ABSTRACT
The chapter discusses the phenomenon of a-marking of object topics in Italian. The use of preposition a to mark the noun phrase only concerns direct objects when they are topics. The phenomenon is primarily a left peripheral one. Distributional and interpretive properties are discussed, and the distinction with respect to the differential object marking/DOM phenomenology is highlighted, together with illuminating data from acquisition (based on the results presented in detail in Chapter 3 of this volume).
