Aspects of transitivity at the beginning of Modern Catalan

Abstract

In this corpus study we make a first approach to different aspects of transitivity, understood as a phenomenon with multiple faces, in the texts corresponding to the beginning of Modern Catalan (17th century, with a especial emphasis on the first half of the century). In particular, we deal with the case of several verbs showing an hesitating behaviour between the transitive and the intransitive use, and we undertake the study of this aspect from the point of view of differential object marking, since the alternations in these verbs may be confusing when analysing the pervasiveness of direct object introduced by a (see § 2). Next, also taking differential object marking as the reference point, we focus on the constructions that favour significantly the use of this marking in front of direct objects (see § 3). Finally, we briefly deal with some other interesting aspects of transitivity in the texts of the beginning of Modern Catalan, such as the use of unergative verbs in transitive patterns including a cognate direct object, or the causativization of intransitive verbs of motion (see § 4).