You are undoubtedly the experts I need for this topic! Is there a specific word to describe words like heretofore, nevertheless, thereunto, etc - legalistic adverbs formed by the combination of a series of smaller words?

Thanks!

Sorry, Isca, welcome, but I'm nonwhatsoever the expert you need on this issue. I know they are out there......I hope you'll get your answer.

Unnecessary?

herefromeverafter? tja..

Thanks for the welcome, BranShea! I'm still hoping :-) They are sort of silly words - isn't it funny that they're all used in overly formal legal documents?

Welcome, Iscah. Keep your computer on, they will come.
(Something akin to "if you build it they will come".)

I'd call 'em compound adverbs. A perennial question, owing much to the unsystematic orthography that English has been saddled with, is when to use hyphens, spaces, or nothing at all. Why pick on adverbs or conjunctions, while passing over nouns and other parts of speech in silence? Why babysitter instead of baby-sitter, or into instead of in to? Why do not but cannot? And baseball used to be base-ball, but it changed a long while ago. The list is endless.

Nevertheless, it started off as base ball. Sobeit.

Is: I'd like to know too. So if you're patient enough and can find it, please do report back:

http://onelook.com/?w=*&loc=revfp2&clue=meaning+heretofore%2C+nevertheless%2C+thereunto

once again, the strange obsession with having just one word for *everything. what, exactly, is wrong with jim's excellent suggestion: compound adverbs‽

as jim also suggests, spelling of these (spaced, hyphenated, or joined) is much more of an issue than naming the concept, n'est-ce pas?

-joe (Avoid compound adverbs like heretofore, therefore, and so on; they will make your writing sound brittle and overly formal.) friday

Qu'est-ce que c'est: Sobeit, so-be-it, so be it. Amen.

Quoth the raven, "Neverthemoreorless."

What quoth the albatros?

"get off my neck!"

Hey Iscah, welcome and glad we could help.

Well, Compound adverbs was my first response, too. But I confess that the root of my question is actually a friend, who is seeking a particularly perplexing crossword answer, and I guess compound adverb doesn't fit the bill. Given that English has a startling number of words which define very precise things ("We needed a word for that?") I thought I'd investigate.

New information suggests that the answer will likely be a compound itself - _ _R_E WORDS. (I'm guessing at the 'words' part, the crossword puzzle complete currently has _ _ R _ E _ O _ D S. Surely, now that I'm given that, something clever rather than an obscure definition.

Zmjezhd, I submit that while most of your points are perfectly valid, in terms of 'why this and not that', our heavy reliance on prepositions in English make 'into' generally mean something quite different from 'in to'.

Thanks, everyone, for your help! If someone does come up with that very precise definition, I'd still quite like to know it!

All has become clear- the answer, obviously, is that both nevertheless and heretofore are THREE WORDS.

Thanks, folks - sorry to abuse the forum for a crossword question, although I think my initial inquiry could still result in something interesting!

<groan> yes; clever in the crosswordese sense only.
-joe (got me searchin' for a word of [fool's] gold) friday

Nah, it's ee R i E w O r D S

I submit that while most of your points are perfectly valid, in terms of 'why this and not that', our heavy reliance on prepositions in English make 'into' generally mean something quite different from 'in to'.

Yes, into is not the same thing as in to, but the to in to be or not to be is also quite different from the to in I gave the book to Jill and they're spelled the same.

Hope you stick around longer and post now that your crossword dilemma has been addressed.

Yes, that is an issue, isn't it? 'To' is an inherent part of the infinitive form in English, and yet a completely separate word, which is odd enough in itself, but then to have it be the same word as the preposition! We need excessive homophone police. (This rapidly becomes clear when teaching English as a second language!)

However, as an English teacher, I beg mercy - the last thing we need in yet another spelling of 'to/too/two' tu teach!

To is used as an auxiliary word with the infinitive in one use of the infinitive. There's no to 'I can write this.'

(This rapidly becomes clear when teaching English as a second language!)

Even better than learning a second language is teaching one. The to in the English infinitival form is related to the preposition to. That much can be ascertained by parallel constructions in other Germanic languages and in some Romance ones.

I once listened to a historical linguist give a good lecture on the particles of a language: all those little parts of speech left overs like preopositions, adverbs, verbal particles, etc. The preposition problem is English was exacerbated by the lose of case in the nominal paradigms ...

There's no to 'I can write this.'

Same sitch in German, you have as in er will lernen 'he wants to learn' vs er hatt Lust, den Dom zu besichtigen 'he'd like to visit the cathedral'.

[Addendum: In Indo-European languages, the infinitival forms are thought to have developed after the break up into daughter dialects. (Cf. Latin -Vre, Greek -ειν (-ein), Sanskrit -tum, and Germanic -Vn.]

(didja have html on?)

(didja have html on?)

Nope, but I do now.