Works on predication have tended to handle only a small range of types of data. In chapter 2 we looked at the typical types of constructions analyzed in these works. In chapters 3 and 4 we examined NPs that to my knowledge have not been discussed previously with respect to the import of their analysis for predication theory. There are a variety of other constructions in both Italian and English which reasonably can be argued to involve the subject role player–predicate relationship and which traditionally have not been discussed in works on predication. In this chapter I briefly discuss only five such constructions (although there are many), all of which present problems for other theories of predication, but call for no changes in the theory of predication put forth in this book.

The discussions here are suggestive of possible analyses rather than in-depth studies (in contrast to the analyses of just a single construction in both chapters 3 and 4), and I hope to convince the reader only that these constructions deserve further examination with the issue of predication in mind. Thus, while the brevity of the analyses in this chapter may make them appear speculative, I offer them quite seriously as a program for future research.

NPs like la città di Sassari

NPs of the form la città di Sassari (‘the city of Sassari’) differ from the Italian NPs of chapter 3 and from the English NPs of chapter 4, sec. 1 in requiring that the NP following di/of within the overall NP be definite.