Needless to say, the cross-references and the index, as well as the extensive glossary, are also meant to realize our second goal, viz. to provide a grammar that can be used as a reference work by scholars and by students with some knowledge of descriptive linguistics and of English grammar. | 140 2. Towards a theory of tense and time If there is more than one Adv-time as in He left at 4 . on 1 May 1999 the relation between the various Adv-times is also Adv-time-simultaneity 1999 includes on 1 May which includes at 4 . It is the last i. e. shortest of these Adv-times that contains the situation time. Punctual Adv-times and durative bounded situations When a durative situation is bounded it is by definition nonhomogeneous and therefore the situation time cannot be a punctual portion of the time of the full situation. Rather the situation time has the same duration as the time of the full situation. This means that a durative bounded situation cannot be located at a punctual time such as t0 or at five o clock. . However a durative bounded situation may be referred to in a clause containing a punctual adverb as long as the description of the situation can be interpreted as inchoative or terminative. For example The elephant will have a bath at four locates the beginning of the bathing not the entire process at four o clock . When a durative situation is represented as L-bounded or interpreted as W-bounded the situation time coincides with i. e. has the same length as the time of the full situation because a bounded situation is by definition heterogeneous see . It goes without saying that such a durative situation time cannot coincide with t0 or with a punctual Adv-time and cannot be contained in an Adv-time that is shorter than the time of the full situation. I write a book. A bounded durative situation cannot coincide with t0. I am writing a book. Here the full situation is homogeneous so that the situation time can be a punctual portion of the time of the full situation. That punctual situation time can be represented as coinciding with t0. I wrote a book at five o clock. Ungrammatical because a bounded durative situation cannot coincide with or otherwise be contained in a punctual Adv-time. I was writing a book at five o clock. .
