Microsoft Word Theoretical Course of English Grammar

Nino Kirvalidze
73
A compound sentence consists of two or more independent clauses which have equal syn-
tactic status that of main clauses. There are no syntactic restrictions on their order, although 
the sentence may not make good sense. For example, “The wind blew and the rain poured.” - is 
compound, because it consists of two independent clauses: “The wind blew” and “the rain 
poured.”
A complex sentence
consists of one main clause and one or more subordinate clauses. The 
terms ‘main’ and ‘subordinate’ indicate that the clauses in the complex sentence do not have the 
same syntactic status. Subordinate clauses are always embedded (contained) either within the 
main clause or within another subordinate clause.
In the sentences below, the main clause is underlined while the subordinate clause boun-
daries are marked with a # sign where there is more than one:
a.
I didn’t know where he had gone.
b.
My friend claimed # (that) Lee thought # (that) Ceri liked chips. 
c.
That Chris liked Lee so much didn’t surprise me. 
d.
The problem is that she doesn’t love him at all.
e.
I wondered # whether they wanted to go to the place # where they had left 
him. 
f.
If you compare Lee with Kim, # you’ll find # Kim is taller. 
Some features of English main clauses: 
1.
Not all main clauses are possible independent clauses. Sometimes the main clause can’t 
occur alone because it’s missing a subject or a subject complement, i.e. predicative. In such 
cases the position of a subject or its complement is filled in by an embedded subordinate clause. 
Embedded clauses that constitute subjects or subject complements (i.e. nominal predicatives) 
are called 
clausal subjects
or 
clausal predicatives
.
For instance, in – “That Chris liked Lee so much didn’t surprise me. ” – the entire subor-
dinate clause “That Chris liked Lee so much” is embedded within the main clause as its subject 

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Theoretical Course of English Grammar 
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