Abstract

The paper examines the properties of the so-called impersonal passives in Irish, Polish, and Old English with the purpose of determining whether it is justified to claim that they contain the expletive pro subject. Since the constructions scrutinised lack the properties characteristic of AgrP, i.e. NOM Case and subject-verb agreement, it is proposed that the relevant structures in these languages do not project AgrP altogether. The Irish and Polish impersonals are shown to contain a covert theta-marked subject, whose presence is supported by the tests relating to anaphors and subject-oriented adverbials. The covert subject in Irish is an empty category with the features [ +number, -person], while in Polish impersonals the subject is realised as PROa,b· In contrast, Old English impersonal passives are shown to be genuinely subjectless. This difference between Irish and Polish on the one hand, and Old English on the other, derives from the fact that impersonal structures in the former languages do not exhibit external theta-role absorption and hence should not be classified as passive, while in Old English the external theta-role is regularly absorbed by the passive morphology. The general conclusion reached is that it is inadequate, at least for the languages examined, to posit expletive pro as the subject of impersonal constructions.