The study maps the development of a new class of adverbs in English, i.e. 'stative physical adverbs' of the type -ly, e.g. redly and massively. Such adverbs are claimed to be ungrammatical; however, the data show that this is no longer the case, but that English has changed with regard to this point of the grammar. The study includes an analysis of the linguistic context in which the corpus adverbs ...