Go (verb)
Template:Short description Template:Italic titleTemplate:Sister project The verb go is an irregular verb in the English language (see English irregular verbs). It has a wide range of uses; its basic meaning is "to move from one place to another". Apart from the copular verb be, the verb go is the only English verb to have a suppletive past tense, namely went.
Principal parts
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The principal parts of go are go, went, gone. In other respects, the modern English verb conjugates regularly. The irregularity of the principal parts is due to their disparate origin in definitely two and possibly three distinct Indo-European roots.
Unlike every other English verb except be, the preterite (simple past tense) of go is not etymologically related to its infinitive. Instead, the preterite of go, went, descends from a variant of the preterite of wend, the descendant of Old English Template:Lang and Middle English Template:Lang. Old English Template:Lang (modern wend) and Template:Lang (mod. go) shared semantic similarities. The similarities are evident in the sentence "I'm wending my way home", which is equivalent to "I'm going home".
Etymology
Go descends from Middle English Template:Lang, from Old English Template:Lang, from Proto-Germanic Template:Lang, from Proto-Indo-European (PIE) Template:Lang 'to go, leave'. Cognates in the Germanic languages include West Frisian Template:Lang, Dutch Template:Lang, Low German Template:Lang, German Template:Lang, Danish, Norwegian, Swedish Template:Lang, Crimean Gothic Template:Lang.<ref>Marlies Philippa, Frans Debrabandere, Arend Quak, Tanneke Schoonheim, & Nicole van der Sijs, eds., Etymologisch Woordenboek van het Nederlands, A-Z, s.v. "gaan" (Amsterdam UP, 3 Dec. 2009): [1].</ref>
Origin of ēode
Old English did not use any variation of went for the general preterite of go; instead, the word Template:Lang (variant Template:Lang) was used, which lingered on as the now obsolete yede, yode and yead.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>
Old English Template:Lang 'he went' (plural Template:Lang) is made up of a defective preterite base Template:Lang and the weak dental suffix Template:Lang} common in most modern English past tense forms (cf. ache : ached). The base Template:Lang and its Gothic counterpart Template:Tlit (pl. Template:Tlit) show the following development:
- PIE perfect singular Template:Lang (singular) → Template:Lang → Template:Lang → Template:Lang
- PIE perfect plural Template:Lang (plural) → Template:Lang (Holtzmann's law) → Template:Lang (i-mutation) → Proto-Germanic Template:Lang → Gothic Template:Tlit.<ref>Jens Elmegård Rasmussen, "Germanic Verschärfung: Tying Up Loose Ends", Selected Papers on Indo-European Linguistics (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum, 1999), 382.</ref><ref>An alternate derivation has Gothic Template:Tlit ← Template:Lang ← PIE Template:Lang; which means OE Template:Lang ← PGmc Template:Lang; see N. E. Collinge, "Holtzmann's Law", The Laws of Indo-European, (Amsterdam: John Benjamins, [2009], c1985), 96, citing F.O. Lindeman, "Gotisch iddja und altenglisch ēode", Indogermanische Forschungen, 72 (1967), 275-286.</ref>
Both forms are derived from the PIE root Template:Lang (late Template:Lang) based on close matches with past tense forms of Sanskrit Template:Tlit 'he goes, travels' (cf. imperfect Template:Tlit, perfect Template:Tlit, and aorist Template:Tlit). The root is regarded as an iterative-intensive derivative of the more common Template:Lang 'to go' (present Template:Lang).<ref>J.P. Mallory & D.Q. Adams, Encyclopedia of Indo-European Culture, s.v. "go" (London: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1997), 228.</ref> One reflex of Template:Lang is Latin Template:Lang 'to go' (present Template:Lang 'I go') which gave many English words such as ambition, exit, introit, issue, preterite, and so forth. It is also found in the Slavic languages as Template:Lang and similar forms.
Development of a new preterite
In Middle English, Template:Lang evolved into Template:Lang and Template:Lang. By the 15th century in southern England, Template:Lang (wend) had become synonymous with go, but its infinitive and present tense forms had ceased to be in frequent use. This was also true of the various Template:Lang-derived preterites of go, thus a variant preterite of wend absorbed the function. After went became established as the preterite of go, wend took on a new preterite, wended. In Northern English and Scots, Template:Lang was Template:Lang, regularly formed by suffixing -ed to a variant of go. Due to the influence of the region, southern English forms constitute the standard language of England, and so went is the standard English preterite. Spencer used yede to mean go with yode as its preterite form but as dialect.
Origin of went
Went, the modern past tense of go, was originally the preterite form of Middle English Template:Language 'to turn, direct; depart' (modern English wend), from Old English Template:Lang (past Template:Lang), itself from Proto-Germanic Template:Lang 'to turn' (transitive). Cognates include West Frisian Template:Lang, Dutch, Low German, German Template:Lang, Yiddish Template:Lang (Template:Lang), Swedish Template:Lang, Danish, Norwegian Template:Lang, and Gothic Template:Tlit. The original forms of the ME past tense were Template:Lang (our modern form), and past participle Template:Lang, but variant Template:Lang developed from about 1200.<ref>Robert K. Barnhart, Chambers Dictionary of Etymology, s.v. "wend" (Chambers Harrap, [2008], c1988), 1228.</ref> By ca. 1500, wended had prevailed in the transitive senses, whereas wente, restricted to intransitive senses, rivalled and replaced go's older past tense, yede/yode.<ref>C.T. Onions, Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, s.v. "wend" (Oxford: Oxford UP, 1996), 1000.</ref>
Proto-Germanic Template:Lang is a causative derivative of Template:Lang 'to wind, wrap', from which the modern English verb wind developed. Cognates include West Frisian Template:Lang, Dutch, Low German, German Template:Lang, Swedish Template:Lang, Danish and Norwegian Template:Lang, and Gothic -Template:Tlit (in Template:Tlit 'to wind around, wrap'). PGmc Template:Lang comes from Proto-Indo-European Template:Lang 'to wind, twist', which also gave Umbrian Template:Tlit 'turn!' (imperative), Tocharian A/B Template:Tlit 'covers, envelops', Greek (Hesychius) Template:Tlit 'wagon', Armenian Template:Tlit 'ring', and Sanskrit Template:Tlit 'carriage framework'.
Summary of the main Proto-Indo-European roots
Go is historically derived from at least three Proto-Indo-European roots: Template:Lang, the source of go and gone (← ME Template:Lang ← OE Template:Lang); Template:Lang, the source of Template:Lang; and Template:Lang, the source of went as well as wend and wind. Only two roots are continually used in their modern English reflexes go/gone and went.
Suppletion in other Germanic languages
The Dutch, Low German, German, and Scandinavian verbs cognate to go, e.g. Dutch Template:Lang, Low German Template:Lang, German Template:Lang, and Danish/Norwegian/Swedish Template:Lang, also have suppletive past forms, namely the preterite Template:Lang of Dutch and German, Template:Lang of Low German, Template:Lang (from the same source) of Danish, Norwegian and Swedish, and the past participle Template:Lang of German. These forms are relics from earlier, more widespread words that meant 'to walk, go' and which survive sporadically in Scots Template:Lang, East Frisian Template:Lang, and Icelandic Template:Lang.<ref>Icelandic dictionary online</ref> Some obsolete cognates include Middle Low German, Middle High German Template:Lang, early modern Swedish Template:Lang, and Gothic Template:Tlit. These are reflexes of Proto-Germanic Template:Lang, from Proto-Indo-European Template:Lang 'to step', which also gave Lithuanian Template:Lang 'to stride', Greek Template:Tlit 'perineum', Avestan Template:Tlit 'ankle', and Sanskrit Template:Tlit 'step', Template:Tlit 'shank'.
Therefore, the case of English go is not unique among the Germanic languages, and it would appear that most have in a like manner reproduced equivalent suppletive conjugations for their words for 'to go', suggesting a cyclical change patterned after the state of affairs in Proto-Germanic.
Phrasal forms
The verb may be combined with various prepositions to form phrasal verbs such as "go around" and "go off".<ref>Template:Citation</ref>
The verb go is used to form the going to future, in sentences like "I'm going to finish my work today."
Perfect forms
In perfect forms of the verb (have gone, had gone, etc.) the past participle gone is often replaced by that of be, namely been. For example:
- He's been to the shops. (He went and came back.)
- He's gone to the shops. (He went to many shops not c.)
For details of this usage, see have been.