The Elamite class system revisited

Marc Bavant Introduction (1/2)

 There seems to exist “class” markers in Elamite  -noun and noun-verb class is used to perform various functions  The descriptions of the Elamite class marker system ● Are not fully consistent with one another, ● Mix observation with conjecture

 Outline of the presentation ● Typical description sketch ● Class, person, ● The alleged functions of class markers and the actual data ● Is the reconstructed system plausible?

p. 2 Introduction (2/2)  Main literature ● Grammatical sketches: Labat (1951), Windfuhr (2006), Stolper (2008) ● Detailed: Reiner (1969), Grillot-Susini (1987), Khačikjan (1998) ● Elamite sources: Quintana Cifuentes (2001), Hinz & Koch (1987)  Important clues about the language ● Periodisation OE (IIIrd millenium), ME (IInd mill.), NE, AE (Ist mill.) ● Possible dialectal segmentation (Khačikjan 1998:3) ● The Dravidian hypothesis ● Babylonian and OP borrowings ➢ taayaušmi tarma aštu for OP dahyāušmaiy duruvā ahatiy ● Troubles with the writing system ➢ Homophony / polyphony of signs ➢ Many ways to cut a word into syllabic signs ➢ No word divider ➢ Reconstructions ➢ Alphabetisation system used here

p. 3 Typical description sketch of Elamite

p. 4 Typical description sketch of Elamite (1/8)

 Windfuhr (2006) ● “The fundamental determinant in both nominal and verbal is the opposition between two : animate (person, human and divine), and inanimate (things, concepts). It is marked by personal pronouns, so-called classifiers, and a of finite endings. Animate has three classes: first person (“locutive”); second person (“allocutive”); third person (“delocutive”), and distinguishes two numbers: singular and . The delocutive inanimate gender does not mark plural in either or verbs.”

 Notice: there is no real case category, but... ● An embryonic accusative case for personal pronouns ● Several postpositions ● Development of a , esp. in AE

p. 5 Typical description sketch of Elamite (2/8)

 Class markers Animate Inanimate ● “Class”: generic term to encompass 1 SG -k , person, number (contrary to 2 SG -t Windfuhr) -me / -Ø ● -t and -n are dialectal (?) or historical 3 SG -r / -Ø (?) variants of -me PL -p  Lexical function of class markers ● and inhabitant nouns ➢ lipa- (serve) → lipa-r (servant, ), lipa-p (servants) ➢ men (crown) → men-ir (sovereign) ➢ hinduš (India) → hinduš-p (Indians) ● Abstract nouns ➢ sunki- (king) → sunki-me (kingship) ➢ lipa- (serve) → lipa-me (service, servitude (Reiner))

p. 6 Typical description sketch of Elamite (3/8)  Syntactic functions of class agreement ● Well attested in OE and ME, vestigial in later stages ● Attributive (or ) function ➢ men-ir (sovereign), Hatamti () → men-ir Hatamti-r ➢ nap-ir (god), riša- (great) → nap-ir riša-r (Reiner) ➢ taki-me (life), u (I) → taki-me u-me ➢ rutu (wife), hanik (beloved) → [ taki-me [ [ rutu hanik ] u ]-ri ]-me ➢ sunki- (king) → sunki-p sunki-me-p (Labat 1951, “les rois du royaume”) ● Appositive function ➢ u (I), sunki- (king) → u... sunki-k “I, king” (Reiner 1969:100) ➢ u sunki-k Anzan Šušun-ka “I, king of Anzan and ” (Windfuhr) ➢ sunki-r pit-ir aak tar-ir “the king, enemy or allied” ● Predicative function ➢ u (I), sunki- (king) → u... sunki-k “I am king” (Reiner 1969:95) ● And some possible others...

p. 7 Typical description sketch of Elamite (4/8)  Sketch of the verbal system ● Necessary to see how nominal classes interact with verbs ● Verbal categories ➢ Tense-aspect: imperfective / perfective  No real tense, but past / non-past opposition linked with aspect  Orthogonal with another opposition: “non-extended” / “extended”  Uncertain value: aspectual or modal? ➢ or agentivity?  Action / state verbs  Transitive / intransitive verbs  Most scholars describe Conj. II as “passive” for transitive verbs  IMO the existence of an agentive passive remains to be proved ➢ Moods: indicative, imperative (?), optative (suffix)  Imperative 2SG/2PL**  Identical with Conj. I (2SG or 3SG)  Sometimes bare stem  Prohibitive: + Conj. III  Optative (precative) exists in Conj. I and II (perfective)

p. 8 Typical description sketch of Elamite (5/8)  Sketch of the verbal system (continued) Conj. I ● Forms 1 SG -h ➢ Verbal form proper (Conj. I)  Specific verbal endings 2 SG -t  Perfective (past), active 3 SG -š  Animate subjects only (Malbran-Labat) 1 PL -hu < -h-h ? ➢ Nominal forms of the verb 2 PL -h-t  “Past participle”: -k 3 PL -h-š  Passive with transitive verbs  “Present participle” or “gerund”: -n  Passive (Grillot), non-oriented (Malbran- Conj. II Conj. III Labat), active (others) 1 SG -k-k > -k -n-k

➢ e

Conjugated nominal forms (quasiverbal) t

a 2 SG -k-t -n-t 

With markers m i

n 3 SG -k-r -n-r  Conj. II: built upon past participle A  Perfective (past) PL -k-p / -p -n-p  Conj. III: built upon gerund Inanimate -k -n  Imperfective (non-past)

p. 9 Typical description sketch of Elamite (6/8)  Sketch of the verbal system (continued) ● Forms (continued) ➢ Many details and conjectures make the picture more complex ➢ Extended forms  Stem extended with a -ma- morpheme ● Noun-verb agreement ➢ Verb ending  In Conj. I: represents the agent (A) or the intransitive subject (S)  In Conj. II: represents the (O) or the intransitive subject (S)  In Conj. III: represents A or S ➢ Resumptive pronouns  Verb arguments are often referenced by a chain of pronouns placed just before the verb  Something like: ap u in tunih “to-them I it gave” (Grillot, Stolper...)  The pronouns are more or less fused phonetically (sandhi)  Some scholars consider the last pronoun to be a verb supposed to reference to A or S in Conj. II and III, whereas it is O in Conj. I  Would result in a kind of bi-personal conjugation

p. 10 Typical description sketch of Elamite (7/8)  The verbal system: a non typical recap

Conj. I Conj. II Conj. III Conj. IV Built upon Verb stem Past participle Present participle Infinitive Person endings Verbal Class markers Class markers Class markers (animate) (3rd pers. only) Person endings n.a. Ø Ø n.a. (inanimate) Tense-aspect Past perfective Past perfective Non-past imperfective Past perfective Moods rendered • Indicative • Indicative • Indicative • Indicative • Imperative • Precative (with -ni) • Prohibitive (with anu) • Precative (with -ni) Extensibility with -ma Yes Yes Yes ?? Suitable for verbs... • Transitive • Transitive • Transitive • Transitive • Intransitive of • Intransitive of • Intransitive of action? • ?? action action • Intransitive of state? • Intransitive of state Role of the person A / S O A / S A ending Role of the alleged O A / S A / S ? « prefix » Role of resumptive ir Animate O Pseudo-O of ? ? intransitive action Usable in main clause Yes Only if prohibitive, precative or negative Yes (Reiner)

p. 11 Typical description sketch of Elamite (8/8)  Elements of typological classification ● Ergative, active or nominative? ➢ Diakonoff (1967) classifies it as ergative  Though without ergative case  Opposition action vs state  No direct category  No active vs passive voice opposition ➢ The qualificative “active” seems more appropriate today ➢ Khačikjan (1998) classifies it as “early nominative”  Denies existence of action vs state opposition (contra her teacher)  Admits relics of ergative and/or active type ● Constituent order ➢ Verb final: neither strictly SOV or OSV because extraposition of arguments and resumptive pronouns blur the picture ➢ But right- at the NP level

p. 12 Class, person and Suffixaufnahme

p. 13 Class, person and Suffixaufnahme (1/4)  Is it sound to embed person within a class system? ● Reiner (1969:77) assimilates the Elamite class system to the gender systems of “languages which have several genders that control concord, such as many African languages” ● Noun class systems can be seen as an extension of gender ➢ Usual semantic criteria:  Sex, animacy, personhood, ability to think, strength...  Shape, vegetal, eatable... ➢ Agreement ➢ One noun belongs (usually) to one class*** ● In Elamite, each animate noun belongs potentially to 4 classes

p. 14 Class, person and Suffixaufnahme (2/4)  History of introducing person as a nominal category ● Scheil (1901) ➢ Interprets -k and -me as genitive case suffixes in  šak šutruk-nahunte-ik “son of Šutruk-Nahunte”  siyan -me “temple of Pinigir” ➢ What about the -k of sunki-k in sunki-k Anzan Šušun-ka ? ● Labat (1951) ➢ «Certains auteurs [e.g. Hüsing (1905)] ont supposé que -k exprimait l’indéterminé et -r le déterminé. Il est plus probable d’admettre que -k identifie la sphère du sujet parlant, alors que -r est l’indice de ce qui est extérieur à cette sphère : sunki-k (moi) le roi, sunki-r (toi, lui) le roi.» ● Reiner (1969) ➢ Introduces the terms locutive, allocutive, delocutive ➢ Does not make it clear what is the criterion for using person in nouns  Sphere of the speaker?? Person of the subject (or topic)?  “My beloved wife”: inside or outside the personal sphere of the speaker?

p. 15 Class, person and Suffixaufnahme (3/4)  Suffixaufnahme (Plank 1995) ● Windfuhr (2006) ➢ “Elamite is a head initial language and is characterized by Suffixaufnahme” ● Suffixaufnahme: what it means (in a nutshell) ➢ “In the palace of the king”:  Without Suffixaufnahme: palace-LOC king-GEN  With Suffixaufnahme: palace-LOC king-GEN-LOC (and variants) ➢ A morpheme from the head is repeated on the dependant  It can be any noun category marker (case, gender or class, determinacy...) ● The agreement along the Elamite way and Suffixaufnahme ➢ Connection with Suffixaufnahme done by Bork (1905)  Suffixaufnahme observed initially in Old Georgian  Suspicion of areal influence Caucasus / ➢ Limited to class agreement and GEN = Ø ➢ “Double case”...  siyan insušnak-ni-ma tah “I put [it] in the temple of Inšušinak”

p. 16 Class, person and Suffixaufnahme (4/4)  Suffixaufnahme (continued) ● Suffixaufnahme and person ➢ Person playing a role in Suffixaufnahme is exceptional ➢ Only one example in Plank (1995): Chukchi  Agreement in person between head and attribute inside a predicative NP  Predication marked with a modified person pronoun  E.g. 1SG-ABS elk-POSS-1SG friend-1SG “I am the elk’s friend” ➢ Compare u sunki-k Anzan Šušun-ka provided it would mean “I am the king of Anzan and Susa”

p. 17 The alleged functions of class markers and the actual data

p. 18 The alleged functions of class markers  Review of the functions ● More detailed ● Critical ● Based on sourced examples (sources not mentioned here)  List of the reviewed functions ● Lexical ● Attributive or possessive ● Determinative ● Subordinating ● Appositive ● Quasiverbal agreement ● Predicative  Difficult to set apart the functions: they are often superposed  Can a unifying principle be found?

p. 19 Lexical function (1/2)  Acknowledged by all scholars ● Some descriptions imply that it is limited to -r / -p / -me ➢ Stolper (2008): “Third-person suffixes are derivational” ➢ But lipa-k, meni-k can be found: isn’t it derivational? ● Primary markers (lexical) vs secondary (syntactic)  Primary (non-derived) nouns ● They do not take (primary) class marker ➢ šak “son”, rutu “wife”, zana “lady”, pat “foot”, kik “heaven”, hiš “name”... ● Are they “indeclinable”? ➢ Stolper (2008): “Kinship terms in which possessive or attributive relationships are inherent [...] are indeclinable; that is, they do not have markers of gender and person where other nouns have such markers”  Difficult to prove: no examples of a kinship term used as a possessor! ➢ Reiner (1969) assigns personal names to indeclinables ● There are (few) examples of secondary marking of primary nouns ➢ nap-pi kik-ip “gods of heaven”, šak šutruk-nahunte-ik “(I) son of PN” ➢ Caution: forms like šak-ri, pak-ri are explained differently (see below)

 p. 20 Lexical function (2/2)  Simple or derived? ➢ sunki-k : is its -k primary or secondary?  Appears as a head in a context where primary noun heads are unmarked  But no word sunki exists ➢ nap or nap-ir?  nap is predominantly AE, nap-ir ME  But:  huthalikpi nap paha-pi-ni “las imágenes de los dioses protectores”  nap kik-ip “gods of heaven”  Where nap = nap-(i)p, nap-p(i), plural  nap u-ri (na-pu-ri) “my god” (1 occurrence, vs nap-ir u-ri) ➢ siyan or siya-n?  Derivatives may exhibit various forms ➢ sute-t (su-dè-it ElW) / šut-me / šuti-me “night” ➢ siyan “temple”, siyan-me (probably siyan i-me) ➢ , el-t-e ki (AE) “one of his eyes”

p. 21 The attributive or possessive function (1/5)  Acknowledged by all scholars, best justified ● One level ➢ pit-ir naram--ir-a pit-ir u-ri “the enemy of Narâm-Sin [is] my enemy” ➢ nap-ip hatamti-p “the gods of Elam” ➢ taki-me u-me “my life” ➢ puhu kušik u-pe aak nahunteutu-pe “hijos biológicos míos y de Nahunteutu” (double possessor, repeated marking) ● Two levels ➢ taki-me iki šutu u-pe-me “the life of {brother[s] [and] sister[s] of {me}}” ➢ taki-me nahunteutu ama haštuk u-ri-me “the life of {NH revered mother of {me}}” ➢ šutur DINGIR.GAL aak inšušnak siyankuk-pa-me “the law of {Napiriša and Inšušnak of {the Siyankuk}}” ● Probably forged examples ➢ *sunki-r sunki-me-r (Wikipedia), *sunki-p sunki-me-p (Labat) ● Vestigial in AE ➢ SUNKI SUNKI-ip-ira “king of the kings”, SUNKI irša- “great king”

p. 22 The attributive or possessive function (2/5)  Other “genitive” constructions ● AE na-genitive, analyzed as -n (= -me) + a by Grillot ➢ šak kuraš-na [DBb] “son of Cyrus” ➢ tariyamauš SUNKI.na GIŠ.sirumkuktira [DNc] “spear-bearer of Darius the King” ● Construction with “possessive pronouns” ➢ noun + pers. pronoun (u / nu / i / nika...) + class marker (-r, -p, -me only)  ata *iri > ateri (AE) “his father”, X u-me, Y ni-ri, Z nika-me... ➢ Specific suffixes  ulhi.MEŠ-mi (1SG, AE) “my royal house”, NUMUN.MEŠ-ni (2SG, AE) “your family”, hiš-e (3SG) “his name” ● Reversed ➢ kuraš šak-(i)ri “son of C.”, tariyamauš SUNKI šak-ri “son of D. the king”, parsira šak-ri (AE) “son of a Persian”, u ata-ta (AE) “my father”, u lipar uri (AE) “un vasallo mío” ➢ u aak nahunteutu šuru nika-me “our happiness(?) of me and N.” ➢ siyankuk siyan i-me (si-ya-an i-me) “the temple of the siyankuk”*** ➢ Parallels in Turkish, Germanic languages...

p. 23 The attributive or possessive function (3/5)  Problem with adjectives ● Reiner (1960): « Il n’est pas établi avec certitude que l’élamite possède un adjectif comme catégorie distincte du nom appositif » ● AE has adjectives but lacks class agreement ● OE/ME has very few adjectives, if any ➢ (Probably) derived nouns: lansiti-ni, lansiti-ya “golden”, lani-ni “of silver”, šušen-ni “of Susa” (no agreement)  suhteirwe lansitini haltite lanini lansitini ahat sirah “un altar de oro con sus puertas de oro y plata allí establecí”  siha lansitiya aha tatah “cuernos de oro allí puse” ➢ Agreeing nouns: lansiti-pa “golden”, “of gold?”  IM aak šala lansitipa apun ahan murtah “unos Adad y Shala de oro allí los instalé”

p. 24 The attributive or possessive function (4/5)  Problem with adjectives (continued) ● OE/ME has very few adjectives, if any (continued) ➢ Agreeing nominals (real adjectives?): riša-  e insušnak teimti riša-r “Oh Insusinak gran señor”  But  e insušnak riša-r nap-ip-ir (superlative, noun value?)  u... likame riša-ki (participle?) “yo... grande del reino”, “ich... der Mehrer des Reiches”  PN... likame riša-ri ➢ Non-agreeing  Past participle  hutelutuš-insušnak... šak hanik šutruk-nahunte-ir “hijo amado de Shutruknahunte”  Also used as noun: u... hanik insušnak-ki “amado de Insusinak”  Other  huthalikpi... kuteir-nahunte iki hamit u-ri-me “las imagenes... de Kutirnahunte mi hermano mayor”

p. 25 The attributive or possessive function (5/5)  Excursus: Are there inanimate possessors? ● Examples of “direct” possessive constructions ➢ puhu siyan-ir lit. “temple child”, “enfant de chœur” ➢ temti alimelu-ri or teimti alieli-ri “seigneur de l’acropole”  ali-eli, alum-elum etc. are various casual forms of a single babylonian word ➢ taki-me kušhuhun nika-Ø-me “the life of our family” ● Examples of “reverse” genitive constructions ➢ (aka ulhi i melkanra aak) upatipi lani-e (pakanra) “(quien esta morada destruya o) de los ladrillos su plata (arranque)”  upat i-pi “its bricks” with “its” referring to ulhi i “esta morada”  lani-e “their gold” with “their” referring to upat ipi “its bricks” ➢ kik murun kutrime  kik murun kut(i)r i-me : “the guard of the universe (sky-earth)”  But Grillot sees a direct construction with possessor kut(i)r-i “his guard”:  (1978:17) “le ciel, la terre de son seigneur”  (1987:30) “l’univers de son gardien”

p. 26 The determinative function  A very rarely mentioned function ● Grillot-Susini (1987:24)  Meaning: the class marker is viewed as a definite article ● Not a syntactic function ● Reminiscent of Hüsing (1905) ● Introduced (probably) to provide an explanation for some doubly marked occurrences ➢ u PN šak šutruk-nahunte-k-ik “I PN the son of Šutruk-Nahunte” ➢ u PN lipa-k hanik inšušinak-k-ik “I PN the beloved servant of Inšušinak” ➢ But in this case a determiner is neither useful, nor frequent:  u PN šak šutruk-nahunte-ik pate-ik nahunte-ik hanik insušnak-ki ➢ Other functions could be candidates to explain double marking

p. 27 The subordinating function (1/2)  Class markers may be attached to a clause with Conj. I verb ● The clause is nominalised and functions as a dependent of a noun ● But examples are rare ➢ siyan (inšušinak mašti aak teipti sitanme) muhtuh-me kuših “j’ai construit le temple (...) que j’ai sanctifié” [odd?] ➢ u šilhak-insušnak šak šutruk-nahunteik likam(e)-e insušnak ir haniš-ri “whose kingship Insušnak loves” (Khačikjan 1998:60) ➢ pet-ip luk limaš-pi tar-ip šali ziraš-pi limak kurak patpup rapakna “los enemigos que el rayo quemó, los aliados que la estaca empaló, quemados (y) abrasados, a mis pies que sean atados”  But šali is inanimate: “die Bundesgenossen wird er an den Pfahl hängen” ● Not to be mixed with the use of class markers in quasiverbal forms ➢ See “Quasiverbal agreement function” below ● This function can be conceived as an extension of the attributive or the determinative (Grillot 1987:25) functions ➢ See Benveniste (1957) about relative pronouns  “Le pronom relatif joue le rôle d’un « article syntaxique » déterminatif”

p. 28 The subordinating function (2/2)  Caveats ● In competition with a conjectural subordinating particle -a ➢ siyan upurkupak-me sunkip uripupi šušun ime kuši-hši-m(e)-a u alumelu kuših “el templo de Upurkupak que los reyes anteriores en Susa no construyeron, yo en la acrópolis construí” ➢ kukunum sunkip uripupi ime kuši-hš-a u kuših ➢ Cf the role of -a in Sumerian (Benveniste 1957:212) ● Later, in competition with a relative pronoun ➢ menpu apa ime kuši-hš-a u kuših “el pavimento que no construyeron, yo construí” ● In some occurrences the class marker seems to agree with A (not O) ➢ teimti purkipi ini huta-h(a)š-pi-ni ini an tukni “lo que los señores de antaño no hicieron no ha podido ser recibido” ➢ 6.ip ANŠE.KUR.RA.MEŠ tuka-š-ta-pe “las seis personas que domaron los caballos” ➢ Terribly redundant!

p. 29 The appositive function  Hardly justified ● u PN šak PN -ik lipak GN-ik 1 2 ➢ In šak PN -ik and lipak GN-ik, there is an attributive function 2  No overt marking of the conjectured appositive function ➢ PN which has probably the same appositive function bears no marker 1

 “Indeclinable”? No: PN -ik, GN-ik ! 2 ● e kiririša zana liyan lahak-ra “¡oh! Kiririsa, dama de la muerte en Liyan” ➢ zana liyan lahakra is clearly appositive, but the marker -ra is demanded by the attributive function ● sunki-r pit-ir aak tar-ir “the king, enemy or allied” ➢ pitir and tarir use the marker lexically ➢ Again no overt appositive marking

p. 30 The quasiverbal agreement function  Envisioned contents of this slide ● Examples for each person in Conj. II and III ➢ Are there examples with -kp? (no), with -p? (yes) ● Try to prove or disprove the results of the recapD table of page 11 ➢ Subordinate or main clause? E T ➢ Active or passive? How is the agent expressed?E ➢ Role of the referenced by theL class marker? ● How can all this be related to otherP syntactic functions of class M agreement? O C E B O T

p. 31 The predicative function (1/3)  The predicative function is most likely... ● A person mark functions often as a copula ● Existence of “appellative” verbs in Dravidian ➢ Conjugated nouns ● Quasiverbal forms seem to combine a participle with a copula (class marker) ● Extensible to other syntactic functions (Chukchi’s Suffixaufnahme)

p. 32 The predicative function (2/3)  The predicative function is most likely...  ... but it is also the least justifiable in Elamite ● Khačikjan (1998): “The predicative was related to the subject by the class marker of the subject” ➢ But the only example she gives is AE nuku sunkiput (not sunkip!) ➢ Diakonoff (1967) puts forward u šak PN-k-ik (attributive + predicative) ● Unfortunately, there is no single example of an isolated predicative function of class agreement!** ➢ Finding predication in titulatures is awkward: I, X, son of Y, king of Z... ➢ But u šutruknahute sunkip urpupa akara upat aktipa inri huhtanra u huhtah “Yo soy Shutruknahunte. De los reyes anteriores ninguno había hecho ladrillos esmaltados, yo los hice”  If šutruktnahute is not an extraposed agent, it is probably a (as in Quintana’s translation)  Otherwise the u... u huhta-h is very high ● Quasiverbal forms are mostly used in subordinated clauses ➢ Clue that the class marker may rather have an attributive function

p. 33 The predicative function (3/3)  Excursus ● Rendering of OP amiy “I am” in AE ➢ adam xšāyaθiya amiy “I am the king”  (DB:§5) SUNKI.me u huta “I made the kingship”  Curious; it made Norris think that huta- may mean “to be” and -me may be a predicative marker  (DBb, DBh) u SUNKI.me huta  (DNa:§4) u SUNKI kit (v.ú v.SUNKI gi-ud) ➢ adam Imaniš amiy Uvjaiy xšāyaθiya “I am Imaniš, king in Elam”  (DB:§22) u umanuš SUNKI hatamtupna ● Rendering of some OP nominal phrases in AE ➢ adam Kuruš xšāyaθiya Haxāmanišiya “I am Cyrus the King, an Achaemenian”  (CMa) u kuraš SUNKI hakamanušiya ➢ manā pitā Vištāspa Vištāspahyā pitā Aršāma “my father was Hystaspes; Hystaspes’ father was Arsames”  (DBa:§2) u atata mištašpa aak mištašpa ateri iršama

p. 34 Is the reconstructed system plausible?

p. 35 Recap of previously seen problems

 Person in a semantic class system?  Criteria for using locutive/allocutive/delocutive?  Rarity and limitation of a Suffixaufnahme with person  Multiplicity of genitive constructions lowers the importance of class agreement  Do “indeclinables” exist?  Syntactic functions of class agreement are often superposed ● Low likelihood of the determinative function ● Low likelihood of the appositive function ● Low likelihood of the predicative function

p. 36 Coexistence of lexical and morphological functions

 Plural marker -p is a class marker ● With a lexical function ● No certainty how plural of primary nouns is formed ➢ igi-p (Malbran-Labat 1993): not in ElW ➢ Possible primary : pali-p, pat-ip, upat-i-pi ? ➢ Some primary unmarked nouns trigger plural concord puhu... u-pe

p. 37 Coexistence of lexical and syntactic functions (1/4)  Position of an NP-level mark with syntactic function? ● Apparently: phrase final ➢ taki-me iki šutu u-pe-me ➢ šak kutir-nahunte aak šilhak-insušnak-ik “son of KN and ShI” ➢ taki-me par-uli pak hanik u-ri šurur u-ri-me “das Leben der Bar-Uli, meiner geliebten Tochter, meiner Glücksbringerin” ➢ siyan DINGIR.GAL teimti riša-ri-me “el templo de Napirisa, el señor más grande” ➢ But: huthalikpi...NP -me NP -me puhu kušik u-pe “las imágenes... de 1 2 NP , de NP , hijos propios míos” 1 2

p. 38 Coexistence of lexical and syntactic functions (2/4)  Position of an NP-level mark with syntactic function? (cont.) ● So what about u [...] sunki-k hatamti-k “I... king of Elam”? ➢ The -k of hatamtik marks the function of “Elam” wrt “king” ➢ Does the -k of sunkik mark the function of “king of Elam”?  Probably not, because other heads have no mark here  u... šak PN-ik

 huthalikpi...NP -me NP -me puhu kušik u-pe “las imágenes... de NP , 1 2 1 de NP , hijos propios míos” 2 ➢ Conclusions  The appositive function is not marked  The -k of sunkik must be a lexical mark ● See above discussion about “indeclinables”

p. 39 Coexistence of lexical and syntactic functions (3/4)

 Disturbing ambiguity ● šatin-me: “priesthood” and potentially *“(X ) of the priest” inan. ➢ Semantically OK ➢ But syntactically? ● sunki-p: “the kings” or potentially *“(X ) of the king” anim. pl. ➢ e.g. *puhu sunki-p  Very few occurrences of combined lexical and syntactic functions ● sunki-p sunki-me-p “les rois du royaume”: not in ElW ● BTW, how to say “(X ) of the king”: sunki-me or sunki-r-me? inan. ➢ None is attested ● Existing occurrences: see next slide  Very few occurrences of a primary noun with a syntactic class marker***

p. 40 Coexistence of lexical and syntactic functions (4/4)

Syntactic -k -r -p -me Lexical -k Not suitable: halmeni-k-ki, hatamti-k-ki, menkuli-k-ki, sunki- k-ki -r hatamti-r-me meni-r-ri? (likame huli-ri-me? aka meniri) liyan-ira-me kiri-r-ri? tuki-ra-me?

-p sunki-p-ri, sunki-p- ira nap-ip-ri, nap-ip-ir, paha-p-pi? husi-p-me? nap-pe-ra... hute-ip-ra -me

p. 41 Coexistence of multiple syntactic functions (1/2)

 Attributive / appositive / predicative functions rarely appear alone*** ● Since appositive and predication functions are doubtful, let us on multiple attribution  Class marker stacking ● Up to 2 levels ● Example of 3 levels (one marker missing) ➢ siyan upurkupak zana hute hiš-ip-Ø-ri-ni  “el templo de Upurkupak dama del camino de los fieles” (Quintana)  “den Tempel der Upurkubak, der Herrin des Weges der Herren” (ElW)  (-ip is lexical) ● One marker can perform two functions ➢ taki-me kušhuhun nika-me “la vida de nuestra familia”  -me refers both to kušhuhun and to takime

p. 42 Coexistence of multiple syntactic functions (2/2)

Table of attested double attributive functions  Special cases ● u-ri-me, u-pe-me D ● puhu-ri(?) siyan inšušinak-mi-ra E ● T siyan kiririša liyan-ira-me E ● takime puhu nika-mi-me L P ➢ nika-me-na (several occurrences),M nika-me-ma (1 occurrence) O C E B O T

p. 43 Class markers and actancy

 Envisioned contents of this slide ● Are there occurrences of a class-agreeing NP in S, A or O role? ➢ Typical examples are appositive (and/or predicative) or noun attributes D ● E Analyse T ➢ u aak nahunteutu šuru nikame napip hatamtipE napip anšanpi napip šušenpi i hutakna “yo y sra. NahunteutuL nuestros deseos por los dioses elamitas, los dioses de Anshan,P los dioses susianos que ellos sean cumplidos” (agent?)M ➢ sunkir pitir aak tarir aka melkanraO hatanra aak lansitie tunra aak hiš untaš.DINGIR.GAL.me sukušak C imeni ahar tanra hat DINGIR.GAL inšušnak aak kiririša siyankukpaE ri ukuri ir takni B O T

p. 44 Various discrepancies (1/2)

 Attestation of allocutive (2SG class) ● Reiner: “the gender suffix -t of the second person, i.e., the allocutive, is attested only with participles” ➢ And nearly only in Conj. III ● 2nd person is used in addresses to gods ➢ e mašti nap-ir u-ri kulak ume hahputni “¡oh! Masti, mi diosa, mis plegarias escucha” ➢ e insušnak teimti alimeli-ri nu u tenti “¡oh! Insusinak, señor de la acrópolis, tú me eres favorable” ➢ “You the god”, “you the lord”... but delocutive marking

p. 45 Various discrepancies (2/2)  Unexpected inanimate plurals ● huthalikpi ume, patip (patp-up?), husip (ElW), upat aktipa, upatipi (upat i-pi?), upat husipme, zalmu-pi (ElW)  Unexpected variations*** ● per-ir nap-ip-ir “herald of the gods” ● But also ➢ perir napira (nap-(p)-ira), kitin... MAN perir napirana (nap-(p)i-ra- na?)“las reglas divinas... de el heraldo de los dioses”  Mixed locutive-delocutive agreement ● suki-r atahamiti-MÙŠ.LAM šak hutranteipti-ka “rey Addahamitiinsusinak, hijo de Hutrantemti (context***)”  Cases difficult to analyse ● men hatamti “la corona de Elam” (no agreement) ● siyan insušnak-me husa-me “le temple d’Inšušinak du bosquet” ● taki-me u-mi-ni nahunteutu-me aak puhu nika-me-na “mi vida, la de Nahunteutu y de nuestros hijos” ● likame rišaki “grande del reino”

p. 46 Final words (1/3)

 The functions of class agreement ● Appositive, determinative and predicative: no real bases ● Attributive: the most evident ● Subordinative and quasiverbal agreement: possible extensions of the attributive function  Unification of the functions ● Unification by predication and “small clauses” (Eric Smith) ➢ Indeed apposition and attribution can be adduced to predication ➢ Cf Persian izâfet ➢ Cf Plank (1995:15), rewording Winkler about Hurrian: “At the heart of this essentially appositive mode of syntax were predicates which were not really verbal but participial (or adjectival or nominal)” ● But predication is not an attested function of class agreement ● Unification on the basis of the attributive function seems possible

p. 47 Final words (2/3)  A simpler (tentative) explanation framework ● Four “genitive” markers for the possessor ➢ -me : the possessum is inanimate (siyan GN-me, takime u-me) ➢ -k : I am the possessum (šak PN-ik, menik hatamti-k)  And even: likame riša (i)-ki , a reversed construction “the realm, the great of it (who I am)” ➢ -r : the possessum is an animate, not me (pak u-ri, menir hatamti-r) ➢ -p : the possessum is animate plural (puhu PN-pe, napip hatamti-p) ➢ Markers are suffixed to the possessor (rectum) noun or noun phrase  Hence marker stacking ● Lexical use: possessive construction with implicit possessum ➢ Sometimes called “free-standing genitive” ➢ sunki-me “(the thing) of kingness”, lipa-me “(the thing) of service”  The derived noun may have the same meaning as the stem ➢ sunki-r “(the one) of kingness”, hatamti-r “(the one) of Elam”  Idem for sunki-p, hatamti-p, nap-ip “(the ones) of deity” ➢ sunki-k, lipa-k “(the one, who I am,) of kingness”, “of service”

p. 48 Final words (3/3)  A simpler (tentative) explanation framework (cont.) ● Is possessum agreement attested cross-linguistically? ➢ Attested  In Awngi (Hetzron 1995:325), Albanian, Hindi, Bantu (Spencer 2007)...  In possessive constructions with the so called nota genitivi  Akkadian (with relative ša before it became invariable)  Ugaritic (with relative d before it became invariable)  Old Persian (with relative hya: kāra hya manā), Imperial Aramaic...  Headless use is also attested (≈ lexical function of Elamite class markers)  Ugaritic: d ḫṭm “(the one) of nose” (= “human being”)  And even, somehow, in IE possessive adjectives (= genitive of personal pronouns: vita me-a = takime u-me) ➢ Probable deictic origin of genitive markers in those languages  Aristar (1995): “head-referent” vs “dependent-referent binder-anaphors”  Proximal/distal deictic may account for Elamite opposition -k ~ -r ● This explanation is not so far away from unification by predication ➢ But it presents lexical, attributive and subordinative function markers as an evolution of deictic markers agreeing with the head (possibly void) ➢ It does not imply a full fledged predicative function of class agreement

p. 49 Cited references  Aristar, 1995  Plank, 1995  Benveniste, 1957  Quintana Cifuentes, 2001  Bork, 1905, (OLZ)  Reiner, 1960  Diakonoff, 1967  Reiner, 1969  Grillot-Susini & Roche, 1987  Scheil, 1901  Hetzron, 1995  Smith, 2006  Hinz & Koch, 1987  Spencer, 2007  Hüsing, 1905, (OLZ)  Stolper, 2008  Kausen, 2006  Windfuhr, 2006  Khačikjan, 1998  Labat, 1951  Malbran-Labat, 1993

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