Do-support is a unique characteristic of English. Many languages other than English have do-periphrasis but not English-type do-support. This raises the obvious question: What is special about English? The goal of this paper is to provide an account of English do-support that explains why do-support, with its attendant properties, is found uniquely in English. I review the classical derivational approaches to do-support and argue that they do not satisfactorily capture the generalizations. I suggest an alternative, non-derivational account of contemporary do-support that makes crucial use of constructions. Finally, I propose an account of the history of do-support in English that characterizes the changes in terms of the content and scope of constructions. The rise of do-support can be understood as a consequence of the contraction and re-specialization of particular constructions in the wake of well-documented changes in the overt morphological system of the language.*

Through statistical and comparative investigations of eddic poetry, I show that Old Norse fornyrðislag meter is sharply distinguished from its West Germanic cognates by its strong preference for the trochaic cadence lift + drop in the b-verse. This unique feature is claimed to have induced the radical redistribution and reorganization of the major metrical types, types A, B, and C in fornyrðislag. Furthermore, I suggest that this favored cadence served as a basis for the fixed cadence of dróttkvætt meter by generalization and reanalysis.*