Universals Archive
A database of proposed crosslinguistic laws and tendencies in grammar across the world’s languages. 2,029 published entries.
1,130 entries · page 8 of 23
| # | Standardized / Original | Domain | Type | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 490 | In declarative sentences with nominal subject and object, the dominant order is always one in which the subject precedes the object. | syntax | unconditional | declarative sentence, order, subject, object |
| 491 | With overwhelmingly greater than chance frequency, IF basic order is SOV, THEN adpositions will come after their NPs (i.e., be postpositions). | syntax | implication | order, SOV, postposition |
| 492 | IF dominant order is VSO, THEN SVO will be an alternative or the only alternative order. | syntax | implication | order, SOV, VSO, VOS |
| 493 | IF SOV is the dominant order and there is no alternative basic order or only OSV as the alternative, THEN all adverbial modifiers of the verb likewise precede the verb. | syntax | implication | order, SOV, OSV, verb, adverb |
| 494 | When a yes-no question is differentiated from the corresponding assertion by an intonational pattern, the distinctive intonational features of each of these patterns are reckoned from the end of the sentence rather than from the beginning. | syntax, prosodic phonology | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | sentence type, interrogative, yes-no question, intonation |
| 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 |
| 498 | IF interrogative sentences are formed from declarative sentences by inversion so that verb precedes subject, THEN the question word or phrase is normally initial. IF such inversion occurs in yes-no questions, THEN it also occurs in information questions. |
syntax | implication | order, sentence type, interrogative, subject-verb inversion |
| 499 | IF basic order in declarative sentences is VSO, THEN interrogative words or phrases always occupy the first position in interrogative word questions. IF basic order is SOV, THEN there is never such an invariant rule. |
syntax | implication | order, sentence type, interrogative, interrogative word, VSO, SOV, wh-movement |
| 500 | IF the nominal object always precedes the verb, THEN verb forms subordinate to the main verb also precede it. | syntax | implication | order, object, noun, verb, subordinate |
| 501 | In conditional statements, the conditional clause precedes the conclusion as the normal order in all languages. | syntax | unconditional | clause combining, conditional clause, order |
| 502 | IF basic order is OV, THEN, in expressions of volition and purpose, the main verb follows the subordinate verb. IF basic order is VO, THEN, in expressions of volition and purpose, the main verb precedes the subordinate verb. |
syntax | implication | order, clause combining, volition, verb, subordination |
| 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 |
| 504 | IF the pronominal object follows the verb, THEN the nominal object also does. | syntax | implication | order, verb, object, noun, pronoun |
| 506 | IF there are only suffixes, THEN there will be postpositions; IF there are only prefixes, THEN there will be prepositions. |
morphology, syntax | implication | prefix, suffix, postposition, preposition |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 522 | It is possible but not necessary for the adnominal and pronominal demonstratives stems to be fully or partially identical. | morphology, syntax | unconditional | demonstrative |
| 523 | IF the adnominal adjective agrees with the noun, THEN so does the adnominal demonstrative. | inflection, syntax | implication | agreement, demonstrative, adjective, NP |
| 524 | In more than one language, but not in all, the demonstrative and the definite article co-occur. | syntax | unconditional | demonstrative, definite article |
| 525 | In more than one language, and possibly in all, preposed demonstratives are peripheral to tautolateral numerals and adjectives; postposed demonstratives are most frequently so. | syntax | unconditional | order, demonstrative, numeral, adjective, noun |
| 526 | IF the adnominal demonstrative and the definite article occur on the same side of the head noun, THEN the demonstrative is consistently more peripheral than the article. | syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | adnominal demonstrative, definite article, noun, order |
| 534 | It seems probable that in all languages expressions of time and place may appear in the initial positions in the sentence. | syntax | unconditional | order |
| 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 |
| 540 | IF there are numerals in which the expression of the multiplier follows that of the multiplicand, THEN the numeral will follow the noun. | word formation, syntax | implication | numeral, order, noun |
| 543 | IF a link for addition occurs medially, THEN it always goes with the following numeral in a prepositional language and with the preceding numeral in a postpositional language. | word formation, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | numeral, order, postposition, preposition |
| 544 | When there is a word order variation in addition between larger and smaller, and one order has an overt link and the other has not, it is always the order smaller+larger which has the link. | word formation, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | order, numeral |
| 545 | IF a link for subtraction is final, THEN there are postpositions. | word formation, syntax | implication | numeral, postposition |
| 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 |
| 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 |
| 552 | In indefinite and approximative constructions, the numeral tends to follow the noun. | syntax | unconditional | numeral, order, indefinite, approximative |
| 553 | IF a link for addition is final, THEN there are postpositions. | word formation, syntax | implication | numeral, postposition |
| 554 | IF there is free variation in Noun Quantifier order depending on the identity of the numeral, THEN one of the two orders is used with a continuous series of numbers beginning with ‘one’, or ‘one’ and the bases of the system are used with one of the orders. IF there is free variation in Noun Quantifier order with a particular numeral ‘x’, THEN the next higher is also in free variation or is in the opposite order to that of ‘x’ with the noun. |
syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | numeral, order, noun, quantitative |
| 555 | IF there are both partitive and adjectival Quantifier Noun constructions, THEN the smallest number which employs the partitive is larger than the largest number which has the adjectival construction. | syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | numeral |
| 556 | The construction with the interrogative 'how many?' is usually the same as that with the highest block of numerals. | syntax | unconditional | numeral |
| 557 | When there is an overt marker distinguishing absolute and contextual numbers, THEN this marker is added to the contextual form yielding the absolute form, and not vice versa. | word formation, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | numeral |
| 558 | Where there are contrasting forms for the absolute and contextual uses of cardinal numbers, there is always neutralization for some numerals, in which case the contextual form appears. | word formation, syntax | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | cardinal numeral |
| 559 | When languages with and without articles are in contact, it is more common for languages without an article to innovate one than for languages with an article to abandon it. | syntax | unconditional | article, borrowing |