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    9 R-pronouns and the indefinite expletive
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    R-pronouns are pronouns which can function either as locative adverbs or as adpositional objects. An example of each is given below:

    1
    Deer is ‘t fluch Woonjen.
    there is it nice living
    It is nice living there.
    2
    Uus Mäme weet deer niks fon.
    our mother knows R nothing of
    Our mother knows nothing about it.

    R-pronoun and adposition have been put in bold. In the first sentence, the R-pronoun is a locative adverbial. In the second sentence, the R-pronoun is construed as the argument of the preposition fon ‘of’, even though it is separated from it. R-pronouns functioning as prepositional complements behave differently from prepositional complements which are not R-pronouns. Normally, objects of prepositions must be adjacent to, and follow, the preposition. R-pronouns, on the other hand, must precede their adpositions, and need not be adjacent to them. In addition, the R-pronoun deer ‘there’ is used to introduce indefinite subject NPs.

    The sections below discuss various aspects of R-pronouns and the indefinite expletive.

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    [+]1. The set of R-pronouns

    R-pronouns (almost) all contain the letter /r/, which is how they got their name. The set of R-pronouns for Saterland Frisian is given below:

    Table 1
    R-pronoun Meaning as adverb Meaning as object of adposition Pronominal equivalent
    Deer ‘there’ ‘it, that’ dät
    wier ‘where’ ‘what’ wät
    hier ‘here’ ‘this’ dit
    allerwegense ‘everywhere’ ‘everything’ alles, aal
    nargends ‘nowhere’ ‘nothing’ niks
    ainewainde ‘somewhere’ ‘something’ wät

    The first two R-pronouns in the table are the most frequent. The use of the others seems to be quite restricted in frequency, perhaps as a result of the influence from German.

    [+]2. The phenomenon of R-pronouns

    It is cross-linguistically a weird phenomenon for a language to have a set of locative pronouns, which also show up obligatorily as objects of adpositions, with the meaning of ordinary (non locative) pronouns. In the following example, it is not grammatical to have a pronominal equivalent where an R-pronoun is possible.

    3
    Uus Mäme weet deer niks fon.
    our mother knows R nothing of
    Our mother knows nothing about it.
    4
    *Uus Mäme weet niks fon dät.
    our mother knows nothing of it
    Our mother knows nothing about it.

    To the extent that the sentence above is grammatical, it has become so as an interference from German. The R-pronominal object can be separated from the adposition to which it functions as an object. The R-pronoun can show up at the beginning of the VP (the middle field), as in the example above. The R-pronoun, together with adpositions, also takes part enthusiastically in all sorts of idiom formation, as a glance in the dictionary reveals. Historically, R-pronouns were already present in Old West Germanic, specifically in Old English and Old Frisian, but they became atrophied in English, and in High German their use is quite restricted. Some instances of the interrogative R-pronoun are given below:

    5
    Wier däd hie dät mäd?
    R.Q did he it with
    What did he do it with?
    6
    Wier dät Haat ful fon is, deer boalt ju Mule fon.
    R.Q the heart fol of is R talks the mouth of
    What the heart is full of, the mouth talks about.

    The R-pronoun hier ‘here’ doesn’t seem to function as a true R-pronoun anymore. Fort’s dictionary lists many combinations of wier ‘where’ and deer ‘there’ followed by an adposition, but hier ‘here’ is conspicuously absent. The only combination that is found in the dictionary is: hierhäär ‘thereto’. This is a loan from German: hierher, which means ‘to there’ or ‘from there’ in directional contexts. Nevertheless, the Saterland language still allows an R-pronoun to be split off from the directional adposition häär ‘to’. Some examples are given below:

    7
    Hierhäär!
    here
    Come here!
    8
    Deer kumt die Mon häär.
    R comes the man from
    The man comes from there.

    It seems that hierhäär means ‘to here’, and deerhäär ‘from there’. This is weird, as it suggests that häär is directional, but that the kind of direction (this direction versus that direction) depends on the R-pronoun. It may be hypothesized that the use of hier ‘here’ as an adpositional object has atrophied in Saterland Frisian under the pressure from German, seeing that German doesn’t use it as an adpositional object either. The universal R-pronoun of location likewise functions as the object of PP:

    9
    Hie hät ju Noze allerwegense twiske.
    he has the nose R.UNIV between
    He likes to poke his nose into other people's affairs.
    10
    Ju moangt sik allerwegense oun.
    she mixes REFL R.UNIV in
    She meddles in everything.
    11
    Hie häd deer allerwegense ‘n Dunst fon.
    he has R R.UNIV a haze of
    He seems to know everything.

    In the last example the universal R-pronoun is strengthened by the default R-pronoun deer ‘there’. This may be an indication of a weakening of the function of the universal R-pronoun as an adpositional object. The R-pronoun nargends ‘nowhere’ likewise can be used as an adpositional object meaning ‘nothing’:

    12
    Hie wikt (sik) nargends foar.
    he goes REFL R.NEG for
    He gives way to nothing.
    13
    Hie kummert sik nargends uum.
    he cares REFL R.NEG about
    He cares about nothing.
    14
    Dät smoakede nargends ätter.
    it tasted R.NEG after
    It tasted like nothing.
    15
    Dät ludt nargends ätter.
    it sounds R.NEG after
    It sounds very bad.

    Here we also find examples in which the quantifying R-pronoun is strengthened with the neutral R-pronoun:

    16
    Hie fräiget deer nargends wät ätter.
    he asks R R.NEG what after
    He is a go-getter.
    17
    Hie weet deer nargends wät fon.
    he knows R R.NEG what of
    He doesn’t know anything about it.

    Again, this seems an indication the use of the negative R-pronoun as an adpositional object is declining. The last R-pronoun, the existential one, likewise doesn’t seem to be used as an adpositional object. In the following example, its use is similar to that of hier in hierhäär, namely as a directional adverbial, which is a pro-form for a PP:

    18
    Die in dän Skepestaal nit truch ju Dore oungungt, man uursainewainde ounstigt, die is ‘n Steler.
    who in the sheep.shed not through the door in.goes but R.EX in.climbs he is a thief
    Whoever enters not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbs up some other way, he is a thief.

    So the R-pronoun has a locative interpretation here, meaning “at another location”. To sum, the two R-pronouns which are still in frequent use are the neutral R-pronoun and the interrogative R-pronoun. The others seem to be rare.

    [+]3. The presentational there-construction

    The R-pronoun deer ‘there’ has the additional function of being an expletive in the subject position of indefinite sentences. So it is used in the presentational there-construction, see also: Definiteness and indefiniteness (7.4). In this respect, it competes against dät ‘that’ and its weak form et. Some examples with the R-pronoun in the presentational there-construction are given below:

    19
    Deer kumt goud wät ap dän Disk.
    R comes good what on the table
    There’s plenty of good food on the table there.
    20
    Deer is Woater in dän Sood.
    R is water in the well
    There’s water in the well.

    The construction consists of the R-pronoun at the beginning of the clause, followed by a verb that is usually an accusative verb, that is, a verb that is conjugated with weze ‘be’ in the perfect tense. Kume ‘come’ is such a verb, because the perfect tense is: kemen weze ‘have come’, and not kemen häbe. Now, suppose an existential clause features a PP of which the object is also deer ‘it’. This would yield a clause with two instances of the R-pronoun. However, this is usually avoided. There’s just one R-pronoun at the beginning of the clause, functioning both as the expletive subject and as the object of the adposition. Two examples are given below:

    21
    Deer is Woater oane.
    R is water in
    There’s water in it.
    22
    Deer is neen Jeeld oane.
    R is no money in
    There’s no money in it.

    It is clear that the R-pronoun has this dual function. It functions as the object of the adposition, as is obvious. But it also functions as a marker requiring an indefinite subject, because the presence of a definite subject is ungrammatical:

    23
    *Deer is Triene oane.
    R is Triene in
    Triene is in it.

    In order to construct a grammatical sentence, the R-pronoun must follow the definite NP Triene:

    24
    Triene is deer oane.
    Triene is R in
    Triene is in it.

    In this example, the R-pronoun no longer functions as an expletive subject. Alternatively, one might say that the R-pronoun may cross over indefinite subjects, but not over definite ones, from a movement perspective. In sentences which are not unaccusative, no such restriction holds:

    25
    Deer kon man sik neen Bielde fon moakje.
    R could ARB REFL no image of make
    You can’t picture it.

    This sentence doesn’t feature an unaccusative verb, but a transitive verb, so the R-pronoun does not function as an expletive subject, and the R-pronoun functioning as object of PP is allowed to introduce the sentence. The expletive R-pronoun has a singular meaning, but it does not determine agreement on the verb. It is the indefinite subject which determines agreement. Two examples are given below:

    26
    Deer sunt fjauer Bäiste dood kemen.
    R are four animals dead come
    Four cows have died.
    27
    Disse Wilkens, deer sunt tjo Wuchter in Huus wezen un träi Wäänte.
    this Wilkens (family) R are three girls in house been and three boys
    This Wilkens family, they had three girls at home and three boys.

    Negative NPs also count as indefinites for this construction. Some further examples are given below:

    28
    Deer is naan Fats fon uurblieuwen.
    R is no rag of over.stayed
    There’s not a bit of it left.
    29
    Deer is silläärge nit wäl touhuus.
    R is ever not who home
    There’s never anybody home.’ ‘There’s nobody ever home.

    In the first example, the R-pronoun again serves both as an expletive subject pronoun and as an adpositional object. In the second example it is just an expletive. Now, there are also sentences without subjects, such as passives of intransitive verbs. In such sentences, the R-pronoun may also show up:

    30
    Oaber Jield waas der doo je genouch, deer wuud je nit ätter kieked.
    but money was R then yes enough R became yes not after looked
    But there was enough money, it was not looked at.

    The first R-pronoun is just a subject expletive in the context of an indefinite subject. Interestingly, the subject itself has been split. The NP part (Jield ‘money’) of the indefinite subject is preposed to the beginning of the sentence, whereas the quantifier part of the indefinite subject (genouch ‘enough’) has remained inside the middle field. The second R-pronoun functions both as an expletive filling the subject position and as the object of the PP headed by ätter ‘after’. The subject of a passive sentence is likewise subject to the indefiniteness effect in case the R-pronoun fills the subject position:

    31
    Deer wude in’t Jier bloot een Swien slaachted.
    there became in.the year hardly a swine slaughtered
    In that year hardly a pig was slaughtered.

    Passives are like unaccusatives in that they form the perfect tense with the verb weze ‘be’. Another interesting example is the following passive sentence, which seems a counterexample to the indefiniteness effect:

    32
    Deer is al oafters de Froage stäld wuden wo oold Seelterlound is.
    R is already more often the question put become how old Saterland is
    The question has been asked more often, how old Saterland is.

    Here we have a definite NP functioning, apparently, as the subject of a passive sentence. However, this is an idiomatic NP, in which the definite article is vacuous: it is just part of the idiom. It cannot be replaced with an indefinite article (n Froage), nor can de Froage ‘the question’ be pluralised. So the passive sentence seems to count as indefinite or subjectless, and this makes the appearance of the R-pronoun possible.

    References
      About this article
      Author(s): Eric Hoekstra, Bouke Slofstra
      Category: Saterfrisian Syntax
      Version: 1.0, December 2023
      Version history:
      version editor(s) date remarks
      1.0 Eric Hoekstra, Bouke Slofstra December 2023
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