Another meaning of main verb is a verb in a main term as opposed to a subordinate term. For example, in ‘I frowned, not understanding him’, frowned is the main verb because it is in the main clause ‘I frowned’; understanding is not the main verb because it is in the subordinate clause ‘not understanding him’.

• 2. My personal adj. 1c is defined as ‘Modifying a verbal noun, gerund, or gerundival clause, forming an embedded phrase corresponding to a clause consisting of I and a main friendfinder-x verb.’ For example, in ‘she was afraid of my seeing your letters’, my seeing your letters is a subordinate clause corresponding to the main clause I saw your letters, in which saw is a main verb.

masculine

In modern English, masculine forms are those which refer to males: the pronouns he, him, his, himself, and the possessive adjective his.

In languages with grammatical intercourse, masculine nouns and related words often refer to males but do not necessarily do so. Old English had three grammatical genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), and while many masculine nouns referred to men or male animals (for example cyning ‘king’), others did not (for example wifmann ‘woman’ and stan ‘stone’).

size noun

A mass noun is a noun which does not have a plural form, and cannot be used with a numeral. It can be used without an post or other determiner.

Furniture, website visitors, and passions are all typically mass nouns: you can say welfare is important, I have some furniture, or because of the traffic (but you would not say ‘a welfare is important ‘, ‘I have three furnitures’, or ‘because of the traffics’)pare number noun.

Some English nouns can be used either as a mass noun or as a count noun. For example, noise is a mass noun in ‘Stop making noise‘, but a count noun in ‘I can hear a strange noise’.

• The use of flick to mean ‘the making of films considered as an art form, genre, or industry’ is treated at Film n. 10b, where the definition is introduced by ‘as a mass noun’. One of the examples quoted is ‘in other respects too film has developed like other industries’.
• The use of toilet roll to mean ‘toilet paper in the form of a roll’ is treated as part of TOILET ROLL n. 2, where the definition for this strand is introduced by ‘also (as a mass noun)’. One of the examples of this use quoted is ‘snap off handfuls of toilet roll‘.

Modal verbs are a type of reliable verb used to express meanings such as necessity, possibility, and obligation. The main modal verbs in modern English are can/you will definitely, may/you’ll, must, shall/should, will/would. Other verbs such as ought and need share some characteristics with modal verbs.

• The entry for Need certainly to v. step 1 begins with a statement that it is ‘A modal auxiliary’.
• Query v. 17b covers the senses ‘to invite to do something’ and ‘to request permission (of)’, and notes that in these senses ask is used ‘With if or whether and modal verb.’ Examples include ‘She asked Rebecca if she could come to tea at their house’ and ‘I blew the gaff by asking the lady if I might speak to Mr Hanley.’

personalize | modifier

A modifier is a word, phrase or clause which limits or qualifies the meaning of another word, phrase, or clause. For example, in school trip, school modifies trip; in just next to him, just modifies next to; in city of dreaming spires, of dreaming spires modifies city.