principal clause
Americannoun
Example Sentences
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Subordinate Conjunctions and Complex Sentences.+—A subordinate conjunction is used to join a subordinate clause to a principal clause, thus forming a complex sentence.
From Composition-Rhetoric by Brooks, Stratton D.
What is the difference between a principal clause and a subordinate clause?
From Practical Grammar and Composition by Wood, Thomas
In Principal Clauses.—The principal clause in a conditional statement also takes the subjunctive form when it refers to what is future and contingent, and when it refers to what is past and uncertain, or denied.
From The Verbalist A Manual Devoted to Brief Discussions of the Right and the Wrong Use of Words and to Some Other Matters of Interest to Those Who Would Speak and Write with Propriety. by Osmun, Thomas Embly
Subordinate infinitives and participles take their time from the verb in the principal clause.
From The Style Book of The Detroit News by News, The Detroit
A principal clause is sometimes defined as "one that can stand alone," and is therefore independent of the rest of the sentence.
From Composition-Rhetoric by Brooks, Stratton D.
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
