Constructions and Environments: Copular, Passive, and Related Constructions in Old and Middle English (Oxford Studies in the History of English)

Synopsis

This Monograph Presents The First Comprehensive Diachronic Account Of Copular And Passive Verb Constructions In Old And Middle English. Loss Of The High-frequency Verb Weorðan 'become' Is Explained As A Result Of Changing Word Order In Narrative During Middle English. The Merger Of Is 'is' And Bið 'shall Be, Is Generally' Into A Single Suppletive Verb Is Related To The Development Of A General Analytic Future Shall Benally, The Co-occurrence Of Multiple Changes Led To Become And Wax Crossing A Threshold Of Similarity With Existing Copulas, From Which They Analogically Adopted Full Productivity. Environmental Linguistics -- In Dialogue With Previous Studies -- Theory And Method -- The Past Tense -- The Present Tense -- Copularization Of Becume And Weaxe -- Evaluation Of The Results. Peter Petré. Includes Bibliographical References And Index.