Not until ( sentence ) + do (sentence)
Can someone explain the structure of the following sentence?
- It was not until hours later did I find him.
Does it have anything to do with emphasis ?
The sentence is not grammatical. It should either be
It was not until hours later that I found him.
or
Not until hours later did I find him.
This structure indeed emphasizes the temporal adverb. It means the same thing as
I didn't find him until hours later. (= I found him hours later)