Universals Archive
A database of proposed crosslinguistic laws and tendencies in grammar across the world’s languages. 2,029 published entries.
789 entries · page 7 of 16
| # | Standardized / Original | Domain | Type | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 467 | The subjects in predications of class membership are grammatically identical to subjects of intransitive verbs of state. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | subject, predication, transitivity, stative |
| 469 | IF the marking for nominal and verbal number is phonologically identical, THEN this will be the case for nouns and verbs of the 3rd person. | inflection, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | number, person, 3, noun, verb |
| 470 | IF the marking for number is identical for nouns and verbal forms of 1st and 2nd person, THEN this will also be true for nouns and verbal forms of 3rd person. | inflection, syntax | implication | number, person, 1, 2, 3, noun, verb |
| 472 | IF there is an opposition ergative/absolutive in the inflection of independent personal pronouns of the 1st and 2nd person (or at least one of them), THEN there is the same opposition in the inflection of nouns. | inflection, syntax | implication | alignment, case, ergative, absolutive, personal pronoun, person, 1, 2, noun |
| 473 | IF personal and/or demonstrative pronouns of 3rd person have an opposition ergative/absolutive, THEN the nouns have the same opposition. | inflection, syntax | implication | alignment, case, ergative , absolutive, personal pronoun, demonstrative pronoun, person, 3, noun |
| 474 | IF nouns have the opposition ergative/absolutive, THEN with a high probability personal and/or demonstrative pronouns of 3rd person have the same opposition. | inflection, syntax | implication | alignment, case, ergative, absolutive, personal pronoun, demonstrative pronoun, person, 3, noun |
| 475 | IF there is an opposition accusative/nominative in the inflection of nouns, THEN there is the same opposition in the inflection of independent personal pronouns of 1st, 2nd, 3rd person (at least one of them). | inflection, syntax | implication | alignment, case, accusative, nominative, personal pronoun, person, 1, 2, 3, noun |
| 476 | Correlation between Types of Exponence and the Number of Terms of inflexional categories: Cumulative and sensitive separatist exponents limit the number of terms that may potentially realize inflexional categories more severely than insensitive separatist exponents. |
inflection | implication | exponent, cumulation, sensitivity |
| 477 | IF a case system is extra-large (beyond a dozen or so cases), THEN exponents of case are insensitive separatist (rather than sensitive cumulative). | inflection | implication | cumulation, sensitivity, case |
| 478 | IF there are tense distinctions in progressive, THEN there will be as least as many tense distinctions in non-progressive. | inflection | implication | tense, aspect, progressive, non-progressive |
| 479 | IF the same progressive constructions are used for present and for non-present tenses, THEN the progressive aspect verb phrase will either be unmarked or marked as present. | inflection | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | tense, present, non-present, aspect, progressive |
| 480 | When the head (lexical) verb in a progressive verb phrase is marked for tense, THEN it is marked as present tense. | inflection | unconditional | tense, present, aspect, progressive |
| 481 | IF there is future progressive form, THEN there is also a past progressive form. | inflection | implication | tense, past, future, aspect, progressive |
| 482 | IF there is a word-level progressive form for some tenses and there are phrase-level progressive constructions for other tenses, THEN the word-level progressive will be the present tense form. | inflection, syntax | implication | tense, present, aspect, progressive |
| 483 | IF progressive aspect is expressed by a suffix, THEN any tense, mood, or person suffixes will follow the progressive suffix. | inflection | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | aspect, progressive, affix-order, suffix, tense, mood, person |
| 484 | IF the direct object is morphologically marked in a sentence, THEN the indirect object is also morphologically marked in the same sentence. | inflection, syntax | implication | direct object, indirect object, markedness |
| 485 | IF direct and indirect objects are distinguished by word order, THEN they are also likely to be distinguished by morphosyntactic marking (affix, adposition). | inflection, syntax | implication | direct object, indirect object, order |
| 486 | When word order is rigid, regardless of whether the indirect or direct object is contiguous with the verb, the indirect object tends to be marked either extra- or intra-verbally | inflection, syntax | unconditional | direct object, indirect object, order, verb |
| 487 | In variable order SVO languages where indirect-object marking is optional, IF the indirect object is unmarked, THEN it is contiguous with the verb, and IF the indirect object is marked, THEN the direct object is contiguous with the verb. | syntax, inflection | implication | direct object, indirect object, order, verb, SVO |
| 488 | When direct object is zero-marked or non-zero-marked depending on animacy/definiteness, non-zero case marking is used for direct objects higher on the hierarchies. | inflection, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | case, accusative, zero, direct object, animacy, definiteness |
| 495 | When question particles or affixes are specified in position by reference to the sentence as a whole, IF they are initial, THEN there are prepositions, and IF they are final, THEN there are postpositions. |
inflection, syntax | implication | order, sentence type, interrogative, question particle, question affix, preposition, postposition |
| 497 | When the position of question particles or affixes is specified relative to a particular word in the sentence, they almost always follow that word. IF dominant order is VSO, THEN there are no such question particles or affixes. |
inflection, syntax | implication | order, sentence type, interrogative, VSO, question marker |
| 503 | IF the dominant order is VSO, THEN an inflected auxiliary always precedes the main verb. IF the dominant order is SOV, THEN an inflected auxiliary always follows the main verb. |
inflection, syntax | implication | order, auxiliary, verb, inflection |
| 508 | IF there is inflection, THEN there is derivation. | inflection, word formation | implication | |
| 509 | IF the verb inflects for person-number or for gender, THEN it also inflects for tense-mood. | inflection | implication | verb, person, number, gender, tense, mood |
| 510 | IF the verb agrees with either the subject or the object in gender, THEN the adjective always agrees with the noun in gender. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, gender, verb, adjective<br> |
| 511 | IF the verb agrees with a nominal subject or nominal object in gender, THEN it also agrees in number. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, subject, object, noun, gender, number |
| 512 | Whenever there is number agreement between an NP and the verb and such agreement can be suspended depending on the order of NP and verb, it can only be suspended when the verb precedes the NP and the default number form of the verb is always singular. |
inflection, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | agreement, number, singular, verb, order |
| 513 | IF there is a trial, THEN there is also a dual. IF there is a dual, THEN there is also a plural. OR, BY CONTRAPOSITION: IF there is no dual, THEN there is no trial. IF there is no plural, THEN there is no dual. |
inflection | implication | number, trial, dual, plural |
| 514 | There is no language in which the plural does not have some non-zero allomorphs, whereas there are languages in which the singular is expressed only by zero. The dual and the trial are almost never expressed only by zero. | inflection | unconditional | number, singular, plural, dual, trial, allomorphy, zero<br> |
| 515 | IF there is the category of gender, THEN there is always the category of number. | inflection | implication | number, gender |
| 516 | IF there are n genders in the non-singular, THEN there will be at least n genders in the singular. | inflection | implication | gender, number |
| 517 | All languages have pronominal categories involving at least three persons and two numbers. | inflection | unconditional | pronoun, number, person |
| 518 | IF there are gender categories in the noun, THEN there are also gender categories in the pronoun. | inflection | implication | gender, noun, pronoun |
| 519 | IF there are gender distinctions in the 1st person [of the personal pronoun], THEN there are gender distinctions in the 2nd and/or 3rd person. | inflection | implication | pronoun, gender, person, 1, 2, 3 |
| 520 | IF there are any gender distinctions in the plural of the pronoun, THEN there are some gender distinctions in the singular also. | inflection | implication | pronoun, gender, number, plural, singular |
| 521 | IF conjunction reduction has ergative alignment, THEN so does coreferential deletion in purposive constructions. IF coreferential deletion in purposive constructions has ergative alignment, THEN so does relativization. IF relativization has ergative alignment, THEN so does verb agreement. IF verb agreement has ergative alignment, THEN so does case marking. |
inflection, syntax | implicational hierarchy | alignment, ergativity, conjunction reduction, coreferential deletion, purposive, relativization, verb, agreement, case |
| 523 | IF the adnominal adjective agrees with the noun, THEN so does the adnominal demonstrative. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, demonstrative, adjective, NP |
| 535 | IF numeral classifiers are included in the dominant mode of forming quantification expressions, THEN plural marking on nouns will not be obligatory. | inflection, syntax | implication | numeral classifier, number, plural |
| 542 | In numeral systems with only simple lexical representation: IF the limit number is 2, THEN there is a singular/plural distinction, and vice versa. IF the limit number is 3, THEN there is a singular/dual/plural distinction, and vice versa. |
inflection, word formation | mutual implication | numeral, number, dual, plural, singular |
| 548 | IF plural marking on nouns is optional, THEN the singular may be used on nouns in construction with numerals higher than 1. | inflection, word formation | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | noun, numeral |
| 549 | Provided the number marking of nouns distinguishes singular, dual, and plural, IF the plural is used in any instances where a set of two objects is designated, THEN the plural can be used on nouns in construction with the numeral ‘two’. |
inflection, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | number, dual, plural, numeral |
| 550 | IF numeral expressions for the smallest addends take the plural of the noun when they designate numbers >1, THEN complex numerals with one as an addend will take the plural of the noun if ‘one’ is not a separate word. | inflection, word formation | implication | numeral, noun |
| 551 | Where there is rule-governed variation between the use of the singular and plural of nouns accompanied by numerals: IF the number is a higher one, THEN the singular is favoured; IF the construction is a measure construction , THEN the singular is favoured; IF the construction is indefinite , THEN the singular is favoured; IF the noun is inanimate or impersonal, THEN the singular is favoured. |
inflection, syntax | implication | numeral, noun, number, singular, plural |
| 560 | IF there is a separate absolute form for a particular numerical value, THEN there is a separate absolute form for the next lower value as well. | inflection | implication | cardinal numeral |
| 563 | IF the dual extends to non-pronominal agreement forms, THEN it also extends to personal pronouns and nouns. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, number, dual, noun, personal pronoun |
| 564 | IF there is a dual with nouns other than those denoting natural pairs, THEN there will be one with natural-pair nouns as well. | inflection | implication | number, dual, noun, pair |
| 565 | IF there is a duo-paucal, THEN there is a contrast between a general paucal and a multal. | inflection | implication | number, dual, paucal |
| 566 | IF the dual extends to nouns, THEN it also extends to pronouns. | inflection | implication | number, dual, noun, pronoun |
| 567 | IF 3rd person differentiates a dual, THEN so does 2nd. IF 2nd person differentiates a dual, THEN so does 3rd. |
inflection | mutual implication | pronoun, personal pronoun, number, dual, 3rd person, 2nd person |