Mind the Gap! Null Modals (and Other Functional Verbs) in Finite Complementation in Italo-Greek

Abstract

Although Italo-Greek is characterized by a general retreat of infinitival complementation, it partly preserves the infinitive in restructuring contexts: a handful of functional auxiliaries—in an overt or covert form—allow for infinitival complements, with which they enter in a monoclausal union. Such a preservation also triggers consequences for finite complementation. Indeed, those predicates that still select for infinitival complements may lack finite complementation, resulting in only the lexical embedded verb surfacing instead of the complex sentence AUX + na + finite verb: δen du ékame típote ‘he could not do anything to him’ (lit. ‘he did not do anything to him’). I claim that such an absence—which gives rise to a semantic or even a syntactic gap—depends on the effects of the restructuring rule, which creates a high level of dependency and interlacing between the matrix and embedded verbs. When finite complements gradually replaced infinitival ones, though only sporadically, some predicates stopped selecting for finite complements, ultimately depriving the sentence of modal and other functional specifications.

Keywords

• avoidance of the infinitive
• complementation
• modal verbs
• restructuring
• monoclausality
• <i>irrealis</i> dependent clauses