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From: barryg@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Lee Gold)
Newsgroups: net.nlang
Subject: Re: Second person singular (long quote)
Message-ID: <2337@sdcrdcf.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 13-Sep-85 06:40:29 EDT
Article-I.D.: sdcrdcf.2337
Posted: Fri Sep 13 06:40:29 1985
Date-Received: Wed, 18-Sep-85 02:43:53 EDT
References: <2058@dutoit.UUCP> <3568@dartvax.UUCP> <1156@ihuxn.UUCP> <1116@sphinx.UChicago.UUCP>
Reply-To: barryg@sdcrdcf.UUCP (Lee Gold)
Organization: System Development Corp. R+D, Santa Monica
Lines: 26
Summary: 

Here's what Baugh's HISTORY OF THE ENGLISH LANGUAGE has to say....

	"The 16th century saw the establishment of the personal pronoun in
the form which it has had ever since....Three changes were involved:  the
disuse of thou, thy, thee; the substitution of you for ye as a nominative
case, and the introduction of its as the possessive of it.

	"In the earliest period of English the distinction between thou and
ye was simply one of number; thou was the singular and ye the plural form for
the second person pronoun.  In time, however, a quite different distinction
grew up.  In the  13th century, the singular forms (thou, thy, thee) were
used among familiars and in addressing children or persons of inferior rank,
while the plural forms (ye, your, you) began to be used as a mark of respect
in addressing a superior....The usage spread as a general concession to
courtesy until ye, your and you became the usual pronoun of direct address
irrespective of rank or intimacy.  By the 16th century the singular forms
had all but disappeared from polite speech and are in ordinary use today
only among the Quakers.
	"Originally a clear distinction was made between the nominative ye
and the objective you.  But since both forms are so frequently unstressed,
they were often pronounced alike....In the 14th century you began to be used
as a nominative.  By a similar substitution ye appears in the following
century for the objective case, and from this time on the two forms seem
to have been used pretty indiscriminately until ye finally disappeared."

--Lee Gold


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