Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics
preposition [Lat. praeponere ‘to place in front of’]
Uninflected part of speech (usually) developed from original adverbs of place. Like adverbs and some conjunctions, prepositions in their original meaning denote relations between elements regarding the basic relations of locality (on, over, under), temporality (before, after, during), causality (because of), and modality (like). In all modern European languages, prepositions occur not only in the adverbial, but also in the verbal domain.
(
also prepositional phrase)
References
Zelinsky-Wibblet, C. (ed.) 1993. The semantics of prepositions. Berlin and New York.
Bibliography
Gumier, C. 1981. Prepositions: an analytical bibliography. Amsterdam.
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