Distributive plural marker tul and its structural licensing

Korean has a copied plural marker -tul (i.e., distributive plural marker, DPM), which looks like a plural morpheme in its form but does not denote genuine plurality of the element it is attached to since it is simply copied from the preceding plural marker. The DPM can be attached not only to a singular noun but also to a verb, adverb, whole verbal chunk or even complementizer, which inherently triggers distributivity, but resists genuine plurality. The licensor of DPMs is not always necessarily a subject but can be a c-commanding nominal. As for the shifted object licensing the DPM attached to the VP adverb, it carries discourse effect such as specificity or presupposed interpretation of distributivity, which induces it to move to the Spec of v*P. Hence, the shifted object c-commands and licenses the DPM attached to the VP adverb. The argument to which the typical distributive markers such as -mata ‘every’, -ssik ‘each’, or hana hana ‘one-by-one’ as well as the plural marker -tul are attached can be a licensor of the DPM. I put forward the observation that in the bi-clausal structure, the DPM attached to the embedded complementizer -ko as well as the matrix adverb is only licensed by the matrix distributive argument. As for the RTOed nominal, it is located in the matrix clause, which induces it to c-command and license the DPM attached to the complementizer and matrix adverb. Like the shifted distributive object, the RTOed argument to which the plural marker -tul is attached also carries discourse effect such as specificity and presupposed interpretation of distributivity, which induces the RTOed object to move to the Spec of v*P in the matrix clause. This set of facts leads us to suggest the condition that the DPM must be locally c-commanded and licensed by PRO, a trace, null argument (i.e, pro) or syntactic argument, which bears distributivity.