The Syntax of Early English - Cryptm.org

to one in which there is wh-movement (or A-bar movement) in the infinitivalclause, which would be the major alternative approach to the facts. As discussedin 2.6, Old English allows preposition stranding with pronouns and in variouswh-constructions, but not in passives. Above, we argued in detail that the OldEnglish ‘easy-to-please’ construction did not allow preposition stranding, andthis would follow directly if the construction was actually passive.Let us look more closely at the details of passive in Old English to see if suchan analysis can indeed be maintained. The pattern for ‘easy-to-please’ foundin all attested examples in Old English, given in (36), contains a trace adjacentto a verb that would assign accusative case to an overt object.(36) NP i... to V acct iThis is exactly like the pattern that is found for Old English passives with anovert subject, such as (46).(46) he iwæs fram mannum forsewen t ihe iwas by men despised‘he was despised by men’ (ÆCHom I, 23.330.21)The relevant part of the structure for this sentence is just as in (36), except thatthe verb is a participle rather than a to-infinitive.Another construction in Old English with a trace adjacent to a verb thatassigns accusative case is (47). In this example, hit is a referential pronounrather than a dummy subject.(47) hit inis not to forseone t iit is-not not to despise‘it is not to be despised’ (Bo 24.56.2)Such examples are comparable to the modern Dutch sentence type seen in (48).(48) dit iis niet te doen t ithis is not to do‘This cannot be done’The history of the ‘easy-to-please’ construction 269The Dutch construction is often referred to as a modal passive and it isanalysed as involving NP-movement by van Riemsdijk (1982), Bennis (1990)and others (see also Demske-Neumann 1994 for a similar approach to the correspondingconstruction in German). If the verb indeed has passive properties,the construction should not allow preposition stranding, since this isimpossible in Dutch passives generally. The ungrammaticality of (49) showsthat this is correct.(49) *Dat onderwerp is niet met hem over te praten*that subject is not with him about to talk‘That subject cannot be discussed with him/That subject is impossible totalk about with him’