Abstract
In this paper, I follow Diessel's analysis and elaborate on Chudobová's (2011) pilot corpus study by addressing the influence of iconicity on clause order. In the analysis, I focus on the connectives než, dříve/předtím než 'before'; až, potom/poté co 'after'.
These are particularly interesting because the connectives provide information about the order of events by marking the SC as either preceding or following the events depicted in MC, at the same time their ʻtime reverse' potential goes against the iconicity principle. These connectives are contrasted with zatímco 'while' and protože 'because'.
While the former marks simultaneity of events, the latter is used in causal adverbial clauses and has no inherent temporal meaning. The "cause event" may thus precede, follow or happen simultaneously with the MC event.