
Predicative possession refers to indefinite, alienable possession. Sentences like <i>This bike is John’s</i> or <i>I have two eyes</i> are thus excluded.<br><br>

The language encodes this with an existential expression which takes the possessor as a topicalized argument with respect to the existential proposition. Stassen (2008) provides an example from Tondano, where the possessor preceeds the topic marker <i>si</i>, as in <i><u>si tuama</u> <b>si</b> wewean wale rua</i> ‘<u>ANIM.SG man</u> <b>TOP</b> exist house two.’ This is literally glossed as something like ‘As for the man, there are two houses,’ but means ‘The man has two houses.’ 

<br><br><b>Reference</b><br>Stassen, Leon. 2008. Predicative Possession.
In Haspelmath et al. (2008), chapter 117. Available online at <a href=â€http://wals.info/feature/117â€> http://wals.info/feature/117</a href>. 	
