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VERB POSITIONS IN A SENTENCE

By: R. Yohanes Radjaban

I. Introduction

The verb is the most complex part of speech. Its varying arrangements with nouns determine the different kinds of sentences (Frank, 1972: 47). The arrangements can be symbolized by such formulas as S V O (subject + verb + object), N₁ V N₂ (noun + verb + noun), or NP + VP (noun phrase + verb phrase), and the like. This complexity sometimes causes some confusion. Synchronic studies on the positions of verbs seem to be the most common effort to avoid confusions. Diachronic studies, on the other hand, seem to be left behind. This paper, therefore, is trying to provide a diachronic contrastive study on the verb positions in the Old and Modern English.

This paper aims at contrasting the positions of verbs in a sentence between Modern English and Old English. The discussion will start with the description of the kinds of Modern English sentences to get the overview of the verb positions in Modern English. After describing the verb positions in Modern English, we will try to get the description of the verb positions in Old English. A diachronic approach to prove the assumption on similarities of verb positioning patterns among the Indo-European languages is also applied. From the descriptions then we try to draw some conclusions on the verb positions of English sentences both in Modern and Old English.

II. Three Kinds of Modern English Sentences

Sentences are generally classified into three kinds i.e. Declarative, Interrogative, and Exclamatory (Curme, 1947: 97).

A. Declarative Sentences

Declarative sentences are to state a fact, or to assert something as a fact (Curme, 1947: 97). In declarative sentences, the verb of a complete predication normally follows the subject (p.104).

A day has twenty-four hours.

Kind words are the music of the world.

B. Interrogative Sentences

Interrogative sentences are to ask a question. In a question, requiring yes or no for an answer the personal part of the verb usually stands in the first place (p.97).

Are you going?

Is she here?

Am I right?

Elsewhere the question is introduced by an interrogative pronoun.

Who did it?

What did he want?

Whom did he meet?

A question may also be introduced by an interrogative adjective.

What book did you buy?

Which book did you finally select?

What novel had you finished?

A question can also be introduced by an interrogative adverb.

Where did he come from?

How did he do it?

Where did he hide?

C. Exclamatory Sentences

Explanatory sentences are to utter an outcry, or give expressions to a command, wish, or desire. In explanatory sentences, the subject does commonly not appear. This is probably the oldest form of the sentence.

Look!

Come in.

Write soon.

Don’t go.

Don’t forget.

Don’t do that.

When the tone becomes that of an emphatic prohibition or negative command, the subject is often expressed (Curme: 1947: 250).

Don’t you go!

Don’t you forget!

Don’t you do that!

D. Deviations

Deviations from this norm and other features of English word order relating to the position of the verb are given as follow:

1. An emphatic adverb or object may stand in the important first place, the personal part of the verb in the second place, and the subject in the third place (the old inverted word order).

Seven times did this intrepid general repeat his attacks.

Never had I even dreamed of such a thing.

This word order has become fixed in all questions in which there is an interrogative adverb or object.

When did he come?

Whom did you meet?

2. Often a stressed or unstressed element takes the first place so that the subject may be withheld for a time to create the feeling of suspense and thus call attention to it and render it emphatic.

Then came the dreaded end.

Now comes my best trick.

“You have acted selfishly,” replied the old man.

3. In questions expecting yes or no for an answer and imperative sentences, the auxiliary verbs (personal part of the verb: Modal Aux, Do Aux, BE Aux, and TENSE Indicator Aux) stands in the first place.

Did you see him?

Could you come?

Are you happy?

Have told them the news?

The idea of action is important in both questions and commands. Hence the verb is put into the important first place in both kinds of sentences. In narrative, action is prominent, so that there is a natural tendency here to bring the verb forward as near the important first place as possible. It now often stands at the head of the sentence after the expletive there and later on after then.

There was a heavy frost last night.

There is a change on him.

There sailed a bold mariner over the sea.

Then came unfavourable winds

Then sank the ship into the sea.

4. The negative adverbs of zero or low frequency cause subject/auxiliary inversion to accompany their movement to initial position. (Cece-Murcia, 215).

Never have we seen such a sight.

Seldom did she go home late.

Rarely has John washed his socks.

Scarcely ever was she sick.

Hardly ever had they paid the rent for the apartments.

III. Tenses and Verb Positions in Modern English

Besides the kinds of sentences, the other possible factor influencing the position of verbs is tenses. As a member of Germanic language family, it is very possible that English has typical grammatical arrangements for its verbs influenced by the tenses. To get a general description on the verb positions dealing with the tenses of the sentence, it is necessary to give a contrastive description of the influence of tenses to the positions of verbs in German and Dutch.

In German and Dutch, the presence of past participle to indicate the past-to-present times, and modals change the positions of verbs in a sentence. The presence of modals and have shifts the position of verbs from the second position after subject to the end of the sentence (Court, 1966: 39).

German

1. Ich spreche Deütch.

[first person singular] [present stem: speak] [accusative: German]

I speak German.

2. Ich kan Deütch sprechen.

[first person singular] [present MODAL Aux: can] [accusative: German] [infinitif: speak]

I can speak German.

3. Ich habe Deuth gespröchen.

[first person singular] [present perfect indicator/HAVE Aux : have] [accusative: German] [past participle: speak]

I have spoken German.

Dutch

1. Ik hur een huis.

[first person singular] [present stem: rent] [article + accusative: a + house]

I rent a house.

2. Ik wil een huis huren.

[first person singular] [MODAL Aux: will] [article + accusative: a + house] [present stem: rent]

I will rent a house.

3. Ik heb een huis gehuurd.

[first person singular] [present perfect indicator/HAVE Aux: have] [article + accusative: a + house] [past participle: rent]

I have rented a house.

From the above contrastive descriptions, the shift of verb positions due to the presence of modals and have in German and Dutch does not happen in Modern English. It happens since Modern English considers ‘a verb’ an important element in a sentence. It is more important than the object of a sentence (Frank, 1972: 51-54).

IV. The Positions of Verbs in Old English

To know the positions of verbs in Old English, we need to study the following corpus taken from The Cambridge Encyclopedia of The English Language page 20. The text is about the Cædmon Story. It is an Old English prose, which provides the clearest way in to analyzing the grammar of the language. This extract is from an Old English translation of Bede’s Ecclesiastical History. It tells the story of Cædmon, the unlettered cowherd who became England’s first Christian poet, sometime in the late 7^th century. The translation dates from the late 9^th century.

A. An Old English Corpus

From the following corpus, I try to categorize the verb positions based on the pattern of MoE verb positions. Based on the categorizations, the patterns between OE and MoE are compared to draw some conclusions.

wæs he se mon in weoruldhade geseted oð Þa tide Þe he

Was he the man in secular life settled until the time that he

wæs gelyfdre ylde; ond he næfre nænig leoð geleornode, on he

was of-advanced age; and he never any poem learned, and he

for Þon oft in gebeorscipe, Þonne Þær wæs blisse intinga

therefore often at banquet, when there was of-joy occasion

gedemed, Þæt heo ealle sceolden Þurh endebyrdness be hearpan

decided, that they all should by arrangement with harp

singan, Þonne he geseah Þa hearpan him nealecan, Þonne aras he

to sing, when he saw the harp him approach, then arose he

for scome from Þæm symble, ond ham eode to his huse, Þa he

for shame from the feast, and home went to his house. When he

Þæt Þa sumre tide dyde, Þæt he forlet Þæt hus Þæs

that a certain time did, that he left the house of the

gebeorscipes, ond ut wæs gongende to neata scipene,

banquet, and out was going to of-cattle stall

Þara heord him wæs Þære neahte beboden; Þa he ða Þær

Of which keeping him was that night entrusted; when he there

In gelimplice tide his leomu on reste gesette ond onslepte,

At suitable time his limbs at rest set and fell asleep,

Þa stod him sum mon æt Þurh swefn, ond hine halette

then stood him a certain man beside in dream, and him hailed

ond gerette, ond hine be his noman nemnde, ‘Cedmon, sing me

and greeted, and him by his name called. ‘Cædmon, sing me

hwæthwugu.’ Þa ondswarede he, ond cwæð, ‘Ne con ic noht

something.’ Then answered he, and said, ‘Not can I nothing

singan; ond ic for Þon od Þeossum gebeorscipe ut eode on hider

sing; and I for that from this banquet out went and hither

gewat, for Þon ic nacht singan de cuðe.’ Eft he cwæð,

came, because I nothing to sing not knew how.’ Again he spoke,

se ðe wið hine sprecende wæs, ‘Hwæðre Þu meaht me

he that with him speaking was, ‘However you can for-me

singan.’ Þa cwæð he, ‘Hwæt sceal ic singan?’ Cwæð he, ‘Sing

sing, Then said he, ‘What shall I sing?’ Said he, ‘Sing

me frumsceaft.’ Þa he ða pas andsware onfeng, Þa ongon he

me creation.’ When he this answer received, then began he

sona singan in herenesse Godes Scyppendes, Þa fers

immediately to sing in praise of God Creator, those verses

ond Þa word Þe he næfre gehyrde …

and those words that he never had heard …

B. Verb Pattern Categorizations

From the text above, it seems that Old English has quite similar patterns of the verb positions. We can easily find the ‘declarative-like verb position’.

1. he forlet Þæt hus Þæs gebeorscipes,

he left the house of the baquet,

2. Eft he cwæð,

Again he spoke,

We can also find the ‘interrogative-like verb position’ or inversion.

1. wæs he se mon in weoruldhade

was he the man in secular life

2. Þonne aras he for scome from Þem symble,

then arose he for shame from the feast,

3. Þa ondswarede he,

then answered he,

4. Þa cwæð he, ‘Hwæt sceal ic singan?’

then said he, ‘What shall I sing?’

5. Þa ongon he sona singan in herenesse Godes Scyppendes,

then began he immediately to sing in praise of God Creator,

We may also find the ‘exclamation-like verb position’.

1. ‘Cedmon, sing me hwæthwugu.’

‘Cædmon, sing me something.’

2. ‘Sing me frumsceaft.’

‘Sing me creation.’

Besides the above kind-like Old English sentences, we can also find some verb positions typical to Germanic language sentence concerning with the shift of verb position from the second position following the subject to the very end of the sentence (Crystal, 1995; 20).

1. heo ealle sceolden Þurh endebyrdness be hearpan singan,

they all should by arrangement with harp to sing,

2. ond he næfre nænig leoð geleornode,

and he (had) never any poem learned,

The above explication seems to be the most common false inference to get the patterns of Old English kinds of sentences dealing with the verb positions. Although the description above shows the positive correlation between the kinds of Modern English sentences and Old English ones, it does not mean that Old English has fixed patterns of verb positions in a sentence. Still from the text, we can find even the absurd patterns of the verb position.

1. Þa he Þæt Þa sumre tide dyde,

When he that a certain time did,

2. ond ic for Þon od Þeossum gebeorscipe ut eode on hider gewat,

and I for that from this banquet out went and hither came,

From the last two descriptions, we should go further to analyze the role of word order in Old English. It seems that Old English word arrangements—including verb positions—are free because of its synthetic nature. Since Old English is a synthetic language, word order does not play a significant role. A synthetic language is one, which indicates the relation of words in a sentence largely by means of inflections (Baugh & Cable, 1978: 55). In the case of the Indo-European languages these most commonly take the form of endings on the noun and pronoun, the adjective and the verb. The Latin sentence Nero interfecit Agrippinam means ‘Nero killed Agrippina.’ It would mean the same thing if the words were arranged in any other order, such as Agripinam interfecit Nero, because Nero is the form of the nominative case and the ending - am of Agrippinam marks the noun as accusative no matter where it stands.

As a synthetic language, Old English indicates the relation of words in a sentence by means of inflections. The sentence sèò cwèn geseah Þone guman has the same meaning as Þone guman geseah sèò cwèn. The two sentences mean the woman saw the man. In Modern English, if we want to say that it is the man who saw the woman we just put the man as the subject and the woman the object. It is a matter of word order. In Old English we have to write se guma geseah Þa cwèn. The nominative feminine from seo must be changed to an accusative form Þa. Similarly, the accusative masculine from Þone has to become a nominative se. It is thus always clear who is doing what to whom, regardless of the order in which the noun phrases appear.

V. Conclusion

To modern eyes and ears, Old English grammar provides a fascinating mixture of the familiar and the unfamiliar. The word order is much more varied than it would be in Modern English, but there are several places where it is strikingly similar. The main syntactic differences affect the placing of the verb, which quite often appear before the subject, and also at the very end of the clause.

In Modern English, word order is relatively fixed. The reason Old English order could vary so much is that the relationships between the parts of the sentence were signaled by other means. Like other Germanic languages, Old English was inflected: the job a word did in the sentence was signaled by the kind of ending it had. Today most of these inflections have died away, leaving the modern reader with the major task of getting used to the word endings, in order to understand the Old English texts.

Reference:

1. Baugh, Albert, C. & Cable, Thomas, (1978), A History of the English Language, Prentice-Hall, Inc., Englwood Cliffs, N. J. 07632

2. Celce-Murcia, Marianne, (1983), The Grammar Book,Newbury House Publishers, the U. S. A.,

3. Court, J. F. H. A. De La, (1966), Dasar Bahasa Belanda & Jerman, N. V. Uitgeverij W. van Hoeve, The Hague, Holland,

4. Crystal, David, (1995), The Cambridge Encyclopedia of The English Language, Cambridge University Press.

5. Curme, Geroge O., (1947), English Grammar, Barnes & Noble, Inc.

6. Frank, Marcella, (1972), Modern English, a practical reference guide, Prentice-Hall, Inc.

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