open access

https://doi.org/10.14943/2115.99355

https://hdl.handle.net/2115/99355

On Mongolian Postpositions

日本語

文法化

2026-03-20

日本北方言語学会

Northern Language Studies

16

299-318

This study provides a descriptive analysis of a group of words commonly referred to as postpositions in Mongolian. Although postpositions have been frequently mentioned in previous studies, their definition has not been rigorously established, and there has been insufficient discussion of how far the category of postpositions should extend, despite the many features shared among the relevant forms. In this paper, I first examine the characteristics of 100 lexical items that have been treated as postpositions in earlier research and evaluate the extent to which they exhibit properties typically associated with postpositions. The analysis shows that many Mongolian postpositions are derived from words that can also be used independently in an adverbial function, and that relatively few items are restricted exclusively to postpositional use. In addition, some of these forms show limited productivity. These findings suggest that the category of Mongolian postpositions is not uniform and that it is difficult to treat all of these forms as postpositions in the same sense.

紀要論文

Version of Record

2185-7121

AA12516968