Function words, prosodic structure and morphological dependency

This paper addresses the grammatical status of pronominal clitics in European Portuguese (henceforth EP). Based on properties displayed by the clitic-clitic sequence and the verb-enclitic combination, it is argued that object pronouns in this language must be derived in the morphological component. Among other affix-like properties, it is shown that they undergo allomorphic variation and induce stem allomorphy on the verb. These non-productive phonological alternations support the view that enclitics are in morphological construction with the verb.