Overview

Based on four historical corpora, the book is a comprehensive study of the demise of five preterite-present verbs in English. It offers a detailed description of their distribution in Old and Middle English. The subsequent comparison of the forms and uses of the preterite-presents in the two periods allows the author to suggest the reasons for their elimination from the language. The discussion focuses on phonological and morphological changes the verbs underwent as well as on the syntactic structures they appeared in. Yet, the study does not ignore factors of extra-linguistic nature such as genres in which the verbs were frequently found and the potential rivalry with other items of native and foreign origin.

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9783631729502

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Anna Wojtyś is Assistant Professor at the Institute of English Studies, University of Warsaw. Her research interests focus on the history of English. She is the author of numerous articles, mainly on historical morphology, and a monograph on the past participle marking in mediaeval English.

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