(22) [FP eall ðis <th←acc, top> [F’ aredað+F
all this arranges the ruler very rightly
[V’ eall ðis aredað]]]]]
all this arranges
‘the ruler arranges all this very rightly’ (CP 168.3; van Kemenade (1987: 17))
(23) [FP John This means that the rise of FP brought about a new device to identify the- (24) F That is, FP, which emerged to identify discourse features such as topic and (25) a. [FP þam c ynge<exp←dat>, As shown in (25a), F (26) [FP Jóhi<exp←dat>, In addition, it enables us to explain the word order difference between 206 Michio Hosaka [F’ gave +F
[VP John [V’ Mary [a ring gave]]]]]]]]]^18
matic roles on the basis of its hierarchical structure. It is presumed that such a
development of FP is considered as a kind of exaptation,^19 which expanded FP
as in (24).
focus, expanded itself to identify thematic roles and predicational relation.^20
The structural change as illustrated in (25) is assumed to lie in the process
from impersonal constructions to personal constructions discussed in Jespersen
(1927).
[V’peran<th←nom> licodon]]]
b. [FP the king<exp←dat>,
acc> likeden]]
c. [FP the king [F’ liked+F [VP the king
[V’pears liked]]
an early stage, and in (25b) F
at the same time as the loss of infl ection, F<θ> emerged to make thematic roles
visible. This can be also regarded as the change from Topic Prominent Language
to Subject Prominent Language.^21
Let us go back to the problem of quirky subjects in Icelandic. As the loss of
morphological infl ection is not attested there, Icelandic still remains at stage b.
It means that, as illustrated in (26), Icelandic keeps the morphological device
to identify thematic roles and has developed PredP to clarify the relation between
a subject and a predicate so that the dative behaving as a subject emerged.
likuðu]]]
Icelandic and German. In the subordinate clause of Icelandic, the V2 order