3.2.1 Final sibilant in the possessor

Altenberg (1982) shows that possessors with a final sibilant are less likely to use s-genitives, because “incompatible sound combinations are often avoided in speech” (Clark & Clark 1977: 290). In the research of Hinrichs and Szmrecsanyi (2007), possessors with final sibilants do prefer the of-genitive, which amounts to 28.1% in the corpora (Brown, LOB, Frown and F-LOB), while the s-genitive only amounts to.

In addition, Altenberg (1982) suggests that in 17th century English, the zero genitive and his-genitive were used to avoid the phonetic awkwardness. There are two conditions: One is the omission after final /s,z/, for example, (1) Doctour Caius wife, (2) in Justice name, (3) my mistris estate. Another is the omission before an s-sound, for instance, (1) for Heaven sake, (2) by the way side. According to Altenberg (1982: 43-44), “the his-form, including the variants her, its, their, is chiefly used as a variant of the syllabic es-suffix.” Some examples are as follows: (1) I intended to have sent an Answer to poor Charles his letter, (2) I made me ready and find Jane Welsh, Mr. Jervas his maid, come to tell me that…

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