GB072
Morphological case involves any type of case marking that is phonologically bound (affixes, clitics, tone, alternation, vowel lengthening, etc.). Oblique NPs are NPs having a function other than S, A or P, e.g. dative, locative, ablative instrumental, comitative, location in time, etc. If a phonologically free adposition agrees in gender, number or person with the noun phrase, it does not count as a case marker for the purpose of this feature. Note that genitive or possessive are not seen as cases for this feature.
- Code 1 if an oblique case is marked on nouns or noun phrases using tone, affixation, clitics or any other phonologically bound means.
- Code 0 if oblique functions are only marked on nouns or noun phrases using phonologically free adpositions.
- Code 0 if oblique functions are only indicated using constituent order.
- Code ? if you think there is not enough data or analysis to say whether oblique case is marked on nouns or noun phrases (e.g. because it is not clear whether the marker(s)are phonologically bound, or nothing is mentioned by the author and there are no examples of oblique noun phrases). Mention this in the comment column.
Warrongo (ISO 639-3: wrg, Glottolog: waru1264)
Warrongo has case markers on every element of the NP (Tsunoda 2011: 342ff) and is coded 1.
ngali nyina-ya jarribara-ngga yamba-ngga
1DU.NOM sit-IMP good-LOC camp-LOC
‘Let's sit down in the good camp.’ (Tsunoda 2011: 343)
Zuni (ISO 639-3: zun, Glottolog: zuni1245)
Zuni has a directional enclitic -kʷin and a locative enclitic -ʔan. No clear examples are given where we can check whether they really attach to the end of the noun phrase or just to the noun. In any case, Zuni is coded 1 for this feature.
kalapa-kʷin
Gallup-DIR
‘(He went) to Gallup’ (Newman 1965: 66)
kʔakʷe-'w-an
house-PL-LOC
‘(We stayed) at their houses’ (Newman 1965: 66)
Ndam (ISO 639-3: ndm, Glottolog: ndam1251)
In Ndam, the locative of disyllabic nouns with mid-mid melody is formed by lowering the melody to low-low. Low-low nouns are turned into locatives by changing their melody to low-high (Broß 1988: 57-58). This triggers 1 for this feature.
būgō ‘house’ → bùgò ‘in the house’
gūjʌ̄n ‘my stomach’ → gùjʌ̀n ‘in my stomach’
gə̀lè ‘concession’ → gə̀lé ‘in the concession’ (Broß 1988: 58)
Fore (ISO 639-3: for, Glottolog: fore1270)
Fore marks allative case by means of the enclitic =ti (Scott 1978: 104, 109–111). This triggers 1 for this feature.
pi nkáu='i wa-y-e
that place=ALL go-he-IND
‘He goes to that place.’ (Scott 1978: 109)
Holoholo (ISO 639-3: hoo, Glottolog: holo1240)
Various Bantu languages have one or more ‘locative noun classes’, which qualify as oblique case markers for the purposes of Grambank. Holoholo is a good example, having three 'locative' noun class 'prefixes' (classes 16, 17, 18 in Coupez 1955: 36, 38), which are in fact proclitics (they only attach to the noun, which is the first element of the noun phrase) and thus count as both prepositions and oblique case markers here. These languages are coded 1.
heelungu
ha-lungu
LOC-country
‘in the country’ (Coupez 1955: 38)
kwilungu
ku-lungu
LOC-country
‘close to the country’ (Coupez 1955: 38)
mwilungu
mu-lungu
LOC-country
‘in the country’ (Coupez 1955: 38)
Island Carib (ISO 639-3: crb, Glottolog: isla1278)
In Island Carib, the instrumental preposition áo ‘INS’ agrees with the noun in number and gender. When the noun is masculine, for example, the preposition carries the prefix l- ‘3SG.M’: l-áo ‘3SG.M-INS’. In principle, one could analyze l- as a constituent of the noun phrase, as a number-gender marker that acts as a host for case markers. For this feature, however, we consider it as an agreement marker on the preposition. Island Carib is coded 0 for this feature. See Rat (1898: 294) for examples and Josephs (2019: 51) on the agreement markers, which the author calls pronominal prefixes.
l-áo akúruku
3SG.M-INS creepers
‘with creepers’ (Rat 1898: 294)
l-áo musiérc
3SG.M-INS leaves
‘with leaves’ (Rat 1898: 294)
Hokkaido Ainu (ISO 639-3: ain, Glottolog: ainu1240)
Hokkaido Ainu has no morphological cases whatsoever, and is coded 0 (cf. Tamura 2000).
Dryer, Matthew S. 2013. Position of case Affixes. In Matthew S. Dryer & Martin Haspelmath (eds), The world atlas of language structures online. Leipzig: Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.
Haspelmath, Martin. 2009. Terminology of case. In Andrej L. Malchukov & Andrew Spencer (eds), The Oxford handbook of Case, 505–517. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Spencer, Andrew. 2009. Case as a Morphological Phenomenon. In Andrej L. Malchukov & Andrew Spencer (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Case (pp. 185–199). Oxford & New York: Oxford University Press. Note that Spencer does not count clitics as morphological case, while in Grambank they are counted as such.
Broß, Michael. 1988. Materialen zur Sprache der Ndam von Dik (Republik Tschad): Untersuchungen zur Phonologie und Morphologie. Marburg: Philipps-Universität. (MA thesis.)
Coupez, André. 1955. Esquisse de la Langue Holoholo. (Annalen van het Koninglijk Museum van Belgisch-Congo: Reeks in 8, 12.) Belgique: Tervuren.
Josephs, Keisha Marie. 2019. A descriptive grammar of Kalinago. Tucson: University of Arizona. (Doctoral dissertation.)
Newman, Stanley. 1965. Zuni grammar. (University of New Mexico Publications in Anthropology, 14.) Albuquerque: The University of New Mexico Press.
Rat, Joseph Numa. 1898. The Carib Language as now spoken in Dominica, West Indies. Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute of Great Britain and Ireland XXVII. 293–315.
Scott, Graham. 1978. The Fore Language of Papua New Guinea. (Pacific Linguistics: Series B, 47.) Canberra: Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University.
Tamura, Suzuko. 2000. The Ainu language. (ICHEL Linguistic Studies, 2.) Tokyo: Sanseido.
Tsunoda, Tasaku. 2011. A grammar of Warrongo. (Mouton Grammar Library, 53.) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
- GB027 Are nominal conjunction and comitative expressed by different elements?
- GB070 Are there morphological cases for non-pronominal core arguments (i.e. S, A or P)?
- GB071 Are there morphological cases for phonologically independent personal pronominal core arguments (i.e. S, A or P)?
- GB073 Are there morphological cases for phonologically independent oblique personal pronouns (i.e. not S, A or P)?
- GB074 Are there prepositions?
- GB075 Are there postpositions?
- GB105 Can the recipient in a ditransitive construction be marked like the monotransitive patient?
- GB252 Can predicative possession be expressed with an S-like possessum and a locative-coded possessor?
- GB253 Can predicative possession be expressed with an S-like possessum and a dative-coded possessor?
- GB254 Can predicative possession be expressed with an S-like possessum and a possessor that is coded like an adnominal possessor?
- GB256 Can predicative possession be expressed with a comitative/conjunctional construction?
Jakob Lesage