Park Sang-soo. 1997. Verb Raising in Early Modern English. Studies in Modern Grammatical Theories 11: 17-38. From the viewpoint of the history of English, the Early Modern English period, especially from about 1500-1600, is characterized by the complete loss of inflectional system, the disappearance of overt verb-raising consequent on the change of the verb feature of tense from strong to weak, and the emergence of modal verbs including dummy verb do. The erosion of inflectional ending system made the overt verb-raising impossible which is necessary for the checking of subject-verb agreement in the functional category of T or AGR. The change of verb feature of tense in the late 16th century is closely related to the loss of agreement system by 1500. During the Early Modern English period of the 16th century, the verb feature of tense was either strong or weak. This means that both the overt verb-raising and do-support are allowed in this transitional stage of tense feature. When the verb feature of tense becomes weak, the overt verb-raising from the verb position of lexical category to T was suppressed. The change of verbal system implies the agreement of formal features between subject and finite verb is checked off not through the overt verb-raising at the level of syntax but through the covert verb-raising at the level of logical form or through the operation of do-support. From the end of the l6th century do-support was forbidden in an affirmative sentence, but it became obligatory in a negative sentence or an interrogative sentence. We can explain such grammatical operation using the economy principle of `last resort` in the Minimalist Program. This change, of course, resulted from the weak verb feature of tense and the impossibility of the overt verb-raising. The dummy verb do originated from the development of the raising verb do in the Middle English period. The raising verb do was reanalyzed as a functional element of tense carrier from the late 16th century.

• 박상수 | Sang Soo Park