So, Herb, would a more contemporary paraphrase of "ago" (the used-to-be participle) in a phrase like "many years ago" be something like "many years that have gone"?
Seth
Dr. Seth Katz
Assistant Professor
Department of English
Bradley University
________________________________
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar on behalf of Stahlke, Herbert F.W.
Sent: Tue 10/5/2010 9:49 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Adverbs?
I agree with Dick's analysis. Historically "ago" is a shortening of an older past participle of "go," "agone" The prefix a- has about as complex and ancestry and etymology as anything in English, but a lot of words that have an a- prefix are used only postnominally or predicatively. We can't say "an awake dog" or "an alive fish," although other a- words like "alert" and "ashamed" can be attributive. Because "ago" has lost all participial traces but remains postnominal, it has become what Dick called it, a postposition. "Alert," by the way, is not etymologically one of the a- prefix words. It was borrowed from French in something close to its current form and would break down in French etymology to al+ert. It first appears in English in 1598 where it is used predicatively. The first attributive usage appears in 1712.
Herb
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Dick Veit
Sent: Tuesday, October 05, 2010 6:09 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Adverbs?
"Forty years ago" seems to function much like a prepositional phrase, but with "ago" as a postposition rather than a preposition.
Thanks for posing this question, Janet. I look forward to being enlightened by responses from others.
Dick
On Tue, Oct 5, 2010 at 5:47 PM, Castilleja, Janet <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
Hello
How do you usually analyze a structure like this: Our old beach house, which was built forty years ago, has now vanished. What do you do with 'forty years ago'? I learned it as a noun phrase functioning as an adverb, but I'm not sure that's the best description, especially when working with students.
Thanks!
Janet
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