Logos

CONSTRUCTIONcon.spa.comparativa-de-superioridad

comparativa de superioridad

A pattern stating that a property holds of one term to a greater degree than of another, marked by a quantifier and a connector.

The construction is fully regular in the modern language with one small set of exceptions, a handful of adjectives that carry inherited comparative forms and refuse the quantifier. The connector introducing the second term is the same word that heads a complement clause, and it is replaced by a preposition when the second term is a number, a substitution that changes the reading from a comparison to a statement of quantity. Where the second term is a clause rather than a phrase, a determiner appears before the connector and agrees with what is being compared, which is a shape the language uses in no other construction.

statusstatus
documentedasserted, and the sources agree
provenanceprovenance
authoredwritten for Logos, from first principles
derivation statusderivation_status
unstatednobody has said whether it follows from anything
saliencesalience
No salience. Where no frequency source applies the object carries none, rather than a default or a guess (03-schema.md §3.5).
aliasesaliases
  • metalanguagecomparative of superiority
sourcessources
  • SOURCENueva gramática de la lengua española (2009)src.nueva-gramaticano page in v1
  • SOURCEA New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish (Butt and Benjamin)src.butt-benjaminno page in v1

Why this is a construction at all

construction.admission

Goldberg's admission test: a template earns storage either by being unpredictable or by being frequent.

admissionadmission
frequentit is stored because it recurs often enough to be learned whole

The slots

construction.slots

At least two, by the schema: fewer is not a multi-element template. Every filler is a link, never a name in prose.

  1. 0el cuantificador máslexically specified: only the fillers below may occupy it

    fillerslots[].filler
    functionslots[].fn
    No function is assigned to this slot.

  2. 1la propiedad comparadalexically specified: only the fillers below may occupy it

    fillerslots[].filler
    functionslots[].fn
    FUNCTIONnúcleofun.spa.nucleo

  3. 2el nexo quelexically specified: only the fillers below may occupy it

    fillerslots[].filler
    functionslots[].fn
    No function is assigned to this slot.

  4. 3el segundo término de la comparaciónpositional: this slot is a place in the string, not a lexical requirement

    fillerslots[].filler
    No filler is named. For a positional slot that is the correct reading; for a lexical one it is a gap.
    functionslots[].fn
    FUNCTIONcomplemento del núcleofun.spa.complemento-del-nucleo

Slot template

4 slots: 3 constrained, 1 positional, 2 naming a grammatical function.

  1. el cuantificador más
    constrained
    • adverbioclass
  2. la propiedad comparada
    constrained
    • adjetivoclass
    • adverbioclass
    • sustantivoclass

    names núcleo

  3. el nexo que
    constrained
    • conjunciónclass
  4. el segundo término de la comparación
    positional

    no lexical filler — this slot marks a position only

    names complemento del núcleo

Confusable with

construction.confusable

Objects a reader is likely to mix up with this one, and the difference that separates them. The edge is symmetric and stored once, so this renders on both objects' pages from the one statement.

Everything joined to this object

One group per typed edge, in both directions. A1b guarantees no object node is an orphan, so this is the whole navigation: an object with no edges would have failed the build rather than reached this page.

What this object is a kind of

Walking this object's own `is-a` edges: what it is a kind of. Several branches from one object are several classification axes, not competing supertypes.

objects
1
places drawn
1
multi-parent
None in this view. This subgraph happens to be a tree, which the explorer draws as one without assuming it is one.

Siblings are listed by name, then by id to break ties. That is a display choice made here and not an order the graph asserts.

Fan-out per dimension

A4

One row per dimension, largest first. That is a display order, not a verdict: 03-schema.md declares no threshold above which fan-out is too much, so this reports the count and grades nothing.

  • case13 values
  • mood8 values
  • voice8 values
  • aspect7 values
  • aktionsart6 values
  • number6 values
  • person6 values
  • tense6 values
  • comparison4 values
  • evidentiality4 values
  • gender4 values
  • politeness4 values
  • valency4 values
  • animacy3 values
  • definiteness3 values
  • deixis3 values
  • finiteness2 values
  • information structure2 values
  • interrogativity2 values
  • polarity2 values
  • switch-reference2 values

What kinds of this object there are

Walking the `is-a` edges that point at this object: what kinds of it there are. An object reachable two ways is drawn in both places and is still one object.

objects
1
places drawn
1
multi-parent
None in this view. This subgraph happens to be a tree, which the explorer draws as one without assuming it is one.

Siblings are listed by name, then by id to break ties. That is a display choice made here and not an order the graph asserts.

has-a

edges.has-a

the parent carries this

this object carries

selects

edges.selects

the parent requires this elsewhere

this object requires, elsewhere

  • CLASSpreposicióncls.spa.preposiciondocumented
    • conditionBefore a numeral the connector is replaced by a preposition, and the substitution states a quantity rather than a comparison of two terms.

via

edges.via

this realizer, this way

this object realizes

overrides

edges.overrides

declared arbitrariness (A7)

these objects override this one

  • FORMmejorfrm.spa.mejordocumented
    • reasonThe construction places a degree word before the graded adjective and is available for almost every adjective in the language. This shape is a stored one word comparative that occupies the position the construction would otherwise fill for this adjective, blocking it rather than competing with it.

derives

edges.derives

the why-chain

derived by