I VERBI DI MANIERA DEL MOVIMENTO IN ITALIANO

This paper deals with the classification and analysis of more than 200 mannerof- motion verbs in Italian. According to Talmy’s typology, Germanic languages are satellite-framed and rich in manner-of-motion verbs while Romance languages are verb-framed and poor in manner-of-motion verbs. Moreover, only in the first type of languages can manner-of-motion verbs express directionality through the satellite element. Analysis of the Italian data we present shows that (a) manner-of-motion verbs are quantitatively relevant in the lexicon and (b) most verbs can express directionality in combination with prepositional complements. We have detected three classes of manner-of-motion verbs that are syntactically and aspectually regular, and a residual class that includes verbs whose behavior is irregular and at times idiosyncratic. This paper also investigates the complex preposition da...a (‘from...to’) and the syntactic interdependence between the prepositions of source and goal