Universal 1560: verb-initial ⇒ no verb agreement V. agreement with two noun phrases
Original
With possibly greater than chance frequency, the verb in verb-initial languages either agrees with no NPs, or with two NPs (both subject and direct object, or sometimes subject and indirect object).
Standardized
IF basic order is verb-initial, THEN the verb either agrees with no NPs or with two NPs.
Cf. #1518 about subject-final langugages, which are all VOS, following from Keenan’s survey (#1516): If a language is subject-final then either transitive verbs of unmarked sentences agree with no full noun phrase in the sentence or they agree with two noun phrases.
Cf. #1518 about subject-final langugages, which are all VOS, following from Keenan’s survey (#1516): If a language is subject-final then either transitive verbs of unmarked sentences agree with no full noun phrase in the sentence or they agree with two noun phrases.