• We will now review further arguments in favor of the hypothesis that what we call “NegP” originates as an internally layered XP encoding more than one feature.
• These arguments have to do with some exceptions to the Jesperson cycle, which can be explained only by assuming that the expression of negation is syntactically and semantically complex.

The negative cycle has be originally defined by
Jespersen in the following way: a) Neg V b) Neg V neg c) V Neg
The basic property of the cycle is that the sentential negative marker is renewed by means of a doubling stage

• Several authors have proposed a more refined view of the JC which has up to six different stages depending on which the negative marker is obligatory.
• At the same time reasons have been proposed for its activation beyond the original proposal made by Jespersen that the original negator is phonologically weakened.

• For instance van der Auwera (2011) assumes the following steps (Neg= obligatory, neg = optional):
• A) Neg V (Spanish)
• B) Neg V neg (Northern Italian)
• C) Neg V Neg (standard French)
• D) neg V Neg (spoken French)
• E) V Neg (Piedmontese, Quebec French)

• The phenomenon is found also in other language groups, not only in Indoeuropean languages. For instance the Bantu languages have been reported to have a similar cycle in a pretty similar way to Romance (i.e. preverbal negation, minimizer doubling, and loss of the original negator).

• The literature on the factors triggering the JC is vaste, in principle it can be claimed that the cycle is activated by
• A) phonological factors (weakening of the negative marker non> no> ne, see French)
• B) Semantic factors: the original negator requires a context of „emphasis“ whatever that means.
• C) Syntactic factors: change in word order

• To provide a (partial) answer to the complex question concerning the factors enhancing or restraining the JC and their interplay, let us compare languages that have undergone the cycle with similar languages that have not.
• Within the IE domain we see Germanic, that has undergone the cycle rather quickly, Romance, where we partially see the cycle, but much more slowly and Slavic, where the cycle has not been activated at all.

• The JC has been completed in some spoken
French varieties, North Western Italian dialects, is in progress in standard French and
North Eastern Italian dialects, but has never progressed beyond stage B in van der
Auwera’s proposal in Southern Italian.
• What is the specificity of Southern Italian negation that stops the development of the cycle?

• The advantage of using closely related languages is that you control for the basic properties of the language like basic word order, verb raising properties, type of morphology, etc.
• The generalizations obtained are free from interference from other factors and more reliable, since you have a much wider set of languages to investigate.

• In a general view of diachronic change similar to the one formalized in van Gelderen (2011), where every “cycle” is the effect of an economy principle which reduces complex elements to heads, which become so small that another XP has to be used in order to express the relevant features, the JC is simply one instance of the Head Preference Principle.

• The problem is that there are languages that are perfectly stable, like German, others where the cycle applies very rapidly, or very slowly.
• Comparing the way Low German has completed the cycle according to Breitbarth
(2014) with the way French has developed clearly shows the point.

• Even if we take into account sociolinguistic or language policy considerations, we cannot explain cases where similar dialects ha ve had a similar history and have been subject to the same standardization pressure coming from the standard like for instance, Lombard, which has undergone the cycle completely and Emilian, which has not.

• What are the factors that enhance or slow down the JC?
• Can the JC be interpreted as evidence that negation is a complex XP?

• We investigate the morphosyntactic properties of the sentential negative marker in
SI in order to establish the factors that block or allow for the activation of the JC.
• It will turn out that one of the reasons is the fact that the speaker has empirical evidence that the negative marker is morphologically complex in SI but not in NI.

We focus on the interaction between the preverbal negative marker and object clitics in old and modern
Italian varieties:
Il prossimo tuo non ucciderai e nol fedirai the neighbor your not will.kill and not. him hurt e no li farai (…) alcuno rincrescimento and not to.him you.will.do any damage
‘You will not kill you neighbor, nor hurt him, nor do him any harm’ (Vizi e Virtudi 17)

 Old French displays a preverbal negative marker and an optional postverbal negative marker (gote, mie, pas, etc.)
Si fait oscur, ne veient refl= makes dark not they.see
gote, not
(…) neveient not clarté ne soleil they.see
light not sun
‘It's so dark, they do not see, (…) they do not see any light nor the sun’ (Enéas 195)
Mais a bataillen’oset but to battle il not=dares pas
=he venir not
‘But he does not dare to come to battle’ (Guillaume 81) come

 Old Italian also displays a preverbal and an optional postverbal negative marker certono llo darebbe tosto così sure not it= he.would.give
soon so he would not answer so soon’ (B. Latini, La Rettorica)
“Certo, sire” disse elli “io non ve lo celerò mica.” sure sir said he I not to.you=it I.will.hide not
‘He said “Of course, sir, I will not hide it from you” ’
(Tristano Riccardiano 75)
 Why has Italian remained stable and French has not?

 Italian has not changed because there was/is evidence that the negative marker is morphologically complex, i.e. it contains two morphemes, while French (and some
Northern Italian dialects) did not provide the speaker with any evidence for this.

• Since a complex morphology is an indication of a complex set of semantic features and of several syntactic projections, this can be seen as positive evidence for the big NegP hypothesis.
• This means that the JC can be derived by the need to maintain morphological complexity since (the licensing of) negation is semantically and syntactically complex.

 The bi-morphemic status of the negative marker is clearly not the only factor blocking or favoring the Jespersen cycle, since other means can be indicated that negation is complex, but it is at least one of the possible types of evidence which block the activation of the cycle.

A) Old Florentine and Old Sicilian, where the alternation between non and no is a purely syntactic phenomenon.
B) Modern Western Sicilian deletion, where the alternation between non and n is a phonological rule of deletion conditioned by syntactic proximity.
C) Modern Eastern Sicilian, where the assimilation rule n+l  nn is phonological but still conditioned by syntactic proximity.
D) Modern Florentine, where the assimilation rule has become a purely phonological assimilation phenomenon found in all contexts where n+l  ll.

• Modern Florentine has lost the clues for morphological complexity of the negative marker and is thus potentially subject to the
JC unless other independent evidence for complexity is present.

• The Old Italian alternation between non and no is conditioned by the presence of a following clitic:
No ti vo’ qui mostrare e aprire not to.you
I.want here show and explain
‘I do not want to show and explain to you (that)’ (Fiore di
Rettorica 65)
Il prossimo tuo non ucciderai e nol fedirai the neighbor your not you.will.kill and not.him will.hurt
e no li farai (…) alcuno rincrescimento and not to.him you.will.do
any damage
‘You will not kill you neighbor, nor hurt him, nor do him any harm’ (Vizi e Virtudi 17)

 Old Sicilian displays the same alternation between a clitic and the negative marker:
...ki
Deu non possa cuntentari ad unu so bon sirvituri, that God not can satisfy at one his good servant et ki no li possa donari la visioni sua perpetua and that not him can give the vision his eternal et perpetua sequranza di no li mancar mai and eternal certainty of not to.him
disappoint never
‘...that God cannot satisfy one of his good servants, and give him his eternal vision and the eternal certainty that he will not be disappointed’
(Sposizione del Vangelo della Passione secondo Matteo 1.7)

 As no other element can delete the coda of the negative marker, I propose that the phenomenon is not phonologic but syntactic in nature. For instance a verb starting with a liquid does not delete the nasal coda of non:
…cui liga la navicella who binds the boat a la rocca non to the rock not liga per firmari binds to snub la rocca… the rock
‘…who binds the boat to the rock does not do that to snub the rock
(Sposizione del Vangelo della Passione secondo Matteo 1)

 Other cases in which the negative marker and clitics interact are known in the literature. For instance, Friulian deletes some subject clitics in the presence of a negative marker: a.
tu as mangiat you have eaten
‘You ate’ b.
No as mangiat not have eaten

 We propose that speakers of Old Italian had evidence that the negative marker was bi-morphemic, because the lower morpheme alternates only with a clitic:
 [[no ] [n ]]
 A purely syntactic analysis might be stated along the following lines: both the negative marker and the clitic have an existential feature, which can be checked by either of the two elements.
[NegP no [ExistP n [ Clit ]]] → [NegP no [ExistP n Clit [
Clit ]]]

 The phenomenon cannot be analyzed as purely phonological deletion because:
A) it does not occur any time a nasal is followed by a liquid or by a stop, but only in this context.
 sensitivity to structural proximity.
B) it is only the object clitic that can delete the coda of the negative marker.
 sensitivity to the category of the following item.

 Eastern Modern Sicilian also presents an alternation between two forms of the negative marker:
Avissi statu cchiù attentu, non fussi a stu puntu.
had been more careful not would.be at this point
‘If you had been more careful, you would not be in this situation.’
Penzu chi n o pottu dumani.
think that not.it
I.bring tomorrow
‘I think that I will not bring it tomorrow.’

• The alternation is between /non/ and /n/.
• The clitic has the form of a simple vowel and provides the vocalic nucleus for the negative marker.
(14) [non] V → [non] V → [n] V
• Hence, in this case the two negative morphemes are to be analyzed as follows:
(15) [n [on ]]

 Deletion can also occur when the following element is the verb (if it starts with a vowel):
(16) N’assicutunu picciriddi, ma cani.
not follow kids but dogs
‘They do not follow kids, but dogs.’
(17) Non assicutunu picciriddi, ma cani.
not follow kids
‘They do not follow kids, but dogs.’ but dogs
 deletion is no longer sensitive to the category of the following element.

 Deletion is still sensitive to syntactic proximity and not simply to linear adjacency:
(18)Don Antonio → *D’Antonio
‘Don Antonio’
 Deletion could still be sensitive to the category of the negative marker, although it is not sensitive to the category of the following word.

 We propose that Eastern Sicilian has a purely phonological rule of deletion conditioned by structural proximity, as in well known cases like:
(19) la arancia → la arancia → l’arancia
[laˈraɲtʃa]
‘the orange’
 But not:
(20) sono andata a casa → *sono andat a casa
I.am gone to home
‘I went home’

 There exist other cases in which structural proximity is known to count: for instance raddoppiamento fonosintattico (syntactic doubling), liason.
 We hypothesize that the Eastern Sicilian speaker still has evidence that the negative marker is bi-morphemic.

 In the varieties belonging to Western Sicilian, the form of the negative marker lacks the initial nasal in the onset and is lexicalized as un.
(21)
Si fussi statu chiù attentu, un fussi accussì.
if were been more careful, not would.be so
‘If he had been more careful, he would have not been in this situation.’
We still find interaction with object clitics, but of a different type.

Third person object clitics have two forms:
(22) U va cciercu.
it go search
‘I’m going to search for it.’
(23) Piensu ca pi curreggillu t u puortu rumani.
think that to correct=it you=it bring tomorrow
‘I think that I will bring it to you tomorrow in order to correct it.’
In proclisis the clitic is a vowel, in enclisis a C+V form.

 The liquid of the clitic assimilates to the nasal coda of the negative marker:
(24) Pensu ca rumani unn u puortu.
(Palermo) think that tomorrow not=it bring
‘I think that I will not bring it tomorrow.’

If another clitic starting with an obstruent intervenes, then the third person object clitic surfaces in its vocalic form providing the nucleus for the other clitic, which becomes the onset of the new syllable:
(25) Piensu ca rumani un t u
(Palermo) puortu think that tomorrow not you=it bring
‘I think that I will not bring it to you tomorrow.’

 If the following verb starts with a vowel, no assimilation is observed between the clitic and the negative marker, the clitic exploits the nucleus of the following verb to surface as a liquid:
(26) Un l’accattasti ancuora?
not it bought yet
‘Haven’t you bought it yet?’

 Assimilation is only possible when the clitic whose underlying form has a liquid and the negative marker are: a) adjacent and b) the liquid does not already surfaces as the onset of the nucleus provided by the following verb.

 The phenomenon is phonological in nature, but restricted to the clitic field, where the negative marker and the clitic are located on adjacent heads: the assimilation rule /n/+/l/→/n:/ does not apply in contexts that do not involve clitics and the negative marker:
(27) Don Luigi → /Dɔl:uidʒi/ */Dɔn:uidʒi/
 It does not provide any evidence that the negative marker is bi-morphemic.

 The syntactic rule of alternation of Old Italian varieties always provides evidence for the bimorphemic status of the negative marker.
 The purely phonological rule of Modern
Florentine never provides evidence for the bimorphemic status of the negative marker.
 The phonological rule conditioned by syntax can but need not provide evidence for this (in Eastern
Sicilian it does, in Western Sicilian it does not).

A) If a rule is sensitive to the category of the words involved, it is not a phonological rule, but a syntactic one. Interactions between clitics and negation have to be explained on the basis of the formal features they possess and can check in the clitic field. (in our case an existential feature)
B) This rule provides the speaker with evidence that the negative marker is bi-morphemic and contributes to block the Jespersen cycle.

• If the JC is the effect of a general uniformity principle, which tends towards a similar semantic, syntactic and morphological complexity, it is most probably blocked or favored by several factors.

• One of these factors is morphological complexity:
• if there is still evidence that the negative marker is morphologically complex, it is not necessary to „reinforce“ negation activating the cycle.
• In a sense, negative doubling makes up for the lack of morphological complexity in the original negative marker.

In the Southern Italian dialects (SIDs) no standard postverbal negative marker has been developed.
SIDs can display a series of non standard strategies to mark sentence implicatures but these elements, but nowadays they generally do not involve postverbal elements.

Southern Italian dialects have developed new preverbal negative markers without undergoing any doubling stage, i.e.
violating the Jespersen cycle.
The exception can be shown to be only apparent if we assume that negation is syntactically complex construct.

In the dialect of Rionero in Vulture the usual form non has been replaced by ‘mankə’, related to the verb ‘lack’ and the adverb ‘less’, in this sense its development follows one of the known types of evolution of negative markers:
Vivə spessə se mankə vu caré malatə drink often if not want.2sg fall.inf ill

Mankə behaves like non in a) Occurring after the subject and before object clitics:
Mankə tə rə dikə pecché mankə rə saccə.
not you=it=tell.1sg because not it=know.1sg
b) Being incompatible with true imperative forms
Mankə u piglià!
not it=take.inf

c) Requiring negative concord with postverbal nwords
Mankə je venutə nesciunə.
not is come nobody d) Not being the pro-sentence negation
Hai vistə a Pierə? No / *Mankə.
have.2sg seen to P. no

• The neighboring dialects still display the standard negative marker non:
Nov volənə sce’nə. Venosa not want.3pl go=there

• There exist residues of a negative marker of the standard type:
Sə nə mə nə vù rà, kə sə pòzza strafucà.
if not me=of-it=want.2sg give.inf that you may chock
‘If you do not want to give it to me, may you chock.’
 However, there is no evidence that there has been a doubling stage.

• How can this exception be explained?
• [
Focus/Operator
[
ExistentialP
NO/manco [
(ni)-ente ]]]]
ScalarP
non [
MinQ mica
• The change has occurred internally to the complex negation, nevertheless, since the element moves as a whole, the syntactic properties of the whole have not changed.

• Manco might still be syntactically complex, including one of the lower internal projections of the big XP.
• It is not not clear whether it is morphologically complex or not.

• We conclude that the big NegP hypothesis is superior to the idea that NegP can occur in a lot of different positions, because it can explain at least some exceptions to the JC.