ABSTRACT
Over thirty years ago, just as verbs were often called ‘doing words’, so nouns were referred to as ‘naming words’. This primary-school term was useful when thinking about types 1-3 but far less successful when type 4 was under consideration. Nouns do ‘name’ things, yes; it is nevertheless forgivably hard for pupils to regard such words as grace, happiness, misery or stupidity (all abstract nouns) as ‘things’. So if the concept noun does not yet make complete sense to you, a better way of defining and identifying all kinds of noun is needed. We can best do this by looking in turn at each type.
