Discussion Groups / English Usage / December 2007

That's the easy part.  It means "comes", and it comes from an obsolete
form of the present tense of the verb.  Actually, I don't know for
certain that the verb "come" did behave in such a way, but the whole
point of this archaic construction is to appear to be speaking in an old
style: it is the use of an archaic verb  form that is important, not the
accuracy of the form.

I suppose that the simple present four centuries or so ago would have
been of the form I come, thou comest, he cometh, in contrast to the
modern I come, you come, he comes.

The more interesting aspect of this question would be to discover the
reason for using the older form.  My guess is that it is a rather
hackneyed allusion to the title of the Eugene O'Neill play "The iceman
cometh", but if there is any point in such an allusion it escapes me;
nor do I know why O'Neill used this form, except it be in turn an
allusion to a passage perhaps in an old Bible translation where "cometh"
was indeed the English word used.

There are other sayings in English that use this type of verb form: "the
old order changeth" is one that comes to mind.

On Dec 30, 2:15 pm, ggd...@gmail.com wrote:

It is an old version of "comes" ( 3rd person singular form of the verb
"to come").  He

I imagine that it occurs in the King James Version of the Bible which
would explain why it is occassionally seen in  current English.

John Kane, Kingston ON Canada

John Kane, Kingston ON Canada