Susan,
That's why I specified that it was prefixal a-, but I should have excluded the Greek-derived negative prefix a-, as in "amorally." It's the native English prefix a- as in asleep, awake, aware, alive, etc. We do have "sleepily," "warily," and "lively," but notice that they all lose the prefix if they add -ly. And the -ly is often added to a derived adjective stem in -y, as with "wary" and "sleepy." By the way, one can make an argument that the Greek-derived a- is actually a bound root involved in compound formation because of its stress pattern. Notice we don't stress the prefix of "alike" but we do in "amoral."
Herb
-----Original Message-----
Sent: 2008-05-31 09:24
Subject: Re: Lonely Morphology
I'm not sure what you mean. There are many adjectives turned adverb
that start with an "a": amiably, absurdly, amorally, adjectivally.
Susan
On May 31, 2008, at 7:47 AM, STAHLKE, HERBERT F wrote:
"Lonely," by the way, is an interesting word, an adverb derived
from "lone" which is itself an aphetic form (initial vowel dropped)
of "alone." "Alone" appears first in 1300 as an adjective derived
from a combination of "all one," a phrase that was current at the
time. "Lone" appeared in 1377 by the loss of the initial vowel
(aphesis, hence, "aphetic"). I wonder if the need for an adverbial
form could have contributed to the aphesis, since we don't add -ly
to adjectives starting with the prefix a-.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
Sent: 2008-05-31 08:39
Subject: Re: Lonely Morphology
There's even a name for it, haplology. Wikipedia informs me, and
OED concurs, that the word was introduced by American philologist
Maurice Bloomfield in an 1895 Journal article. The date and source
are from the OED entry.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
Sent: 2008-05-30 21:23
Subject: Re: Lonely Morphology
At 06:37 30/05/2008, STAHLKE, HERBERT F wrote:
. . . we don't generally like to repeat a syllable
immediately. Notice how we can say "He's becoming a good
grammarian" but tend to avoid "He may be becoming a good
grammarian," and if we say it in normal speech we'll drop one of
the "be"s.
DD: A really great point that was new to me. I appreciate the concept
and thank you for the insight. I like things that make me stop and
think, and that really did.
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