The syntactic structure of <i>pelirrojo</i> compounds

This paper deals with Spanish adjective-headed compounds ( pelirrojo ), whose main properties are systematically compared with those of their English counterparts ( red-haired ). I provide a distinction based on the grammatical category of the non-head projections peli and red and on their relative complexity to capture the relevant differences. Additionally, I focus on the most noticed feature of Spanish pelirrojo compounds, which is the fact that they only codify inalienable possession relationships. I argue that the existence of an inalienable-only compound pattern shows that Spanish pelirrojo compounds contain a relational head which establishes an inalienable possession relationship between a possessee located inside the compound ( pelo ‘hair’), and a possessor located outside it (e.g., Juan in Juan es pelirrojo . ‘John is red-haired.’). The same kind of relational structure is not identifiable inside English parallel structures or other Spanish compound patterns.