To Boldly Split an Infinitive

You know how Star Trek starts, to boldly go where no one has gone before?

I used to imagine Patrick Stewart, good Shakespearean actor that he is, wincing while reciting those immortal lines. Now I'm not so sure. Even Shakespeare split his infinitives.

I've been told that the split infinitive rule arose during a period of medieval Oxford history when English grammarians were trying to elevate the language by modelling it more closely on Latin. (You'll note I use slightly old-fashioned English; nowadays that double l in modelling is almost obsolete.) In fact, it seems that the Latin theory may not hold water. No one's ever found evidence of any grammarian, medieval or otherwise, arguing against English split infinitives based on Latin infinitives, which are one word.

Instead, it seems to have been a rule that was bandied about in the 1800s, when a bunch of snobs decided that to boldly go and its cousins were vulgar. Admittedly, split infinitives are peculiar. You're not allowed to split infinitives in German, English's second cousin. However, split infinitives have a long literary history, and the period when war was declared on English split infinitives turns out to have been both recent (the 1800s) and brief.

English teachers and grammarians are declaring a ceasefire, because to go boldly doesn't sound as eloquent, and there are times when kicking the adverb outside the infinitive sandwich is actually confusing, because the adverb might then modify another word in the sentence.

So split your infinitives without guilt, I say. Absolvo.

However, I'm not there to talk to your teacher, so if you've got one who's a stickler, well, you know how teachers are: part of the game of school (and jobs) is to figure out what each teacher, employer, or person in charge expects of you.