ABSTRACT
One of the interesting features of the dialect of East Somerset is the use of periphrastic do in affirmative sentences. The decline in the use of do in affirmative sentences can be seen from the treatment of tenses by various eighteenth-century grammarians. Although periphrastic do disappeared from Standard English during the New English period, dialectologists have attested its appearance in some local dialects. In Standard English the distinction between the categories is brought out by the use of the simple and progressive forms, respectively. The situation is complicated by the fact that instead of the two distinctions that were postulated for the present, there are three categories: past general; imperfect; and past habitual. Under 'imperfect' Elworthy gives the progressive form. The use of the verbs used to and would/'d in East Somerset does not differ from their use in Standard English.
