English grammar error-spotting (mixed conditional with inverted ‘‘Had … not’’ and noun phrase): Read the sentence split into four labeled parts (A–D) and choose the part that contains a grammatical/idiomatic error; select ‘‘No error’’ only if the sentence is fully correct. Evaluate tense logic and the noun phrase spelling/spacing: ‘‘Had you not / reached in time / he would have lost allour belongings. / No error.’’

Difficulty: Easy

Correct Answer: he would have lost allour belongings.

Explanation:

Given data

  • A: ‘‘Had you not’’ (inverted third conditional opener meaning ‘‘If you had not …’’)
  • B: ‘‘reached in time’’ (time-phrase is idiomatic)
  • C: ‘‘he would have lost allour belongings.’’
  • D: ‘‘No error.’’

Concept / ApproachThis is a past unreal condition (had + past participlewould have + past participle). The grammar of A and B is fine. The error is lexical/orthographic in Part C: the determiner phrase must be written as two words ‘‘all our’’; the concatenation ‘‘allour’’ is incorrect.

Step-by-step checkStep 1: Inversion after ‘‘Had’’ is correct: ‘‘Had you not reached …’’ = ‘‘If you had not reached …’’Step 2: Result clause form is correct: ‘‘would have lost …’’Step 3: Noun phrase is misspelled: it should be ‘‘all our belongings,’’ not ‘‘allour belongings.’’

Correction‘‘Had you not reached in time, he would have lost all our belongings.’’

Common pitfalls

  • Confusing punctuation with grammar (punctuation is to be ignored here).
  • Missing lexical spacing errors that change correctness.

Final Answerhe would have lost allour belongings.

More Questions from Spotting Errors

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