Peeling away the layers of the onion: on layers, inflection and domains in Icelandic compounds

Abstract In Icelandic there are two different types of modifiers within compounds, inflected and uninflected, and the inflected modifiers appear to be peripheral to the uninflected ones. In this article, it is proposed that this is an effect of compounding being required to combine elements of the same type or size. The inflected modifiers, containing more structure than the uninflected ones, cannot be merged at the same level as uninflected modifiers. This article also explores two other issues of domainhood within the compound. One being the establishment of domains for morphophonological pr... Mehr ...