Semantic principles of adverbial distribution

Abstract This chapter supports the scopal theory of adverbials, by laying out the major semantic principles underlying adverbial distribution and showing how cartographic theories cannot adequately handle the main facts of adverbial distribution without massive complications. The most basic ordering of adverbials is a matter of their interacting semantic properties, e.g. probably not vs. *not probably following from probably’s status as a positive polarity item. Such semantic factors also allow straightforwardly predicting which adverbials have freer ordering and which are more restricted. Cartographic theories, by contrast, typically require multiple redundant licensing heads, cannot account for certain exceptional alternate orders, and cannot explain why some adverb classes allow freer ordering and others do not.