0 INTRODUCTION

2. –ING NOMINALS: ORIGINS AND DEVELOPMENT
nominal (as demonstrated by their adjectival modification and the preposition governing
their objects) or “neutral,” in the sense that there is no syntactic evidence in either
direction. Nevertheless, Emonds’ study is based on just one brief text and its results must
be taken with caution. In turn, Tajima (1985b), after having comprehensively analyzed
Chaucer’s works, concludes that the gerund, although infrequent, was present in
Chaucer’s language. Similarly, Donner (1986) demonstrates the use of the verbal gerund
in ME from an analysis of the quotations in the Middle English Dictionary. It seems that
the gerund with verbal characteristics was mainly used to match Latin gerunds in the
translation of Chauliac’s Cyrurgie, dating from the first quarter of the 15 th century, and by
Reginald Peacock (c. 1395–c. 1461) as a way to make English suitable for philosophical
discourse and extending its reach, both lexically and syntactically. However, as Donner
(1986: 400) puts it:
the gerund can hardly be said to have become established during the
Middle English period. No writer except Peacock uses gerunds
regularly, normally, and naturally as part of his syntactic repertoire.
Where they do occur, if not occasioned by Latin or French gerunds,
they look rather more like solecisms than signs of a developing
syntactic innovation. The true development is to be sought among later
writers.
To sum up, although the development of the (verbal) gerund was not fully completed
during ME, it can be considered to have come into use during that period.
2.3. The structural instability of –ing nominals during the EModE period
As has just been mentioned, the (verbal) gerund first becomes available during the ME
period, but only develops fully in later stages. In Fanego’s (1996) analysis of –ing forms
in the EModE sections of the The Helsinki Corpus, –ing nominals are shown to exhibit a
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