the prenominal space must belong to
a higher functional structure (the converse being also true). Thus given a
hierarchy like that in (93):55
54
It might be thought that the movement operates in a `pied piping' fashion, according to
which the AP is only dragged by the possessor on its way up. But although pied piping can
be invoked in the possessor case, it is not generalizable to cases where no possessor occurs,
yet the adjective occurs in a mirror image order.
55
I have included D in parentheses to indicate that it does not move, contrary to all other
categories.

(93) Q 4 Dem 4 (D) 4 Ord 4 Card 4 A 4 N

and assuming that this hierarchy is basic, then orderings which appear to
violate this hierarchy are excluded, unless some motivated extra mechan-
ism operates. Given these mechanisms, we predict that a number of
orders which have no derivational sources are excluded. Our predictions
are borne out, as we will see.
A first set of cases concerns prenominal modifiers which do not respect
direct hierarchical ordering, e.g. *Num Q (N) in (94a), or *Num Dem (N)
in (95a):
(94) a. *talaatat-u kull-i kutub-in
Å Å
three-nom every-gen books-gen
b. kull-u talaatat-i kutub-in
every-nom Åthree-gen
Å books-gen
Èvery three books'
(95) a. *t-talaatat-u haadihi

Å
Åthe-three-nom
Å Å theseÅ
b. haadihi t-talaatat-u
theseÅ Åthe-three-nom
Å Å
`These three'
A second set concerns postnominal modifiers which do not observe
MIO, e.g. the order *N Q A Num in (96a), or *N A Q Num in (96b),
when compared with N A Num Q in (96c):
(96) a. *l-kutub-u kull-u-haa l-xadra?-u t-talaatat-u
Ç
the-books-nom all-nom-them the-green-nom Åthe-three-nom
Å Å
b. *l-kutub-u l-xadra?-u kull-u-haa t-talaatat-u
Ç
the-books-nom the-green-nom all-nom-them Åthe-three-nom
Å Å
c. l-kutub-u l-xadra?-u t-talaatat-u kull-u-haa
Ç
the-books-nom the-green-nom Åthe-three-nom
Å Å all-nom-them
Àll the three green books'
The same is true of the order *N Dem Num A in (97a), in which the normal
hierarchical order is respected, yet the construction is ungrammatical:
(97) a. *s-suhuf-u haadihi t-talaat-u l-jadiidat-u
ÇÇ Ç
the-newspapers-nom theseÅ ÅÅ Å
the-three-nom the-new-nom
b. s-suhuf-u l-jadiidat-u t-talaat-u haadihi
ÇÇ Ç
the-newspapers-nom ÅÅ Å
the-new-nom the-three-nom theseÅ
`These three new newspapers'
The construction (97b), with the N-A-Num-Dem order, is the only
acceptable postnominal output.
A third set of cases concerns mixed orders, which reflect a combination
of the two previous sets. Thus Num-N-Dem, A-N-Q, Q-N-A-Num, or
Dem-N-A-Num in (98)±(101) are not problematic, but Dem N Num A in

(102) is:56
(98) t-talaat-u (s-)suhuf-i haadihi
Åthe-three-nom
Å Å Ç Ç Ç
(the-)newspapers-gen theseÅ
`These three newspapers'
(99) waafir-u s-sabr-i kull-u-hu
ÇÇ
plentiful-nom the-patience-gen all-nom-it
Àll the plentiful patience'
(100) kull-u l-kutub-i l-xadra?-i t-talaatat-i
Ç
all-nom the-books-nom the-green-gen Åthe-three-nom
Å Å
Àll the three green books'
(101) haadihi s-suhuf-u l-jadiidat-u t-talaat-u
theseÅ ÇÇ Ç
the-newspapers-nom ÅÅ Å
the-new-nom the-three-nom
`These three new newspapers'
(102) ?? haadihi s-suhuf-u t-talaat-u l-jadiidat-u
theseÅ ÇÇ Ç
the-newspapers-nom Åthe-three-nom
Å Å the new-nom
These three new newspapers'
In sum, the various ordering restrictions on prenominal and postnom-
inal determiners and modifiers are adequately accounted for in our
analysis, assuming LSH and various left branching raising processes, in
conformity with Kayne's (1994) AS theory, and multiple checking
processes observing minimality restrictions, along the lines of Chomsky
(1995).
7. Conclusion
In this paper, I have addressed various descriptive and theoretical
questions concerning the base structure ingredients of modifying APs,
and how these constituents are reordered within larger DP structures. I
have argued for the existence of AP (and A) leftward movement, which is
motivated by the strength of D features of Arabic APs. The recursive
local application of the latter movement has been shown to be behind
MIO effects. Furthermore, AP and Possessor movements interact appro-
priately, without inducing minimality violations. I have reanalyzed the
structure of synthetic possessives in the light of the observation that they
may or may not involve Def inheritance. The latter has been argued to be
syntactic in nature: it is triggered by Possessor raising, in a split/fissioned
56
The judgements with respect to (101) and (102) are very subtle, and some speakers are
unable to make a distinction between the two constructions. When confronted with the
difference in interpretation, however, speakers tend to correct their judgements in the right
direction.

DP architecture. On the other hand, Case, Def, and Agr features play
separate roles with respect to Attract, in autonomous DP domains.
Possessive and partitive structures have been examined and contrasted,
and the relevance of their structure to that of the treatment of prenominal
adjective constructions explored. Finally, Gen checking has been disso-
ciated from Def checking in SGs, thus providing additional motivation
for a fissioned DP approach. Further research is obviously needed to
detail and refine this picture.57
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Received November 11, 1997 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri
Accepted December 15, 1998 IERA, Mohammed V University
BP 6216 Rabat Institutes, Morocco
Fax: (212) (7) 772065
Phone: (212) (7) 773012
E-mail: fassi@atlasnet.net.ma

Abdelkader Fassi Fehri Arabic Modifying Adjectives and DP Structures

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3d ^ 22/6/99 ^ 14:33 ^ sh/mp

ARABIC MODIFYING ADJECTIVES AND

Abstract. Important characteristics of the Arabic adjectival system are

106 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

is the strength of the various features in D which triggers A or N raising

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 107

2. Adjective classes and their distributions

2.1 Serialized postnominal ordering

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

108 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

Consider e.g. the serialized ordering prominence restriction on object

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 109

(12) a. una comedia musical americana

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110 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

2.2. Further features of attributives

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 111

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112 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

A further distinction between attributives and predicatives suggests

(23) s-suhufiyy-u l-faransiyy-u t-tawiil-u

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 113

2.3. Prenominal determiners

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114 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

Note, however, that these determiners (and/or modifiers) can also

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 115

2.4. Prenominal adjectives

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116 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

(38) a. ladiid-u t-ta¹ aam-i lladii ?akal-tu-hu

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 117

Further cases of prenominal adjectives are provided by superlatives,

3. An antisymmetrical structure of adjectival constructions

(iii) jayyid-u qadiim-i l-manaazil-i

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118 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

the Spec of a functional projection F, of which the NP is a complement.

3.2. Deriving MIO and variation

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Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 119

through (a) N or (b) NP movement, targeting higher left located heads or

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

120 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

l-hujuumi l-?amirikii NPi ej

Note, however, that NP raising (as described) cannot be adequately applied

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 121

3.3. Raising postnominal APs

3.3.1. Checking Def, Case, and Agr on adjectives. As exemplified thor-

# The Editorial Board of Studia Linguistica 1999.

122 Abdelkader Fassi Fehri

b. l-hukm-u ma¹ ruufun musbaqan

3.3.2. Deriving multiple AP structures. Suppose that APs originate as

Arabic modifying adjectives and DP structures 123

generated as left specifiers of NP or np (possibly in a np shell