43. Phrase through periods

The syntactic structure of a language can be described at the level of the phrase and at the level of the sentence. In OE texts we find a variety of word phrases. OE noun patterns, adjective and verb patterns had certain specific features which are important to note in view of their later changes. A noun pattern consisted of a noun as the head word and pronouns, adjectives, numerals and other nouns as determiners and attributes. Most noun modifiers agreed with the noun in gender, number and case. An adjective pattern could include adverbs, nouns or pronouns in one of the oblique cases(косвенный) with or without prepositions, and infinitives, e.g. him wæs manna þearf ‘he was in need of man’.

Verb patterns included a great variety of dependant components: nouns and pronouns in oblique cases with or without prepositions, adverbs, infinitives and participles, e.g. brinз þā þīnз ‘bring those things’.

"adjective + substantive (and "substantive + adjective"), "substantive + substantive"

hwales ban – whale’s bone

'pronoun + substantive' his hlaforde

numeral + substantive syx hund – 6 dogs

verb -+ adverb he thaer bad westanwindes there he waited for he western wind

adverb + adjective swithe god

44. Word Order through periods

The main Old English word-orders are these

Subject-Verb. Ēac swylċe ðā nȳtenu of eallum cynne and eallum fugolcynne cōmon tō Noe, intō ðām arce, swā swā God bebēad.

[Also the beasts of each species and (of) each species of bird came to Noah, into the ark, as God commanded.]

It is typical of independent clauses, though it also occurs frequently in subordinate clauses

The direct object, when it is a noun or noun phrase, will generally follow the verb

Old English has a tendency to place pronoun objects—direct and indirect—early in the clause. A pronoun object will usually come between the subject and the verb

If the clause has both a direct and an indirect object, and one of them is a pronoun, the pronoun will come first

Verb-Subject. Ðā cwæð Drihten tō Caine: “Hwǣr is Abel ðīn brōðor?” [Then the Lord said to Cain: “Where is Abel, your brother?”

This word-order is common in independent clauses introduced by the adverbs þā ‘then’, þonne ‘then’, þǣr ‘there’, þanon ‘thence’, þider ‘thither’, the negative adverb ne, and the conjunctions and/ond and ac ‘but’.

This word-order also occurs in independent clauses not introduced by an adverb or adverbial element

When the clause contains a direct object, it will usually follow the subject, but it may also come first in the clause.

The Verb-Subject word-order is also characteristic of questions, whether or not introduced by an interrogative word

Subject . . . Verb.

is commonly found in subordinate clauses and clauses introduced by and/ond or ac ‘but’, though it does sometimes occur in independent clauses. The subject comes at the beginning of the clause and the finite verb is delayed until the end (though it may be followed by an adverbial element such as a prepositional phrase).

Gode ofðūhte ðā ðæt hē mann ġeworhte ofer eorðan.

[Then it was a matter of regret to God that he had made man upon the earth.]

Middle English

The Middle English period was characterized by extensive, profound changes, changes that affected the English language in both grammar and vocabulary. The Norman Conquest and the conditions that followed from it resulted in some of them. At the beginning, early Middle English differed somewhat from its modern counterpart, but late Middle English was similar to Modern English in several aspects. The SVO pattern was a dominant order throughout the Middle English times, even though the SOV pattern also appeared in a decreasing manner during the Middle English period.

The SVO pattern occurred frequently in early and late Middle English, but the SOV order was also used much less frequently in that period of time. the base SOV pattern was turned into the surface main clause SVO pattern. However, many of the grammatical distinctions of Old English disappeared in the Middle English times, so Middle English became structurally much more like the language of the present time. that knyght smote down sir Trystramus frome hys horse that knight smote down sir Tristramus from his horse

Word Order of Modern English

English grammar in the early Modern English is marked more by the survival of certain forms and usages that have since disappeared than by any fundamental developments. The great changes that reduced the

inflections of Old English to their modern counterparts had already taken place . Modern English lost most of the inflections that had been used in the Old English times. In Modern English, the subject and the object do not have distinctive forms, nor do we have, except in the possessive case and in pronouns, inflectional endings to indicate the other relations marked by case endings in Latin. Lee (1993: 265-267) relates the loss of V2 movement to a weakening of agreement morphology, especially to the loss of plural endings of verbal inflection, which occurred approximately in 1400. Due to the great reduction of the inflections, Modern English came to depend heavily on fixed word order to indicate the distinctive grammatical relations.

early Modern English.

and amend things by rebellion to your utter undoing.

Applieth the Italian phrase to our English speaking.

He that delicately bringeth up his servant from a child shall have him become his son

late Modern English.

Then he himself uses it to the’r punishing.

Since she has gone to Mayfair they say she only frequentspartiesc.

If he had not come up as he did he would have had a Feaver

or Convulsions.