Brings together many of the resources needed for the exploration of English historical syntax and deals with the important changes in English sentence structure from old English to the present.
Denison's work is likely to become a standard work in the field. Reading it is stimulating and challengingxxx;
Linguistics
The range of topics covered in this book will make it relevant to anyone interested in the history of English syntax in general, and the solid scholarship behind the observations made makes it an excellent starting point for any investigation.
Diachronica
Preface
Part I: Groundwork
1. Introduction
2. Background
3. Nominal Morphology
Part II: Word Order
4. Word Order
Part III: Subject and Verb Phrase
5. Impersonals
6. Dative Movement and the Indirect Passive
Part IV: Complex Complementation
8. VOSI and V+I (control verbs)
9. Subject raising
Part V: Auxiliaries
10. Origins of Periphrastic DO
11. Modals and Related Auxiliaries
12. Perfect
13. Progressive
14. Passive
15. Multiple auxiliaries, regulation of DO
Part VI: Bibliography and Indexes
Abbreviations
16. Glossary of technical terms
17. Secondary sources
18. Primary sources
19. Index of verbs in examples