A typological analysis of the copulative and locative/ existential constructions in Modern Persian

World languages encode the copulative and locative/ existential constructions differently. Typological studies introduced in Stassen (2009) have yielded two strategies: share and split. Hence two different language types have been proposed. The share strategy employs the same verbs and the split one uses different verbs to encode these sentences. Using natural data, the present study examines the two strategies in Modern Persian in order to determine its language type. The data analysis shows that Persian employs various forms of copulative verbs /budæn/ ‘to be’, and /hæst/ ‘exists’ as well as their cliticized forms. The locative sentences also use the copular verb /budæn/, and its cliticized form. Therefore, Persian could be categorized as a share type. Yet, in the existential sentences which are of the locative category, the two compound verbs /vo􀔪ud daštæn/ ‘to exist’ and /mowud budæn/ ‘to exist’ can be seen in addition to the copulative verbs. Thus, Persian has the split strategy too. Hence Persian could be categorized in both language types – in line with Stassen’s prediction that some languages may employ both strategies.