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Word Order

§ 539. In ME and Early NE the order of words in the sentence underwent noticeable changes: it has become fixed and direct: subject plus predicate plus object (S+P+O) or subject plus the notional part of the predicate (the latter type was used mainly in questions).

Stabilisation of the word order was a slow process, which took many hundreds of years: from Early ME until the 16th or 17th c. The fixation of the word order proceeded together with reduction and loss of inflec­tional endings, the two developments being intertwined; though syn­tactic changes were less intensive and less rapid. They may have been delayed by the break in the written tradition after the Norman con­quest and by the general unsettling of the grammatical system during the Early ME dialectal divergence, whereas morphological changes may have been intensified for these very reasons.

Though the word order in Late ME may appear relatively free, sev­eral facts testify to its growing stability. The practice of placing the

verb-predicate at the end of a subordinate clause had been abandoned, so was the type of word order with the object placed between the Sub­ject and the Predicate (see OE examples in § 224). The place before the Predicate belonged to the Subject, which is confirmed by the prev­alence of this word order in prosaic texts and also, indirectly, by the transition of the “impersonal” constructions into “personal”: as shown above, in the pattern the mann(e) liketh the noun was understood as the Subject, though originally it was an Object in the Dat. case (cf. him liketh, see § 533).

§ 540. In the 17th and 18th c. the order of words in the sentence was generally determined by the same rules as operate in English today. The fixed, direct word order prevailed in statements, unless inversion was required for communicative purposes or for emphasis, e. g.:

Now comes in the sweetest morsel in the night... These numbers will I tear and write in prose. (Shakespeare)

The order of the Subject and Predicate remained direct in sentences beginning with an adverbial modifier:

then the two bears will not bite one another when they meet. (In OE an initial adverbial modifier required an inverted word order — P+S — see § 225.)

In questions the word order was partially inverted — unless the ques­tion referred to the subject group. The analytical forms of the verb and the use of the do-periphrasis instead of simple forms made it possible to place the notional part of the Predicate after the Subject even with simple Predicate. Cf.:

Are they good?... Can you make no use of your discontent? ... Who comes here? ... Lady, will you walk about with your friend? ... Did he never make you laugh? (Shakespeare)

Occasionally we find simple verb forms in questions placed before the Subject: Which way looks he? ... How came you to this? Full inver­sion in questions is more common with Shakespeare than with later authors (see also § 508 for the history of forms with do).

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