Cén Fáth “Why” in Modern Irish

McCloskey (2002) argues that cén fáth “why” in Irish is inserted at the SPEC of the clause where it takes scope, and is overtly moved to the SPEC of the [+Q] COMP, producing the (aL, aN) chain, while McCloskey (1985) only provides data with the chain (aN, aN), which does not involve overt movement. We provide abundant data with both types of chains, arguing that both chains are actually possible in Irish. We further investigate the mechanism that allows the chain (aN, aN), and argue that the (aN, aN) chain, which does not involve overt movement, does involve LF movement. This suggests that the LF component does exist, and that both (aL, aN) and (aN, aN) chains actually involve movement.