MMM11 Online proceedings 2018 Koutsoukos, Audring & Masini (Eds.) Nuŵďer iŶfleĐtioŶ iŶ AN aŶd NA ItaliaŶ ĐoŵpouŶds M. Silvia Micheli University of Pavia – University of Bergamo silvia.micheli@unibg.it 1. Introduction Although number inflection of Italian compound words is generally considered to be an irregular phenomenon, it has often been neglected in the literature devoted to morphological variation. In this paper, our aim is to provide a deeper analysis of the number inflection of two types of Italian compounds, i.e. Noun-Adjective (e.g. roccaNforteA ‘stronghold’) and Adjective-Noun (e.g. mezzaAlunaN ‘half-moon’) compounds. These kinds of forms are generally considered to be compounds by grammars and dictionaries, even though they are often the result of the lexicalization of originally syntactic expressions (e.g. camposanto ‘cemetery’, lit. ‘holy field’). As in many other cases, the boundary between syntax and compounding is not so clear. With regard to number inflection, these forms are very interesting since they display both cases of double inflection (e.g. cassePLfortiPL ‘safes’, doppiPLvetriPL ‘double glasses’), in which there are two plural markers, and cases of external inflection (e.g. roccaSGfortiPL ‘strongholds’, doppioSGpettiPL ‘double-breasted’), in which the plural marker of the word is in the canonical position, namely on the right. Furthermore, in some cases the same compound shows both kinds of inflection: e.g. caposaldo ‘cornerstone’ (pl. capoSGsaldiPL – capiPLsaldiPL) or terracotta ‘terracotta’ (pl. terraSGcottePL – terrePLcottePL). These cases can be considered as instances of ‘overabundance’, i.e. “the situation in which there are two or more forms available to realize the same cell in an inflectional paradigm” (Thornton 2012: 183). This work aims at describing this twofold variation through the analysis of both quantitative and qualitative data from a corpus of Contemporary Italian, i.e. itWaC (Baroni et al. 2009). By investigating the number inflection of AN and NA Italian compounds, we hope to enrich the description of these forms which seem to be halfway between syntax and morphology. The paper is organized as follows. In sections 2 and 3, we provide a general introduction on Italian compounding and the plural inflection of compound words. Section 4 is devoted to the data retrieval and the parameters of the analysis. In section 5, we illustrate the results of the analysis of AN and NA compounds, focusing on the most relevant factors which can impact their number inflection. Finally, in section 6 we sum up our findings and provide some theoretical remarks on compounding in Italian. 2. AN and NA Italian compounds Compounding in Italian (as in other Romance languages) is generally considered not to be very productive, 1 especially compared to derivation, which represents the most productive word formation mechanism throughout the history of the Italian language. 1 For an overview of Italian compounding see Masini and Scalise (2012).