Cainntear wrote:No, the two-object pattern is very much English.
So while in English we can say "I gave the dog a bone" or "I gave a bone to the dog", in most languages we have to translate the latter, not the former.
Also, in most dialects of English your 2nd and 3rd sentences would be considered ungrammatical. The structure tends to indicate something for someone's benefit; in sentence 1 "the town" would be read as being for the benefit of the community/population/townsfolk, but the wall and the moon don't represent anyone of anything with desires, needs or volition.
Excellent information, thanks.
Yes, those last two English sentences sounded very strange to me, even as a native English speaker, but I couldn't figure out why. All sources I've read that list the 10 sentence patterns of English represent this two-object pattern as "Pattern #8: NP1 + V-tr + NP2 + NP3" without saying anything about the implied context of someone deriving benefit.
Thanks to you and El Forastero for the responses. This clears up part of my question from another thread about whether other languages differ in the number of basic sentence patterns. Clearly Spanish does not contain Pattern #8 that English uses. After numerous such translations on Yandex I suspected it did not, because the three examples I gave were the only translations where Yandex did not insert prepositions. When a preposition is inserted in order to convey the same meaning then the basic sentence pattern no longer holds. For those who are interested, here are the other Pattern #8 sentences that Yandex translated that appeared to me to be accurate because they relied on prepositions:
[English] Smithers gave the employees a raise.
[Spanish] Smithers dio a los empleados un aumento.
[English] He bought the man a drink.
[Spanish] Le compró al hombre una bebida.
[English] They named their dog Oscar.
[Spanish] Llamaron a su perro Oscar.
[English] The judge awarded Mary the prize.
[Spanish] El juez le otorgó a Mary el premio.
[English] They called it puppy love.
[Spanish] Lo llamaron amor cachorro.
[English] They called it a promotion.
[Spanish] Lo llamaron una promoción.
[English] He wrote his mother a letter.
[Spanish] Le escribió una carta a su madre.
[English] He slipped the man a $20 bill.
[Spanish] Le deslizó al hombre una factura de $ 20.
[English] The artist painted the collector a masterpiece.
[Spanish] El artista pintó al coleccionista una obra maestra.
[English] The manager handed his employee a broom.
[Spanish] El gerente le entregó a su empleado una escoba.
[English] The stranger sold the tourist a phony treasure map.
[Spanish] El extraño vendió al turista un mapa del tesoro falso.
[English] The real estate agent found the family a new house.
[Spanish] El agente de bienes raíces encontró a la familia una casa nueva.
[English] The soldier threw his friend a rifle.
[Spanish] El soldado arrojó un rifle a su amigo.
[English] Mister Gauguin carved the tourist a tiki.
[Spanish] El señor Gauguin talló al turista un tiki.
[English] The tourist tossed the child a coin.
[Spanish] El turista arrojó al niño una moneda.
[English] They called the transfer a promotion.
[Spanish] Llamaron a la transferencia una promoción.
[English] The sailors brought the port a new ship.
[Spanish] Los marineros trajeron al puerto un nuevo barco.
[English] The doctor scribbled the patient a prescription.
[Spanish] El médico garabateó al paciente una receta.