Syntactic distribution of person marking within possessed nouns alongside nominal possessors (Northern Mansi)

GenPossAff~Nonaff: Possessed nouns are optionally marked with possessive affixes; or, the use of such affixes is determined by considerations other than the form of the possessor noun.


(1) āťa-m witujsow ťēnt
father-1sg beaver_pelt hat
‘my father’s beaver pelt hat’ (S. D.)


(2) āťa-m witujsow ťēnt-e
father-1sg beaver_pelt hat-3sg
‘my father’s beaver pelt hat’ (S. D.)


In Northern Mansi, two constructions can express a possessive relationship (Kálmán 1976, Riese 2001). The first one is the bare juxtaposition of the possessor and the possessed (1), while in the other construction the possessed entity takes a personal suffix (2). The constructions, however, do not differ on syntactic grounds.

Author: 

Szilvia Németh