Subject inversion in transitive sentences from Classical to Modern European Portuguese

Abstract

This chapter focuses on Classical Portuguese and its change to Modern European Portuguese, bringing to the debate new data concerning transitive sentences. The data are drawn from the Tycho Brahe Parsed Corpus of Historical Portuguese (texts written by Portuguese authors born 1502–1836). It is argued that both constituent order syntax and the information structure functions of word order in transitive sentences (SVO, VSO, VOS) support the characterization of Classical Portuguese as a verb-second language: the verb occupies a high position in clause structure, which makes a high position for post-verbal subjects available as well. This explains why post-verbal subjects in Classical Portuguese are not obligatorily associated with an information focus interpretation, but very frequently receive a familiar topic interpretation. The empirical evidence discussed in this chapter supports the claim that there was a syntactic change from Classical to Modern European Portuguese, rather than a discursive reinterpretation of the same syntax.