I costrutti esistenziali nelle varietà del cilento interno: una indagine preliminare

A preliminary investigation of existential constructions in some Cilento varieties reveals the free alternation between the patterns with the copula essere ‘be’, the proform ngi (etymologically a locative adverb, ‘there’) and agreement with the pivot, and the structures with the copula avere ‘have’, optionality of the proform ngi and lack of agreement with the pivot, only for a subset of existentials (inverse locatives and deictic locatives). With canonical existentials the pattern with avere is preferred and the sole construction allowed with indefinite pivots. The selection of the copula avere also functions as an optional marker of evidentiality and always entails the presence of a dedicated marker (the preposition a ‘to’) with highly individuated nominals and personal pronouns