Noun Postmodification: Ed-Clauses

Postmodification with Ed-clauses

Nouns are sometimes post-modified with an ed-clause. These are non-finite participle clauses.

The ed-clause gives more information about the headword. Ed-clauses can easily be rewritten as passives (e.g. "research published in Nature" = "research which was published in Nature").

These clauses are known as ed-clauses because they are participle clauses (in this case past participle) but not all past participles end in "ed". There are many common irregular verbs in English so you might see an ed-clause beginning with one of these (e.g. broken, made, found, etc.).

• a fuzzy-looking area called the Orion Nebula      (context)
• clouds of gas and dust called molecular clouds      (context)

  As with other forms of post-modification, head nouns may be extended noun phrases (pre- or post- modified). In the first example above the head noun is "area", premodified with "fuzzy-looking". In the second example the head noun is "clouds" postmodified with the prepositional phrase (of gas and dust). The verb is the ed-clause "called" is quite common in academic texts.

• time spent on language learning apps      (context)

  Note the irregular verb in the ed-clause.

• a sea of lava fuelled by countless volcanoes,      (context)
• small areas of rocky surface surrounded by a substantial global water ocean      (context)

  Note the extended head noun phrases in these examples.

• our latest study published in the journal Cortex      (context)
• a brain scanning technique known as diffusion MRI      (context)

  The two examples above come from the same sentence. The first shows a non-restrictive use of an ed-clause (extra information about where the study was published) and the second show a restrictive use (its particular type of scan - diffusion MRI).

• shadows cast by poles stuck vertically into the ground, at midday on the summer solstice, at different latitudes      (context)

  Again we have an ed-clause introduced by an irregular verb "cast". This introduces a long clause containing a series of prepositional phrases. But the clause also contains an embedded ed-clause modifying the noun "poles". You can see this in the schema below.

• poles stuck vertically into the ground, at midday on the summer solstice, at different latitudes      (context)

  Again we have an ed-clause introduced by an irregular verb "stuck". So we have an ed-clause embedded in another ed-clause. Most ed-clauses can be rewritten as a relative clause. So we could rewrite the embedded ed-clause as "shadows cast by poles which were stuck vertically into the ground, at midday on the summer solstice, at different latitudes". Relative clauses are slightly easier to understand but ed-clauses are often preferred for the sake of brevity.

• a film produced in 1950 and stored in the recommended conditions since then      (context)

  Here we have two consecutive ed-clauses (not embedded): "produced in 1950" and "stored in the recommended conditions since then", "then" referring back to 1950 in the first ed-clause.

• The following three examples all come from the same sentence.

  the study, published in Science Advances      (context)

  This ed-clause, "published in Science Advances", is a non-restrictive ed-clause. It just gives extra information about where the study was published.

• other skeletons buried around the same period in the Americas      (context)

  This ed-clause, "buried around the same period in the Americas", is a restrictive ed-clause. This clause is an important qualifier of the noun "skeletons" because puts a restriction of the evidence they reviewed.

• similar tools associated with big-game hunting      (context)

  This ed-clause, "associated with big-game hunting", is also a restrictive ed-clause. It restricts the type of tools they looked at.

• a Viking warrior from Sweden discovered early in the 20th century and long assumed to be male      (context)

  This ed-clause, "discovered early in the 20th century and long assumed to be male", is a non-restrictive ed-clause. It gives extra information about the famous burial of a Viking warrior. In fact there are two ed-clauses here: "discovered early in the 20th century" and [long] "assumed to be male".

Test your understanding with the Ed-Clauses Quiz.