The Italian verb–noun anthroponymic compounds at the Syntax / morphology interface

Abstract

This paper offers an analysis of Italian anthroponymic verb–noun compounds. It is argued that the first element of these compounds historically is an imperative (2nd sg) form. Such a view not only accounts adequately for the evolutionary process at work in the original naming process; it also rightly accounts for the actual morphological make-up of these compounds. It is argued as well that anthroponymic compounds involving imperatives provided for a structural model which is still traceable in the morphological make-up of non-anthroponymic compounds, even though a reanalysis process has led to the reinterpretation of the verbal element of V–N compounds as a bare stem. Crucially, such a reanalysis will be said to have been favoured by the morphological unmarkedness of imperatives: as zero inflected stems, imperatives may serve as a base for paradigmatic restructuration. Italian Verb–noun compounds will be shown to offer an illustration of this basicness of the imperative, following a pattern of word formation which is available in other languages.