Abstract

The aim of this paper is twofold: firstly, we present a theoretical background in the literature about two related phenomena in Spanish, dequeismo and deismo. Both have the non-mandatory presence of preposition de in common. However, whereas the former has been studied thoroughly in the literature (Gómez Torrego 1999; Demonte & Fernández-Soriano 2005 among many others), references concerning the latter phenomenon are scarce. Nonetheless, neither of them has received a conclusive explanation that takes into account all the varieties in which they occur. The second aim is to link these phenomena to a new proposal: the possibly nominal nature of the embedded clauses, which would have to be marked with exactly this preposition. It will be argued that other phenomena formed by the article el are a clearer spell-out of the nominal nature advocated here and, therefore, support the present analysis.