The NP strategy for expressing reciprocity : typology history syntax and semantics This book provides a comprehensive treatment of the syntax and semantics of a single linguistic phenomenon the NP strategy for expressing reciprocity in synchronic diachronic and typological perspectives. It challenges the assumption common in the typological syntactic and semantic literature namely that so called reciprocal constructions encode symmetric relations. Instead they are analyzed as constructions encoding unspecified relations. In effect it provides a new proposal for the truth conditional semantics of these constructions. More broadly this book introduces new ways of bringing together historical linguistics and formal semantics demonstrating how on the one hand the inclusion of historical data concerning the sources of reciprocal constructions enriches their synchronic analysis; and how on the other hand an analysis of the syntax and the semantics of these constructions serves as a key for understanding their historical origins The types of constructions and their origin The diachronic development from a two unit to a one unit construction Relics as a syntactic category : Modern Hebrew and Italian constructions as frozen formulae Heterogeneity : languages with more than one NP strategy construction Changing meaning of the NP strategy constructions A comparative linguistics study of NP strategy constructions The basic meaning of the NP strategy for expressing reciprocity Specifying the meaning of the NP strategy through context.