Causatives 321
3.3 Causatives of syntactically transitive verbs
Those verbs that are syntactically transitive, that is, verbs that take two core
arguments in basic actor voice clauses, exhibit yet a slightly different fact pat-
tern. With syntactically transitive verbs, the root with actor voice morphology
forms the stem to which the causative morpheme is affixed. This is evident in
the b- and c-sentences in the following.
(147) a. Red-mored noles sorat.
RED-student AV.write letter
‘The students wrote letters.’
b. Guru-na ma-noles red-mored sorat.
teacher-DEF AV.CS-AV.write RED-student letter
‘The teacher made the students write letters.’
c. Guru-na ma-noles sorat red-mored.
teacher-DEF AV.CS-AV.write letter RED-student
‘The teacher made the students write letters.’
(148) a. Bambang a-sapo kamar-ra.
Bambang AV-sweep room-DEF
‘Bambang swept his room.’
b. Bapa' ma-nyapo Bambang kamar-ra.
father AV.CS-AV.sweep Bambang room-DEF
‘Father made Bambang sweep his room.’
c. Bapa' ma-nyapo kamar-ra Bambang.
father AV.CS-AV.sweep room-DEF Bambang
‘Father made Bambang sweep his room.’
(149) a. Marlena ngerra' rote.
Marlena AV.slice bread
‘Marlena sliced the bread.’
b. Ebu' ma-ngerra' Marlena rote.
mother AV.CS-AV.slice Marlena bread
‘Mother made Marlena slice the bread.’