People Dead or Dead People

[LilyAm]

Some part of a history book reads:
"But such uprisings as the Ole Miss riots seldom come without victims. It had been a nasty night of fighting and resentment, and trails of blood and a ground layer of thick, powdery teargas residue lingered that following day. In the end, there were two people dead and 166 wounded."

Why is "dead" after "people" but not before? I do know that "wounded" could come after "166 [people]" because it is formed from the verb "wound". But "dead" has no verb form.

[Tdol]

Two people dead has a meaning similar to two people who had been killed.

[TheParser]

Some part of a history book reads:
"But such uprisings as the Ole Miss riots seldom come without victims. It had been a nasty night of fighting and resentment, and trails of blood and a ground layer of thick, powdery teargas residue lingered that following day. In the end, there were two people dead and 166 wounded."

Why is "dead" after "people" but not before? I do know that "wounded" could come after "166 [people]" because it is formed from the verb "wound". But "dead" has no verb form.

REMINDER: NOT A TEACHER


I most respectfully suggest that it is a short way to write:

In the end, there were two people [who were] dead and 166 [who were] wounded.

[billmcd]

Some part of a history book reads:
"But such uprisings as the Ole Miss riots seldom come without victims. It had been a nasty night of fighting and resentment, and trails of blood and a ground layer of thick, powdery teargas residue lingered that following day. In the end, there were two people dead and 166 wounded."

Why is "dead" after "people" but not before? I do know that "wounded" could come after "166 [people]" because it is formed from the verb "wound". But "dead" has no verb form.

Adjectives of quality e.g. 'happy', 'rich', 'alive' (or lack of quality as in 'dead') can go before their nouns or after some verbs such as 'be' (and its forms), 'seem','become'. (Practical English Grammar, Oxford University Press)

[LilyAm]

Adjectives of quality e.g. 'happy', 'rich', 'alive' (or lack of quality as in 'dead') can go before their nouns or after some verbs such as 'be' (and its forms), 'seem','become'. (Practical English Grammar, Oxford University Press)

But in my example, the adjective of quality (dead) comes AFTER the noun (people).

[LilyAm]

If "In the end, there were two people dead and 166 wounded." is acceptable, would "In the end, there were two people happy and 166 unhappy." be too?

[emsr2d2]

If "In the end, there were two people dead and 166 wounded." is acceptable, would "In the end, there were two people happy and 166 unhappy." be too?

Acceptable, yes. Unusual, yes.

However, I am not saying that we would normally say "in the end, there were two happy people and 166 unhappy people". The "there were" construction doesn't really fit. I would be more likely to say "In the end, two people were happy and 166 were unhappy."