0 INTRODUCTION

5. CORPORA AND METHODOLOGY
(134) And this power of approaching the Cushion by vertue of the
operation of its own steams, was so durable in our vigorous piece
of Amber, that by once chafing it, I was able to make it follow the
Cushion no less than ten or eleven times. (E3 1675-6 Boyle
Electricity & magnetism)
Example (133) shows the item well acting as a pre-head constituent of the –ing formation
purging. The kind of structure in which this item occurs may help in disambiguation.
Thus, the definite article the acting as pre-head dependent of the –ing formation, and the
PP of the body acting as its post-head dependent, both point to its nominal nature. Since
nouns are usually modified by adjectives, the decision was taken to classify the item well
as an adjective. However, the item once in (134) has been classified as an adverb, in light
of the nature of the nominalization it modifies. As well as the pre-head modifier once
under discussion, the structure contains a bare NP functioning as its object in its agnate
sentence, which seems to indicate that the –ing formation chafing is verbal in nature.
5.3.2.2.3. Ambiguous pre-head modifiers
Other pre-head modifiers, such as only, right and just, among others, are ambiguous in the
sense that they have the same form when functioning as adjectives and as adverbs. Some
instances from the corpus follow:
(135) Howbeit, hee said also, that his skill was such, that if a man were
wounded at Yorke, bring him the weapon that hurt the Patient, and
he would cure him forsooth by onely dressing of the weapon, and
though he neuer see the Patient. As certain as Sea burnes. (E2
1602 Clowes Treatise for the artificiall cure of struma)
(136) and therefore could not without great perill and danger be safely
taken away, eyther-1 by Launce or Causticke remedies, by reason
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