Toward or Towards Part III

The s-ending of towards is a suffix that forms adverbs, just like -ly. But unlike -ly, the -s suffix is a genitive ending.

What is a genitive? Roughly speaking, a genitive is a noun form that may be translated by the phrase "of the __."

For instance, the genitive form of the Old English noun stan (meaning stone) is stanes, meaning "of the stone." In modern English we no longer speak of the genitive but of the possessive. The possessive case is normally indicated with an apostrophe s (e.g., the cat's toy).

There are, however, many instances where an apostrophe s strictly indicates a genitive relation, not a possessive one. In the phrase a stone's throw, we are speaking not of a throw belonging to the stone but of a throw of the stone (the genitive expresses an object relation for the stone).

Adverbial genitives are -s endings or of a/the phrases that indicate an adverbial function. In a sentence such as Sundays my family goes to church, the -s on Sundays doesn't indicate a plural; it indicates an adverb (of time). That it is a genitive may be shown by the sentence My family goes to church of a Sunday, which is another way of saying exactly the same thing. Phrases such as of an evening or of a Sunday are becoming somewhat quaint in modern English, but they are genitives that express an adverbial function.

In some dialects of English, people say She's ages with him, with the meaning "she and he are the same age." In more standard English, the of form is preferred: She is of an age with him or They are of an age.

If this all seems impossibly archaic, then consider the expression I'm friends with him. The -s here isn't a plural (I'm a friend, he's a friend, we're all friends!), but an adverbial genitive. In this case, however, the of form doesn't seem to be in use.

The adverbial genitive -s is still alive and well. You can see it in usages such as You've got it backwards, Don't look sideways and in the words once, twice, and thrice (where it is spelled with a -ce).

I used to explain all this to some of my long-suffering co-workers at the press. But it never occurred to me (and I believe they were too polite to point out) that, of course, toward/towards isn't an adverb, but a preposition.

So why the adverbial -s? I'll write about that in my next post.