This project aims at a comparative analysis of verbs of putting in three Romance languages: Spanisch, Portuguese and French. Three near-synonymous verb pairs will be studied: ponor/meter (Sp.), por/meter (Pr.) and poser/mettre (Fr.) from a synchronic and a diachronic angle. The intra- and cross- linguistiqc differences in use and the grammaticalization paths of the verbs constitute the focus of this study.