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The accessibility hierarchy was first proposed by Keenan & Comrie (1977) to describe the cross-linguistic distribution of relative markers in terms of likelihood of relativization of different syntactic roles. The hierarchy is also commonly believed to reflect constraints on possible changes in the domain of relativization. For example, the hierarchy predicts that locative relatives that develop into general relativizers should expand their functional range in a step-by-step fashion from lower to higher roles. In this paper, we revise existing claims about the diachrony of locative relatives. In doing so, we survey known cases of locative relatives that develop into general relativizers and we also discuss data from linguistic variation in non-standard varieties in European languages, with a focus on social variation in Italian. As we argue, data from Italian suggests that another possible cline of development of locative relatives should be acknowledged, that is, locative > concern > subject.

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This paper deals with various aspects of the use of the subjunctive in spoken Italian. Firstly, a brief overview is provided of the interplay of linguistic and extra-linguistic factors underlying the selection of the subjunctive in various syntactic structures. Special attention is paid to the differences in subjunctive use in factual and non-factual contexts, pointing out that the former are less studied and less affected by normative injunctions than the latter. The focus then falls on factual contexts, in particular subordinate clauses which depend on factive and semi-factive governors. The investigation is based on KIParla, a corpus of spoken Italian consisting of different types of interactions with speakers of various origins and social backgrounds. It is argued that in the factual context at hand the subjunctive fulfills a specific set of functions, mostly related to the speaker’s stance towards the content of the subordinate clause. Finally, a statistical analysis is performed using conditional inference trees and random forests in order to uncover the linguistic and extra-linguistic conditioning of subjunctive use. The analysis shows that in the context under observation it is only linguistic factors that significantly condition mood selection; the use of the subjunctive is substantially insensitive to socio-stylistic and geographic variation, and therefore a socially shared pattern of variation has emerged.