3.2.1 Loss of Word Order Flexibility and Emergence of Non-Canonical Patterns

According to Haeberli (Reference Haeberli2018), loss of OV (or V-final) begins in the OE period and reaches completion during the Middle English (ME) period (see also Rissanen Reference Rissanen and Lass1999). Initially, this strengthens V2 word order in late OE and early ME, particularly in areas with language contact between OE and Old Norse (Haeberli Reference Haeberli2018). Loss of V2 then begins in the fifteenth century and reaches (near) completion by the seventeenth century (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen1997; Fischer & van der Wurff Reference Fischer, van der Wurff, Hogg and Denison2006: 185). Remnants of OV can be found in Early Modern English (EModE) and remnants of V2 into Late Modern English (LModE), as examples (9) and (10) show.Footnote ⁷

PDE also allows for V2 word order, but such instances are clearly non-canonical. Hawkins (Reference Hawkins1986) provides examples of V2 in negative contexts (as in (11)), following so (in (12)), and with directional adverbs or locatives, illustrated in (13) and (14), respectively (subjects and verbs in italics; emphasis added).

1. 1. a. Never have I been so insulted.

   2. b. Under no circumstances can I permit it.

1. 1. a He can drive a car, and so can I.

   2. b. So be it.

   3. c. So slowly did the workmen get on with their work that they were dismissed.

While the chronology of the major change in word order type is relatively uncontested, the factors that contributed to it and that allow us to explain this fundamental typological change in the history of English are more varied and have been put forward within different theoretical frameworks. We will look at them in the next subsection.

With the flexibility of simply promoting almost any constituent to sentence-initial position in OE having been lost, the language had to develop patterns that would allow for discourse-pragmatic requirements to be met. Already existing constructions that allowed non-prototypical subjects, namely incipient be-passives, fully grammaticalised and increased in frequency (see Seoane Reference Seoane, van Kemenade and Los2006). In addition, English developed non-canonical syntactic patterns that allowed for topicalisation of already ‘given’ referents, which previously would simply occur in sentence-initial position. These include prepositional and get-passives (as in (15)), it-clefts (illustrated in (16)), extraposition (see example (8) above), and – if word order is taken to include the mapping of semantic roles onto syntactic function – patterns with non-canonical subjects, notably middles and secondary subject constructions, illustrated in (17) and (18), respectively.

1. 1. a. This problem has already been taken care of.

   2. b. The train got cancelled.

1. 1. a. It was surely a novel, high-performance ChatBot that insulted him in this genius way.

   2. b. It is with sincere regret that we have to inform you of the cancellation of the scheme.

1. 1. a. She scares easily.

   2. b. The book reads well.

   3. c. The straps on the backpack adjust for a comfortable fit.

As Hawkins (Reference Hawkins1986, Reference Hawkins, Nevalainen and Traugott2012) has pointed out, a concomitant change to a rigid SVO word order in English is an increase in the semantic diversity of the S‑slot. In other words, verbs have fewer selection restrictions and broader subcategorisation frames; in addition, English became more flexible with respect to raising and movement constructions. Thus, in the change from a loose-fit (discourse-oriented) to a tight-fit (syntax-oriented) language, English subjects became more semantically diverse: The middles in (17), for instance, have experiencer and patient subjects with no marking for voice on the verb. The flexibility of English middles goes beyond these two semantic roles and even allows for locative subjects as in (19).

1. 1. a. The new trails in the park cycle smoothly, even for beginners.

   2. b. The moonlight pond fishes well in the early morning.

These examples illustrate well how ‘a language that changes its lexical verb position, from SOV to SVO (like English), can see earlier requirements for predicate frame differentiation and argument differentiation weakened or overridden’, as Hawkins (Reference Hawkins, Nevalainen and Traugott2012: 629) points out.

3.2.2 Theoretical Approaches to Word Order Changes

A relatively common explanation for the loss of the more flexible word order and a shift towards SVO makes a connection between loss of case marking and word order, claiming that in the absence of morphological marking for syntactic function, the development of fixed syntactic slots was a way to avoid ambiguities and ensure communication; in other words, the typological shift was a means to compensate for loss of morphological links (e.g., Vennemann Reference Vennemann and Li1975). Since this account makes a connection between the requirements of processing and fixed order, change is seen as occurring in language use, which is a functionalist explanation. The complementary theoretical perspective conceives of word order changes to occur during acquisition and as a result of shifting frequencies in the input. Change, in this view, is seen as occurring in I-language, with parameters of Universal Grammar (UG) being set differently from one generation to the next. This traditionally falls under the umbrella of a ‘formal’ (or generative) approach to change (even though much of the original formalism in generative grammar has been given up).

Fischer and van der Wurff are critical of the view that communication and successful processing rely on morphological marking or fixed word order, pointing to the role of context:

Levshina (Reference Levshina2022) does not deny the possibility of a connection between word order and morphological complexity. However, the existing research (e.g., Koplenig et al. Reference Koplenig, Meyer, Wolfer and Müller-Spitzer2017) that she cites indicates that the causal effect is from fixed word order to loss of inflections rather than in the other direction, or in her words, ‘rigid word order helps to lose distinct forms’ (Levshina Reference Levshina2022: 143). This is, by the way, a point that had already been made by Jespersen at the end of the nineteenth century (Jespersen Reference Jespersen1894: §75): ‘a fixed word order was the prius, or cause, and grammatical simplification, the posterus, or effect’.

Some generative linguists conceive of V2 as a result of movement (from OV to V2 in main clauses: V-to-C movement); with loss of verbal inflection the verb no longer moves to V2 (see, e.g., Fischer et al. Reference Fischer, van Kemenade, Koopman and van der Wurff2000: 135–6). The problem with this account is that loss of inflection in the verb does not necessarily lead to a loss in the flexibility of word order, as the case of Dutch illustrates (Fischer et al. Reference Fischer, van Kemenade, Koopman and van der Wurff2000). In another generative account, OE pronominal subjects are analysed as clitics. According to this approach, de-cliticisation of the pronominal subjects increased SVO in the input and thus brought about the change in the basic word order pattern that children acquired (Lightfoot Reference Lightfoot1999; Taylor & Pintzuk Reference Taylor, Pintzuk, Nevalainen and Traugott2012). In other words, this account assumes that competition was between two different types of grammar (OV and VO). This ‘double base hypothesis’ (Hinterhölzl Reference Hinterhölzl, Los and de Haan2017) can find an answer within the generative framework via change in the input to first language acquisition. There is a problem for the competing grammars account, however, in that variable use often continues for much longer than catastrophic change scenarios allow for: a case in point would be the fact that OV after auxiliary continues to be found into EModE and V2 is occasionally attested beyond the 1700s. Biberauer and Roberts have countered the criticism that has been voiced against catastrophic change scenarios:

Biberauer and Roberts (Reference Biberauer, Roberts, Ledgeway and Roberts2017: 139) also acknowledge that variation between conservative and innovative patterns can also be observed in texts produced by the same individual, who would then, theoretically, have to have access to competing grammars. They therefore settle on an emergentist approach to parameter setting (see below).

A more sociolinguistic angle is provided by linguists who see language contact with Old Norse and (imperfect) large-scale second language acquisition (or disrupted transmission) as the driving factors that not only led to simplification and the loss of inflections but subsequently also to a more fixed word order (see Weerman Reference Weerman1993). McWhorter (Reference McWhorter2002: 266) summarises this factor in the following way: ‘The English timeline was decisively influenced by what Trudgill (2001) has termed, in apt and savory fashion, “the lousy language-learning abilities of the human adult”’. That sociolinguistic factors may affect syntactic change, particularly with respect to the use of non-canonical patterns, is discussed in more detail by Lange (Chapter 5 in this volume).

Sometimes different theoretical accounts overlap in the cause they see behind the shift in word order type. In his largely functional account, Rissanen (Reference Rissanen and Lass1999: 265) makes a connection between the (late) grammaticalisation of the article and the development of a more fixed word order (again, to compensate for loss of morphological marking). Hinterhölzl (Reference Hinterhölzl, Los and de Haan2017) also sees a connection with the development of the article at the end of the OE period and the loss of word order flexibility; from within a generative framework, he provides a more detailed explanation claiming that

In this analysis (Hinterhölzl Reference Hinterhölzl, Los and de Haan2017: 26), OE has a VO-base and variable spell-out influenced by prosody and pragmatics, with the determiner influencing the weight of the noun phrase: ‘Definite DPs will count as prosodically heavy as soon as the definite determiner is fully grammaticalized and reanalyzed as the head of the DP’. Bastiani (Reference Bastiani, Los, Cowie, Honeybone and Trousdale2022) shows that these forces are also at work in early ME.

As pointed out above, generative accounts traditionally view syntactic change occurring from one generation to the next as part of a change in the input and subsequent changes to the grammar that the next generation of speakers acquires. Usage-based accounts such as grammaticalisation theory and usage-based construction grammar conceive of change as emerging incrementally via small changes in patterns and pattern frequencies. More recent generative accounts call for an emergentist view of syntactic change, too:

In other words, theoretical accounts of language change (including word order change) appear to be converging. This also applies to methodological approaches in the field (see Section 3.2.2).

Construction grammar conceives of constructions as ‘conventional, learned form–function pairings at varying levels of complexity and abstraction’ (Goldberg Reference Goldberg, Hoffmann and Trousdale2013: 17). An important difference between this approach to language and generative accounts is that form and meaning are not separate components or modules but intricately linked in the speaker’s grammar or ‘construct-i-con’. The representation of English possessive constructions in Figure 3.1 provides an illustration of the different levels of abstraction or schematicity (first introduced by Trousdale Reference Trousdale2008: 107) that construction grammarians have come to assume.

Figure 3.1 A construction grammar view of levels of abstraction

(after Hundt Reference Hundt, López-Couso, Méndez-Naya, Núñez-Pertejo and Palacios-Martínez2016: 237; reprinted by permission from Brill)

Figure 3.1Long description

There are four sections in the model: from macro-level, meso-level, micro-level, to construct. Each level is explained on the right in a box. The levels and the explanations are as follows:

• Macro-level: Predicative construction: subject-copula-subject-predicate

• Meso-level: P C 1 to P C 2 to P C 3

• Micro-level: X Copula, the or a, N P, professor of subject, at place

• Construction: She is emeritus professor of linguistics at M I T.

Interestingly, these can now also be found in emergentist approaches to parameter setting from within the generative paradigm. Biberauer and Roberts (Reference Biberauer, Roberts, Ledgeway and Roberts2017: 149) distinguish

• macroparameters (all heads of a relevant type);

• mesoparameters (all heads of a natural class, e.g., V);

• microparameters (small, lexically definable subclass of functional heads, e.g., modal auxiliaries, subject clitics); and

• nanoparameters (one or more individual lexical items).

An important difference with the constructionist approach lies in the fact that the different levels of schematicity or abstraction are not limited to the phrasal level but may be found in other areas of the construct-i-con, for instance the transitive schema at the most abstract level, which allows for less abstract (mono- and ditransitive) constructions at a meso-level, benefactive constructions at a micro level, and lexically filled constructs at the lowest level of abstraction.

Kuningas and Leino (Reference Kuningas, Leino, Suominen, Arppe, Airola and Heinämäki2006) claim that construction grammar is particularly suited to the modelling of word order because it makes the link between form and meaning, including discourse-pragmatic requirements. Despite this, research providing more of a bird’s-eye perspective by aiming to account for the typological shift in English from a loose- to a more tight-fit language was a blind spot in diachronic construction grammar for a very long time. This most likely had to do with the fact that construction grammar was initially somewhat biased towards more idiomatic constructions. An early example of diachronic research into English constructions looks at the emergence of the way-construction (Israel Reference Israel and Goldberg1996) and how the range of verbs that enter the construction develops across time. Hilpert (Reference Hilpert2013), one of the first book-length approaches to English diachronic syntax from a constructionist perspective, has a chapter on ‘information packaging constructions’. However, this provides the basics of what information structure is and lists a number of constructions that serve the reordering of arguments (cleft constructions, dislocation, extraposition) rather than giving a formal account of how they could be modelled in a constructionist account.

Word order changes started to be modelled within constructionist approaches below the constituent level. Cappelle (Reference Cappelle2006) and Perek (Reference Perek2012) assume that at a relatively high level of abstraction, the nodes in the construct-i-con may be underspecified constructemes which, at a lower level of abstraction, would allow for allostruction and thus word order variation, for example in particle placement in particle verbs (she took her hat off vs. she took off her hat). Zehentner (Reference Zehentner2019) applies this notion in her diachronic study of the dative alternation, where a ditransitive constructeme would allow for two allostructions: the direct object construction, as in He gave her the book, and the prepositional object construction, as in He gave the book to the first girl he met that day.

Another factor for the relative paucity of word order as object of study in construction grammar approaches may have been that early constructionist research focused on vertical relations, and Figure 3.1 is an example of this emphasis. The notion of allostructions already shifted this emphasis towards horizontal links, as alternating constructions were conceived of as being linked on this level. This was then brought to bear on diachronic construction grammar more systematically (Sommerer & Smirnova Reference Sommerer and Smirnova2020). Horizontal or ‘lateral’ relations take centre stage in the modelling of OV to VO change that Bloom (Reference Bloom2021) provides. She makes a connection between subject relative clauses and main clauses in her study; the notion of syntactic slots that can be variably filled is another concept characteristic of a constructionist approach:

Similarity relations (or ‘analogy’) thus are seen as an important driving force in a major typological shift in English.

The development of the novel syntactic patterns that emerged to compensate for the loss of flexibility in positioning elements in sentence-initial position (see Section 3.2.1) have also been studied from within different theoretical approaches, notably generative grammar (e.g., Los & Dreschler Reference Los, Dreschler, Nevalainen and Traugott2012; Los & Komen Reference Los, Komen, Nevalainen and Traugott2012; Los & van Kemenade Reference Kemenade, Nevalainen and Traugott2012; Dreschler Reference Dreschler2015, Reference Dreschler2020), grammaticalisation theory (e.g., Sun & Traugott Reference Sun, Traugott, Narrog and Heine2011), and diachronic construction grammar (e.g., Hundt Reference Hundt2007).

3.2.3 Methodological Approaches to Word Order Change

Research on word order change in English used to be largely qualitative. With the advent of computer corpora, more quantitative approaches became possible, which were initially pursued by linguists working within the functional paradigm (e.g., Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen1997). Usage-based construction grammar, especially research within the frequentist strand, has regularly relied on quantitative corpus data and statistical modelling. Again, Bloom (Reference Bloom2021) is a good example of this approach being applied to word order change. More recently, generative studies have also increasingly used quantitative methods (e.g., Komen et al. Reference Komen, Hebing, van Kemenade, Los, Bech and Eide2014), including multivariate statistical modelling, to substantiate their claims. A good example is the study by Struik and van Kemenade (Reference Struik and van Kemenade2020), who use data from The York-Toronto-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Old English Prose (YCOE) and regression modelling to validate the claim that changes in word order and aspects of information structure are connected:Footnote ⁸

In a similar vein, García García (Reference García García2023) is able to show that a connection exists between the development away from a relatively flexible, discourse-oriented syntax and the increase of labile verbs (i.e., those allowing alternation between transitive and intransitive construal).

4.2.1 Full-verb Inversion in PDE

Full-verb inversion in PDE involves inversion of the subject and the full verb phrase. It is distinct from inversion that only involves the auxiliary, such as in yes/no-questions and wh-questions, and after certain negative or focusing initial constituents including (not) only, so, thus (Huddleston & Pullum Reference Huddleston and Pullum2002: 94–7). It is known under various names, including ‘locative inversion’ (e.g., Bresnan Reference Bresnan1994; Hoekstra & Mulder Reference Hoekstra and René1990; Broekhuis Reference Broekhuis2005), ‘inversion’ (Birner & Ward Reference Birner and Ward1998), ‘subject-dependent inversion’ (Huddleston & Pullum Reference Huddleston and Pullum2002), and ‘full-verb inversion’ or ‘full inversion’ (Chen Reference Chen2003; Biber et al. Reference Biber, Johansson, Leech, Conrad and Finegan2021). To include all relevant instances in PDE, not just those starting with a locative PP, and to distinguish between different types of inversion in earlier stages of English, I will use the term ‘PDE full-verb inversion’.

PDE full-verb inversion is often referred to as ‘locative inversion’ because it is especially common after PPs indicating a location, although this observation does not account for all examples. In Birner and Ward’s (Reference Birner and Ward1998) corpus study, the majority of the 1,778 examples involve PPs in initial position (72%), followed by verb phrases (16%) and adjective phrases (6%). Bresnan (Reference Bresnan1994) accounts for non-PP examples by proposing that even in those examples, there is some sense or indication of either location or direction, as in (4), where crashing through indicates movement.

However, in the absence of systematic corpus studies, it is unclear whether this explanation holds for all non-PP examples. Indeed, Huddleston and Pullum (Reference Huddleston and Pullum2002) describe the occurrence of a sentence-initial locative PP as one condition for full-verb inversion, but list a separate condition for non-locative initial elements, which is that the initial element should contain a strong discourse-link, as in (5).

The initial element Adorning the first one in the second sentence is inferable from the description in the first sentence.

A second syntactic characteristic is that locative inversion overwhelmingly occurs with to be, intransitive verbs (more specifically unaccusative verbs), and passivised transitive verbs. To be-inversion is treated as a distinct category by some authors, with Birner and Ward (Reference Birner and Ward1998) arguing that it is less restricted both semantically and syntactically, while Chen (Reference Chen2003) argues it is the prototypical type and other verbs represent an extension. Birner and Ward (Reference Birner and Ward1998) focus on the information value, rather than the argument structure, of the non-be verbs, proposing that the verb needs to be predictable from the context. Unaccusative and passivised transitive verbs, in turn, are usually grouped together based on their argument structure: as Levin and Rappoport Hovav (Reference Levin and Hovav1995: 215) explain, these verbs lack an underlying subject with the role of agent. Yet examples of other verbs involved in full-verb inversion do exist, as in (6), which has an unergative intransitive verb (i.e., it does have an agent subject).

However, exceptions seem to be few: Birner and Ward’s (Reference Birner and Ward1998) corpus study contains only two transitive examples.

The final defining characteristic of PDE full-verb inversion is its pragmatic function, which has been described in many different ways. Birner and Ward (Reference Birner and Ward1998) propose that full-verb inversion is governed by a relative information-structural constraint: in order for the sentence to be felicitous, the preposed element needs to be older than the postposed element (78.2% of their 1,778 examples) or equal in information status (10.7% old–old; 11.1% new–new). Birner and Ward (Reference Birner and Ward1998) specifically phrase their constraint in terms of occurrence in the text (discourse-oldness) rather than familiarity based on world knowledge (hearer-oldness). They also briefly address the factor of definiteness and find that the majority of preposed elements are definite, but postposed constituents are equally as often definite as indefinite, which they explain by pointing out that definiteness only indirectly relates to information status. Birner and Ward’s (Reference Birner and Ward1998) relative information constraint is compatible with an earlier proposal by Bolinger (Reference Bolinger1977), who defined the function of inversion as ‘present[ing] something on the immediate stage’ (Reference Bolinger1977: 93–4). Chen (Reference Chen2003), in turn, defines full-verb inversion as a construction that allows for placing the ground before the figure, going against the standard English order of figure-before-ground. Although the details of these accounts differ, they share the basic notion that the reversal of subject and verb achieves a certain pragmatic effect associated with ‘positioning’ the last element with respect to the first.

4.2.2 Inversion Patterns in OE and ME

OE word order is notoriously variable. With respect to the position of the subject, most attention has gone to identifying the regularities and variation within the V2 system (following van Kemenade’s initial analysis, Reference Kemenade1987), a syntactic organisation of the main clause which involves inversion of subject and finite verb in main clauses that start with a phrase (an unspecified XP) that is not the subject. While in modern V2 languages such as German and Dutch, the finite verb is always in second position in the main clause, whatever the first constituent, V2 in OE is less systematic (for an overview, see Fischer et al. Reference Fischer, van Kemenade, Koopman and van der Wurff2000). Two contexts are regular: pronominal subjects are almost never inverted, while certain clause-initial elements always trigger inversion, most notably þa and þonne (both meaning ‘then’). It is the remaining contexts – nominal subjects in declarative main clauses which start with an XP other than þa and þonne (most frequently adverbs, PPs, and objects) – that show variation between V2 with inverted subjects, as in (7), and V3 with uninverted subjects, as in (8).

In (7), the subject se bisceop follows the finite verb moste, whereas in (8) the subject þæt lond precedes the finite verb wearð. Information structure has been invoked as a guiding principle for the variation in OE and ME, following observations that preverbal V3 subjects tend to be given and postverbal V2 subjects tend to be new (e.g., Bech Reference Bech2001; Hinterhölzl & Petrova Reference Hinterhölzl and Petrova2010; Biberauer & van Kemenade Reference Biberauer and van Kemenade2011). The variation between V2 and V3 continues to exist until near the end of the ME period, with the loss of V2 usually dated as taking place in the fifteenth century (e.g., Fischer et al. Reference Fischer, van Kemenade, Koopman and van der Wurff2000; Haeberli Reference Haeberli, Jan-Wouter Zwart and Abraham2002; van Kemenade Reference Kemenade, Nevalainen and Traugott2012), although there is considerable variation between contexts, such as the type of verb and type of initial elements.

In addition to the V2/V3-variation in OE and ME, late subjects have been identified as a third subject position and seem to represent a distinct phenomenon. Warner (Reference Warner2007) is the first to use the term ‘late subject’, although the pattern was also described by others before him (van Kemenade Reference Kemenade, van Kemenade and Vincent1997; Haeberli Reference Haeberli1999, Reference Haeberli, Pintzuk, Tsoulas and Warner2001; Bech Reference Bech2001). The late subjects in Warner’s database of OE and ME examples do not only follow the finite verb, as in V2 inversion, but also a non-finite verb or a verbal complement (i.e., they represent full-verb inversion).

Warner (Reference Warner2007) analyses the verb and subject properties of late subject examples and finds that unaccusative and passive verbs with an indefinite subject favour the late subject position, just as subjects longer than four words do, where he takes indefiniteness and length as proxies for discourse-newness. Biberauer and van Kemenade (Reference Biberauer and van Kemenade2011) predict that late subjects are information-structurally new but do not provide corpus data. Testing Biberauer and van Kemenade’s (Reference Biberauer and van Kemenade2011) prediction for OE, Dreschler (Reference Dreschler, Los and de Haan2017) analyses the information status of 121 late subjects in passive main clauses. Her results show that most late subjects are not hearer-new, but are indeed discourse-new. In addition, analysis of a larger database consisting of all main clauses with passive verbs confirms Warner’s (Reference Warner2007) findings regarding definiteness and length: late subjects are generally long, and definite subjects are slightly less likely to occur in the late subject position. Finally, Dreschler (Reference Dreschler, Los and de Haan2017) shows that the initial elements that trigger V2 inversion do not seem to influence late subject placement, which suggests that late subjects are indeed a phenomenon distinct from V2 inversion.

4.2.3 Interim Summary

Both PDE and OE/ME full-verb inversion (i.e., late subjects) are characterised by the subject occurring after the full verb phrase in clauses with unaccusative verbs and passivised transitive verbs. The two phenomena also seem to share an information-structural function: both PDE and OE/ME full-verb inversion are subject to a relative information-ordering constraint in terms of discourse-familiarity, as demonstrated by Birner and Ward (Reference Birner and Ward1998) for PDE, Dreschler (Reference Dreschler, Los and de Haan2017) for OE, and Warner (Reference Warner2007) for ME. There are also some differences. PDE full-verb inversion is closely associated with clause-initial locative PPs, while no such specific association with clause-initial elements has been demonstrated for OE/ME. Most importantly, however, full-verb inversion occurs as one of only few inversion options in PDE, while various other inversion patterns exist in OE and ME, which may also serve a similar information-structural function. Overall, full-verb inversion seems to be more specialised in PDE than in OE/ME, both in terms of the verbs and initial elements and in terms of the clearly defined information-structural function.

While both syntactic and discourse-related factors have been analysed for OE/ME and PDE, no such studies exist for the intermediate periods, and the OE/ME and PDE data are based on different types of corpora, methods, and theoretical analyses. In the remainder of this chapter, I provide an overview of syntactic properties of full-verb inversion in all periods using a consistent methodology, in order to answer the question whether PDE full-verb inversion represents the emergence or continuation of a non-canonical word order. In addition, I will add to the existing research by analysing certain factors (type of verb, definiteness and length of subject) for those periods where no such data are yet available.

4.4.1 General Overview

Figure 4.1 and Table 4.1 present the relative frequencies of the five subject positions in all four corpora, using the abbreviations and subperiods as defined in the corpora, with ‘O’ referring to OE, ‘M’ to ME, ‘E’ to Early Modern English, and ‘B’ to Modern British English. The preverbal subjects (XSV and XSVV) have been combined.

Figure 4.1 Distribution of subject positions in the four corpora of historical English

Figure 4.1Long description

The vertical axis marks percentage, ranging from 0 to 100, in increments of 10. The horizontal axis marks the subject positions as O 1, O 2, O 3, O 4, M 1, M 2, M 3, M 4, E 1, E 2, E 3, B 1, B 2, B 3, and B 4. Five different line styles are marked on the graph. The line styles are as follows:

• Solid line with dot – X S V V

• Solid line with solid square – X V S V

• Line with triangle – X V S

• Line with empty square – X V x S

• Line with star – X V V S

The trends observed in the line styles are as follows:

• The X V S line starts at 60% and drops to 39%, which again rises to 51% and then gradually declines to 8%.

• The X S V V line starts at 40%, gradually declines to 25%, and then rises to 90% with fluctuations in between.

• The X V S V, X V x S, and X V V S lines start from 0% rises and then show a gradual decrease, and again subside to 0%.

Table 4.1Subject positions in the four corpora of historical English

Table 4.1Long description

The table displays the distribution of subject positions in four historical English corpora across 14 periods, from 450–800 to 1840–1914. The periods are labeled O 1, O 2, O 3, O 4, M 1, M 2, M 3, M 4, E 1, E 2, E 3, B 1, B 2, and B 3. The periods are 450 to 800, 850 to 950, 950 to 1050, 1050 to 1150, 1150 to 1250, 1250 to 1350, 1350 to 1420, 1420 to 1500, 1500 to 1569, 1570 to 1639, 1640 to 1710, 1700 to 1769, 1770 to 1839, 1840 to 1914. The periods are grouped into historical ranges, illustrating the linguistic evolution over time. The data from left to right is filled as follows:

• For X S V V, the corresponding values are 6, 1267, 2478, 2693, 736, 320, 3137, 3131, 2596, 2837, 1876, 1282, 1530, and 1529.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 40, 35, 25, 36, 33, 47, 62, 63, 67, 81, 87, 93, 88, and 90.

• For X V S V, the corresponding values are 0, 449, 1034, 794, 309, 41, 410, 296, 280, 165, 44, 30, 41, and 37.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 0, 13, 10, 11, 14, 6, 8, 6, 7, 5, 2, 2, 2, and 2.

• For X V S, the corresponding values are 9, 1369, 5220, 3274, 990, 225, 1289, 1272, 710, 379, 203, 55, 152, and 121.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 60, 38, 52, 43, 44, 38, 26, 26, 18, 11, 9, 4, 9, and 7.

• For X V x S, the corresponding values are 0, 357, 845, 573, 163, 41, 82, 136, 99, 36, 24, 5, 6, and 4.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 0, 10, 8, 8, 7, 6, 2, 3, 3, 1, 1, 0, 0, and 0.

• For X V V S, the corresponding values are 0, 135, 383, 222, 6, 21, 127, 144, 210, 104, 19, 8, 15, and 14.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 0, 4, 4, 3, 3, 3, 3, 3, 5, 3, 1, 1, 1, and 1.

• For the total, the corresponding values are 15, 3577, 9960, 7556, 2262, 678, 5045, 4979, 3895, 3521, 2166, 1380, 1744, and 1705.

• For percentage, the corresponding values are 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, 100, and 100.

Figure 4.1 clearly shows the most obvious change in the distribution of these subject positions: preverbal (i.e., uninverted) subjects – XSV(V) – become the dominant pattern over time. While in the earlier periods, preverbal subjects make up between roughly 30% and 40% of the X-initial clauses, there is a first major shift between M1 and M3, when the percentage rises to 62%. The percentage continues to climb steadily, but at a slower pace, and is relatively stable in the Modern British English (MBE) corpus, with percentages of roughly 90% throughout. Not surprisingly, the inversion pattern which is initially most frequent – XVS – shows the opposite development, starting out at 60% and decreasing more or less at a constant rate throughout the periods, except for dips in O2 and B1, eventually reaching 7% in the final subperiod of MBE.

The remaining three inversion patterns are much less frequent overall, and as a result changes in their frequencies take place on a smaller scale. Note that in the literature on PDE, all full-verb inversion types are generally grouped together, but distinguishing between them in earlier periods provides a better insight into the historical development.Footnote ⁷ The XVSV pattern – V2 inversion – is relatively frequent in OE and ME, except in O1 (which has extremely low numbers compared to other subperiods). Until M2, the percentages range between 11% and 14%. In the second half of the Middle English period, they dip below 10%, and by the final subperiod of Early Modern English (EModE), they are at a mere 1%; throughout MBE the pattern makes up 2% of all main clauses in the database. The XVxS pattern – likely to be full-verb inversion – shows a continuous decline like XVS but starts out at a lower percentage (10%) and also ends up with a lower percentage (0%). Finally, unambiguous full-verb inversion pattern, XVVS, starts out as the smallest category with 4% in O2 and slowly decreases even further over time, ending at 1% in MBE. Interestingly, while it is a very infrequent option to start with, it does not disappear completely.

While the focus in this chapter is on inversion patterns in X-initial clauses, there are two further relevant developments. First, the proportion of subject-initial main clauses increases over time: from 46% in OE, to 57% in ME, 64% in EModE, and 74% in MBE.Footnote ⁸ In other words, the potential set of inverted subjects becomes smaller, which in turn means that inversion patterns overall become less frequent, and hence more noticeable. Second, among the group of X-initial clauses, the distribution changes of the types of clause-initial elements, each of which triggers inversion to a different degree. Most importantly, adverbs decrease between OE and MBE, from 52% to 27%, while PPs increase from 15% to 38%. NPs, including objects, also decrease, from 15% in OE to 6% in MBE, while subordinate clauses increase, from 9% to 17%.Footnote ⁹ Overall, then, adverbs and NPs become less prominent in clause-initial position, while PPs become more prominent.

4.4.2 Inversion Patterns per Period

In this section, I discuss the distribution of inversion patterns per period, focusing on frequencies of the five subject positions and the role of clause-initial elements. In the discussion that follows, I will focus on three phrasal categories – adverbs, PPs, and NPs – because these are (i) directly involved in full-verb inversion in all periods, and (ii) robustly present throughout all periods. For the two later periods, I will also analyse verbs (type of verb) and subjects (definiteness and weight) because no such data are yet available for those periods.

OE: Considerable Variation with Inversion as the Dominant Pattern

Subject-initial clauses account for 44% of all main clauses in the entire YCOE.Footnote ¹⁰ Among the X-initial clauses, adverb phrases (AdvPs, 48%) are the most frequent initial element, followed by PPs (17%) and NPs (15%).

Table 4.2 presents the overall frequencies of the five subject positions in all X-initial clauses and further specifies the frequencies for AdvP-, PP-, and NP-initial clauses in order to assess whether there is a specific association between clause-initial elements and subject positions. NPs have been divided into ‘NP-Object’ and ‘NP-Other’ because objects in particular are central to the V2-system in OE. The remaining initial elements, such as adjectives, participles, and subordinate clauses, are grouped under ‘XP-Other’.Footnote ¹¹

Table 4.2Subject positions and clause-initial elements in YCOE

Table 4.2Long description

The table presents linguistic analysis from the York-Toronto-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Old English, abbreviated as Y C O E. The table focuses on subject positions and clause-initial elements. It is organized into six main columns with the following headers: Initial element, X S V V, X V S, X V x S, X V V S, and total. Each of these columns is divided into two sub-columns labeled frequency and percentage. The rows categorize different clause-initial elements: A d v P, P P, N P Object, N P Other, and X P other. A final row labeled total sums the data across all initial elements.

The row details from left to right are as follows:

• For A d v P, the corresponding values are 3045, 27, 1246, 11, 5623, 50, 908, 8, 345, 3, 11167, and 100.

• For P P, the corresponding values are 892, 28, 347, 11, 1607, 50, 165, 5, 197, 6, 3208, and 100.

• For N P object other, the corresponding values are 462, 51, 52, 6, 335, 37, 43, 5, 13, 1, 905, 100.

• For N P other, the corresponding values are 878, 39, 166, 7, 873, 39, 220, 10, 125, 6, 2262, and 100.

• For X P other, the corresponding values are 1161, 33, 466, 13, 1425, 40, 439, 12, 60, 2, 3551, and 100.

• For the total, the corresponding values are 6438, 31, 2277, 11, 9863, 47, 1775, 8, 740, 4, 21,093, and 100.

Overall, roughly only one third (32%) of the X-initial clauses are not inverted. It is fair to say, then, that based on frequency, inversion is a majority pattern in OE X-initial clauses. Among the inverted subjects, the largest category is the ‘mixed bag’ category of XVS (47%). This is true for all but the NP-initial clauses, where in fact the uninverted order is the largest (51% for objects; 39% for other NPs). The straightforward V2 subjects, XVSV, account for only 11% overall. Unambiguous full-verb inversion, XVVS, represents a small category, with only 4% overall; likely-to-be full-verb inversion clauses, XVxS, are a little more frequent, at 9%.

With respect to differences between initial elements, XVVS is a little more common with PPs and ‘NP-Other’, while XVxS is a little more frequent with ‘NP-Other’ and ‘XP-Other’. In contrast, all NPs have lower percentages for both XVS and XVSV. However, the differences are small and do not provide evidence for a particular association between a particular initial element and subject position.

In assessing canonical word order patterns in OE from a theory-based perspective, it is important to note that the largest category, XVS, is also the most diffuse category: it includes both subjects that are inverted because of V2 triggers and subjects that are inverted because of factors such as the type of verb or information status. While these factors have not been distinguished here systematically, it is clear that V2 triggers play a major role at this stage: a further investigation of the adverb-initial clauses shows that more than two thirds (69%) of the initial adverbs in XVS sentences belong to the so-called then-group (then, now, thus; Warner Reference Warner2007), known to invariably trigger inversion. As another factor, to be as a main verb seems to have some association with inversion: 23% of the XVS sentences and 30% of the XVxS sentences have to be, against only 14% of the XSV examples.

To conclude, in OE, inversion is clearly the majority pattern, even though uninverted orders are also quite frequent. In many contexts inversion is the only option (as part of the V2 system) or the most frequent option. Syntactically, XVVS and XVxS are infrequent but distinct categories of inversion; at the same time, these patterns stand out less than PDE full-verb inversion because inversion in general is much more common. Finally, while V2-inversion is determined by initial elements, full-verb inversion does not seem to be associated with a particular type of initial element.

ME: Increasing Variation and Development towards Preverbal Subjects

In the ME corpus, the overall percentage of subject-initial clauses is a little higher than in OE (57% compared to 44%). The proportions among the X-initial clauses have changed: AdvP-initial clauses have decreased (from 48% to 40%), as have NP-initial clauses (from 15% to 12%), while PP-initial clauses have increased (from 17% to 31%). Table 4.3 presents the distribution of the subject positions, again organised by clause-initial element.

Table 4.3Subject positions and clause-initial elements in PPCME2

Table 4.3Long description

Table showing the distribution of subject positions and clause-initial elements in the Penn Parsed Corpus of Middle English, version two, abbreviated as P P C M E subscript 2. The table is structured into six main columns representing syntactic structures: X S V V, X S V S, X V S, X V x S, X V V S, and total. Each column contains two sub-columns labeled frequency and percentage.

The rows are labeled with five categories of initial elements: A d v P, P P, N P object, N P other, and X P other. A final total row sums all values across initial elements and syntactic types.

The detailed data in the rows from left to right are as follows:

• For A d v P, the corresponding values are 3089, 58, 404, 8, 1544, 29, 158, 3, 93, 2, 5288, and 100.

• For P P, the corresponding values are 2026, 49, 374, 9, 1363, 33, 140, 3, 191, 5, 4094, and 100.

• For N P object, the corresponding values are 109, 20, 63, 12, 319, 58, 39, 7, 16, 3, 546, and 100.

• For N P other, the corresponding values are 754, 71, 58, 5, 199, 19, 32, 2, 25, 2, 1061, and 100.

• For X P other, the corresponding values are 1026, 79, 116, 9, 126, 9, 19, 1, 10, 1, 1297, and 100.

• For total, the corresponding values are 7004, 57, 1015, 8, 3551, 29, 381, 3, 335, 3, 12286, and 100.

Overall, preverbal subjects now constitute the largest category, accounting for just over half of all X-initial clauses (57%). Yet at the same time preverbal categories can also not yet be described as the default or norm, especially because there is considerable variation between the clause-initial elements: the ‘NP-Other’ and ‘XP-Other’ categories have a much higher percentage of preverbal subjects than the average (71% and 79%, respectively), while ‘NP-Object’ has a much lower percentage (20%). The decrease among inversion patterns is most striking for XVS, the ‘mixed bag’ category, now at 29% (down from 47%), although it is still the largest inversion category. The straightforward V2 pattern, XVSV, is a little smaller than in OE, with 8%, and the likely full-verb inversion pattern, XVxS, has also decreased, to 3%, the same percentage as unambiguous full-verb inversion, XVVS.

In the ‘mixed bag’ category, XVS, the influence of the then-group, as one trigger of V2 inversion, seems to have become smaller, accounting only for roughly 20% of adverb-initial XVS clauses. XVS and XVxS still have a higher percentage of to be, but the difference with uninverted subjects is smaller (29%, 26%, and 21%, respectively). Finally, the results show no obvious association between initial elements and late subjects: XVVS is a little more frequent after PPs (5% against 3% overall) and XVxS after ‘NP-Other’ (7% against 3% overall), but these differences are extremely small.

To summarise, inversion orders have decreased overall in ME but are still common, at a little under 50%. As in OE, the full-verb inversion patterns, XVVS and XVxS, represent infrequent but distinct patterns. What stands out most in this period is the extensive variation in the percentages of preverbal subjects and inversion patterns among different clause-initial elements. In other words, neither inversion nor non-inversion can be described as the default or canonical option, neither from a frequency-based nor from a theory-based perspective.

EModE: Preverbal Subjects as the New Norm, Inversion Increasingly Infrequent

In the EModE corpus, the overall proportion of subject-initial clauses has risen to 64%, meaning that only one third of clauses now have the potential to show inversion. In the X-initial clauses, the proportions of AdvP-initial clauses (38%), PP-initial clauses (27%), and NP-initial clauses (13%) have largely remained similar. Table 4.4 presents the distribution of subject patterns for the entire EModE corpus.

Table 4.4Subject positions and clause-initial elements in PPCEME

Table 4.4Long description

A table showing the distribution of subject positions and clause-initial elements in a corpus. The table is organized into six columns: X S V V, X V S V, X V S, X V x S, X V V S, and Total. Each column has two sub-columns labeled frequency and percentage.

The rows categorize five types of initial elements: A d v P, P P, N P Object, N P Other, and X P Other. A total row at the bottom summarizes all values across the initial elements. The data across the rows from left to right is as follows:

For A d v P:

• The corresponding values are 2594, 73, 191, 5, 603, 17, 68, 2, 74, 2, 3530, and 100.

For P P:

• The corresponding values are 2008, 78, 122, 5, 282, 11, 42, 2, 104, 4, 2558, and 100.

For N P object:

• The corresponding values are 93, 56, 19, 11, 48, 29, 6, 4, 1, 1, 167, and 100.

For N P other:

• The corresponding values are 612, 84, 37, 5, 62, 9, 2, 0, 16, 2, 729, and 100.

For X P other:

• The corresponding values are 1822, 86, 77, 4, 207, 10, 9, 0, 8, 0, 2123, and 100.

For totals:

• The corresponding values are 7129, 78, 446, 5, 1202, 13, 127, 1, 203, 2, 9107, and 100.

Preverbal subjects are now clearly the dominant category, accounting for over three quarters of the X-initial clauses overall (78%). ‘NP-Object’ has a much lower percentage (55%) and ‘XP-Other’ a much higher percentage (86%), but the range of variation is smaller, and in all clauses, preverbal subjects are the most frequent pattern. Among the inversion patterns, XVS is still the largest category, but it has become much less significant, with only 13% overall (with ‘NP-Object’ as the exception, at 29%). The continued decline of V2-type inversion is reflected in the low percentage for XVSV clauses: 5%. Finally, XVxS and XVVS lose a little more ground, at 1% and 2%, respectively.

By this time the V2 system has largely collapsed. Indeed, the straightforward V2 examples of the XVSV pattern in EModE are now restricted or archaic options, with many Bible translations and formulae such as in (16).Footnote ¹²

(16)

[To the worshipfull Robart Plompton, knight,] be this byll delivered in hast.

(aplumpt-e1-h, 184.74)

XVS, the ‘mixed bag’ category, is a little more frequent after adverbs (18%) and objects (29%), but is likely to contain far fewer cases of typical V2 inversion. Indeed, only 4% of the adverb-initial XVS clauses now contain an adverb from the then-group, as one of the typical V2 triggers. There are, however, other adverbs that occur quite frequently in the dataset, such as here in (17).

(17)

And [here] are the names of them that hath payd me; Robart Wood, Peter Cott, John Gloster, Robart Taler, William Bentham.

(aplumpt-e1-h, 167.7)

In other words, while the XVS category still contains leftover V2 patterns, other clause-initial triggers found in this period will continue to exist into PDE.

From the perspective of the defining characteristics of PDE full-verb inversion, two further factors are worth investigating. The first factor is the type of verb. The verbs in the PPCEME corpus were previously annotated for type of verb (for details, see van Kemenade Reference Kemenade, Nevalainen and Traugott2012: 828), which allows for a comparison of the inversion patterns in terms of the type of verb. Table 4.5 presents the results for the clauses with only a finite verb, distinguishing between to be, an unaccusative verb, or another verb.

Table 4.5Subject positions and types of verbs in PPCEME

Table 4.5Long description

The table presents the frequency and percentage of different types of verbs in three syntactic structures: X S V, X V S, and X V x S. The table is divided into three vertical sections, one for each structure. Each section contains two columns labeled frequency and percentage. The rows in the table are organized by type of verb: to be, unaccusative, and other. A fourth row labeled total summarizes the data within each structure. The data from left to right are filled as follows:

• For to be, the corresponding values are 1527, 32.4, 950, 20.1, 2241, 47.5, 4718, 100, 560, 43.3, 31, and 19.5.

• For unaccusative, the corresponding values are 950, 20.1, 356, 27.6, 83, and 52.2.

• For other, the corresponding values are 2241, 47.5, 376, 29.1, 45, and 28.3.

• For total, the corresponding values are 4718, 100.0, 1292, 100.0, 159, and 100.0.

Table 4.5 shows that almost three quarters of the inverted subjects occur with either be (43.3% for XVS; 19.5% for XVxS) or an unaccusative verb (27.6% for XVS; 52.2% for XVxS). For the preverbal subjects, these percentages are much lower, with just over half of the clauses occurring with be (32.4%) or an unaccusative verb (20.1%). In other words, unaccusative verbs and be are dominant in inversion patterns.

The second factor relevant to the diachrony of full-verb inversion are proxies for discourse function, in particular weight and definiteness of the subject. While Dreschler (Reference Dreschler, Los and de Haan2017) and Warner (Reference Warner2007) show that OE/ME late subjects are preferred by indefinite and long subjects, no comparable data are available for later periods. Table 4.6 presents the distribution of subjects of different length across the five subject positions.Footnote ¹³

Table 4.6Subject positions and subject length in PPCEME

Table 4.6Long description

The table presents the relationship between subject length and syntactic structure across five different structural types: X S V V, X V S Y, X V S, X V x S, and X V V S. Each structure is represented by two columns: frequency, labeled as freq. and percentage, labeled as %. The rows categorize the length of the subject in number of words, grouped into four categories: 1, 2, 3, and greater than 3 words. A row at the bottom labeled total summarizes the total frequency and percentage for each structure.

The data filled in the rows from left to right are as follows:

• For 1 word, the corresponding words are 2086, 29, 120, 25, 225, 17, 14, 9, 5, and 2.

• For 2 words, the corresponding words are 2688, 37, 188, 39, 372, 29, 29, 18, 47, and 14.

• For 3 words, the corresponding words are 992, 14, 78, 16, 186, 14, 15, 9, 49, and 15.

• For greater than 3 words, the corresponding words are 1539, 21, 102, 21, 509, 39, 96, 60, 232, and 70.

• For the total, the corresponding values are 7305, 100, 488, 100, 1292, 100, 154, 100, 333, and 100.

The effect of weight is clearest for the XVVS category, with only 2% of subjects consisting of just one word and 70% consisting of more than three words. The same trend – few short subjects and many long subjects – is visible for XVxS and XVS, but the differences are smaller and two-word subjects are in fact quite frequent. Interestingly, the percentages for preverbal subjects and V2-inverted subjects are very similar, both showing a preference for one- or two-word subjects, although longer subjects are not uncommon. To further examine syntactic indicators of discourse status, I also compared definiteness of the subjects, with a definite article or demonstrative as an indicator of definiteness, and indefinite article or absence of definiteness indicators as corresponding to indefiniteness. However, these results did not show any observable differences between the subject positions. This is perhaps surprising considering the results for OE and ME, but not when we take into account Birner and Ward’s (Reference Birner and Ward1998) findings for PDE inverted subjects, which were equally as often definite as indefinite.

In summary, inversion is a minority pattern in EModE. The majority of the examples, also in the ‘mixed bag’ category of XVS, are no longer triggered by V2 factors; rather, while some can be specified by a specific triggering initial element, there is a large category that can be grouped together based on shared characteristics: inversion with either specific verbs and/or specific subjects. These factors are not new per se, but rather, because other factors are lost, they are now more evident as the defining factors of remaining inversion orders. All inversion patterns stand out more as a non-standard pattern now that preverbal subjects are the norm.

MBE: Preverbal Subjects as the Default, Inversion as a Rare Option

By the Modern English period, 74% of the main clauses are subject-initial. In terms of frequency, then, preverbal subjects are clearly the default, regardless of (non-)inversion in X-initial clauses. In the X-initial clauses, PP-initial clauses have further increased (from 27% to 38%), while AdvP-initial clauses have further decreased (from 38% to 27%), just as NP-initial clauses (from 13% to 7%). Table 4.7 presents the distribution of the five subject positions in X-initial clauses.

Table 4.7Subject positions and clause-initial elements in PPCMBE

Table 4.7Long description

The table is divided into 6 columns and is labeled X S V V, X V S V, X V S, X V x S, X V V S, and total. Each column is divided into two sub-columns labeled frequency, freq., and percentage, %.

The rows are categorized by initial element: A d v P, P P, N P object, N P other, X P other, and a final total row that summarizes each column. The data of the rows filled from left to right are as follows:

• For AdvP, the corresponding values are 1169, 88, 44, 3, 107, 8, 7, 1, 4, 0, 1331, and 100.

• For P P, the corresponding values are 1712, 92, 36, 2, 75, 4, 3, 0, 27, 1, 1853, and 100.

• For N P object, the corresponding values are 41, 75, 5, 9, 8, 15, 1, 2, 0, 0, 55, and 100.

• For N P other, the corresponding values are 283, 93, 8, 3, 8, 3, 2, 1, 2, 1, 303, and 100.

• For X P other, the corresponding values are 1136, 88, 15, 1, 130, 10, 2, 0, 4, 0, 1287, and 100.

• For total, the corresponding values are 4341, 90, 108, 2, 328, 7, 15, 0, 37, 1, 4289, and 100.

Table 4.7 clearly demonstrates the dominance of preverbal subjects, with an overall percentage of 90% for XSV(V); only ‘NP-Object’ has a slightly lower percentage, at 75%. Among the inversion patterns, XVS is still the largest category, but it represents only 7% of the clauses. XVxS is by now almost extinct and XVVS is extremely rare. XVSV has a slightly higher percentage, which, as in EModE, is mostly due to the corpus containing some archaic examples and several Bible translations, where these orders are still relatively common.

Table 4.7 also shows that most of the XVVS examples (27 out of 37) occur in PP-initial clauses, which suggests an association between full-verb inversion and clause-initial PPs at this stage, although for XVS clauses, AdvPs and NPs seem more relevant. The PPCMBE corpus is not annotated for type of verb, but we can still examine the number of examples with be: in the clauses with a single verb and an inverted subject, be accounts for 54% of the examples, against only 36% of the uninverted subjects; in other words, be seems to have a larger influence than in EModE. Table 4.8 presents the distribution of subject length across subject positions.

Table 4.8Subject positions and subject length in PPCMBE

Table 4.8Long description

The table is divided into 7 columns with the headings labeled as subject length in number of words, X S V V, X V S V, X V S, X V x S, and X V V S. The columns of subject position are sub-divided into two labeled frequency and percentage. The data in the rows filled from left to right are as follows:

• For 1 word, the corresponding values are 1108, 26, 17, 16, 44, 13, 3, 20, 2, and 5.

• For 2 words, the corresponding values are 1582, 36, 46, 43, 107, 33, 2, 13, 1, and 3.

• For 3 words, the corresponding values are 585, 13, 17, 16, 41, 13, 4, 27, 4, and 11.

• For greater than 3 words, the corresponding values are 1065, 25, 28, 26, 136, 41, 6, 40, 30, and 81.

• For total, the corresponding values are 4340, 100, 108, 100, 328, 100, 15, 100, 37, and 100.

Table 4.8 shows the same tendencies as in the PPCEME corpus. The percentage of subjects longer than three words in XVVS has increased to 81% (against 70%), while two-word subjects especially have become less frequent (3% against 14%); most categories are largely unchanged, except for XVxS, which has few examples. With respect to definiteness, as in EModE, the percentages of definite and indefinite subjects are again largely the same for all subject patterns.

A final question is to what extent the data in the PPCMBE corpus already resemble the observations from studies on PDE full inversion. A further analysis of all inversion examples in the final subperiod (B3, 1840-1914; 176 examples) reveals that there are still a considerable number of sentences from Bible translations or otherwise archaic examples, as in (18).

(18)

Moreover, [herein] is revealed that of which thou didst erstwhile profess thyself ignorant.

(boethja-1897,114.257)

The selection also contains some examples of quotative inversion and subject-auxiliary inversion, as well as initial adverbs such as then, so, here. However, apart from these specific types, many of the examples seem unremarkable from a PDE perspective. The majority of examples have be as the main verb, a passive verb or an unaccusative verb, and/or have a strong discourse-link, as in (19).

(19)

Prince Rupert threw away the best of his horsemen in attempts to break the solid masses of the London train-bands, who showed a steady power of resistance very admirable in such young soldiers. [In one of these desperate charges] fell Lord Falkland, the wisest and most moderate of the king’s councillors, who is said to have deliberately thrown away his life because of his sorrow at the long continuance of the war.

(oman-1895,387.168)

This example meets all descriptions for PDE: it has an unaccusative verb, a clause-initial element that has a strong link to the preceding discourse (charges refers to attempts), and a long (and discourse-new) subject.

In summary, in the MBE corpus, inversion has clearly become a non-standard option due to the dominance of preverbal subjects; it is non-canonical both in terms of frequency and in terms of the default word order options in the language. There are still some differences from PDE full-verb inversion, which is not surprising considering the fact that there is still a time gap of roughly a hundred years between the end of the final MBE subperiod and Birner and Ward’s (Reference Birner and Ward1998) study. Nevertheless, the majority of inversion patterns (XVS, XVxS, and XVVS) can be categorised together in terms of the characteristics of PDE full-verb inversion.

5.2.1 Form, Function, and Origin

Both the form and the function of the existential construction are captured succinctly by Ward and Birner (Reference Ward, Birner, Horn and Ward2004: 163–4): as a postposing construction which ‘offer[s] a way to preserve the given-before-new ordering of information in cases where canonical word order would violate this ordering’, the existential construction is ‘defined by the presence of non-referential there occurring in subject position while the NP that would canonically appear in subject position instead appears postverbally, and finally by the presence of be as the main verb’. This definition excludes the presentational construction with verbs other than BE (example (1)). Example (2), from the statement of a police surgeon under cross-examination in a case of assault on the police, features two existential constructions, one ‘bare’ and one extended form. Example (3), again with an extended notional subject, further displays lack of agreement: singular agreement with plural notional subjects, or ‘default singulars’, will be the main focus of this chapter’s first case study.

The first existential construction in example (2) contains a locative extension, one of the most common among the larger set of possible extensions (see Huddleston & Pullum Reference Huddleston and Pullum2002: 1394 for a complete list); the second existential remains bare. Both existential constructions ‘serve to introduce previously unidentifiable or inactive referents into a discourse’ (Lambrecht Reference Lambrecht1994: 179). In this particular instance, both Smith and his bruised testicles have been mentioned at the very beginning of the surgeon’s statement but are now being recalled. This example also illustrates that BE agrees with the postverbal notional subject. In example (3), the notional subject is indeed hearer-new, thus confirming that ‘the existential construction is characteristically used to introduce addressee-new entities into the discourse, and for this reason the displaced subject NP is usually indefinite’ (Huddleston & Pullum Reference Huddleston and Pullum2002: 1396).

5.2.2 History

The history of the existential there-construction can be traced back to Old English, as Breivik (Reference Breivik1990, Reference Breivik and Kastovsky1991) has shown. His database, a corpus including Old English (OE), Middle English (ME), and Early Modern English (EModE) texts, yields 1,653 existential constructions (Breivik Reference Breivik and Kastovsky1991: 34). OE originally featured three options for the existential construction, two with a dummy subject (either there or it) and one without an overt subject. The large majority of existential constructions in OE were formed with a zero subject, with existential it-constructions a marginal option throughout the periods covered by his data. Existential constructions introduced by there began to outnumber those with zero subjects between early and late ME; by EModE, the distribution of there- vs. zero existential constructions was 88.1% against 11.9% (Breivik & Martínez-Insua Reference Breivik and Martínez-Insua2008: 354). Breivik (Reference Breivik1990, Reference Breivik and Kastovsky1991) also discusses the origin of dummy there in the existential construction; Huddleston and Pullum provide a short summary of the process:

One of the alternatives to the existential there-construction, ‘the type “It is no man (who) can discourage me” was formerly quite common’ (Visser Reference Visser1963: 42). Visser’s list of examples goes up to the early nineteenth century, with his last examples from poetry. A search for existential it in the OBC yielded no examples, which might be taken to indicate that the existential it was restricted to archaic/poetic usage from the eighteenth century onwards.

5.2.3 The Existential Construction as a Vernacular Universal

The concept of vernacular universals has been proposed for English by Chambers (e.g., Chambers Reference Chambers and Kortmann2004). He includes ‘default singulars, or subject-verb non-concord’ (Reference Chambers and Kortmann2004: 129) in his list and also points out that the existential construction happens to be the context which favours default singulars the most (Reference Chambers and Kortmann2004: 132). The finding that default singulars occur more frequently in existential constructions than in all other contexts has been confirmed multiple times for a wide range of varieties of English (Hay & Schreier Reference Hay and Schreier2004; Tagliamonte Reference Tagliamonte, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009). For present-day English, feature 172 ‘Existential/presentational there’s with plural subjects’ in the electronic World Atlas of Varieties of English (eWAVE)Footnote ² ranks among the top runners-up to the top six vernacular universal features across varieties of English, with an attestation rate of over 70% (Kortmann & Wolk Reference Kortmann, Wolk, Kortmann and Lunkenheimer2012: 908).

Rupp and Britain note with respect to default singulars in existential and non-existential constructions:

Collins (Reference Collins2012) summarises the factors that have been shown to correlate with default singulars in PDE; apart from social variables such as gender, a range of grammatical variables favour default singulars in existential constructions, among them:

• present tense;

• ’s-contraction;

• ‘absence of overt number marking in the NP via the plural marker –s’ (Collins Reference Collins2012: 55); and

• bare (vs. extended) existential constructions.

Hay and Schreier (Reference Hay and Schreier2004: 217) have further included modifier type in the notional subject NP as a grammatical variable (e.g., adjective, article, quantifier, negative) and report that the distance between verb and notional subject might also be a conditioning factor (Reference Hay and Schreier2004: 221). The two case studies in Section 5.4 will contribute a diachronic perspective to the contemporary analyses. Both case studies focus on additional factors conditioning default singulars in existential constructions, namely the influence of normative grammar and semantic criteria. In addition, the first case study, in Section 5.4.1, will probe into the question whether default singulars in two different contexts show similar developments, namely in existential constructions and with singular you was.

5.4.1 Two Constructions, One Development? There was/were vs. you was/were

As described in Section 5.2.2, Chambers’ (Reference Chambers and Kortmann2004) list of vernacular universals includes default singulars in a hierarchy of favourable syntactic contexts ranging from you was to there was. Nevalainen (Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 92–3) points out that ‘according to the original definition of the term, “default singular” was used only with reference to was’, but her data, to be discussed below, show that present tense forms pattern with the default singulars. If singular BE with (singular) pronominal you and singular BE with plural notional subjects in existential constructions were indeed related, then we would expect a shared historical trajectory. The following case study combines data and evidence from different studies on the changing agreement preferences in these two syntactic contexts.

Non-standard number agreement in general and in existential there-constructions in particular was quite high on the list of eighteenth-century prescriptive grammarians (cf. Leonard Reference Leonard1962: 211–27; Sundby et al. Reference Sundby, Bjørge and Haugland1991): ‘Subject-verb (non)agreement was a topic regularly treated in eighteenth-century grammars. A number of patterns of “false concord” in existential constructions were distinguished and proscribed’ (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 87). Two studies provide a historical perspective on change in the status of/attitudes towards ‘default singulars’ in existential there-constructions, dealing with developments in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Both Nevalainen (Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009) and Anderwald (Reference Anderwald, Säily, Nurmi, Palander-Collin and Auer2017) examine the lack of concord in existential constructions as a putative vernacular universal (see Section 5.2.2). Nevalainen’s data come from the Corpus of Early English Correspondence Extension (CEECE), a collection of around 4,400 private letters from 300 writers, covering the period 1681 to 1800 and comprising around 2 million words (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 85). Her search frame for relevant instances of singular verb agreement with plural notional subject NPs was narrowed down as follows:

• only present and past forms of BE were included, that is non-finite compound tenses such as the perfect were left out;

• all cases with coordinated subject NPs were excluded, since contemporary grammars were divided about their agreement patterns, for example, ‘When he express’d himself upon these Subjects, there was a Weight and a Dignity in his Manner, such as I never saw before’ (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 90, emphasis in the original).

This left Nevalainen with 631 instances of BE with plural notional subjects, with 151 instances of non-standard against 480 instances of standard agreement, distributed over three 40-year periods shown in Table 5.3. Table 5.4 displays the data for two OBC periods that overlap with the two CEECE periods which show the most decisive decrease in default singulars.

Table 5.4 BE OBC

OBC period	1 1720–1759	2 1760–1799
∑ words	5,917,323	6,773,964
∑ tokens existential constructions	8,320	12,242
∑ tokens with ${\mathrm{NP}}_{\mathrm{pl}}$	3,004	4,318
is + NPpl (abs. & rel. freq.)	42 (1.4%)	67 (1.6%)
was + NPpl (abs. & rel. freq.)	344 (11.5%)	334 (7.3%)
Total BEsg + NPpl (abs. & rel. freq.)	386 (12.8%)	401 (9.3%)

In Nevalainen’s data, the steady decrease in the relative frequency of singular BE with plural subjects is noticeable, both as an overall tendency and separately for present tense is and past was. The relative frequency of there was $+{\mathrm{NP}}_{\mathrm{pl}}$ remains stable at slightly over 50% in the first two periods, but then drops to less than a third of all relevant tokens in the second half of the eighteenth century. The OBC data in Table 5.4, on the other hand, depict a similar downward trend for default singulars overall, but with much lower frequencies to begin with, and further without any indication of a decisive turning point between the first and the second half of the eighteenth century. In order to arrive at a more differentiated picture, Table 5.5 breaks down the data from Table 5.4 into 20-year periods.

Table 5.5Singular BE with plural notional subjects, breakdown of OBC periods, absolute and relative frequencies

^a Narrowing down of the database: only existential there-constructions with present and past be, judges’ questions excluded.

Table 5.5Long description

The table breaks down data from the O B C into four 20-year subperiods: 1720 to 1739, 1740 to 1759, 1760 to 1779, and 1780 to 1799. For each subperiod, it records the total number of words, the number of existential construction tokens, the subset of those containing plural noun phrases, and how often singular be verbs occur with these plural noun phrases both in the present and in the past tense. Absolute frequencies and percentages are provided for is plus N P plural, was plus N P plural, and the combined B E singular plus N P plural category.

• For the number of words, the corresponding values are 2331226, 3586099, 3443553, and 3330411.

• For the number of tokens of existential constructions, the corresponding values are 1995, 6325, 6016, and 6226.

• For the number of tokens with N P plural, the corresponding values are 620, 2384, 2283, and 2035.

• The absolute and relative frequency for is plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 19, 3.1%, 23, 1.0%, 26, 1.1%, and 41, 2.0%.

• The absolute and relative frequency for was plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 182, 29.4%, 162, 6.8%, 172, 7.5%, and 162, 8.0%.

• The absolute and relative frequency for total B E singular and N P plural, the corresponding values are 201, 32.4%, 185, 7.8%, 198, 8.7%, and 203, 10.0%.

Table 5.5 reveals a sharp decrease in default singulars from around a third of all tokens in the period 1720–1739 to less than 10% in subsequent periods. This overall tendency is again mostly due to the plummeting of there was + NP_pl, showing a trajectory comparable to Nevalainen’s results. The relative frequencies in the subperiods 1b to 2b, on the other hand, are messier in that they do not replicate the general downward trend apparent in Table 5.4, which invites further research.

One difference between Nevalainen’s data and the OBC data is due to text type: while Nevalainen found more present than past tense forms in her letter corpus (Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 93), past tense forms predominate in the OBC, which is only natural given that the court proceedings deal with past events. The ‘steady fall in frequency of singular agreement with plural existential there-constructions across time’ (Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 92) from 1680 to 1800 in her data ends at 15% non-standard agreement in the period 1760 to 1800 and is still higher than the OBC figures of around 10%. The exact reason for this difference is difficult to pin down: it may again be due to specific situational characteristics of the registers involved, or it could reflect the decrease towards the end of the eighteenth century that is captured by the smaller time frame chosen for the OBC data. But these do not show a continuing reduction in frequency of non-standard agreement patterns: the total percentage of singular BE with plural notional subjects increases slightly in the first decade of the nineteenth century (see Table 5.6), and this increase is mainly driven by the rise in present tense BE + NP_pl.

Table 5.6Existential constructions with plural notional subjects in the two OBC subperiods; frequencies: absolute, pmw, relative (where applicable)

^a Including a single token for contracted ’s.

Table 5.6Long description

The table presents data from the O B C corpus for two subperiods: the second half of period 2 from 1790 to 1799, and the first half of period 3 from 1800 to 1809. It shows the total word counts and provides detailed statistics on existential constructions containing plural noun phrases. Data is presented as absolute frequencies, frequency per million words, and relative percentages for each verb form. The data for the 7 rows filled from left to right are as follows:

• For the number of words, the corresponding data are 1678291 and 1828541.

• For the number of tokens with N P plural, the corresponding data are 950/566.1 and 1018/556.7.

• For the are plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 181/107.8/19.1% and 144/78.8/14.1%.

• For is plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 21/12.5/2.2% and 36/19.7/3.5%.

• For was plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 82/48.9/8.6% and 79/43.2/74.5%.

• For were plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 666/36.8/70.0% and 758/414.5/74.5%.

• For the total B E singular plus N P plural, the corresponding values are 103/61.37/10.8% and 115/62.89/11.3%.

This picture changes drastically in the nineteenth century, at least where the attention of grammarians to this particular detail is concerned, as Anderwald (Reference Anderwald, Säily, Nurmi, Palander-Collin and Auer2017) could show. Drawing on a subset of her Collection of Nineteenth-Century Grammars, comprising both British and American grammars (Anderwald Reference Anderwald, Säily, Nurmi, Palander-Collin and Auer2017: 277), she found very little attention to non-standard agreement in existential there-constructions and concludes: ‘Then as now, there is/was seems to have been either not very salient, or simply not very stigmatised, and the present-day attitude of tolerance towards this phenomenon can thus again be traced back to the nineteenth century’ (Anderwald Reference Anderwald, Säily, Nurmi, Palander-Collin and Auer2017: 292). That is, even though the two datasets are not directly comparable, we are left with an apparent contradiction: Nevalainen’s study of the actual occurrences of non-standard agreement patterns in existential constructions indicates a steady decrease over time in the eighteenth century, whereas Anderwald’s study of nineteenth-century linguistic metacomments is indicative of a trend towards the recognition of the pattern. This case study has concentrated on the eighteenth century and can thus provide no evidence from the OBC data for the tendencies identified by Anderwald. However, the data for contracted there’s in existential constructions displayed in Table 5.2 may be taken to indicate that there are no momentous changes throughout the nineteenth century, leaving ample opportunity for further research.

Nevalainen further examines the use of non-standard agreement in existential there-constructions by individual authors represented in the corpus, and found a clear correlation between gender (as a decisive factor in the access to education) as well as social class and non-standard singular BE + NP_pl: ‘In the prenormative era, a gentlewoman at Court could be a consistent there is/was user, whereas less than a hundred years later, we have to go much lower down on the social scale to find one’ (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 95). Her study also briefly touches upon default singulars with pronoun subjects, that is, you was/were-variation. As also observed by Anderwald, you was represents the intriguing case of a feature that changed from being prescribed to being proscribed within a relatively short time span:

Widlitzki (Reference Widlitzki2018) is the first in-depth study to exploit the potential of the OBC; her OBC data allow to pin down the turning point for the use of you was vs. you were: between the 1790s and the 1800s, the relative frequency of you was went down from more than 60% (142 vs. 229 tokens) to around 15% (362 vs. 54 tokens) (Widlitzki Reference Widlitzki2018: 230).

Widlitzki’s data for the disappearance of you was tie in with Nevalainen’s finding about the decrease of there was + NP_pl in existential there-constructions, despite the difference in text type. Recall that one of the open questions concerning default singulars is whether the two phenomena are related, or whether you was and the rise of there’s/is/was with plural notional subjects are separate developments which happened to coincide historically. This question can be approached by replicating Widlitzki’s focus on the two decades around 1800. Accordingly, two further OBC subcorpora were created which straddle the line of the OBC periods 2 (1760–1799) and 3 (1800–1839), comprising the years 1790–1799 and 1800–1809. In a next step, Nevalainen’s criteria for the inclusion of tokens were applied (see above). Finally, following Widlitzki, only existential constructions in full declarative sentences were included: ‘Inverted forms, mainly found in questions (was you? Were you?), were excluded because their distribution in the OBC is heavily skewed towards the groups of lawyers and judges. Other participants very rarely make use of them because they almost never ask questions’ (Widlitzki Reference Widlitzki2018: 226). This led to the exclusion of both tokens in example (9), the first representing an interrogative and the second an elliptical answer that is directly prompted by the preceding question.

Table 5.6 shows the frequencies and the distribution of standard and non-standard agreement patterns in existential constructions in the two OBC subperiods.

The comparison with Widlitzki’s data reveals that the drastic decrease of you was is not replicated by the figures for there was with plural notional subjects. The turn of the century may represent a turning point for the successful change from above concerning you was, but not for non-standard singular past forms in existential there-constructions. This may be taken as a piece of historical evidence that the two default singulars are quite separate patterns that either do not influence each other or are subject to different constraints, but further OBC data from later periods would be needed to strengthen that point.

5.4.2 Leaky Grammar: Variation with Notional Plurals and Coordinated Subject NPs

Compiling the database for the previous case study has also highlighted that speakers’ choices concerning the ‘correct’ agreement pattern in existential there-constructions are not as straightforward as normative grammar would have it. ‘The tension between syntactic and semantic criteria in subject-verb agreement is a long-standing one in English’ (Nevalainen Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009: 89), and this is particularly evident for the existential construction. Visser (Reference Visser1963: 62–84) documents the extent of agreement variation with collective nouns (e.g., army, crowd) and indefinites such as everybody, none, etc., which is persistent across all periods of English. Leonard’s survey of eighteenth-century grammars similarly devotes a whole chapter to ‘various solutions of problems of concord’ (Reference Leonard1962: 213–27). Eighteenth-century grammarians felt quite secure in pronouncements such as the following:

Leonard (Reference Leonard1962: 213) refers to an almost identical quote from John Clarke’s Rational Spelling Book (1796) but notes that most grammarians allowed for variable agreement patterns with coordinated subjects depending on semantic criteria.

While collective nouns such as crowd or mob do indeed occur with singular agreement in the OBC data, thus apparently with all due deference to those contemporary grammarians who insisted on the singular, the categories of ‘quantifying collectives’ (e.g., group, pack, flock) as well as ‘quantifying determiners’ (e.g., a number/couple of) (Biber et al. Reference Biber, Johansson, Leech, Conrad and Finegan2021: 249–50) still seem ‘leaky’ enough to lead speakers to dissolve the tension between syntax and semantics one way or the other, as examples (10)–(13) show:

Such ‘faultlines’ in the grammar giving rise to variation present a particularly intriguing case for the study of speakers’ choices. In the following, the agreement patterns in existential there-constructions with a selection of such expressions will be examined. The choice was made mainly on the basis of overall frequency: while some collective nouns occur only infrequently in existential constructions in the OBC – parcel occurs 60 times, mob only 18 times overall – the expressions chosen for analysis are frequent enough to trace their agreement patterns over time. Coordinated subjects that were excluded from Nevalainen’s analyses (see Section 5.4.1) will also be included.

Table 5.7 presents that data for existential there-constructions of the general form there was/were a (great) number of (persons, …), illustrated by examples (14) and (15).Footnote ⁹

While the choice of singular and plural agreement with this pattern was equally divided in the first OBC period (but note the low absolute count), plural agreement has become the unequivocal majority option in the last OBC period (see figures in bold print in Table 5.7).

Table 5.7Agreement patterns in existential there-constructions containing number (there * a number of…, N = 341; absolute and relative frequencies)

Table 5.7Long description

The table presents data across five O B C periods covering the years 1720 to 1913. It focuses on existential constructions that involve B E singular or B E plural, followed by a number. Each period is identified by a number and its corresponding date range:

• Period 1 is 1720 to 1759

• Period 2 is 1760 to 1799

• Period 3 is 1800 to 1839

• Period 4 is 1840 to 1879

• Period 5 is 1880 to 1913

For each period, the table lists the number of existential tokens and then breaks them down into the number and proportion of B E singular plus a number and B E plural plus a number. The data for the rows from left to right is filled as follows:

• For the number of tokens, the corresponding values are 14, 63, 71, 98, and 95.

The row existential constructions are subdivided into two as aforementioned. The corresponding data are:

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E singular plus a number of are 7, 50%, 15, 24%, 22, 30%, 11, 11%, and 5, 5%.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E plural plus a number of are 7, 50%, 48, 76%, 49, 70%, 87, 89%, and 90, 95%.

The data for many (e.g., there was/were so/(a great) many people about), depicted in Table 5.8 and illustrated in example (16), show a stronger initial preference for plural agreement, which turns into the default option over time. According to Visser (Reference Visser1963: 79), ‘a (great, good, etc.) many is invariably found with a plural verb’; the OBC data show that this agreement pattern has developed over time.

Expressions containing dozen in Table 5.9 (e.g., there was/were (about) x dozen), illustrated by examples (17) and (18), are fewer overall and display more fluctuation between agreement preferences over time but pattern with the expressions with many in arriving at a 100% rate for plural agreement.

While the data for these collective expressions (see Biber Reference Biber, Johansson, Leech, Conrad and Finegan2021: 249–56) reveal a dominant tendency away from contemporary prescriptive pronouncements demanding singular agreement, the case of coordinated subjects seems to be different. Here, in fact, frequencies of singular BE remain high throughout all OBC periods, as depicted in Table 5.10. Examples (19)–(21) illustrate the pattern.

Figure 5.1 plots the results for all four constructions under review in one graph. All three quantifying expressions show a tendency towards almost categorical plural agreement over time, while the existential constructions with coordinated notional subjects overwhelmingly trigger singular agreement. Given the evidence for the chosen quantifying expressions, it seems safe to assume that speakers’ conceptualisations of the referents of these expressions were or became independent of LModE prescriptive grammar rules calling for singular agreement. To put it another way: in this particular case, cognitive factors outweighed the demands of grammatical correctness imposed from above. In the case of the coordinated notional subjects, singular agreement remains speakers’ preference over time. It would be interesting to establish whether grammarians’ opinions on this topic were as divided in the nineteenth century as Nevalainen (Reference Nevalainen, Filppula, Klemola and Paulasto2009) found them to be in the eighteenth century, but this is beyond the scope of the present study.

Table 5.8Agreement patterns in existential there-constructions containing many (there * many…, N = 494; absolute and relative frequencies)

Table 5.8Long description

The table presents the frequency of existential constructions in the O B C corpus using either B E singular or B E plural with the word many across five historical periods:

• Period 1 covers 1720 to 1759

• Period 2 covers 1760 to 1799

• Period 3 covers 1800 to 1839

• Period 4 covers 1840 to 1879

• Period 5 covers 1880 to 1913

For each period, the table lists the total number of existential constructions tokens and breaks them down by the frequency and percentage of those using B E singular plus many and B E plural plus many. The data for the rows filled from left to right is as follows:

• For the number of tokens, the corresponding values are 70, 104, 106, 135, and 79.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E singular plus many are 8,111%, 8, 8%, 7, 7%, 7, 5%, and 0, 0%.

• The absolute and relative frequency of B E plural plus many are 62, 89%, 96, 92%, 99, 93%, 128, 95%, and 79, 100%.

Table 5.9Agreement patterns in existential there-constructions containing dozen (there * * dozen …, N = 92; absolute and relative frequencies)

Table 5.9Long description

The table presents the use of B E singular and B E plural forms with the quantifier dozen in existential constructions across five time periods in the O B C corpus:

• Period 1 spans 1720 to 1759

• Period 2 spans 1760 to 1799

• Period 3 spans 1800 to 1839

• Period 4 spans 1840 to 1879

• Period 5 spans 1880 to 1913

Each row shows the total number of existential construction tokens that include dozen, and then separates them into B E singular plus a dozen and B E plural plus dozen, giving both the absolute frequency and the relative percentage for each. The data in the rows is filled from left to right as follows:

• The corresponding values for the number of tokens are 8, 11, 25, 28, and 20.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E singular plus dozen, the corresponding values are 2, 25%, 4, 36%, 11, 44%, 4, 14%, and 0, 0%.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E plural plus dozen, the corresponding values are 6, 75%, 7, 64%, 14, 56%, 24, 86%, and 20, 100%.

Table 5.10Agreement patterns in existential there-constructions with coordinated notional subjects (there * NN and NN, N = 706, 682 tokens with date; absolute and relative frequencies)

Table 5.10Long description

The table summarizes the frequency of B E singular and B E plural forms in existential constructions that include double noun phrases connected by "and" (for example, a cat and a dog) across five periods in the O B C corpus:

• Period 1 covers 1720 to 1759

• Period 2 covers 1760 to 1799

• Period 3 covers 1800 to 1839

• Period 4 covers 1840 to 1879

• Period 5 covers 1880 to 1913

Each period lists the total number of existential construction tokens with this double-noun pattern, followed by the number and percentage of B E singular and B E plural uses. The data in the rows from left to right are filled as follows:

• The corresponding values for the number of tokens are 117, 191, 115, 135, and 124.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E singular plus N N and N N is 101, 86%, 170, 89%, 110, 96%, 132, 98%, and 111, 90%.

• The absolute and relative frequency for B E plural plus N N and N N is 16, 14%, 21, 11%, 5, 4%, 3, 2%, and 13, 10%.

Figure 5.1 Plural agreement patterns over time for selected collective expressions in notional subjects in existential there-constructions (relative frequencies)

Figure 5.1Long description

The line graph illustrates the relative frequencies of plural agreements for different collective expressions in existential there-constructions over five distinct periods: 1720-1759, 1760-1799, 1800-1839, 1840-1879, and 1880-1913. The vertical axis indicates relative frequencies from 0 to 100, while the horizontal axis represents the periods. Four expressions are tracked: a number of p l., many p l., dozen p l., and N plus N p l. The a number of p l. line, represented in light gray, starts at 75 in the first period and shows a slight increase, peaking at 76 in the second period. It then drops to 64 and 56 in the third and fourth periods, respectively, before rising to 70 by the fifth period. The many p l. line, in a darker gray, begins at 89 and steadily rises to 92, 93, 95, and finally reaches 100 in the last period. The dozen p l. line, in the darkest gray, starts at 50, increases to 62 and then 70, before dropping to 56 in the third period, and subsequently rises again, reaching 89 and 95 in the last periods. The N plus N p l. line, in black, begins relatively low at 14, gradually declines to 11, 5, and 2, before experiencing a slight increase to 10 in the final period.

6.4.1 Overview

In total, we identified 1,155 examples of demonstrative ProTag use in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection. This included a number of examples used in translations into English from other languages. To mitigate the possible influence of the original language and its features in such cases, we excluded all examples from works that were clearly translations. This left 1,037 examples of demonstrative ProTag constructions used in 675 individual works by a total of 284 writers.Footnote ⁵ The earliest example attested was from 1594Footnote ⁶ (11a) and the latest – excluding reprints of earlier works – was from 1925 (11b). This gives us a span from the late sixteenth century to the early twentieth century.

1. 1. a. Ill tidings for my Lady these. (Robert Wilson, The coblers prophesie, 1594)

   2. b. Very striking poems those, don’t you think, Miss Taylor? (John Drinkwater, Robert Burns, 1925)

Within the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection, the most prolific users of demonstrative ProTags are those listed in Table 6.1. As the dates of birth and death show, these writers’ lives span from the late sixteenth century through to the mid-nineteenth century.

Table 6.1The most prolific users of the demonstrative ProTag construction in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection

Table 6.1Long description

The table provides information about five writers, their years of birth and death, and the number of demonstrative pronouns or ProTags identified in their works. The information is given in three columns with the aforementioned headers. The data from left to right in the rows is as follows:

• For Ben Jonson, the corresponding data is 1572 to 1637 and 43.

• For Thomas D’Urfey, the corresponding data is 1653 to 1723 and 40.

• For Aphra Behn, the corresponding data is 1640 to 1689 and 37.

• For John O’Keeffe, the corresponding data is 1747 to 1833 and 28.

• For W. T. Moncrieff, the corresponding data is 1794 to 1857 and 19.

Using the estimated word counts provided in Hoffmann (Reference Hoffmann2006), which examined tag questions in Early and Late Modern English as attested in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection, it is possible to calculate the frequency of ProTag constructions per million words in the corpus; see Figure 6.1.

Figure 6.1 The occurrence of demonstrative ProTag constructions in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection, including the frequency per million words (pmw); N = 1,037

Figure 6.1Long description

The vertical axis marks the period from top to bottom. The labeled periods are up to 1500, 1500-1549, 1550-1599, 1600-1649, 1650-1699, 1700-1749, 1750-1799, 1800-1849, 1850-1899, and after 1900. The horizontal axis marks frequency per million words, ranging from 0 to 35. The constructions are plotted as horizontal bars, and the data from top to bottom is as follows:

• During 1550-1599, the corresponding value is 1.

• During 1600-1649, the corresponding value is 13.

• During 1650-1699, the corresponding value is 26.

• During 1700-1749, the corresponding value is 23.

• During 1750-1799, the corresponding value is 24.

• During 1800-1849, the corresponding value is 20.

• During 1850-1899, the corresponding value is 32.

• During 1900, the corresponding value is 28.

As Figure 6.1 shows, frequency counts are modest in the corpus – far smaller than for tag questions in the same corpus (Tottie & Hoffmann Reference Tottie and Hoffmann2009). The demonstrative ProTag construction is rare, but it is attested from the late sixteenth century onwards. From a frequency count of 1 pmw in the period 1550–1599, there is an increase to 26 pmw a century later. Relative frequency remains fairly stable from that point until another increase to 32 pmw in the period 1850–1899. Finally, a slight dip in frequency to 28 pmw is recorded for the period starting 1900, though it must be noted that for this period only 21 examples were identified and the latest recorded example is 1925, so this figure is not fully comparable to those for preceding periods.

6.4.2 The ProTags

We find the same range of examples for each demonstrative ProTag in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection as has been identified previously in PDBE (Mycock Reference Mycock2019) and in the smaller sample of EModE data examined in Mycock and Misson (Reference Mycock and Misson2020). For singular demonstratives, we find ProTags this and that used with both overt (12a–b, 13a–b) and covert anchor points (12c–d, 13c–d).

1. 1. a. ’Tis good tabacco this! (Ben Jonson, The Alchemist, 1616)

   2. b. This is a fellow of some sense, this: come, good Uncle. (Anonymous, The London prodigal, 1664)

   3. c. A plaguy dull fellow this, that can sleep in so good Company as we are. (Aphra Behn, The younger brother, 1696)

   4. d. Awfully good place to meal in, this, don’t you find? (H. V. Esmond, The wilderness, 1901)

1. 1. a. oh take heed sir, ‘Tis against nature that, (Thomas Middleton, The widdow, 1652)

   2. b. it must be a queer dress that! (Lady Emmeline Stuart-Wortley, Ernest Mountjoy, 1844)

   3. c. A very pleasant fellow that. (Thomas D’Urfey, A common-wealth of women, 1686)

   4. d. Very barbarous that, in my Mind. (Nicholas Rowe, The biter, 1705)

Examples (12a) and (13a–b) show that it is not accurate to describe the ProTag construction as involving doubling: the anchor point and ProTag need not be identical in form. This is even more clearly illustrated by the examples in (14), in which the demonstrative ProTag appears to co-refer with a third person singular male personal pronoun.

1. 1. a. He’s a strange chap, this! (Henry J. Byron, War to the knife, 1866)

   2. b. He’s a deuced good servant that, if he wouldn’t talk so much. (Charles James Mathews, Patter versus Clatter, 1881)

Both plural demonstratives are employed as ProTags in the corpus. These is used with both overt (15a–b) and covert (15c–d) anchor points. By contrast, those is only attested with a covert anchor point (16a–c).Footnote ⁷

1. 1. a. These are the trophies of your treachery, these. (Shackerley Marmion, A fine companion, 1633)

   2. b. Sure, they’ar’ caues Of sleepe, these; or els they’ar’graues! (Ben Jonson, Oberon, 1616)

   3. c. A Pleasant Couple these! (Colley Cibber, Woman’s wit, 1697)

   4. d. Uncommon talents these. (Thomas Vaughan, The hotel, 1776)

1. 1. a. Good Lads those, They kill themselves: Give me such Foes. (Sir Richard Fanshawe, To love only for love’s sake, 1670)

   2. b. Mighty pretty Eyes those --- mighty pretty Eyes truly (Christopher Bullock, Woman is a riddle, 1717)

   3. c. Strange girls, those! (W. T. Moncrieff, Tom and Jerry, 1821)

The relative frequency of each demonstrative ProTag varies over time; see Figure 6.2.Footnote ⁸

Figure 6.2 The relative frequency in percentages of each demonstrative ProTag in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection

Figure 6.2Long description

The vertical axis marks the period from top to bottom. The labeled periods are 1600-1649, 1650-1699, 1700-1749, 1750-1799, 1800-1849, and 1850-1899. The horizontal axis marks a percentage range from 0 to 100. The four pronouns this, that, these, and those are indicated by solid, empty, shaded, and light shaded horizontal bars, respectively. The frequency of using the pronoun this decreased over time from 63, 79, 75, 68, and then to 52%. The frequency of using the pronoun that increased from 25 to 40% over time. The use of the pronoun these decreased from 11 to 6% over time. The use of those increased from 0 to 1, 2, and then to 1%.

The most noticeable trend shown in Figure 6.2 is a decrease in the frequency of ProTag this alongside an increase in the frequency of ProTag that.

We examined the usage of the four demonstrative ProTags by author in the corpus. A large number of authors use a demonstrative singular ProTag (this or that) but do not use either demonstrative plural ProTag (these or those) in their works: 237 in total (excluding multi-authored or anonymous works). A small number of authors – 15 in total – only use a plural demonstrative ProTag; their works do not include singular demonstrative ProTags. These authors are not confined to a particular period. Their dates of birth range from the mid-sixteenth century to the late nineteenth century.

6.4.3 Anchor Points

Demonstrative ProTags have overt and covert anchor points in the corpus. Their relative frequency exhibits variation over time. Figure 6.3 shows that covert anchor points increased from 45.2% in 1600–1649 to 93.4% in 1700–1749, before dropping slightly to 89.1%–91.7% in the subsequent 100+ years. ProTag those is only attested with a covert anchor point in the corpus; see (16).

Figure 6.3 The relative frequency of overt compared to covert anchor points in demonstrative ProTag constructions in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection

Figure 6.3Long description

The horizontal axis labels the period from 1600-1649, 1650-1699, 1700-1749, 1750-1799, 1800-1849, and 1850-1899. The horizontal axis marks relative frequency as percentage from 0 to 100. The horizontal bars are divided into two segments: the shaded part denotes covert and the unshaded part denotes overt. Except for the period 1600 to 1649, the use of overt exceeds the covert. In the remaining period, the covert ranges from around 70 to 90% and the remaining share is for overt.

It is an interesting question whether the two trends identified – the increase in frequency of ProTag that and the increase in frequency of covert anchor points – are linked.Footnote ⁹ The relative frequency of each ProTag occurring with a covert anchor point is represented in Figure 6.4.

Figure 6.4 The relative frequency of (i) each ProTag with a covert anchor point and (ii) all ProTags with a covert anchor point compared to overt anchor points in demonstrative ProTag constructions in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection

Figure 6.4Long description

The vertical axis marks the relative frequency, ranging from 0 to 100%. The horizontal axis marks the periods from 1600-1649, 1650-1699, 1700-1749, 1750-1799, 1800-1849, and 1850-1899. The line graphs are styled in different patterns, which include:

• Solid line with a solid dot for this

• Solid broken line with a solid dot for that

• Line with a shaded dot for these

• Broken line with a shaded dot for those

• Solid dotted line with a solid diamond for all Protags

The relative frequency of this begins from 60%, peaks around 80%, remains constant around 80%, drops to 40%, and then rises to 60%. The relative frequency for all protags begins from 50%, rises steadily to around 80%, and reaches 90%. The relative frequency for that begins from around 20%, drops down to 10%, and then increases steadily, and peaks at around 48%. The relative frequency of these begins from around 19%, which gradually declines and maintains a steady state at around 8%. The relative frequency of those begins from around 0% and is almost a constant throughout the period.

If the increase in the frequency of covert anchor points were linked to the increasingly common occurrence of that in ProTag constructions, we would expect to see a consistently high proportion of instances of ProTag that with a covert anchor point over time. An increase in the relative frequency of ProTag that would then account for an increase in the overall relative frequency of covert anchor points. However, this is not what we find. The greatest increase in the relative frequency of covert anchor points comes between the periods 1600–1649 and 1650–1699, jumping from 45.2% to 75.1%. However, at the same time the number of ProTag constructions with a covert anchor point and ProTag that actually decreases from 26.9% to 15.9%. Furthermore, from the start to the end of the seventeenth century, the relative frequency of ProTag that falls: that accounts for 24.6% of all occurrences of ProTags in the period 1600–1649 but 17.7% in the period 1659–1699. By contrast, the relative frequency of ProTag this rose: from 64.4% in 1600–1649 to 78.5% in 1650–1699. Thus an increase in the relative frequency of ProTag that does not seem to be responsible for the general increase in covert anchor points that is observed.

When the anchor point is overt, its grammatical function is overwhelmingly subject (97.9%). Object anchor points are also attested – (17a–c) are examples – but are much rarer (2.1%).

1. 1. a. but you shall heare these_i in her excellent white bosome, these_i. (William Shakespeare, Hamlet, 1623)

   2. b. You mean it_i for an Insult this_i, you do. (James Thomson, Agamemnon, 1738)

   3. c. for I dare say you’l think it_i no unwise discourse this_i, nor ill argu’d. (M. Clifford, The rehearsal, 1672)

Object is the only grammatical function other than subject attested as an overt anchor point for a demonstrative ProTag in the corpus. This is the same finding reported for EModE in Mycock and Misson (Reference Mycock and Misson2020).

All overt anchor points are pronouns. This is consistent with the possible topic-marking function of the ProTag that has been discussed previously (Mycock Reference Mycock2019; Mycock & Misson Reference Mycock and Misson2020).

6.4.4 Anchors

A variety of different possible anchors are attested in the corpus. Anchors can be phrases or full clauses; see the examples in (12), (13), (15), and (16). Most anchors are declaratives, but questions are also found:

1. 1. a. is’t not dark and dreadful proof Of madness this? (Lady Emmeline Stuart-Wortley, Eva, 1840)

   2. b. What call ye him, this? (John Skelton, Magnyfycence, 1856)

The anchor in demonstrative ProTag constructions in this corpus seldom includes a verb: over 82% of anchors include no verb form of any kind. Coupled with the tendency for the anchor point to be covert, this means that the anchor is infrequently a full clause. The anchor is never a clause when the ProTag is those: all anchors in those ProTag constructions are NPs (for example, very foolish reasons, good lads, and two short words).

Elements included in the anchor of a demonstrative ProTag construction provide an indication of its function, which is most commonly subjective, that is, speaker-oriented and strongly associated with the indication of the speaker’s attitude. Consistent with expressing the speaker’s attitude to a proposition, there are many examples of ProTag constructions which contain lexical items with inherently subjective meaning signalling speaker orientation such as dreadful, monstrous, pretty, and bad, as in (19).

1. 1. a. A dreadful affair this! (Thomas Morton, Secrets worth knowing, 1798)

   2. b. ’Tis monstrous, this. (Richard Brome, The Antipodes, 1640)

   3. c. a pretty Smile that; (Moses Browne, All-bedevil’d, 1723)

   4. d. Bad fellow that. (T. W. Robertson, Play, 1890)

The tendency is for ProTags to co-occur with positive evaluative expressions (45%) rather than negative (18%) or non-evaluative (37%) expressions. (This is true of each individual demonstrative ProTag as well as ProTags as a group.) The ten most common evaluative expressions, which are adjectives, are presented in Table 6.2.

Table 6.2The ten most common evaluative expressions that co-occur with demonstrative ProTags in the Chadwyck–Healey English Drama Collection

Note. +ve denotes a positive evaluative expression; −ve denotes a negative evaluative expression.

Table 6.2Long description

The table presents the number of times evaluative expressions are used with demonstrative pronouns (ProTags) in a dataset. The expressions are categorized by whether they are positive or negative. The table is divided into 6 columns, each with its headers, evaluative expressions, with ProTag this, that, these, those, and the total number. The data in the rows is filled from left to right as follows:

• For pretty, positive, the corresponding numbers are 49, 11, 1, 1, and 62.

• For good, positive, the corresponding numbers are 19, 21, 3, 1, and 44.

• For fine, positive, the corresponding numbers are 28, 11, 2, 2, and 43.

• For pleasant, positive, the corresponding numbers are 17, 4, 3, 0, and 24.

• For bad, negative, the corresponding numbers are 6, 7, 0, 1, and 14.

• For nice, positive, the corresponding numbers are 7, 4, 2, 0, and 13.

• For excellent, positive, the corresponding numbers are 8, 0, 3, 0, and 11.

• For well, positive, the corresponding numbers are 3, 6, 0, 0, and 9.

• For dreadful, negative, the corresponding numbers are 3, 3, 0, 0, and 6.

• For sad, negative, the corresponding numbers are 6, 0, 0, 0, and 6.

The adjectives with which ProTags co-occur mostly belong to the semantic type Value (good, bad, etc.) as identified in Dixon (Reference Dixon1977), with the majority of others belonging to the type Human Propensity (sad, honest, etc.), which Dixon (Reference Dixon1977: 74) notes can be applied to higher animals as well as humans. The presence of an intensifier is indicative of a strongly evaluative expression. In this corpus, ProTag constructions included intensifiers such as very, devilish, mighty, and damned.

Evaluative nominal expressions are also attested, though not as frequently; for example, whore (20a) and fool (20b).

1. 1. a. A Whore this! (Aphra Behn, The revenge, 1681)

   2. b. ’Tis a poor loving Fool, this; (Thomas D’Urfey, Love for money, 1691)

Compatible with their core subjective meaning, demonstrative ProTag constructions in this corpus regularly include lexical items that indicate speaker orientation. The tendency is for these evaluative expressions to be positive.