Íslenskt mál og almenn málfræði - 01.01.1980, Page 181

lnversion in Embedded Clauses in Modern lcelandic
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tages of this analysis over the traditional way of determining second
position. First, it provides a uniform treatment of conjunctions, in-
cluding interrogative pronouns and the relative particles: they never
count as filling first position, but are always considered to be outside
the clause boundaries. Second, this analysis allows the simplest possible
description of the conditions under which various inverted word orders
are possible in embedded clauses. This is the topic of the next section.
2. Inversion in embedded clauses
2.0
In addition to the Topicalization of stressed elements of the predi-
cate, there is another type of inversion which is extremely common in
embedded clauses and which is characteristic of Icelandic (and Faroese)
as opposed to the other Scandinavian languages. This kind of inversion,
which I will refer to as Stylistic Inversion, is illustrated by the ex-
amples in (5)-(7). These examples were taken at random from two
short stories by Gestur Pálsson, „Tilhugalíf" and „Hans Vöggur“, but
are typical of the inverted word orders one finds in Icelandic prose.
The examples have been divided into three categories according to
whether the embedded clause begins with (i) a past participle, (ii) an
adjective, or (iii) some adverbial. Especially typical of the third cate-
gory are negative adverbs such as ekki ‘not’ and verbal particles such
as fram ‘forward’. Note the postverbal position of ekki in (2a), however,
which illustrates the fact that adverbs do not generally precede the finite
Verb in embedded clauses in Icelandic as opposed to the other Scan-
dinavian languages. The fronted constituent has been italicized:
(5) a Honum mætti standa á sama, hvað sagt væri um hann
(Tilh., 5. k.)
b ... og hann léti þá vita, að hann ... kæmi ekki heim,
eins og ráðgert hafði verið (Tilh., 1. k.)
c Hún benti á ýmsa roskna trésmiði í bænum, sem byrjað höfðu
með engum efnum ... (Tilh., 1. k.)
(6) a Hann raulaði þá vísuna sína nokkuð hærra en venjulegt var
(Hans V.)
b Engum datt í hug, að vert væri að reyna til að kynnast honum
(Hans V.)
c Þeir voru að tala um ... hvað hœgt hefði verið (Tilh., 1. k.)