The loss of thee and thou-a singular pronoun for everyday use-was clearly noticed by English speakers. Queen Elizabeth I seems to have used only you in writing, and a user of her prestige must have given you a boost.īy about the middle of the 16th century the contrast in function between ye and you began breaking down, with the effect that you was more frequently used as a subject pronoun as use of ye decreased. It was even sometimes used to show deliberate disrespect. As the use of the plural increased, the singular use decreased accordingly: by the beginning of the 17th century, thou and thee marked only an intimate or personal relationship or a superior-to-inferior relationship. This is where social forces came into play: once people begin such a use, it must grow, since people would rather be polite than risk offending others in cases of doubt. Once this usage of the polite plural began, it gradually grew. This change could have been influenced by the first-person plural we ( the royal “we”) used by sovereigns or reflected the impact of French politeness at work in Middle English. The singular for this use would be thou:Īs far back as the 14th century, the plural forms ye and you began to be used to address one person-usually a superior-as a mark of deference and respect. When the second person plural was used as a grammatical subject, ye was used. These uses are known respectively as the accusative and dative cases. You began as the grammatical object, used in the following ways: Originally, the pair ye and you was used along with thee and thou to refer to people in the second person, ye and you for plural and thee and thou for singular.
The history of the pronoun you provides a good example of the effect social forces can have on the language.
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