A SYNOPSIS OF ROLE AND REFERENCE GRAMMAR 79[eat'(x,y)] CAUSE [BECOME eaten'(y)] "eat" (accomplishment), its link
ing properties with respect to actor are determined by the higher ranking
position and with respect to undergoer by the lower ranking position. So
with buy, χ is both effector and locative, and the linking rules treat it as an
effector with respect to actor selection; similarly, with eat, y is both locative
and patient, and it is treated as a patient with respect to macrorole selection.
Inverse verb constructions in Icelandic and Georgian provide an
interesting test for the linking schema. In an inverse construction, the "log
ical subject" is in the dative case, while the "logical object" is in the
nominative. This is illustrated in (69).
As Zaenen, Maling & Thráinsson (1985), Thráinsson (1979), and Andrews
(1982) show for Icelandic, and Harris (1981) shows for Georgian, the syn
tactic pivot in clauses such as these is the dative, not the nominative, NP.
These constructions raise a host of interesting problems for most syntactic
theories, but they are handled straightforwardly in RRG. The key to their
analysis is the recognition that these verbs are intransitive in RRG terms:
they take only one macrorole argument. All of their morphosyntactic prop
erties fall out from their transitivity, pykja "think, consider" and qvar-
"love" are two-place state predicates (consider'(x,y) [+MR] and love'(x,y)