# What’s hidden below definiteness and genitive: on indefinite partitive articles in Romance

## TL;DR

The paper explores how indefinite partitive articles in Romance languages can be explained using a revised analysis of lexical items and syntactic functions.

## Contribution

The paper proposes a constituent-based approach using nanosyntax to explain indefinite partitive articles without assuming multiple homophonous lexical items.

## Key findings

- Indefinite partitive articles can be captured using a revised analysis of definite articles and genitive prepositions.
- The variation in partitive constructions is modeled based on the functional structure lexicalized by the nominal root.
- The approach avoids stipulating multiple homophonous lexical items.

## Abstract

In French, Italian, and other Romance languages indefinite nominal phrases can be introduced by what appears to be the conflation of a genitive preposition and a definite article, the so-called “indefinite partitive articles” (e.g., Fr. Je cuisine de la soupe depuis deux jours. ‘I’ve been cooking soup for two days’). This is rather unexpected, since these nominal phrases are neither definite nor in a syntactic position in which we expect to find a genitive preposition. This led part of the literature to consider them as built by lexical items synchronically distinct from the genitive preposition/definite article but homophonous with them. This contribution shows how a constituent-based approach to the lexicon-syntax interface as nanosyntax, paired with a specific take on the sequence of syntactic functions, can capture their apparently conflicting distribution without stipulating multiple homophonous lexical items. The key factor in this proposal is a revised analysis of the Romance lexical item (LI) for (i) definite articles – linked to a constituent containing not only features of definiteness but also lower indefinite features and higher nominative/accusative case features – and (ii) the genitive preposition DE – linked to a constituent containing not only genitive features but also lower nominative/accusative features. Holding these LIs crosslinguistically stable, the variation attested in this domain is modeled as depending on the amount of functional structure lexicalized by the nominal root in the different languages.