Adverbial genitive
Encyclopedia
In grammar
Grammar
In linguistics, grammar is the set of structural rules that govern the composition of clauses, phrases, and words in any given natural language. The term refers also to the study of such rules, and this field includes morphology, syntax, and phonology, often complemented by phonetics, semantics,...

, an adverbial genitive is a noun
Noun
In linguistics, a noun is a member of a large, open lexical category whose members can occur as the main word in the subject of a clause, the object of a verb, or the object of a preposition .Lexical categories are defined in terms of how their members combine with other kinds of...

 declined in the genitive case
Genitive case
In grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...

 that functions as an adverb
Adverb
An adverb is a part of speech that modifies verbs or any part of speech other than a noun . Adverbs can modify verbs, adjectives , clauses, sentences, and other adverbs....

.

Adverbial genitives in English

In Old and Middle English
Middle English
Middle English is the stage in the history of the English language during the High and Late Middle Ages, or roughly during the four centuries between the late 11th and the late 15th century....

, the genitive case was productive
Productivity (linguistics)
In linguistics, productivity is the degree to which native speakers use a particular grammatical process, especially in word formation. Since use to produce novel structures is the clearest proof of usage of a grammatical process, the evidence most often appealed to as establishing productivity is...

, and adverbial genitives were commonplace. While Modern English
Modern English
Modern English is the form of the English language spoken since the Great Vowel Shift in England, completed in roughly 1550.Despite some differences in vocabulary, texts from the early 17th century, such as the works of William Shakespeare and the King James Bible, are considered to be in Modern...

 does not fully retain the genitive case, it has left various relics, including a number of adverbial genitives. Some of these are now analyzed as ordinary adverbs, including the following:
  • always (from all way)
  • afterwards, towards, and so on (from their counterparts in -ward, which historically were adjectives)
  • once, twice, and thrice (from the roots of one, two, and three)
  • hence, thence, and whence (related to the roots of here, then, and when)


Some words were formed from the adverbial genitive along with an additional parasitic -t:
  • amidst (from amid)
  • amongst (from among)
  • midst (from mid)
  • whilst (from while)


The adverbial genitive also survives in a number of stock phrases; for example, in "I work days and sleep nights", the words days and nights, while nowadays analyzed as plural nouns, are in fact derived historically from the genitive or instrumental cases of day and night. (That they function as adverbs rather than as direct objects is clear from the rephrasing "I work during the day and sleep at night.") The modern British expression "Of an afternoon I go for a walk" has a similar origin, but uses the periphrasis
Periphrasis
In linguistics, periphrasis is a device by which a grammatical category or grammatical relationship is expressed by a free morpheme , instead of being shown by inflection or derivation...

 "of + noun" to replace the original genitive. This periphrastic form has variously been marked as used "particularly in isolated and mountainous regions of the southern United States" and as having "a distinctly literary feel".

See also

  • English grammar
    English grammar
    English grammar is the body of rules that describe the structure of expressions in the English language. This includes the structure of words, phrases, clauses and sentences...

  • Genitive case
    Genitive case
    In grammar, genitive is the grammatical case that marks a noun as modifying another noun...

  • History of the English language
    History of the English language
    English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought to Britain by Germanic invaders from various parts of what is now northwest Germany and the Netherlands. Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting the varied origins of the...

  • Wiktionary list of adverbial genitives
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