Edited by Susanne Flach and Martin Hilpert
[Studies in Corpus Linguistics 105] 2022
► pp. 132–171
While Verb-Object (VO) is the basic unmarked constituent order of predicates in Present-Day English, in older stages Object-Verb (OV) was the preferred option at least in certain syntactic contexts. This corpus-based study investigates OV linearisation after the loss of verb-second and focuses on morphosyntactic, processing, semantic and textual determinants of the VO/OV variation in the transition from Late Middle to Early Modern English. The findings reveal a shift from OV word order, ruled by systematic predictors in Late Middle English, to an essentially stylistic alternative in Early Modern English, when VO succeeded as the syntacticised organisation in English predicates. Also, in the later period, the postverbal slot was adapted to host constituents functioning as objects, which constitutes an illustration of exaptation.