Someone correct me, but “you” was originally plural. The correct way to address a singular person is “thou”.
Thou was singular subject and thee was singular object.
https://activeenglishcee.blogspot.com/2020/10/thou-thee-thy-thine-ye-meanings-usage.html
Yesn’t. Actually no.
The singular was thou for subject and thee for object and the plural was ye/you. In formal speech the plural was used and the subject pronoun was replaced by the object but I can’t tell you in which order.
The þ-thing didn’t effect the pronoun but some surnames and the article. I think some pubs have names like “ye old”. They used to be “þe(=the) old” and have nothing to do with þe old pronoun, even tho it is written the same.
Other commenters have already covered the you/thou thing, so to cover the printing press bit: that did happen, but with a different word. “Ye” as in “Ye Olde Village Inn” is the one. The “ye” here is “the”, and it was pronounced as “the” too. It would have been spelled “þe” before, and in blackletter style (𝔱𝔥𝔦𝔰 𝔰𝔱𝔶𝔩𝔢 𝔬𝔣 𝔩𝔢𝔱𝔱𝔢𝔯𝔦𝔫𝔤), “y” and “þ” looked awfully similar. If your press came from a country that didn’t use the thorn - and many presses in Europe did - and therefore didn’t have that character available, then you’d just use the y since they were close enough anyway
A similar thing happened with the letter yogh (ȝ) in Scotland. It wasn’t in most presses, but it looks close enough to a z, so just use a z, and now the name “Menzies” is spelled that way despite being pronounced “ming-iss”
That this “ye” is spelled the same way as the second person plural subject pronoun “ye” is a total coincidence
Stop. You are making some of the senseless things in English make sense. How I’m I supposed to feel superior because my first language is read the way it is written? 😩
Yeah. And Y'all also used to be plural. Now it can be singular and we use All Y'all to clarify when we need people to know we mean plural. Language is bonkers.
I have never heard y’all used singular, growing up in the American South. Instead, as I understand it:
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Y’all: You all, referring to a group of people (Can potentially be a subset of a larger group, e.g. talking to one couple at the table among a group of friends). “When are y’all having the wedding again?”
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All y’all: shorthand for “all of y’all” Explicitly referring to “all of the members of the group in question”, requiring that at least one member of said group is being addressed by the speaker. The difference is there are no exceptions (apart from exaggeration) “Ain’t a single one of you innocent, all y’all had a hand in this” or “All y’all need to put on your seatbelts, I ain’t going to jail for any of y’all’s comfort”.
Also singular they is older than singular you. So any idiots who complain that “they” should only be plural should only be using thou/thee for second person singular.
