In linguistics, a VO language is a language in which the verb typically comes before the object (thus including SVO, VOS and VSO languages). It was W. P. Lehmann who first proposed to reduce the six possible permutations of word order to just two main ones, VO and OV, in what he calls the Fundamental Principle of Placement (FPP), arguing that subject is by no means a primary element of a sentence. VO languages are primarily right-branching, or head-initial; that is, heads are generally found at the beginning of their phrases. In such languages, for example, prepositions are much more frequent than postpositions.
