This book explores the diachronic emergence of the verb have in English in its various
grammatical uses. The development of grammatical functions of have is analysed from
pragmatic-semantic morphosyntactic and phonetic angles. Apart from the well-known and formerly
studied cases of the rise of perfect and obligative have the author describes the developments
of the had better structure as well as causative have which have not received much scholarly
attention thus far. He shows that the first examples of the fully grammaticalised constructions
with have generally appear earlier than it is commonly believed. He also offers possible
motivations behind the growth of obligative and causative have. This book proves that the
changes leading to the rise of new grammatical constructions occur in a specific order:
pragmatic-semantic changes precede morphosyntactic changes and phonetic reductions are the last
to take place.
