On the nature of OV and VO order in Old French

Object–verb (OV) order in Old French exhibits many of the same characteristics as OV order in the West Germanic languages, especially in its occurrence with nonfinite verbs. I argue that Old French was typologically an OV language and show that recent antisymmetric analyses of West Germanic OV order are able to account for Old French OV order in periphrastic constructions. I propose an extension of these to account for OV order in infinitival clauses as well. In addition, the Old French data show that the concomitantly occurring instances of VO in this language must be due to the presence of grammars in competition, where an older OV grammar is being replaced by a newer VO one.

► In Old French (OF), object-verb (OV) order was common with nonfinite verbs.
► Properties of OV in OF pattern closely with those of the West Germanic OV languages.
► These properties show that OF is typologically an OV language.
► Recent antisymmetric analyses of West Germanic OV are extended to account for OF OV.
► The data show that the OV grammar is being replaced by an innovative VO grammar.