I recently came upon this certificate of award of a BA degree at the University of Cambridge, which was written in a strange form of English which I didn't find very grammatical or logical according to Modern English grammar.
Transcript:
I hereby certify that XXX of YYY College in the University of Cambridge was at a full congregation holden in the Senate-House on 24 June 2016 [sic] admitted to the degree of Bachelor of Arts.
Witness my hand this twenty fourth day of June, two thousand and sixteen
The sentence seems to be rather strange, especially nearing the end of the first paragraph, where the sentence abruptly jumps from the date to "admitted".
How does one explain the meaning of this certificate in Modern English?
Answer
This is simple reversal of clauses: see this question. If it helps, you could imagine a bracket after 'was', and a close bracket after '2016'.
(I also think that using the Free Dictionary to validate the syntax of the University of Cambridge is equally back-to-front, though in a less literal sense.)
No comments:
Post a Comment