Chapters in this book

1. Prelim pages i
2. Table of contents v
3. In memoriam James Peter Thorne, 1933–1988 xi
4. Preface xxi
5. List of participants xxv
6. Restandardisation in middle Scots 1
7. British and American English 13
8. The stylistic function of ME gan reconsidered 31
9. Historical linguistics — linguistic archaeology 55
10. The assessment of lexical mortality and replacement between old and modern English 69
11. Preposition stranding and relative complementiser deletion 87
12. The old English impersonals revived 111
13. On the unity of the Mercian Second Fronting 141
14. Hugh Blair’s theory of the origin and the basic functions of language 165
15. Methodological preliminaries to the study of linguistic change in dialectal English 189
16. The typological status of old English word-formation 205
17. The double object construction in Old English 225
18. Where do Extraterritorial Englishes come from? Dialect input and recodification in transported Englishes 245
19. Obsolescence and universal grammar 281
20. On the role of some adverbs in Old English verse grammar 293
21. Adjectival inflexion relics and speech rhythm in late middle English and early modern English 313
22. Modelling functional differentiation and function loss 337
23. Dating old English inscriptions 357
24. Paradigm arrangement and inflectional homonymy 379
25. A contact-universals origins for periphrastic do with special consideration of old English-Celtic contact 407
26. A new kind metrical evidence in old English poetry 435
27. The development of ME from open syllable lenghtening in the west midlands 459
28. Some modern standard English filters 471
29. Exemplification in Eighteenth century grammars 481
30. From less to more situated in language 497
31. The easy-to-please construction in Old and middle English 519
32. Reworking the history of English auxiliaries 537
33. On grounding in English narratives 559
34. Author index 577