Example sentences of "had been [adj] for [noun pl] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | Even the Darwinian theory of evolution was impressive , not because the concept of evolution was new — it had been familiar for decades — but because it provided for the first time a satisfactory explanatory model for the origin of species , and did so in terms which were entirely familiar even to non-scientists , since they echoed the most familiar concept of the liberal economy , competition . |
| 2 | He had found a niche at once with the men , but she told Julia that she had been unhappy for months , struggling with the other women to force local villagers to disgorge food , humping it back up to the camp and preparing it under extraordinarily difficult conditions . |
| 3 | No recording of Jenkins 's music had been available for years before the Thorofon CD , and now this Astrée issue comes onto the market , as if to underline how huge a gap in the recorded repertoire that was . |
| 4 | Neighbours claimed the children 's mother , Sharon Dawson , had been unwell for months . |
| 5 | It had been dry for weeks , but there were thunderheads over against the mountains and the atmosphere was heavy with the hint of rain . |
| 6 | Until 1925 it had been possible for Communists to be represented in all sections of the Labour Party but at the liverpool Conference it was decided to exclude them from membership . |
| 7 | He felt light-headed , as if he had been awake for days on end . |
| 8 | It had been dark for hours . |
| 9 | When he awoke he could not tell if he had fainted or had been asleep for hours or even days . |
| 10 | This was an unusually clear and succinct statement of assumptions which had been current for generations . |
| 11 | He spoke as if they had been married for years , and could joke about sharing a bed . |
| 12 | The old lady had been deaf for years and had what she called a ‘ thing-gummyjig ’ on her telephone receiver which was intended to help her hear her callers more clearly . |
| 13 | Despite Lenin 's theory of national self-determination , the new Soviet Union still embraced the great bulk of the old imperial domains , including minorities like the Georgians and the Ukrainians who had been civilized for centuries before the denizens of what was to become Muscovy . |
| 14 | Although it had been common for surgeons to expect suppuration of the wound as an inevitable concomitant of amputation , Alanson demonstrated that by these methods it was possible for these wounds to heal ‘ by the first intention ’ , that is , without significant infection . |
| 15 | Aunt Bedelia had been busy for days shaping sausage meat into pigs ' testicles and dormice . |
| 16 | He built his shed which , made as it was of old floorboards from a couple of hovels that had been empty for years , resembled a shack . |
| 17 | The one I found was run down , anyway , and had been empty for years . ’ |
| 18 | The house on our western side had been empty for years . |
| 19 | The preacher was describing with enthusiasm how he had been wicked for years and how a certain parson had pointed it out to him : this had gradually turned him from wickedness . |
| 20 | Edmund had been dead for months and she had n't known it . |
| 21 | After the war opinion was more fluid and open on political grounds the tariff issue had been dead for years and I felt it was one which would pull the party together , including the Lloyd George malcontents . |
| 22 | Their mother had been dead for years , and their father had died only three weeks before . |
| 23 | Damned if he was going to call her Empress when her first husband , the Holy Roman Emperor , had been dead for years . |
| 24 | Young lads gather round the car which looks as if it had been dead for days or weeks . |
| 25 | People within the health and social services had been aware for years of the patients ' accusations , but nothing was done . |
| 26 | He had been old for years and grown so fat in the stomach that he puffed when he stooped . |
| 27 | He heard himself , it sounded like a door opening somewhere inside him , it was an old door , it had been stuck for years , you had to heave on it , you needed all your strength , and then it gave a few inches , and cried out as it gave . |
| 28 | Their advisers , Kleinwort Benson , a City bank , claimed that the Al Fayed family had been wealthy for generations . |
| 29 | Although they knew that it was a volcano , it had been dormant for centuries , and they had no records whatever of any eruptions . |