An auxiliary verb is traditionally understood as a verb that "helps" another verb by adding (only) grammatical information to it. So understood, English auxiliaries include: •
Do when used to form questions (
Do you want tea?), to negate (''I don't want coffee
), or to emphasize (I do want tea
) (see do''-support) •
Have when used to express
perfect aspect (
He had given his all) •
Be when used to express
progressive aspect (
They were singing) or
passive voice (
It was destroyed) • The
modal auxiliary verbs, used with a variety of meanings, principally relating to
modality (
He can do it now) However, this understanding of auxiliaries has trouble with
be (''He wasn't asleep
; Was he asleep?
), have
(%He hadn't any money
), and would
(Would you rather we left now?''), each of which behaves syntactically like an auxiliary verb even when not accompanying another verb (or not merely doing so). Other approaches to defining auxiliary verbs are described below.
Be Passive voice Be, followed by the
past participle of a lexical verb, realizes the
passive voice:
He was promoted.) Followed by the
present participle of a verb (whether lexical or auxiliary),
be realizes the
progressive aspect:
He was promoting the film. In Early Modern English, perfect tenses could be formed with either
have (as today) or
be. The latter pattern persisted into the 19th century: a character in
Pride and Prejudice says,
But before I am run away with by my feelings on this subject, perhaps it will be advisable for me to state my reasons for marrying.
Do Do-support The auxiliary verb
do is primarily used for
dosupport. This in turn is used for negation, interrogative main clauses, and more. If a positive main clause is headed by an auxiliary verb, either the addition of
not or (for most auxiliary verbs) a ''n't
inflection can negate. So They could reach home before dark
becomes They couldn't reach home before dark
. (This is the "negation" of NICE and NICER.) However, a lexical verb has to be supported by the verb do
; so They reached home before dark
becomes They '''didn't'
reach home before dark.); the inverted alternative to
How wonderful it tasted! would be
How wonderful did it taste! A negative constituent that is not the subject can move to the front and trigger such inversion:
None of the bottles did they leave unopened. A phrase with
only can do the same:
Only once did I win a medal. Ditto for phrases starting with
so and
such:
So hard/Such a beating did Douglas give Tyson that Tyson lost. And in somewhat old-fashioned or formal writing, a miscellany of other constituents can be moved to the front with the same effect:
Well do I remember, not so much the whipping, as the being shut up in a dark closet behind the study;
for years and years did they believe that France was on the brink of ruin. in English, a sentence using a perfect tense may or may not have a perfective interpretation. The perfect is also used in contexts that require both past reference and an untensed verb form (
He seems to have left;
Having left, he lit a cigarette).
Other uses When used to describe an event,
have is exclusively a lexical verb (*
Had you your teeth done?;
Did you have your teeth done?; *
Had you a nap?;
Did you have a nap?). When used to describe a state, however, for many speakers (although for few Americans or younger people) there is also an auxiliary option: (''he'd stop at a pub, settle up with a cheque because he '''hadn't'
any money on him; '''''Hasn't'
he any friends of his own?; ''I'm afraid I '''haven't'
anything pithy to answer;
This 'hasn't'
anything directly to do with religion).
It hasn’t got anything to do with the little green men and the blue orb;
What right had he got to get on this train without a ticket?; ''Hasn't he got a toolbox?''). With their meaning of obligation,
have to,
has to and
had to – rarely if ever rendered as
ve to,
s to and
d to – can use auxiliary
have for inversion (
if he wants to compel A. to do something to what Court has he to go?;
How much further has he to go?;
Now why has he to wait three weeks?), although lexical
have is commoner.
Use Use (rhyming with
loose) satisfies only one of
The Cambridge Grammar of the English Languages
five criteria for modal as distinct from other auxiliary verbs. "It is also semantically quite distinct from the modal auxiliaries: the meaning it expresses is aspectual, not modal."
Use is far more commonly encountered as a lexical than as an auxiliary verb, particularly for younger or American speakers. This forms questions and negatives with
did. The plain form
use (sometimes spelt ) of the lexical verb is seen in
Did you use to play tennis?). Its preterite perfect
had used is rare but attested. A simple declarative (
I often used to play tennis) could be either auxiliary or lexical. Use of the preterite
used should not be confused with that of the participial adjective (i.e. the adjective etymologically derived from the participle), meaning "familiar with", as in
I am used to this,
We must get used to the cold. (As is common for adjectives and impossible for verbs,
used here can be modified by
very.) When the participial adjective is followed by
to and a verb, the latter is a gerund-participle:
I am used to going to college in the mornings. Data from a corpus of American and British spoken and written English of the 1980s and 1990s show that
used not to, ''usedn't to
(both auxiliary), and didn't use to
(lexical) were then rare in both American and British English, other than used not to
in British novels. Never used to
is a commonly used alternative. Modal auxiliary use
is not used in interrogatives in conversation (Used you to . . . ?
); and even the lexical version with do
-support (Did you use to . . . ?'') is rare.
To In the context for an argument that infinitival
to is a subordinator,
Rodney Huddleston points out that, just as for the subordinator
that (
I said (that) he could), there are contexts where
to is optional, with no change in meaning. His example is
All I did was (to) ask a question; and from it he infers that
to is meaningless. Within an argument for categorizing
to not as a subordinator but as an auxiliary verb, Robert D. Levine disagrees with the main thrust of Huddleston's argument, but not with the claim that
to is meaningless – something that is also true of "dummy
do" and copular
be, both of them auxiliary verbs. Its function is purely syntactic.
Modal auxiliary verbs The modal auxiliary verbs contribute meaning chiefly via
modality, although some of them (particularly
will and sometimes
shall) express future time reference. Their uses are detailed at
English modal verbs, and tables summarizing their principal meaning contributions can be found in the articles
Modal verb and
Auxiliary verb. For more details on the uses of auxiliaries to express aspect, mood and time reference, see
English clause syntax. == Auxiliary verbs in sequence ==