Abstract

This paper examines the Korean sentence-final ending -ney, focusing on its syntax, semantics, and diachronic development to assess competing theories of clause structure. Engaging recent debates between cartographic approaches (Rizzi & Cinque, 2016) and modular, interface-based models (Manzini, 2025), it argues that -ney supports a modular view of grammar rather than a densely layered hierarchy of functional projections. Historically, -ney derives from the fusion of -na, -i, and -ta, shifting from a polite declarative marker to a mirative-evidential form associated with surprise, realization, and direct perception. Syntactically, it behaves as a single portmanteau head in the Force/Mood domain, with its interpretation determined by prosody and discourse context rather than by multiple syntactic heads. Semantically, -ney encodes the speaker’s epistemic stance, yielding either mirativity (unexpected realization) or confirmatory evidentiality (recognition of expected events). These readings correlate with distinct intonation contours (LH% vs. LHL%). The analysis shows that -ney’s flexibility results from modular interactions among syntax, pragmatics, and phonology, demonstrating how fine-grained meaning can emerge from an economical clause structure.