The attribute is a secondary part of the sentence which denotes the quality of a person or thing expressed by a noun (or pronoun) in any of its function in the sentence.
An attribute may be expressed by:
- An adjective:
- an adjective used as an attribute usually precedes the head-noun.
E.g. A little, round clock ticked solemnly.
- an adjective with suffixes –able, –ible derived from verbs are placed in post-position (owing to the predicative character)
E.g. It is the only thing notable.
NOTE: the adjective possible (which isn’t derived from the verb has the same predicative force: It’s the only situation possible)
- an adjective used as an attribute to a pronoun
- I’d like to have something interesting to read.
- an adjective which has the prefix a-, such as alive, awake, asleep, afraid follows the head-noun
- I’m the most happy man alive.
A participle. Then it may stand before the head-noun, but usually is placed in the post-position in the function of detached attribute:
I see trees laden with ripening fruit.
A pronoun. Then it is placed before the head-noun which it modifies:
Her face was close to the window pane.
A numeral:
Two or three days went by.
A noun in the possessive case. The it precedes the head-noun it modifies:
There were no words for Caleb’s emotion.
An adjectived noun:
It was a delicious winter night.
A noun (or a pronoun) with a preposition (a prepositional phrase), which usually follows the head-noun it modifies:
The bough of an apple-tree below the window was broken.
An attributive group of words ( usu. precedes the noun it modifies):
John was of the look-before-you-leap, the think-before-you-speak sort.
An infinitive. Then it follows the head-noun:
There’s only one thing to be done.
A gerund with a preposition, which follows the head-noun:
The pleasure of seeing her again was intensified extraordinary by the welcome in his eyes.
An adverb, which follows the head-noun:
There came the sound of a motor-car in the little street below.
A Complex Attribute (i.e. an infinitival/a gerundial complex or a complex introduced by the preposition with):
He spread a rug for his wife to sit on.
The Apposition
The apposition is a special kind of attribute expressed by a noun (sometimes a pronoun), which denotes the same person or thing as the head-noun.
There are two kinds of appositions: a detached (loose) apposition and an undetached (close) apposition.
- a detached (loose) apposition (обособленное приложение) follows the head-noun in a rather loose connection and has the farce of a descriptive attribute. It may modify a common noun, a proper noun and sometimes a pronoun:
- All over the wall below his window white jessamine was in flower – stars, not only in the sky. (Galsworthy)
- She was dressed in grey, the colour of pigeon’s feathers. (Galsworthy)
- an undetached (close) apposition enters into such close relation with its head-noun that they form a group with one stress. The head-noun is often a proper noun, the name of a person. Then the apposition denotes a rank, profession, relationship, etc.
The undetached/close apposition precedes the head-noun (e.g. Aunt Augusta, Colonel Green, Doctor Manson, etc.), except in some phraseological combinations where the apposition follows the head-noun: e.g. William the Conqueror
In geographical names the apposition follows the head-noun and the stress is on the apposition: The River Thames, Lake Leman, Mount Everest, etc.
