Account of

Question

Hi.Does the prepositional verb account of mean the same as the verb account for ?Thank you.

Fivejedjon · Accepted Answer

I know of no prepositional verb 'account of'',

Anonymous · Answer

fivejedjonI know of no prepositional verb 'account of'',

"They will stop all teaching that conflicts with a holy book from the 7th century and accounts of doubtful provenance on the life and sayings of their prophet written hundreds of years after he died." [From The Guardian.]

Thank you, Fivejedon, for your reply. Is "accounts" a verb or a noun this context? I've got some doubts here: does the conjunction "and" connect two verbs "conflicts" and "accounts" or two nouns "a holy book" and plural "accounts"?

Thank you.

CalifJim · Answer

AnonymousThey will stop all teaching that conflicts with a holy book from the 7th century and accounts of doubtful provenance on the life and sayings of their prophet written hundreds of years after he died.

Wow! It almost sounds as if there's something missing from the sentence. I get this out of it. ("accounts" is a noun, by the way.)

... stop all teaching that conflicts with
.............................a holy book from the 7th century
........................and (that conflicts with?)
.............................accounts of doubtful provenance
...

But it doesn't sound like that's what they really want to say. Too many words with negative polarity.

stop ... conflict ... doubtful

If they have been teaching something that conflicts with doubtful accounts, they will stop teaching it? Because doubtful information should be taught in preference to authenticated information? Even for what is apparently a religious type of institution, that's pretty strange.

Maybe they meant:

... stop all teaching that conflicts with
.............................a holy book from the 7th century
....and (stop all teaching) from
.............................accounts of doubtful provenance
...

It's a mystery.

CJ

Anonymous · Answer

Thank you, CJ, for your detailed and useful reply.

Account of

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