sell · 卖 (mài)

Hierarchy

Same inventory as English sell. Not five-place. Not four sisters of one V. Surface count can name Pat, Chris, a lawnmower, and a price, but the lexicon does not list four co-arguments of √SELL / √卖.

$20 = 二十美元 = one MeasureP. Orthography / measure-word morphology is not extra arity. Sortal 一台 on the goods and mensural 二十美元 on the Price are two QPs on two already-listed objects — they do not grow √卖. There is no sixth argument “currency symbol.” Asking for the classifier (多少台, 多少个) is asking inside the goods QP, not asking for a second object of 卖.

What Group A Mandarin changes is coverb cloth, split-field order (V between Agent and Theme when 把 fronts), and where Amount+Denomination host (measure word inside one QP). What it does not change is the inventory. Twenty is still not dollars. Dollars is still not a sister of 卖. Payment-settled is still implicated, not e2. HAVE of the goods is still e2.

Mandarin frames · Case clothes

No English DOC / to-frame ACC flip. Theme stays the goods QP — often 把-fronted as a whole. Recipient is 给. Price stays inside 以 / 用 / 多少钱 / postverbal measure. There is no Mandarin twin of Chris was sold a lawnmower that promotes Recipient into a second ACC: *克里斯被卖了一台割草机二十美元 is not a second-ACC construction. Cheapness under Neg therefore tracks the 把-Theme (goods) unless Focus / WH independently highlights Price or Recipient.

1. ✓ 帕特把割草机卖给了克里斯，二十美元。 Agent · 把-Theme · 卖 · 给-Recipient · Price measure
2. ✓ 帕特没把割草机卖给克里斯吗？ canonical NegQ · 没…吗
3. ✓ 帕特没卖给克里斯一台割草机吗？ postverbal Theme; no 把
4. ✓ 帕特没以二十美元把割草机卖给克里斯吗？ 以-Price + 把-Theme
5. ✓ 帕特没在 Uniswap 上把 0.2 个比特币卖给 Kim、换 8400 USDT 吗？ Platform Loc + 换 sequel; still one sale + exchange packaging
6. ✓ 帕特把割草机卖了。 Recipient and Price independently omissible
7. * 把二十卖了割草机。 Price ≠ 把-object of 卖 (*sold $20 a lawnmower / *for what twenty)
8. * 克里斯被卖了一台割草机二十美元。 no English DOC second-ACC twin

A bare negative answer on the canonical NegQ most readily challenges the event or the goods (把-Theme cheapness). Challenging the twenty wants the Price QP already under discussion. That is the opposite of 付, where 把 fronts the money QP.

MeasureP WH diagnostics

WH forces Amount ≠ Denomination inside one host of Price (or inside one 把-QP when Theme is quantized). Verbal WH sees the MeasureP / QP, not unit and degree as two objects of 卖. Mandarin keeps WH in situ under polar 吗 more freely than English Did + what. Same MeasureP pattern as English sell, Japanese uru, and deduct. *把二十卖了 and *把多少卖了 N are the Mandarin spelling of *for what twenty and of the illegal QP split under 把.

1. ✓ 卖了多少钱 / 卖多少美元？ Amount WH + measure / currency under Price
2. ✓ 以什么货币没卖？ in-strategy rescue
3. ✓ 没把多少台割草机卖给克里斯？ classifier WH inside goods QP
4. ✓ 谁没把什么卖给谁？ in-situ height; Agent > Theme > Recipient
5. ✓ 大通银行两分钟前把五万什么币卖成了一个比特币吗？ Chase scaler · U-WH in situ inside 把-QP
6. * 把二十卖了割草机。 Mandarin of *for what twenty / *sold $20 a lawnmower
7. * 没把多少卖了割草机给克里斯？ classifier stranded from N under 把
8. * 把五万grand什么卖了 什么 as sister / second 把-object, not as N inside QP
9. * 把多少卖了 0.2 个、8400？ split across two MeasurePs

Two constraints conspire on the stars: Left Branch / QP integrity (Amount and measure word stay inside one 把 / Price domain; Mandarin cannot treat bare 二十 as the sortal of a stranded WH under 把), and the one-object ceiling for 把 on 卖 (Price cannot become a second 把-object of sell). Rescues are 卖多少美元, 卖了多少钱, 以什么货币, and 五万什么币 inside one QP — the Group A spelling of English how many dollars / in what currency. The rescue does not make 美元 a sister of 卖了.

Geometry · 卖 ≠ 换 ≠ 付

In 帕特把割草机卖给了克里斯, Chris comes to HAVE the lawnmower. That is give-geometry. 给-Recipient is the spell-out of low Appl_HAVE — the HAVE diagnostic that 换 can drop.

• ≠ 换 / swap. Chris is Recipient HAVE-goods, not Theme₂. 换 inverts two Themes; 卖 does not invert goods and money. ✓ 没把 0.2 个比特币换成 8400 USDT 吗？ is SWAP. ✓ 没把 0.2 个比特币卖给 Kim、换 8400 USDT 吗？ keeps 给-Recipient. *没把 8400 USDT 卖给 Kim、换 0.2 个比特币吗？ is only good if the goods really are the USDT.
• ≠ 付 / pay_GIVE. Cloth mismatch under one operator: 没把二十块付给克里斯吗？ questions a money QP under 把; 没以二十美元把割草机卖给克里斯吗？ questions a Price layer with goods under 把. Shared 多少钱 strings are packaging. The coverb / fronting gives the heads away: 把 tracks the mower on 卖; 把 tracks the money on 付.
• Payment-true is implicated, not entailed — the missing default of 卖. Goods-HAVE is e2 of 卖 and the missing default of 付.

When Recipient is dropped (帕特把割草机卖了，二十美元), the Price measure can be reread as incoming Incremental Theme of an exchange. That rereading changes the Appl head (HAVE vs SWAP); it does not split twenty from dollars or add a verbal sister for the unit.

Shells, ApplP, and coverbs

VoiceP  [ 帕特
  vP / initP
    baP  [ 把  [ Theme QP  割草机 ]
      ApplP_LOW  [ Appl_HAVE
        VP  [ √卖   … ]  给 克里斯 ] ]
    PP_Price  [ 以/用  [ MeasureP  [ Amount 二十 ] [ U 美元 ] ] ]
      | postverbal 多少钱 / measure ]

Mandarin 卖 never assigns four structural Cases the English DOC way. Theme is the goods QP (optionally 把-fronted); Recipient is 给; Price is inside P / measure. 把 fronts the inner Theme of 卖 — not Voice and not CAUSE. Split-field order places V between Agent and Theme when 把 fronts; that is packaging of one already-listed object, not a fifth θ-slot. A language that appears to have “sold him the mower twenty dollars” has either a second domain (CAUSE / 让 or high Appl) or a MeasureP that is not a second object.

Amount is not an Incremental Theme of sell on the give-reading. The lawnmower is. Twenty dollars can measure the sale as a scale without being the object that is incrementally transferred. On a SWAP rereading, the MeasureP becomes the incoming Incremental Theme — still one Theme, still internally Amount + Unit.

Type A 让 over inner 卖 takes a pivot Causee and leaves 把 on the inner Theme. 让 ≠ 把. Price never becomes Causee Case. Purpose 来 / 好 / 为了 is Type B and does not 把-front as if it were Theme. Stacking degradation (??院长让委员会让助手把割草机卖给克里斯) is already recorded in the causation-chain note — flagged here, not re-elicited.

Omission does not demote Price to a pure adjunct. High and selected P-layers are optional in the numeration; they are still arguments when present. The diagnostic is participanthood under coverb, binding, and WH — not omitability. Topic can lift Platform or Price without promoting them over Theme in the hierarchy.

Underivables (Mandarin)

1. * 把二十卖了割草机。 *for what twenty / Price ≠ 把-object of 卖
2. * 没把多少卖了割草机给克里斯？ classifier / degree split under 把
3. * 把五万grand什么卖了 什么 as sister, not N inside QP
4. * 把多少卖了 0.2 个、8400？ split across two MeasurePs
5. * 没把 8400 USDT 卖给 Kim、换 0.2 个比特币吗？ no SWAP inversion (unless goods really are USDT)
6. * 克里斯被卖了一台割草机二十美元。 no DOC second-ACC twin
7. * 把割草机付给克里斯二十块 as sell cloth on 付 — pay/sell cloth mismatch (Group A pay note)

Group A packaging · this tick Mandarin only

Group A (English, Japanese, Mandarin, Navajo) is the measuring-locus contrast set already used for MeasureP pied-piping and NegQ on sell. Same hierarchy; different host of Amount+Denomination and cloth of Recipient. This tick is Mandarin only. English, Japanese, and Spanish already have sense×language pages. Navajo HANDLE class shares the Group A DOCX and may be briefly pointed; full sense×language page for Navajo is a later queue tick. Group B Romance remains on the Spanish page. *for what twenty, *nani nijū-de, and *把二十卖了 are one constraint written in three hosts.

Open items

• Navajo micro-entry. Same Group A geometry; HANDLE packaging; denomination WH may be stem alternation. Deferred — do not invent depth this tick. The extract states where denomination WH under doo … da must be asked: stem vs next word, not a fifth object.
• Character-and-gloss tightening. Already flagged as open Volume 4 item in the Group A NegQ note. This page uses the extract’s Mandarin strings; it does not invent a cleaned paradigm beyond those citations.
• Dual-denomination prices (换 8400 USDT with goods 0.2 个比特币). Still one MeasureP / sequel packaging with a pair-name unit (LP-token moral), not two Themes / a sixth slot. Same open as English.
• Scaler vs measure word (grand / 万 vs 美元 / 币). Chase Group A: 把五万什么币 seats U inside one 把-QP; *把五万grand什么卖了 is still the extra-object star. Needs controlled elicitation against sell’s Price layer, not only against Theme under 把.
• Sell versus 收费 / charge_FEE. FROM rather than HAVE-TO needs its own grid; do not reuse this frame. Weather still cannot sell.
• Abney DP / Chinese de scout. Companion Abney_DP_Chinese_Scout_de_WH is named by the Group A note; not restamped this tick. Speculative beyond the extract’s agreement.

Corpus filenames

Primary extract for this micro-entry is Group A NegQ on sell (Mandarin §5). Geometry is shared with the English lexical entry. Chase Group A supplies scaler / unit WH under 把. Chat packaging summary: Tritransitive NegQ Turn Group A. Text extracts used this tick under /tmp/ DOCX dumps.