Re: VSO in Romance

[Padraic Brown <agricola@wam.umd.edu>]

On Wed, 19 Nov 1997, Raymond A. Brown wrote:

> 
> I would dearly like to know her evidence on this.  I suppose the problem is
> that the Romancelang I've most familiarity with is French & certainly in
> its modern form SVO is the norm if the object is a noun or SOV if the
> object is a pronoun.  But I must say I've not noticed a tendency to put the
> verb first in what I have come across in the other Romance langs.

I've been going through some recipies given me by the host family I lived
with in Spain a number of years past; and I notice that nearly all the
sentences are VSO.  In English, if I were to translate them, they would
all be straight imperatives (but of course, they too are VSO!).  In light
of the current discussion, I thought this was rather interesting.  Also in
Spanish, imperative and interrogative sentences are VSO.  [I just looked
in my Spanish refernce grammar and such indicative sentences (ie in
recipes) are given as SVO.  Curious.  This VSO business could be dialect,
I suppose.]

decl.	Se baja el fuego a [la posicion] low.
	V       S        O
imper.	baja [tu] el fuego a low.
	V    S    O
inter.	bajaste tu el fuego a low?
	V       S  O

I suppose the first example, by nature of having _se_ in front could be
discounted.  I have learnt to consider it in integral part of the verb,
as it turns _baja_ from active to passive.  Of course, in Old Spanish
_bajase_ would be acceptable.  On the other hand, the true passive could
be _fue bajado el fuego..._

> 
> Ray.
> 
Padraic.