Prepositions expressing source in Norwegian

Av, which historically is a continuation of the Old Scandinavian preposition af (Bjorvand & Lindeman 2007:64), also has a number of other uses in Norwegian, as seen e.g. in the entries for av in Beito et al. (1966) and Guttu et al. (1977). Some of these uses, all attested in the Nordic Dialect Corpus, are shown in (2)–(6). In (2), we see the ablative use of av, whereas it marks cause in (3), material in (4), the whole in a part-whole relation in (5), and the agent of a passive in (6).


Introduction
The preposition that marks the source argument of the verb få 'get' in the two written varieties of Norwegian, Bokmål and Nynorsk, is av.The same preposition is also found in this function in many spoken varieties, as in (1), an example taken from the Nordic Dialect Corpus.
(1) eg fekk rasarbane av farmor og faffar (Norwegian) I got racing course from grandma and grandpa 'I got a racing course from grandma and grandpa.' (gjesdal_01um) Av, which historically is a continuation of the Old Scandinavian preposition af (Bjorvand & Lindeman 2007:64), also has a number of other uses in Norwegian, as seen e.g. in the entries for av in Beito et al. (1966) and Guttu et al. (1977).Some of these uses, all attested in the Nordic Dialect Corpus, are shown in (2)-( 6).In (2), we see the ablative use of av, whereas it marks cause in (3), material in (4), the whole in a part-whole relation in (5), and the agent of a passive in (6).
(2) så sjiffta demm take demm raeiv av all staein then changed they roof.DEF they tore off all stone(DEF) 'Then they pulled the leaves off the twigs.' (enebakk_03gm) (  2008: 1215).In the Nordic Syntax Database and in the Nordic Dialect Corpus we find data that can be used to shed some light on this variation.For space reasons, Scandinavian varieties other than Norwegian will not be taken into consideration.

Nordic Syntax Database (NSD)
In the ScanDiaSyn survey, in which the data for the Nordic Syntax Database were collected, the prepositions other than av which were tested in phrases expressing the source argument of the verb få 'get' were hos, hjå and med (but not the preposition tå).
The basic function of the preposition hos, found in all varieties of Norwegian that have this preposition at all, is as a marker of location, taking a human or at least animate complement.An example is given in ( 7), where hos åss means 'at our place'.Historically, the preposition hos has developed from the noun hus 'house' (Bjorvand & Lindeman 2007: 506).In Old Norse, the corresponding locative preposition was hjá, from the noun hjá 'married couple' (Bjorvand & Lindeman 2007:515).In Danish and Swedish, hos had replaced hjá already in the Old Scandinavian period, and it has later replaced hjá in most varieties of Norwegian.Hjá is still found in Faroese and Icelandic.In addition, in its present-day forms like jå or sjå, it is used in dialects in the (Black = hos (with variants), white= hjå (with variants)).
In addition to expressing location, the Old Norse preposition hjá was also found after verbs like fá 'get', where a phrase headed by hjá expressed the source argument (cf.Heggstad, Hødnebø and Simensen 1990: 187).This usage has been retained in certain parts of Norway, and accordingly, the test sentence shown in ( 9) was presented to informants in those areas that have retained (a form of) hjå.The core meaning of the preposition med is 'with'.Throughout Scandinavian, it is used with an instrumental or comitative meaning.In Norwegian, and in particular in the dialects, it is however a very versatile preposition, as described e.g. in Almenningen et al. (2008Almenningen et al. ( : 1215)).
Further, in some dialects of Norwegian, the source marking function that hjå had in Old Norse has spread to the newer preposition hos.Hence, outside the areas where hjå or med were tested, the preposition used in the test sentence corresponding to ( 9) and ( 10) was hos, as in ( 11).from Sømna in the south to Kjøllefjord in the north.In Nordland, it was rejected by the young informants from Herøy as well as by one young man from Mo i Rana, and in addition, there was variation among informants from Kautokeino and Lakselv, two locations in Finnmark.In Kautokeino, it was accepted by a young man but rejected by a young woman and an old man, while it got a medium score from an older woman.In Lakselv, it got a high score from the older informants but a medium score from the younger informants.The divergences from the general pattern found in Kautokeino and Lakselv might be connected to the fact that many speakers in these locations come from a Sámi-speaking background, or alternatively, in Lakselv, from a Finnish-speaking background.This might be the reason why they have not completely adopted the use of hos found in other speakers from the north of Norway.However, in other locations where there are many speakers with Sámi as their first language, such as Tana, hos marking source was nevertheless fully accepted.Hence, there are still unanswered questions in this area.
In the county of Møre og Romsdal, the test sentence in (10), with med, was largely accepted.
This in accordance with the distribution suggested in Almenningen et al. ( 2008).In the counties of North and South Trøndelag, on the other hand, it was rejected by most speakers.
In the counties of Sogn og Fjordane and Hordaland, as well as in the mountain areas of Buskerud and Oppland and also in some places in Rogaland, the (basically) locative preposition hjå was largely accepted as a marker of source.In Ål, hos was tested and accepted by all informants.In Gausdal, close to Lillehammer, sjå, the local form of hjå, was however rejected by all informants.
In the counties of Hedmark, Akershus, Østfold, Vestfold, Aust-Agder, Vest-Agder and Telemark, forms of sjå marking source were tested in the locations Valle and Tinn, and rejected in Valle but accepted in Tinn.Elsewhere in this area, hos was tested and rejected, with a few exceptions: hos was accepted by one older woman in Kristiansand, by the older informants in Fredrikstad, and by younger informants in Nissedal and Rena.It is possible, though, that some of these results are false positives, since (11) would be grammatical throughout the region with hos Per Ivar meaning 'at Per Ivar's place'.
In the Trøndelag region, consisting of the counties North and South Trøndelag, the picture that emerges is quite complex.The results from this region will be discussed in the next subsection, where the survey data are combined with data from the Nordic Dialect corpus.

Nordic Dialect Corpus (NDC)
Turning now to the Nordic Dialect Corpus, we will first look at occurrences of få 'get' with the basically Some of the authentic examples from the corpus are given in ( 12)-( 16) below.
( As it turns out, all the examples with hjå from the southern part of Norway in the corpus are produced by older informants.This is not necessarily significant, however, since there are not many expressed source arguments of få 'get' in the corpus at all.The absence of examples produced by younger speakers in the south could therefore be a coincidence.In the survey, hjå marking source was accepted by younger and older informants alike in Lindås, Luster, Lom, and Voss, while it was rejected by all informants from Flå.
There are no data from Lesja in the survey.Taken together, the data appear to suggest that hjå as a marker of source is falling out of use in Flå, which is the location closest to Oslo in map 5.In the other locations in the south where it is attested at all, it is probably still retained.
In the north, by contrast, hos expressing source is attested in younger informants as well as in older ones.It was also accepted by almost all informants, with the exceptions mentioned in the previous subsection.This suggests that hos is or is becoming the preferred marker of the source argument of få 'get' throughout the north of Norway.
In the county of Møre og Romsdal, where the preposition med expressing source got high scores in the survey, we also find similar examples in the corpus.Moreover, these are from younger speakers as well as from older speakers.The example in ( 17) is produced by an older man, while the example in ( 18) is produced by a younger man. ( Hence, corpus data as well as survey data suggest that med as a marker of source is not disappearing in this area.In fact, it extends into the neighboring county to the south, Sogn og Fjordane, where an example with med is attested from Stryn. A twist that should be mentioned here is that the informant from Surnadal who produced (17), with me(d), was presented with an example with hos in the survey.He rejected this example, and so did the other informants from the same location.Hence, it appears that the preposition chosen by the investigators here failed to reveal the actual usage in the local dialect.
From the Trøndelag region there are only three instances in the corpus of få 'get' with an expressed source argument.In all these cases, which are shown in ( 19)-( 21), the preposition is tå.
( The preposition tå has developed from ut-av 'out-of' (see e.g.Rietz 1867:770-771, Aasen 1873), and in many dialects of Norwegian, it has replaced avin some varieties in the form ta.Where tå or ta is used instead of av, these prepositions are in general found in the same contexts as av in the standard varieties.
However, the preposition used in Inderøy in the relevant test sentence in the survey was med, whereas hos was used in Skaugdalen.These options were rejected by all the informants in these locations.
And since tå marking source arguments was not tested in the survey, we do not know how widespread the use of tå is.What we do know, however, is that the preposition tå is used in other contexts in many places in the Trøndelag region.We see this in map 6, which shows occurrences of tå regardless of function.The only location represented in the corpus that does not have any instances of tå is Trondheim, the main city of the region.This in accordance with the general tendency that tå is associated with traditional rural dialects rather than with urban dialects.
parts of Southern Norway, and in the form hjå it is also an alternative to hos in Nynorsk.In Bokmål, hos is used, and in many spoken varieties, we find hos or some variant of hos, like håss, åss, oss.Map 1 shows the distribution of (forms of) hos and hjå in present-day spoken Norwegian.Map 1: The distribution of hos and hjå in Norway in the Nordic Dialect Corpus (NDC).
from Per Ivar 'I got the gloves from Per Ivar.'In many locations in the counties of Møre og Romsdal and North and South Trøndelag, the preposition med was used, as in (10), which shows the test sentence used in Volda, in Møre og Romsdal county..DEF from him Per Ivar 'I got the gloves from Per Ivar.'

(
11) e fikk hanskan hos Per Ivar (#996, Ål) I got gloves.DEF from Per Ivar 'I got the gloves from Per Ivar.'The locations where one of the three prepositions hos, hjå or med marking the source of få 'get' were generally accepted are shown in Map 2. We see here that the acceptance of these prepositions form two large clusters: one in the north and another in the west-central part of Southern Norway.Locations where the prepositions hos, hjå or med expressing source got a high score (#996: Jeg fikk hanskene hos Per Ivar.'I was given the gloves by Per Ivar') The overall distribution of judgments shown in Map 2 does not differ much between age groups.As maps 3 and 4 show, the survey results among informants aged 50+ (map 3) were very much the same as the results among informants aged between 15 and 35 (map 4).Locations where the prepositions hos, hjå or med expressing source got a high score among older informants (50+ years).(#996: Jeg fikk hanskene hos Per Ivar.'I was given the gloves by Per Ivar') Locations where the prepositions hos, hjå or med expressing source got a high score among youger informants (15-30 years) (#996: Jeg fikk hanskene hos Per Ivar.'I was given the gloves by Per Ivar') If we look at the details of the database, we see that hos expressing the source of få 'get' was accepted by almost all informants in the three northernmost counties of Norway, i.e.Finnmark, Troms and Nordland, locative prepositions hos or hjå (including variants) marking the source.Examples of this are found in a number of places in the NDC.First, forms of hos with this function are attested in Northern Norway, in the counties of Finnmark (Kirkenes, Kjøllefjord), Troms (Botnhamn, Kirkesdalen, Kvaefjord, Kvaenangen, Lavangen, Tromsø, Tromsøysund), and Nordland (Bodø, Hattfjelldal, Herøy, Myre, Stamsund).There are also occurrences of forms of hjå in the West Norwegian counties of Sogn og Fjordane (Luster) and Hordaland (Lindås, Voss), as well as in Lesja and Lom in the county of Oppland and Flå in the county of Buskerud.All these locations are shown in Map 5.The prepositions hos/hjå expressing source, as attested in the Nordic Dialect Corpus.(Black = places of attestation).