Old English Syntax

Old English was a synthetic language (the lexical and grammatical notions of the word were contained in one unit). It was highly inflected with many various affixes.The principal grammatical means were suffixation, vowel interchange and supplition.Historical syntax has been studied to a much smaller extent than either phonetics, lexicology or morphology.

Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………………..3

1. The phrase………………………………………………………………………………………...3

1.1. Ways of expressing syntactical relations………………………………………………………..4

1.1.1. Agreement…………………………………………………………………………………….4

1.1.2. Government…………………………………………………………………………………...4

1.1.3. Joining……………………………………………………………………………………… 4

1.2. Three component phrases……………………………………………………………………….5

1.2.1. Verb + Substantive Dat. + Substantive (Pronoun) Acc……………………………………….5

1.2.2. Verb + Preposition + Substantive (Pronoun)……………………………………………… 5

2. The sentence…………………………………………………………………………………5

2.1. The simple sentence…………………………………………………………………… 5

2.1.1. Main parts…………………………………………………………………………………5

2.1.2. Secondary parts………………………………………………………………………… 6

2.1.3. One member and elliptical sentences………………………………………………… 7

2.1.4. Sentences introduced by hit and pær…………………………………………………………8

2.1.5. Uses of infinitive and participle…………………………………………………………… 8

2.1.6.. Infinitive phrases…………………………………………………………………………….8

2.1.7. Substantive + Participle or Adjective……………………………………………………… 9

2.1.8 Negation…………………………………………………………………………………… 9

2.2. The composite sentence……………………………………………………………………….9

2.2.1. The compound sentence……………………………………………………………………9

2.2.2. The copmlex sentence…………………………………………………………………… 10

2.2.3. Mixed sentences………………………………………………………………………… 14

3. Word order…………………………………………………………………………………… 15

3.1. Subject-Verb……………………………………………………………………………… 15

3.2. Verb – Subject………………………………………………………………………………16

3.3. Subject…Verb……………………………………………………………………………… 17

Conclusion……………………………………………………………………………………… 18

Bibliography………………………………………………………………………………………18