Universals Archive
A database of proposed crosslinguistic laws and tendencies in grammar across the world’s languages. 2,029 published entries.
2,017 entries · page 10 of 41
| # | Standardized / Original | Domain | Type | Keywords |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 453 | IF there are pre-aspirated consonants, THEN there are also postaspirated ones. | phonology | implication | /h/, consonant, aspiration, postaspirated, pre-aspirated |
| 454 | IF there is a free, less intimate possessor form, THEN there may be a bound, more intimate form, but not the converse. | inflection, syntax | implication | possession |
| 455 | IF there are personal possessive prefixes, THEN genitive precedes its head noun, but not vice versa | inflection, syntax | implication | possession, person, prefix, suffix, order, attributive, noun |
| 456 | IF a noun is inalienably possessed in non-vocative uses, THEN this noun is not necessarily inalienably possessed in vocative uses too. | inflection, syntax | non-implication | inalienable possession, noun, case, vocative |
| 457 | IF /h/ occurs in syllable-initial position, THEN it also occurs in relative initial position. IF /h/ occurs in relative initial position, THEN it occurs in absolute initial position. |
phonology | implication | /h/, aspiration, syllable |
| 458 | IF /h/ precedes a palatal vowel, THEN it also precedes a velar vowel. | phonology | implication | /h/, vowel, aspiration, velar, palatal |
| 459 | IF there are long consonants after long vowels, THEN there are long consonants after short vowels. | phonology | implication | phonotactics, geminate, vowel, long, short |
| 460 | IF in a HAVE-construction the possessor is marked for subject, THEN the possessee is comitative-marked. | inflection, syntax | implication | possession, subject, comitative |
| 461 | Verb taking an effected or annihilated object (in particular verbs meaning ‘to create’ and ‘to destroy’) are transitive in all relevant morphosyntactic respects. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | verb, transitive, effected object |
| 462 | With verbs with the general meaning 'destroy' or 'create', agents will be subject and patients direct object in basic (active) constructions. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | verb, transitivity, subject, direct object, agent, patient |
| 463 | The patient of verbs of creating and destroying is the subject in the passive voice, if there is one. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | diathesis, passive, transitivity, subject, direct object, agent, patient |
| 464 | When a language has an opposition of intransitive verbs of action and state, all (or almost all) verbs meaning 'to move in a certain way' will belong with the verbs of action in all formal respects. | inflection, syntax, semantics | no genuine implication; rather: provided that | semantics, verb, transitivity, stative, active |
| 465 | With more than chance frequency, an NP with the semantic role of peregrinator (the one who moves) will be the subject of clauses with verbs meaning 'to move in a certain way'. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | subject, verb, transitivity |
| 466 | With more than chance frequency, in predications of class membership, the NP referring to the class member will be the subject and the class the predicate. | inflection, syntax, semantics | unconditional | subject, predicate |
| 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 |
| 471 | IF long consonants occur in non-intervocalic position, THEN they will occur in intervocalic position. | phonology | implication | phonotactics, geminate, intervocalic position |
| 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 |
| 489 | If there are long affricates, THEN there are long stops. IF there are long affricates and long stops, THEN there are long fricatives. |
phonology | implicational hierarchy | geminate, affricate, stop, fricative |
| 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 |
| 496 | Every human language has a stock of elements that shift their denotations depending on elementary features of the speech situation – i.e., deictics. | lexicon | unconditional | deixis |
| 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 |