Broekhuis and Corver 2026: Dutch adpositions #

Dutch adpositions are traditionally sorted into four classes by where they stand relative to their complement: prepositions, postpositions, circumpositions, and intransitive adpositions. This file formalizes the argument that the classification is epiphenomenal. Each class is the surface effect of one movement rule inside the adpositional phrase. A complement is selected below the adposition and raises to the specifier of a phrase-internal functional projection when the rule says so: a nominal complement stays where it is selected unless the phrase is directional, while a prepositional complement or an R-pronoun raises. A raised complement precedes the adposition, so the phrase is head-final; an in-situ one follows it. Postpositions are then directional prepositions with a raised complement, and circumpositions are postpositions whose complement is itself a prepositional phrase, so that the first part of a circumposition is the head of the raised complement and the second part is the head of the whole.

The same head direction settles extraction. Dutch resists preposition stranding, but an element that precedes the adpositional head can leave the phrase, and precisely the complements that raise precede it: R-pronouns and the complements of directional postpositions can be extracted, ordinary nominal complements of prepositions cannot, and the complement of a circumposition patterns with the prepositional case because it sits inside the raised prepositional phrase. An R-pronoun never yields the postpositional order, since de wandeling er op 'the hike on it' has only the locational reading, so a circumpositional phrase R-pronominalizes through its prepositional complement, and under wh-movement the first part of a circumposition pied-pipes alone, which shows that it heads a phrase.

The lexical generalizations are checked against the Dutch adposition fragment, which follows the authors' grammar: the rule reproduces every recorded postpositional use from the path it denotes, every circumposition of the grammar is a listed preposition followed by a listed postposition or particle, every postposition but af is also a preposition, an adposition with both uses is locational before its complement unless it is one of the grammar's directional prepositions, circumpositions take only nominal complements, and the morphologically complex prepositions resist R-pronominalization. The chapter itself notes that af and heen, the second parts of van … af and over … heen, are not commonly used as prepositions, although they once were, and remain postpositions or particles with a directional meaning.

The chapter says that the raising of a nominal complement is semantically conditioned and does not state the condition. Helmantel's analysis, which the chapter names as a starting point, supplies one: the complement raises when the phrase is directional and the adposition is not inherently directional, since an inherently directional adposition such as naar 'to' checks the directionality itself. That condition entails the chapter's rule and keeps the grammar's inherently directional prepositions out of the postpositional order.

Main definitions #

ComplementKind, Raises: what a phrase-internal complement is, and when it raises to the specifier of the functional projection.
position, headDirection: where the complement is pronounced, and the head direction of the phrase that results.
linearization: the traditional four-way classification, read off the head direction.
Extractable: extraction requires the extracted element to precede the adpositional head.
verbClass: the transitivity class of a verb of motion with a spatial complementive.

Main results #

linearization_eq_post_iff, linearization_eq_circum_iff: each surface class is the effect of one complement kind and directionality, not a lexical property.
linearization_rPronoun: an R-pronoun complement never gives the postpositional order.
range_linearization: the rule derives every class of the traditional classification and no other order.
extractable_iff_raises, extractable_iff_of_linearization_eq_pre, extractable_of_linearization_ne_pre: extraction is raising, so from a prepositional phrase only an R-pronoun leaves and from any other phrase the complement does.
raises_nominal_of_dpRaises, pointLocative_not_postP: Helmantel's condition on nominal raising entails the chapter's rule, and under it the inherently directional prepositions have no postpositional use.
linearization_direction_post, circumP_parts: the rule reproduces every postpositional use of the fragment and every circumposition decomposes into listed parts.
postP_subset_preP, circumP_complement_nominal, no_rPron_not_postP: the lexical restrictions the analysis predicts.
perfect_op, postP_selects_zijn: a postpositional phrase denotes a path and its verb takes zijn 'be', while the prepositional phrase of the same adposition takes hebben 'have'.

Implementation notes #

The chapter's extraction evidence is modelled over complement kinds only, one level deep. The extraction of modifiers such as measure phrases from a prepositional phrase, the pied-piping of the first part of a circumposition alone under wh-movement, and the restriction of pronominal complements to human referents, which R-pronouns lift, are described in the chapter and not formalized. The raised prepositional phrase inside a circumposition is taken to be a plain prepositional phrase whose complement stays in situ.
The chapter offers the raising analysis as a hypothesis that idealizes away the exceptional prepositional phrases with a prepositional complement, such as van na de oorlog 'from after the war'.
The perfect auxiliary follows the chapter's account of the contrast between heeft op de heuvel gereden and is de heuvel op gereden: a path complementive makes the verb of motion telic and unaccusative. verbClass records that account, and the auxiliary is then the selection rule's, whichever way the language treats its reflexives.

TODO #

Raises idealizes the chapter's semantic condition to directionality, so linearization_eq_post_iff predicts a postpositional order for every directional preposition. Helmantel's condition removes naar, tot and van, but vanaf, vanuit and via, which she does not classify, still come out postpositional although the grammar records no such use, and the prepositional phrase inside van het dak af 'off the roof' is read as locational although van denotes a source path.

Broekhuis and Corver 2026: Dutch adpositions #

Main definitions #

Main results #

Implementation notes #

TODO #

References #

The internal structure of an adpositional phrase #

Extraction #

The condition on nominal raising #

The Dutch lexicon #

Directional phrases and the perfect auxiliary #