The Subject Object Verb reference article from the English Wikipedia on 24-Apr-2004 (provided by Fixed Reference: snapshots of Wikipedia from wikipedia.org)

Subject Object Verb

Subject Object Verb (SOV) is a term used in linguistic typology to state the general order of words in a language's sentences: "Sam oranges ate". The SOV type is the most common type found in natural languages. It corresponds roughly to Reverse Polish Notation in computer languages. Turkish, Japanese, Korean, Persian, Latin and most Indian languages belong to this category. German uses SVO in main clauses, but employs SOV in subordinate clauses.

SOV languages tend to have the adjectives before nouns, to use postpositions rather than prepositions, to place relative clauses before the nouns to which they refer, and to place auxiliary verbs after the action verb. Some have special particles to separate the subject from the object, such as the Japanese wa.

An example in Japanese is: Watashi ha kinou igo wo utta ("I played a game of Go yesterday"), in which watashi is the subject, igo is the object and utta is the verb.

The other permutations in rough order of importance:

• Subject Verb Object (e.g. English, Spanish, Italian, Kiswahili, Chinese)
• Verb Subject Object (e.g. Welsh and Arabic)
• Verb Object Subject (e.g. Fijian)
• Object Subject Verb (e.g. Xavante)
• Object Verb Subject (e.g. Klingon)

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