Syntax I

On HW2, problem 2, part 1, sentence (c), where you are to check to see whether from Greece is a constituent, I put a comment suggesting that you might consider using whence and thence. Perhaps that was a bit obscure, so let me elaborate.

The task here is to try several constituency tests on the substring of the sentence The elated student of history received a book of cars from Greece. And we’re checking from Greece. So, for the replacement test, we’re looking for a one-word replacement that can stand in for from Greece.

When we did this in class, and considered down the street, we were able to replace it with there. But, the prepositional phrase from Greece doesn’t really express a location, but rather a path starting in a location. Is there a word in English that can work in its place (since if possible, we like to do our replacement tests with single words, because single words are guaranteed to be a constituent). The word I came up with here was thence. The usage examples found on wordreference.com are: “proceeded thence directly to college” and “flew from Helsinki and thence to Moscow”. You could substitute in “from there” for thence and arrive at basically the same meaning.

As for whence, it’s basically just the question form of thence (like where and there, what and that, when and then). As in: “The capybara lumbered over to the campsite, and then returned whence he came.” You can see a little rant about the common use of “from whence…” in the Language Corner column of the Columbia Journalism Review as well.