English testifies to a remarkable pattern of lexical gaps. In quite a few cases, particlestem nouns (e.g. the income) and adjectives (e.g. incoming) exist in the current language whereas their corresponding verbs (e.g. *to income) do not. Verbs with the opposite morpheme order (e.g. to come in) are, of course, attested. Since most relevant nouns and adjectives are derivatives of verbs, the word-class shift must either have entailed an inversion of the morphemes, or the verbs must have dropped out of the language. A diachronic analysis does indeed reveal that particle-stem verbs have a lower ‘life-expectancy’ than the corresponding nouns and adjectives. This difference is claimed to follow from differing degrees of compatibility between word classes and morpheme orders. The criterion of syntacticity shows particle-stem nouns and stem-particle verbs to be internally consistent but stem-particle nouns and particle-stem verbs to be inconsistent. This inconsistency gives rise to the observed historical instability of particle-stem verbs. While also disfavoured in this framework, the currency of stem-particle nouns (e.g. the handout) can be attributed to a conspiracy of several facilitatory effects which tend to override the arguments against this word type. The fact that linguistic units may fall into disuse necessitates certain revisions of the notion of optimality as the backbone of Optimality Theory.

Some English adjectives accept both synthetic and analytic comparative and superlative forms (e.g. thicker vs more thick, happiest vs most happy). As many as 20+ variables have been claimed to affect this choice (see Leech & Culpeper 1997; Lindquist 2000; Mondorf 2003, 2009). However, many studies consider one variable at a time without systematically controlling for other variables (i.e. they take a monofactorial approach). Further, very little research has been done on superlatives. Following Hilpert's (2008) multifactorial study, we investigate the simultaneous contribution of 17 variables towards comparative and superlative alternation and further measure the strength(s) of the predictors. On the whole, phonological predictors are much more important than syntactic and frequency-related predictors. The predictors of the number of syllables and final segments in <-y> consistently outrank other predictors in both models. Important differences have also been identified. Many syntactic variables, such as predicative position and presence of complements, are weak or non-significant in the comparative model but have stronger effects in the superlative model. Further, higher frequency of an adjective leads to a preference for the synthetic -er variant in comparatives but the analytic most variant in superlatives. The study shows that generalizations about comparatives do not straightforwardly carry over to superlatives.

This article investigates some functions of the determinative sum(e) in Old, Middle and Early Modern English. It traces, quantifies and models the diachronic development of sum(e) as a pre-head element from a usage-based, cognitive Construction Grammar perspective by postulating several semi-specified but also abstract constructional OE and ME NP-schemas and sketching the observable (changing) network (re)configurations. By analyzing texts from the Penn–Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Middle English (PPCME) and the Penn–Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Early Modern English (PPCEME), the article especially focuses on the demise of the so-called ‘individualizing’ usage with singular nouns and traces the incipient stages of sum(e) as an indefinite near-article with plural and mass nouns. R was used to calculate correlation coefficients and measures of statistical significance in univariate analyses, and for multivariate regression models to address questions involving more than one predictor variable. It is shown that the usage of sum(e) with singular nouns became marginalized because of constructional competition with the numeral ān. In Old English, the two forms were both occasionally used to mark indefiniteness before singular nouns, but ultimately ān became the default marker of indefiniteness ousting sum(e). We also show that that the usage of sum(e) as an indefiniteness marker for plural nouns increased drastically from the later ME period onwards, particularly in informal text genres. Moreover, from the earliest periods onwards, there is a strong preference for this function to occur with complex NPs with pre- and post-head modification, which seem to have acted as bridging contexts.

The topic of this article can be exemplified by the final clause of the following attested sentence: I don't know how he found out that she belonged to that lass, but find out he has. Clauses like this one show a preposed verb phrase that is headed by a plain verb whereas the non-preposed verb phrase of their canonical counterparts is obligatorily headed by a perfect participle (i.e. he has {found / *find} out). This peculiarity of verb phrase preposing, which will be referred to as the perfect participle paradox, has seldom been discussed. The article starts by showing that clauses that manifest the paradox are more frequent in the Corpus of Contemporary American English and in the British National Corpus than their non-paradoxical analogues with preposed canonical perfect participles. The article then looks at the paradox from the point of view of generative syntax, discusses and rejects previous analyses, and argues that a solution entails the rejection of two assumptions that have been associated with a lexicalist position, especially by proponents of distributed morphology. These are the assumptions that (a) a syntactic terminal is an item supplied by the lexicon and comprising a phonological representation and (b) that syntax may not manipulate the internal structure of syntactic terminals. The article proposes an analysis that is not based on these assumptions, but argues that the analysis does not entail the superiority of a distributed morphology framework.

Buchan Scots exhibits a unique phonological process in which mid vowels undergo raising that is triggered by both voiced consonants and stressed high vowels. The fact that the triggers of assimilation do not fall neatly into a single natural class under most feature theories makes it an interesting challenge to straightforward analysis. Given the phonological patterns and a variety of phonetic facts about Buchan, I propose a [Lowered Larynx] feature to explain both vowel height and consonant voicing in this language. I present an autosegmental analysis of the segment inventory and phonological patterns in the framework of the Parallel Structures Model of feature geometry (Morén 2003, 2006, 2007). This analysis provides a unified and minimal account of the assimilation facts and supports the claim that phonological activity is dependent on the structure of the contrast system of a given language (Dresher, Piggot & Rice 1994). Furthermore, the representational analysis fits neatly into a constraint-based model and contributes to the growing body of literature claiming that representations are important even to optimality-theoretic analyses.

This article traces processes of change affecting the concessive adposition notwithstanding in written American English from the early nineteenth century to the present. Data from the Corpus of Historical American English show that, first, there is a dramatic decline in the frequency of notwithstanding. Second, while notwithstanding as a conjunction or conjunct becomes nearly obsolete, its use as an adposition increases in relative frequency. These two developments are interpreted as specialisation in ongoing grammaticalisation, whereby the range of formal alternatives is reduced within the domain of concessive adpositions more generally and among uses of notwithstanding in particular. Third, the postposition becomes the most frequent syntactic variant in the twentieth century. The strengthening of the postposition coincides with two tendencies: (i) the respective phrases are placed in non-final sentence position, and (ii) the noun phrase complements in such constructions are extremely short. In consequence, NP complements of notwithstanding are maximally de-accentuated, being very short and far removed from the focus position. Structuring information in this way is not an option for other concessive connectives, and it is argued to be one of the factors resulting in the strengthening of postpositional notwithstanding in late modern and present-day American English.

In English, some complex words can display exceptional accent preservation (EAP): they can preserve an accent from their base even when this would violate a general restriction against adjacent accents (e.g. retúrn → retùrnée). This article analyses EAP both empirically and theoretically. The analysis of a set of 291 derivatives from Wells (2008) shows that this phenomenon can be partially attributed to the relative frequency of the base and its derivative and partially also to syllable structure, and that these two factors have a cumulative effect. It is also shown that the existence of a more deeply embedded base (e.g. colléct→ colléctive → còllectívity ~ collèctívity) can increase the likelihood for a derivative to display EAP. A formal account of the phenomenon is proposed building on Collie's (2007, 2008) ‘fake cyclicity’ analysis, using weighted constraints (Pater 2009, 2016) and Max-Ent-OT (Goldwater & Johnson 2003). Finally, a model of lexical access building on Hay's (2001, 2003) model and integrating more deeply embedded bases is proposed.

Present-day historians of English are widely agreed that, throughout its recorded history, the English language has absorbed linguistic influences from other languages, most notably Latin, Scandinavian, and French. What may give rise to differing views is the nature and extent of these influences, not the existence of them. Against the backdrop of this unanimity, it seems remarkable that there is one group of languages for which no such consensus exists, despite a close coexistence between English and these languages in the British Isles spanning more than one and a half millennia. This group is, of course, the Insular Celtic languages, comprising the Brittonic subgroup of Welsh and Cornish and the Goidelic one comprising Irish, Manx, and Scottish Gaelic. The standard wisdom, repeated in textbooks on the history of English such as Baugh and Cable (1993), Pyles & Algeo (1993), and Strang (1970), holds that contact influences from Celtic have always been minimal and are mainly limited to Celtic-origin place names and river names and a mere handful of other words. Thus, Baugh & Cable (1993: 85) state that ‘outside of place-names the influence of Celtic upon the English language is almost negligible’; in a similar vein, Strang (1970) writes that ‘the extensive influence of Celtic can only be traced in place-names’ (1970: 391).

In this article we offer a diachronic analysis of simultaneity subordinator as against the background of simultaneity subordinators while, whilst, when from 1650 to the end of the twentieth century. The present survey makes use of data extracted from the British English component of ARCHER (version 3.1), focusing in particular on fiction, the register par excellence for the use of simultaneity subordinators. We analyse our data according to a selection of parameters (ordering, verb type, duration, tense and aspect, subject identity, simultaneity type) and show that, against a background of relative stability, the major change is a dramatic increase in the frequency of simultaneity as-clauses from the first half of the nineteenth century onwards. Adapting the historical work on stylistic change by Biber and Finegan (1989, 1997), as well as theoretical and experimental accounts of the semantics of English simultaneity markers, we highlight an interesting parallelism between the spread of as-clauses in oral narrative from childhood to adulthood and the spread of as-clauses in modern fiction. In either case, the spread of as may be symptomatic of an evolution in narrative techniques, particularly in respect of the means by which complex events are typically represented.

A non-standard form of the definite article is used by upwards of a million speakers every day and yet it has received little attention in terms of a phonological analysis. The most recent discussions have been a historical and contemporary survey, spectrographic investigations and sociolinguistic surveys. It is clearly a complex issue and has relevance to a number of theoretical questions, some of which are rarely addressed. We need to know the range of phonetic forms; the phonological distribution of the forms; the historical development and whether this helps with a synchronic analysis; and the number and nature of the lexical storage forms. The distribution varies between localities and between speakers; many speakers also use standard English the. The historical development is not at all clear, but does throw some light on what the synchronic grammars should be like. There appears to be a break between those grammars in which the phonetic forms of the definite article are predictable in terms of the phonological environment and those later grammars that have lexically specific forms. The changes that have taken place cannot be explained in terms of simple system-internal mechanisms and some knowledge of the sociohistorical background to the emergence of the new grammars is necessary. This article looks at historical sources from the mid seventeenth century onwards to try to determine the changes that have taken place in the northern dialects concerned, and proposes population movements and expansion as a determining factor in the changes that are in evidence. One possible scenario in terms of new-dialect formation during the nineteenth century is suggested. For the modern variants polysystemic, declarative grammars are proposed, with the possibility of grammar-switching under certain circumstances, such as repair or interaction with outsiders.

Old English has traditionally been considered a period of linguistic homogeneity, since most available recorded texts are generally written in the West Saxon dialect. There are, however, isolated texts which have been ascribed to other varieties, in particular Northumbrian and Mercian. In fact, recent research on syntactic dialectology in early English (Kroch & Taylor 1997; Ogura 1999; Hogg 2004, 2006a; Ingham 2006) shows that linguistic variation has been present in the English language from the earliest times. This study reassesses the existence of variation in the syntax of texts belonging to different dialectal varieties in Old English, in particular in relative constructions. Based on an analysis of relative clauses in three versions of the Gospels from late Old English, representing West Saxon, Northumbrian and Mercian dialects, we will observe differences in the texts, regarding both the paradigm of relativizers and the position adopted by the relative clause within the main clause. I relate these differences to the existence of linguistic differences in northern and southern dialects.

The article discusses the grammaticalization of the be + V-ende/V-ing periphrasis as a progressive marker. On the basis of quantitative data, it is claimed that the periphrasis started out as an emphatic alternative to the simple tenses. Its length, unusualness and optionality made it well suited as an emphatic marker. In the Early Modern English period (c. 1500–1700), the periphrasis was reinterpreted as an emphatic progressive marker. The prototypical – so-called focalized – use of the construction gradually became obligatory (from the nineteenth century onwards). This caused the focalized use of the periphrasis to lose its emphasis, while the so-called durative use of the construction has remained optional and emphatic to this day, like the subjective uses of the periphrasis. The article also explores the question of influence from Latin on the periphrasis in the Old English period (i.e. up to c. 1100), concluding that any such influence is likely to have consisted in a reinforcing effect.

The development of low vowels in the history of English is one which shows continuous movement, usually upwards along earlier back and later front trajectories. In addition, low vowels have been subject to lengthening processes which have compensated for the loss of earlier instances of long low vowels. Shifts along a horizontal axis, from low front to low back, can also be discerned throughout the history of English. The present study begins by examining the situation in late eighteenth-century English, using the Eighteenth-Century English Phonology Database and the works of various prescriptivist writers, to determine the outset for later developments in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. It also scrutinises realisations of low vowels in these varieties in order to offer a possible chronology for the overall development of low vowels in the past two centuries.

Which normally transitive verbs can omit their objects in English (I ate), and why? This article explores three factors suggested to facilitate object omission: (i) how strongly a verb selects its object (Resnik 1993); (ii) a verb's frequency (Goldberg 2005); (iii) the extent to which the verb is associated with a routine – a recognized, conventional series of actions within a community (Lambrecht & Lemoine 2005; Ruppenhofer & Michaelis 2010; Levin & Rapaport Hovav 2014; Martí 2010, 2015). To operationalize (iii), this article compares the writings of different communities to offer corpus and experimental evidence that verbs omit their objects more readily in the communities in which they are more strongly associated with a routine. More broadly, the article explores how the meaning and syntactic potential of verbs are shaped by the practices of the people who use them.

Recent years have seen a spate of publications that attempt to recontextualise the history of English in contact-linguistic (Miller 2012; Lutz 2013; Durkin 2014) and sociolinguistic terms (Millar 2012), and conversely to confront previous descriptions of contact phenomena with new data and theoretical insights available from situations of language shift and substratum influence (Filppula, Klemola & Paulasto 2008; Vennemann 2011), extensive bilingualism (Schendl & Wright 2011), language acquisition (Ingham 2012) and contact-induced grammaticalisation (Timofeeva 2010). Coupled with advances in our understanding of contact- and acquisition-induced language change (Heine & Kuteva 2005; Jarvis & Pavlenko 2008), and of the role of contact in the varieties of English around the world (Schreier & Hundt 2013), there is a clear need in this area of historical research for scholars to reinvestigate earlier stages of English as a contact language.

Some nonmodal tense forms (e.g. thought) can trigger one or two kinds of modal interpretation, viz. suspended factuality (implicating present counterfactuality) of the complement clause (I thought you weren't married) or discourse tentativeness (I thought you might lend me your camera). The authors explain how this nonmodal use of the past tense – the thinking is represented as a past fact – can lead to one of these modal interpretations of the complement clause. In doing so they discuss various observations in connection with these and other I thought that…constructions and similar uses of other past-tense and past-perfect forms.

This article presents a diachronic corpus-based study of the distribution of mandative that- and to-clauses complementing deontic adjectival matrices in the extraposition construction, as in It is essential to work upwards from easier workloads (CB). It shows that the to-infinitive encroaches on the that-clause from Early Middle English onwards and comes to predominate in Late Middle English. It thus adduces evidence for Los's (2005) account of the rise of the to-infinitive as verbal complement: against the generally held view that the to-infinitive replaced the bare infinitive, Los (2005) shows that it spread at the expense of the subjunctive that-clause in Middle English, e.g. after intention verbs and manipulative verbs. After considering various factors such as the distribution of the to-infinitive in the adjectival complementation system, the tense of the matrix of the adjectival constructions and the Anglo-Saxon versus Romance origin of the adjectives, I conclude that the rise of the to-infinitive with adjectival matrices in Middle English has to be explained by analogy between verbal and adjectival mandative constructions. In addition, this study shows that – unlike with the verbal constructions – the to-infinitive with adjectival matrices stabilizes at roughly a 3:1 ratio to the that-clause from Early Modern English onwards. For these later periods, finally, it is proposed that the clausal variation may be motivated by lexical determination, discourse factors such as information structure, and stylistic preferences.

The present article studies the linear order of main and temporal adverbial clauses in the Diary of Samuel Pepys (1660–1669). In the development of a framework that combines cognitive and historical data, processing principles identified for Present-day English (e.g. Prideaux 1989; Diessel 2008) are tested for this ego-document from the seventeenth century. The factors investigated are the iconic temporal order of both clauses, the length of the adverbial clause and the implied meaning of the clauses. Moreover, the discourse function of the respective clauses will be discussed. On the basis of the Uniformitarian Principle, the present study assumes that processing principles that are valid for Present-day English predict the position of the clause in past language stages to a similar extent.

In this article, I discuss vowel reduction, stress, and vowel harmony in Buchan Scots English, a dialect spoken in Aberdeenshire in northern Scotland. Work by Wölck (1965) describes Buchan Scots English as having vowel harmony. This article explores the conditions that restrict the distribution of vowels in those syllables that do not receive a primary stress. Such syllables allow a smaller range of contrasts, and vowel height in these syllables is at least partially predictable from a preceding stressed vowel. These facts show that both vowel reduction and vowel harmony operate in Buchan Scots English.

This article contributes to continuing work on the information structural function of passivization, and how quantitative changes in the implementation of a syntactic strategy may be tied in with the acquisition or loss of comparable strategies. Seoane (2006) outlines a proposal that suggests that the passive construction is used more extensively in English than in the other Germanic languages in order to compensate for the lack of unmarked object topicalization found in languages with verb-seconding (V2). We reconsider this hypothesis from a quantitative perspective and find that, upon further examination, the claim does not hold.

We compare parallel New Testament translations along two dimensions: one set across three stages of historical English, and one set across three Germanic languages. We find that the reported change in the rate of passivization between stages of English, and between English and other Germanic languages, is in fact not directly related to the presence or absence of a V2 grammar, but rather due to the availability (or absence) of different strategies of forming impersonal clauses.

The current article focuses in more detail on one of the findings of an ongoing study into phenomena linked to the change in passivization in English. While the New Testament translations provide evidence that the overall rate of passivization remains stable across the history of English in one context, we find, in contrast, a significant difference in the rate of passivization between three translations of the Rule of St Benedict. These translations represent an Old English (OE) translation and two Middle English (ME) translations: one Northern, and one Southern. The data reveal a dialect distinction in ME: the Northern translation passivizes at a significantly lower rate.

Unlike the New Testament, which is primarily a narrative, the Rule of St Benedict text is written as a set of instructions, and passivization is primarily a strategy for expressing clauses in which no agent can be specified. We find that where the Southern translation of the Rule of St Benedict uses a passive, the Northern translation frequently expresses the same content via an active clause with impersonal man in the subject position. While clauses with impersonal man can be found in both the Northern ME and OE translations of this text, it is wholly absent from the Southern ME translation.

This reveals a dialect difference in the ME period: the Southern dialect appears to entirely lack a historically attested strategy for forming impersonal clauses. This, in turn, becomes one factor leading to a rise in the rate of passivization, as passive clauses are used to compensate for the missing strategy.