The Syntax of Early English - Cryptm.org

88 The syntax of early Englishimplicit negative contexts (as defined above); it did not as a rule occur inexplicit negative clauses. Therefore, where present-day English has not . . . anything,not ...ever, etc., Middle English normally (and this usage persisted intothe seventeenth and eighteenth centuries) had nothing, never, etc., as in (59).(59) He was despeyred; no thyng dorste he seye‘He was in despair; nothing dared he say’ (Chaucer Franklin 943)3.5 Subordinate clausesTraditionally a distinction is made between main and subordinateclauses. As shown in chapter 2, Old English had several elements (e.g. a, onne,swa) that could function either as an adverb or as a subordinating conjunction,so that often it was only the word order (but sometimes also the use of theunambiguously subordinating particle e) that would signal whether a specificclause was main or subordinate. In early Middle English some of the OldEnglish correlative constructions like a...a, onne . . . onne, ‘then . . . when’and swa...swa, ‘so . . . so’ survived, but this was rapidly replaced by a systemin which conjunctions were formally distinct from adverbs and word order nolonger played an important role in signalling whether a clause was main or subordinate.Thus in early texts, we can still come across examples like (60) and (61).(60) & at oer dei a he lai an slep in scip, a estrede eand the other day when he lay in sleep in ship then darkened thedæi ouer al landesday over all lands‘and the next day, when he lay asleep in the boat, (then) it became darkeverywhere in the country’ (ChronE(Plummer) 1135.2)(61) anne he com enne he were bliewhen he came then they were glad‘When he came, they were glad’ (Havelok 778)In (60), word order still plays a role, since there is inversion of subject and verbin the main clause but not in the subordinate clause. In (61), there is no suchdifference, although the conjunction and correlative adverb have the sameform. In later texts, however, the correlative adverb was often dropped or oneof the two conjunctives was replaced by one different in form. In Chaucer, forexample, tho (from Old English a) no longer functioned as a conjunction, butonly as an adverb; the same is true, with one exception, for onne/enne.Normally, Chaucer used whan (that) (from Old English hwænne, an interrogativeadverb) as the conjunction, with or without a correlative in the mainclause. (62) exemplifies the former possibility.