Syntactic annotation – adjective phrases – Corpus of Historical Low German

When adjectives do and do not project

Usually, adjectives do not project an ADJP and are just sisters to the noun which they modify.

An ADJP is only projected when:

An adjective is not contained within an NP because it is predicative or extraposed
An adjective within an NP is itself modified
An adjective within an NP takes a complement

(IP-MAT (NP-SBJ (PPER he))
        (VVFIN is)
        (ADJP-PRD (ADJD edel)) ← predicative ADJ projects an ADJP
        ...
)

(ADJP (AVD seer)    ← modifier of ADJ
      (ADJA armode)
)

(ADJP (PP (APPR in)        ← complement of ADJ
          (NP (DIA allen)
              (NA dingen)))
      (ADJD loflyk)
)

Transitive adjectives head an ADJP and take an NP complement:

(ADJP (NP-COM (DIA alles)
              (NA dinges))
      (ADJD luckich)       ← transitive adjective
)

(ADJP (NP-COM (DDARTA de)
              (NA werlt))
      (ADJD half)         ← transitive adjective
)

Note that any ADJP at the clause level should have one of the following dashtags:

(See under noun phrases for use of the extended tags -PRD and -SMC)