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7.2.2.The nominal part

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This section discusses the nominal part of the partitive genitive construction. Four classes of nominal(-like) elements can be distinguished, which are given in (33). These classes will be discussed in the following subsections.

-animate existential quantificational pronouns, e.g., iets

'something'

quantifier nouns, e.g., een heleboel

'a lot'

quantifiers, e.g., veel

'much/many'

the sequence wat voor

'what sort of'

I. Class 1: -animate existential quantificational pronouns
II. Class 2: Quantifier nouns
III. Class 3: Quantifiers
IV. Class 4: Wat voor leuks
V. Summary

[+] I. Class 1: -animate existential quantificational pronouns

The quantificational pronouns iets'something', niets'nothing' and wat'something' in (34) are the most common nominal elements in the partitive genitive construction.

a.		iets	zachts
		something	soft

b.		niets	interessants
		nothing	interesting

c.		wat	warms
		something	warm

Section 7.2.1 has already shown that the partitive genitive construction can be used in the same syntactic environments as the quantificational pronoun in isolation. Partitive genitive constructions also behave like pronouns in other respects. First, the examples in (35) show that the pronouns iets, niets and wat are never preceded by a determiner (although het niets is acceptable if niets is interpreted as a noun meaning “nothingness").

a.	*	een/het	iets	(zachts)
		a/the	something	warm

b.	*	een/het	niets	(interessants)
		a/the	nothing	interesting

c.	*	een/het	wat	(warms)
		a/the	something	warm

Second, the examples in (36) show that modification of the quantificational pronoun by an adjective or an intensifier is excluded regardless of whether the pronoun is followed by the partitive genitive or not. Note, however, that more or less fixed phrases like een aangenaam iets'a pleasant thing' can be encountered; cf. the discussion of (15).

a.	*	aangenaam	iets	(zachts)
		pleasant	something	soft

b.	*	erg	niets	(interessants)
		very	nothing	interesting

c.	*	zeer	wat	(warms)
		very	something	warm

Example (37) shows that, although the +animate pronouns iemand'someone' and niemand'no one' belong to the same class as the pronouns in (34), they are nevertheless excluded in the partitive genitive construction. Note that Section 7.4 will discuss a construction with ( n) iets and ( n) iemand that can easily be confused with the partitive genitive construction.

	*	(n)iemand	vreemds/aardigs
		someone/no one	strange/nice

[+] II. Class 2: Quantifier nouns

Quantifier nouns like ( hele) boel'lot', massa'mass' and hoop'lot' in (38) constitute the second class of nominal expressions that can occur in the partitive genitive construction, although speakers tend to have somewhat varying judgments about the acceptability of these cases. Just like the -animate existential quantificational pronouns, these nominal expressions can be used without the partitive genitive. Observe that the quantifier noun is obligatorily preceded by the indefinite determiner een'a'.

a.	Zij	heeft	een heleboel	(interessants)	gehoord.
	she	has	a lot	interesting	heard
	'She has heard a lot of interesting things.'

b.	Ik	heb	een massa	(leuks)	gezien.
	I	have	a mass	nice	seen
	'Iʼve seen a lot of nice things.'

c.	Hij	heeft	een hoop	(ellendigs)	meegemaakt.
	he	has	a lot	terrible	prt.-experienced
	'He has experienced many terrible things.'

The quantifier nouns in (38) may also be combined with plural or substance nouns to form quantificational binominal constructions like those in (39); cf. Section N4.1.1.

a.	Hij	heeft	een heleboel/massa/hoop	vogels	gezien.
	he	has	a lot/mass/lot	birds	seen
	'He has seen a lot of birds.'

b.	Hij	koopt	elke dag	een	heleboel/massa/hoop	snoep.
	he	buys	everyday	a	lot/mass/lot	sweet
	'Every day, he buys a lot of sweets.'

It seems that quantifier nouns can only occur in the partitive genitive construction if they can be combined with a substance noun in the binominal construction: quantifier nouns that co-occur with plural nouns only give rise to an unacceptable result in the partitive genitive construction. This is shown in (40).

a.	*	een	paar	zachts
		a	couple	soft

a'.		een	paar	snoepjes/*wijn
		a	couple [of]	candies/wine

b.	*	een	aantal	kinderachtigs
		a	number	childish

b'.		een	aantal	kinderen/*wijn
		a	number [of]	children/wine

Binominal constructions also occur with measure nouns like kilo'kilo', container nouns like pak'pack', part nouns like stuk'piece' and collective nouns like berg'pile', but these never occur in the partitive genitive construction, not even if they can be combined with a substance noun. Of course, examples such as een kilo/pak/berg lekkers'a kilo/pack/pile of sweets' are acceptable but this is due to the fact that lekkers also occurs as a nominalized form with the specialized meaning “sweets".

a.	*	een kilo	grappigs
		a kilo	funny

a'.		een kilo	kaas
		a kilo [of]	cheese

b.	*	een	pak	griezeligs
		a	pack	creepy

b'.		een	pak	rijst
		a	pack (of)	rice

c.	*	een stuk	zachts
		a piece	soft

c'.		een stuk	chocola
		a piece [of]	chocolate

d.	*	een	berg	geweldigs
		a	pile	great

d'.		een	berg	speelgoed
		a	pile [of]	toys

The quantifier nouns heleboel, massa and hoop in (38) are obligatorily preceded by the indefinite determiner een. Using the plural form of the noun (provided that it has one) decreases the acceptability of the construction considerably. The same thing holds if the quantifier noun is modified by an adjective. This will become clear by comparing the examples in (42) to example (38c). The decreased acceptability is probably due to the fact that the nouns are more referential in these cases; een grote hoop boeken no longer indicates an unbounded quantity of books but is interpreted literally as “a big pile of books".

a.	??	Hij	heeft	hopen	ellendigs	meegemaakt.
		he	has	lots	terrible	prt.-experienced

b.	*	Hij	heeft	een grote hoop	ellendigs	meegemaakt.
		he	has	a big pile	terrible	prt.-experienced

[+] III. Class 3: Quantifiers

Quantifiers like veel'many/much', meer'more', weinig'few/little', minder'less', genoeg/voldoende'enough', hoeveel'how many/much', and evenveel'as many/much as' are generally used as modifiers of nouns, and the examples in (43) show that many of them can also be used without the noun, in which case they have the same distribution as the corresponding full noun phrases.

a.	We	hebben	veel	(boeken)	gekocht.
	we	have	many	books	bought
	'We bought many books.'

b.	Ik	hoop	dat	we voldoende/genoeg	(kandidaten)	hebben.
	I	hope	that	we enough	candidates	have
	'I hope we have enough (candidates).'

These quantifiers may also act as the nominal part of the partitive genitive construction. Some examples are given in (44).

a.		veel	overbodigs
		much	redundant

a'.		veel boeken/wijn
		many books/much wine

b.		voldoende/genoeg	kouds
		enough	cold

b'.		voldoende/genoeg	boeken/wijn
		enough	books/wine

c.		hoeveel	interessants
		how much	interesting

c'.		hoeveel boeken/wijn
		how many books/how much wine

The primed examples in (44) show that these quantifiers can be combined both with plural and substance nouns. The examples in (45) show that quantifiers like alle'all', elke/ieder'every' and cardinal numerals like vier'four', which cannot co-occur with substance nouns, cannot be used in the partitive genitive construction either.

a.	*	alle	kleins
		all	small

a'.		alle boeken/*water
		all books/water

b.	*	elk	nuttigs
		every	useful

b'.		elk boek/*water
		every book/water

c.	*	vier	hards
		four	hard

c'.		vier boeken/*water
		four books/water

Given that we have seen a similar distinction in the previous subsection, the examples in (44) and (45) suggest that the notion of non-countability seems to be a crucial factor in the delimitation of the set of nominal elements that may occur in the partitive genitive construction. It should be noted that the universal quantifier alle poses a potential problem for this claim: although it cannot be combined with neuter substance nouns like water in (45a'), most speakers do accept the combination of alle and a non-neuter substance noun like wijn'wine'; cf. N6.2.2, sub IG . Note also that elk'each' can be used with noun like brood'bread' or wijn'wine', which are normally used as substance nouns, but in this case the quantifier triggers an interpretation as a common noun; such cases can therefore be put aside as irrelevant.
An alternative way of delimiting the relevant set is to appeal to the fact that whereas the quantifiers in (44) can be used without a following noun or partitive genitive (cf. (43)), the quantifiers and numerals in (45) cannot. The examples in (46) are a problem for such an approach, given that the more or less archaic forms allerlei/allerhande'all kinds of' and velerlei'many' may enter the partitive genitive construction but cannot be used without a following partitive genitive or noun; cf. Kester (1996:306). For completeness’ sake, note that some speakers tend to judge both the partitive constructions in the primeless examples and the primed examples with a substance noun as marked.

a.	allerlei/velerlei	fraais.
	all kinds	beautiful
	'all kinds of beautiful things'

a'.		allerlei	sieraden/speelgoed
		all kinds [of]	jewels/toys

b.	allerhande	aardigs
	all kinds	nice
	'all kinds of nice things'

b'.		allerhande	boeken/wijn
		all kinds [of]	books/wine

Example (47a) shows that the quantifier cannot be preceded by a determiner, and the two (b)-examples show that modification of the quantifier by an intensifier is possible in the partitive genitive construction, provided that this is also possible if the quantifier modifies a noun.

a.	*	een	veel	geweldigs
		a	much	terrific

b.		zeer	veel/*genoeg	overbodigs
		very	much/enough	redundant

b'.		zeer	veel/*genoeg	boeken
		very	much/enough	books

[+] IV. Class 4: Wat voor leuks

The sequence wat voor'what sort of', which is discussed extensively in Section N.4.2.2, is often combined with a noun, which is either bare or preceded by the (spurious) indefinite article een. Being interrogative, the wat voor-phrase is generally moved into the clause-initial position, but it can also be split. In the latter case the interrogative element wat occupies the clause-initial position, the remnant phrase voor (een) N occupying a clause-internal position.

a.	Wat voor	(een)	boek/wijn	heb	je	gekocht?
	what for	a	book/wine	have	you	bought
	'What sort of book/wine did you buy?'

b.	Wat	heb	je	voor	(een)	boek/wijn	gekocht?
	what	have	you	for	a	book/wine	bought
	'What sort of book/wine did you buy?'

The string wat voor also occurs as the nominal part of the partitive genitive construction, and, again, both the unsplit and the split pattern occur. Modification of the wat voor-phrase by means of an adjective or an adverb is not possible.

a.	Wat voor interessants	heeft	hij	je	verteld?
	what for interesting	has	he	you	told
	'What (sort of) interesting things did he tell you?'

b.	Wat	heeft	hij	je	voor interessants	verteld?
	what	has	he	you	for interesting	told
	'What (sort of) interesting things did he tell you?'

The use of the spurious article een seems to give rise to a somewhat marked result, although it is easily possible to find examples of that sort on the internet. The table in (50) gives the number of hits that resulted from a Google search (May 2009). For comparison, it can be noted that a similar search showed that the string [ wat voor] is only twice as frequent as the string [ wat voor een]; the former resulted in 3.49 million and the latter in 1.77 million hits.

search strings	without	with
Wat voor (een) interessants	351	5
Wat voor (een) leuks	3,400	314
Wat voor (een) moois	10,800	171

The constructions in (49) also seem to alternate with partitive genitive wat voor constructions that contain the quantificational pronoun iets'something'. It is not clear to us whether (49) can be analyzed as the counterpart of (51) with deleted iets. Table (52) shows that these constructions never feature the spurious article een.

a.	Wat	voor	iets	interessants	heeft	hij	je	verteld?
	what	for	something	interesting	has	he	you	told
	'What (sort of) interesting things did he tell you?'

b.	Wat	heeft	hij	je	voor	iets	interessants	verteld?
	what	has	he	you	for	something	interesting	told
	'What (sort of) interesting things did he tell you?'

search strings	without	with
Wat voor (een) iets interessants	3	0
Wat voor (een) iets leuks	13	0
Wat voor (een) iets moois	240	0

The wat voor construction can also be used as an exclamative. As is shown in (53a&b), both the unsplit and the split pattern are possible then. For completeness’ sake, observe that the finite verb of the exclamative clause must appear in clause-final position; the primed examples in (53) are excluded.

a.		Wat voor grappigs	ik	nu	gezien	heb!
		what for funny	I	now	seen	have

a'.

Wat voor grappigs

heb ik

gezien!

b.		Wat	ik	nu	voor grappigs	gezien	heb!
		what	I	now	for funny	seen	have

b'.

Wat heb ik nu voor grappigs gezien!

To conclude this subsection we want to note that the fact that the wat voor-phrases in (48) may contain a substance noun, but become ungrammatical if the noun is omitted, supports the suggestion from the previous subsection that it is the notion of non-countability that functions as the crucial factor in the delimitation of the set of nominal-like elements that can enter the partitive genitive construction, and not whether that element can be used independently of the following adjective.

[+] V. Summary

This section has shown that the four classes of elements in Table 1 can be used as the nominal part of partitive genitive constructions; some examples are given in the second column. Recall that it is only a subset of the quantifier nouns and quantifiers that can appear in the partitive genitive construction: those that cannot be followed by a substance noun give rise to an unacceptable result. The third column indicates whether the nominal part can be used independently as a subject or a direct object argument or whether it obligatorily enters a binominal or partitive genitive construction. The fourth and fifth columns indicate whether the nominal part can be followed by a noun, and, if so, whether it can be a substance noun in that case. The final column indicates whether the nominal part can be modified by means of an intensifier. The table does not show that modification of the nominal part by means of an attributive adjective is never possible.

Table 1: The nominal part of the partitive genitive construction

	examples	indep	noun	subst	int
[-animate] quantificational pronouns	iets‘something’ wat‘something’ niets‘nothing’	+ + +	— — —	n.a. n.a. n.a.	— — —
quantifier nouns (subset)	een (hele)boel‘a lot’ een hoop‘a lot’ een massa‘a mass’	+ + +	+ + +	+ + +	— — —
quantifiers (subset)	veel‘much’ weinig‘little’ allerlei‘all kinds of’	+ + —	+ + +/?	+ + +/?	+ + —
wat voor	wat voor (een) ‘what kind of’	—	+	+	—

References:

Kester, Ellen-Petra1996The nature of adjectival inflectionUtrechtUniversity of UtrechtThesis

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About this article

Author(s): Hans Broekhuis

Category: Dutch Syntax

Publication date: 22 November 2023

Keywords: ArticleIndefinite ArticleNounPartitive ConstructionPronounQuantificational PronounQuantifierQuantifier NounSpurious Indefinite ArticleSubstance NounUniversal Quantifier

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