Abstract: In English, an idiom refers to “a set phrase of two or more words that means something different from the literal meaning of the individual words.” So, it is generally not allowed to get the idioms modified both on the lexical and syntactic level. But the fact is that there are potential possibilities for idiom modification which is much more than we can anticipate. The study object is the idioms with “verb+ the +noun” structure. It is discussed to what degree the “verb+ the +noun” idioms are modified and why the modification happens to such idioms as well as the importance of “the” in such idioms.

Key words: “verb+ the +noun” idiom, syntactic modification, internal modification

摘要： 习语在英语中指结构相对固定的词组或短句，它的意义不是其构成词意义的相加。一般来说,习语不允许发生词汇和句法层面的变体，但事实上习语变体的可能性比预料的要大得多。英语中有许多结构不同的习语，选择“动词+定冠词+名词”结构的习语作为研究对象，从词汇和句法层面分析这类习语变体的程度、引起变体的原因以及定冠词“the”在这类习语中的重要性。

关键词: “动词+ 定冠词+名词”习语, 内部变体, 句法变体