Headless Relative Clauses in Tlaxcala Náhuatl

This chapter describes the basic structural, morpho-syntactic, and semantic characteristics of headless relative clauses in the variety of Náhuatl spoken in Tlaxcala. It shows that the language has free relative clauses, i.e. headless relative clauses introduced by wh-expressions. In particular, it has all three main varieties that have been attested crosslinguistically: maximal free relative clauses, existential free relative clauses, and free-choice free relative clauses. Other types of headless relative clauses are attested as well, including light-headed relative clauses, i.e. relative clauses that, rather than a full nominal head, only have a determiner-like element as their head.