The sentence "My friend at school had his house burn down, and they lost everything" uses a grammatical construction that warrants closer analysis. While this phrasing does appear in everyday speech, there are questions about its technical correctness compared to alternatives like "burned down" or "burnt down."
The "Have" Construction in English
In English, the verb "have" can be used in several different ways. When it comes to describing unfortunate events that happen to someone, there are specific grammatical patterns that native speakers typically follow. The construction in question uses what linguists call a causative or experiential "have" pattern.
Examining the Grammatical Structure
The standard causative construction in English typically follows the pattern "have + object + past participle," as in "I had my house painted" (meaning someone painted it for me) or "She had her car repaired" (someone repaired it for her). Following this pattern, the grammatically standard form would be "My friend had his house burned down" rather than "had his house burn down."
When expressing that someone experienced an unfortunate event, English commonly uses either the simple past tense ("His house burned down") or the causative construction with a past participle ("He had his house burned down"). The latter can sometimes imply either that someone arranged for it to happen or that they suffered it happening to them.
American vs. British Usage
It's worth noting that both "burned" and "burnt" are acceptable past tense forms of the verb "to burn," but their usage varies geographically. "Burned" is more common in American English, while "burnt" appears more frequently in British English. In the United States and Canada, "burned" is significantly more prevalent.
According to linguistic sources, "burned" is actually the older form of the word, and "burnt" emerged due to a British trend toward adding "-t" instead of "-ed" to certain verbs that started in the sixteenth century. This is similar to pairs like "learned/learnt" and "spelled/spelt."
The Correct Alternatives
The most grammatically standard ways to express this idea would be:
"My friend at school's house burned down, and they lost everything."
"My friend at school had his house burned down, and they lost everything."
The Cambridge Dictionary confirms that when referring to a building being destroyed by fire, the correct phrasing is "burns down" or "is burned down". For example: "The family home burned down in a matter of hours" or "The factory was burned down in what seems to be a deliberate act".
Conclusion
While "had his house burn down" does appear in casual speech and some written contexts, it deviates from standard grammatical patterns for causative constructions in English. The technically correct forms would be either the simple "his house burned down" or the causative with past participle "had his house burned down". Both "burned down" and "burnt down" are acceptable variants, with preference largely depending on whether you're using American or British English.
