Off the top of my head, Danish "De" (practically never used), German "Sie", Chinese "您", French "vous", Spanish "usted" are formal ways of addressing someone, especially if one isn't familiar with the addressee. Did English ever have this? It sounds as though Proto-Indo-European might have had this (based on my five examples), but perhaps someone can enlighten me?
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Yes it did, and the formal version was (drumroll, please....) you.
In Early Modern English, thou was the singular and you was the plural. Plural you came to be used as a polite form of address (similar to the French vous, which is also used for the plural), but over time this polite form became more and more common, eventually displacing the singular thou altogether.
This explains a peculiarity of traditional Quaker speech, which one often hears in films set in the early Americas. The Quakers opposed making any distinctions of rank, so they insisted on addressing everyone as thou, not as you. The irony is that today we perceive thou to be archaic and formal, while the original intent is to be more informal.
Update: we don't know if there was any politeness distinction in PIE. In any case, the distinctions that exist in the modern European languages are not inherited from PIE, since the oldest recorded IE languages (Latin, Greek, Sanskrit) did not have separate polite pronouns. The current European system apparently began with the late Roman Emperors and became widespread in the Middle Ages.
Non-IE languages often have more than two levels of distinctness. In Thai and Japanese (the only two languages about which I can speak with confidence), there are a variety of different pronouns that can be used depending on the exact nature of the social relations between the interlocutors, and the system often extends not just to the 2nd person pronoun but to the 1st and 3rd person pronouns as well.
JSBձոգչ
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So, politeness inflation means there's only one form now? What about the PIE question? Is the formal form of address specific to PIE? I can't think of analogous forms in Chinese or Vietnamese, and I don't know enough about any other languages... – Carlos Jan 24 '11 at 17:22
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Great answer... you've got the history spot on too, as far as I know. – Noldorin Jan 24 '11 at 17:34
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30Hindi (or Urdu) also has three levels of politeness, as do (according to the Wikipedia article on this, which is called the T–V distinction) Dutch, Czech, Bengali, Turkish, Basque, and dialects of Catalan. – ShreevatsaR Jan 24 '11 at 18:15
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Well, I know in Vietnamese (and Chinese) there's a whole load of different words used to address someone, depending on whether you're younger than them, your father is older than them, etc, etc. I was thinking of a formal address towards an unfamiliar stranger though. – Carlos Jan 24 '11 at 18:26
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@ShreevatsaR: Dutch doesn't really have three levels of politeness: it is just that "gij/ge" is used as a variant of "jij/jou/je" by speakers of some southern dialects, whose ordinary vocabulary and accent would usually not be comprehensible to standard speakers. Perhaps there are some Flemish exceptions to this. As far as I know, "gij" is no more or less polite there than "jij". // Note that, in standard Dutch, "gij" is exactly like "thou": archaic. I don't think anyone has ever called me "gij" in my entire life, except in jest. – Cerberus - Reinstate Monica Jan 24 '11 at 19:45
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Some dialects of Spanish (particularly in Uruguay, I believe) have three too: tú, usted, and vos. – Peter Taylor Jan 24 '11 at 22:50
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@Peter - vos is just a variant form (of either the second-person plural familiar objective or apparently in some places, the singular familiar nominative). – Michael Lorton Jan 24 '11 at 22:56
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@Malvolio, according to the DPD, "coexisten el tuteo como tratamiento de formalidad intermedia y el voseo como tratamiento familiar en Chile, en el estado venezolano de Zulia, en la costa pacífica colombiana, en Centroamérica y en los estados mexicanos de Tabasco y Chiapas". I'm sure I've heard that Uruguay (or maybe just Montevideo) has a three-way distinction, but the Academias either disagree or brush it under the carpet. – Peter Taylor Jan 24 '11 at 23:37
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@Cerberus: here in Vlaams-Brabant (the province just east of Brussels, for those not familiar with Belgian geography) everyone uses "je", and you'll be looked at funny if you use "u". I've never heard "gij" or "ge", but I'm not a native speaker and don't know many people from other provinces, so take that with a grain of salt. – Meredith L. Patterson Jan 25 '11 at 05:08
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In Japanese (in which I'm reasonably fluent) there are many levels of politeness but they are not driven by the choice of personal pronoun but mostly by the verb form. Personal pronouns are often completely removed by formal/polite conversation because the meaning and the respective positions are conveyed by the verb. – Uberto Jan 25 '11 at 12:51
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@MeredithL.Patterson: Oh, that is funny; if there is no "U", then what will people say to visitors from Antwerp? And what does the Bishop say to the Mayor? – Cerberus - Reinstate Monica Jan 25 '11 at 13:46
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@Peter & @Malvolio I'm from Uruguay, to clarify because it is a quite particular case: I uruguay there is only two levels of formality, formal: "Usted", informal: "Tu" and "Vos". The confusing part is that only one "state" of Uruguay (generalization) actively uses "Tu", Rocha. "Tu" is the "correct" form while "Vos" is a deformation but is by far the most wide spread, so "Tu" sounds more formal or educated, and while it might be, it's not another level, I you have to be formal you must use "Usted". – Trufa Jan 25 '11 at 14:44
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15There is a hypothesis that y'all is now emerging as a formal version of you in certain dialects. See here: "Thomas Nunnally (1994) has offered a second hypothesis for the emergence of yall as a singular. He suggests that it may well be expanding to fill the role of a polite singular, just as you did several centuries ago. He points out that many of the citations of yall singular show the form occurring at the edges of discourse — in greetings, partings, and so forth." – RegDwigнt Jan 26 '11 at 10:49
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23"Thou" is still sometimes used as the singular/informal form of you in some parts of northern England, notably in Yorkshire. "Thou" and "thy" are pronounced "tha" and the corresponding -rt and -st verb endings are not used. Such use is archaic (even comical) elsewhere in England. – Will Harris Jan 26 '11 at 22:06
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5@RegDwight: Y'all as a singular has been around for a long time. Dan Simmons wrote a horror novel Summer of Night about a bunch of children growing up in Southern Illinois in 1960, and in it there's a girl from the wrong side of the tracks who sometimes uses y'all as a singular. At first, I thought the author didn't know what he was talking about. But I did some research, and discovered that indeed y'all was used as a singular by people in the lower socioeconomic classes in that region (where Dan Simmons grew up in the 50s and 60s). – Peter Shor May 15 '11 at 12:29
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Correction: the town in Summer of Night is actually modeled after a town in central Illinois, not southern Illinois. But I'm pretty sure the reference I found was to southern Illinois. As a wild guess, I'd say this usage originates in the Ozarks. – Peter Shor May 15 '11 at 12:56
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99 +1 = 100. AFAIK, in English, the T-V distinction was unknown in OE, it came from the Anglo-Normans as it was customary in France at the time. – Alain Pannetier Φ May 16 '11 at 22:15
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@JSBangs: +1 great answer I one of the million people who thought thou was the formal version. BTW: how did you get to know Thai language so well, do you live in Thailand, eh?!! :)) Good for you man!!! – Marco Demaio Jul 17 '11 at 14:14
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3Thamar Eilam Gindin, a scholar of ancient Persian, says that similarly in Persian "you" used to be the polite form for "thou" (like Vy in Russian and Vous in French, it's the plural form). So are the polite forms in Persian: šomā is both polite 2nd person singular or normal 2nd person plural, as opposed to familiar "to". išān is now used only as polite 3rd person singular, as opposed to "impolite" ū, but originally it meant "they" (human). Nowadays 3rd pl. uses the originally inanimate 3rd pl. ānhā for both human, animal and inanimate. – Itamar Nov 30 '11 at 09:43
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@RegDwightѬſ道 A southerner explained to me that when addressing a single person, "y'all" is a familiar form of address, while "all y'all" is something said to people not well known. It's not so much formality as it is insider status. Coming from Maryland, I consider the youse/y'all isogloss the true line of demarcation between North and South. – Taj Moore Jan 07 '12 at 20:31
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Not counting the archaic vos that nobody uses any more, (European) Portuguese can be thought of as having three levels of formality in the notional second person: tu for familiars, você for strangers, and o senhor / a senhora for respect. Only tu takes second-person concordance (well, and vos, but that takes (or rather, took) plural not singular concordance); você and o/a senhor/a take third-person concordance. The plural vocês has replaced vos for a plural familiar, much as ustedes in American Spanish, and unlike vosotros in Spain, which is unreplaced. – tchrist Nov 15 '12 at 14:25
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3A problem with the PIE question is that languages appear to develop and lose honorific systems all the time-- it seems like a "natural thing that languages do". So deducing whether PIE had honorifics on the basis of the number of descendant languages that have them now (or at any point several thousand years after PIE is posited to have existed) is somewhat dangerous. – Neil Coffey Nov 15 '12 at 14:41
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2@tchrist, vos is still used in Portugal, although as far as I know mostly in the northeast, for which reason it is considered by most to be rather rural and peasantly. Danish had, in the earlier parts of the 20th century and probably going back a while before that, three degrees as well: du (intimate, informal); De (neutrally formal); han/hun (highly formal or even distancing; lit. ‘he/she’). – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jan 06 '14 at 03:01
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2As for PIE, some have suggested that the two roots reconstructible for the second plural (*ius and *uos) reflect a genuine plural and a politeness pronoun (and that the two in the first plural, *uei and *nos, reflect inclusiveness/exclusiveness)—but this is not generally accepted. The more common view is that *uei and *ius are simply suppletive nominatives to *nos and *uos, which from the basic of the obliques. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jan 06 '14 at 03:06
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In the south Indian family of Dravidian languages there are separate ways of addressing depending on number,level of respect, familiarity etc for all grammatical persons – Arun Feb 09 '14 at 03:09
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2"thou" sounds pretty similar to the Icelandic ("þú") and Norwegian ("du") pronounciations of the same word. This goes for other languages too. Here is a whole page about the topic: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/thou – Alexander Feb 11 '14 at 14:00
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The peculiarity of Quaker speech you mention, was a reversion at the time, as thou had already died out in most areas, but not so much of a reversion that it wasn't recognised, and reacted to with violence. – Jon Hanna Feb 14 '14 at 18:23
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Its interesting, in Persian the singular for "You" is "To" which is similar "thou". However again for politeness one may use plural "Shoma" – Ahmad Nov 19 '14 at 07:34
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Will Harris states, correctly, that Yorkshire English no longer uses -'rt' and '-st' after 2nd person singular verbs, but I can confirm that in my memory, East Yorkshire speakers used '-s'. "You're right" would be rendered as /ðəz ɹaɪt/, while "YOU see him every day" would be /ðuː siːz ɪm ɛvɹɪ deː/ – David Garner Dec 17 '14 at 12:27
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Maybe this is why the 2nd person plural shares verb forms with the plural. For example, "you are", "they are", "we are" but "I am", "he is", &c. – solidsnack Dec 25 '23 at 00:43
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My understanding is that, as a technical matter, Japanese has no actual pronouns, because all Japanese pronouns are functionally identical to nouns. Generally, pronouns are a distinct class of words with distinct morphological and syntactic rules. For example, in English: pronouns decline and nouns don’t; nouns can attach determiners (“his cheese”) while pronouns can’t (“the she” is ungrammatical). Indeed, there are several ways pronouns are distinct from nouns in Indo-European language; but none of them allow us to distinguish nouns from pronouns in Japanese: https://qr.ae/pKZXoi – solidsnack Dec 25 '23 at 01:07
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@RegDwigнt y'all becoming a polite form of you is very interesting to me. I'm form the South, so I'm familiar with y'all, but as a husband and parent I use it a lot more often now because I think about myself and others as part of a family unit now, instead of individuals, so I saw "us", "we", and "y'all" a lot. – cjohnson318 Dec 25 '23 at 03:00
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Yes. As far as I know, you actually is the formal, originally plural version (ye/you/your) and thou was the informal version (thou/thee/thy/thine). Over time, thou became impolitely informal and is now no longer used, though interestingly enough nowadays it might even be perceived as more formal than you because it's archaic and survives almost exclusively in liturgical language.
Jon Purdy
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14Interesting to note we typically address God in the familiar form, not the formal. – moioci May 11 '11 at 22:31
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6@moioci: As far as I know, the same is true in French, Romanian, Russian, Polish, and Hindi, all of which have T–V distinctions. – Jon Purdy May 12 '11 at 02:31
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16From my Bible-studyin' childhood, I recall Romans 8:15 (King James Version):
– MT_Head May 15 '11 at 17:01For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.Years later, when I visited Israel, I was astonished to hear that "Abba" is the equivalent of "Daddy" in modern Hebrew. It put the New Testament into a whole new context for me... -
17The fact that Abba means Daddy in modern Hebrew doesn't mean that it always meant this in the Hebrew of New Testament times. See, for instance: Abba Isn't Daddy - The Traditional Aramaic Father's Day Discussion – Kyralessa Sep 25 '12 at 16:37
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2@JonPurdy In France, the catholic Church actually switched from “vous” to “tu” when addressing God in the 1960s (e.g. in the Lord's Prayer). The informal form is also used in German but not in Dutch. – Gala Sep 30 '13 at 15:57
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Actually, somewhat contrary to the fine answer selected above, you was not originally the form that paired with the familiar singular thee. Rather, the nominative (and vocative) form was ye. The now-common you was originally used in objective forms alone, so accusative or dative.
For example, Wordsworth draws the nominative–dative distinction when he writes in Lyrical Ballads vii: “Yet ye are seven! — I pray you tell, Sweet Maid, how this may be.” A vocative example by Shakespeare can be found in Richard II III. ii. 84: “Looke not to the ground, Ye fauorites of a King.”
The OED explains of ‘ye’ how:
In the earliest periods of English ye was restricted to the nominative plural. In the 13th cent. it came to be used as a nominative singular = ‘thou’, first as a respectful form addressed to a superior. This use survives in modern dialects, especially (in the form ee) in interrog. and imperative formulæ (e.g. Dee = ‘do ye’), but also in objective uses = ‘thee’ (e.g. Oi tell ee). When you had usurped the place of ye as a nominative, ye came to be used (in the 15th cent.), vice versa, as an objective singular and plural (= ‘thee’ and ‘you’).
Now (in all uses) only dial., arch., or poet.; in ordinary use replaced by you pron.
Illustration of Forms:
a. OE ge, gie, gee, ME ȝie, (gie, ge), ME ( ME–17 Sc. printed ze) ȝe, ME ȝee, north. yhe, ME–15 north. ȝhe, ME–16 yee (ME jȝe, hye, ME iȝe, iye, (i)he, 16, 18 dial. yea), ME– ye.
b. In combination, proclitically or enclitically, with other words, as: †ȝet = ye it, yare = ye are, y’have; d’ee, dee = do ye, hark’ee, harkee. Now dial.
1 a. The pronoun used (as the plural of 2nd singular thou pron.) in addressing a number of persons (or, rhetorically, of things), in the nominative (or vocative).
<p><strong>†2 b.</strong> In apposition to <em>self</em> (<strong>ye self</strong>, <strong>ye selven</strong> = yourselves): see <strong>self</strong> <em>pron</em>. 2. <em>Obs</em>.</p> <p><strong>1 c.</strong> In apposition to and preceding a <em>n</em>. (or <em>adj</em>. used <em>absol</em>.) in the vocative.</p> <p><strong>2 a.</strong> Used instead of <em>thou</em> in addressing a single person (originally as a mark of respect or deference, later generally: cf. <strong>thou</strong> n., <strong>you</strong> <em>pron</em>.).</p> <p><strong>2 b.</strong> In apposition to and preceding a n. in the vocative.</p> <p><strong>3 a.</strong> Used as objective (accusative or dative) instead of <em>you</em> (in plural or singular sense).</p> <p><strong>†3 b.</strong> Used redundantly (‘ethical dative’). <em>Obs</em>.</p>
In contrast, here’s its note about you:
Originally the accusative and dative plural of the second personal pronoun: see thou n. for the declension of the 2nd person pronoun in Old English and Middle English. Between 1300 and 1400 it began to be used also for the nominative ye pron which it had replaced in general use by about 1600. During the 14th century it also appears as a substitute for the singular obj. thee n. and nominative thou n., being originally used in token of respect in addressing a superior, but later also to an equal, and ultimately generally: compare thou pron. 1. Thus you is now the general pronoun of the second person, nominative or objective, singular or plural.
The historical forms given for you are:
Forms: OE–ME eow, (OE ieow, iow ME ȝeau, heou, heow, how, ȝehw) ME eou, ȝeu, ȝew, ME ou, hou, ȝu, ME iou, æu, ew, heu, eo, oeu, howe, ȝeow, ȝuw, ov, ME ow, owe, ȝiu, ME eu, yu, (15 Sc.) ȝou, ME iow, ȝue, ȝuu, ȝouȝ, yuu, youu, yhow, ME ȝowe, ȝhow, ȝo, (15–16 Sc.) ȝow, ME–16 yow, ME ȝoue, ȝewe, ȝhu, yowe, yoow, yw, yo, yewe, Sc. yhu, yhw, ME–15 youe, 15 iow, 16 yew, ME– you, (18 dial. and vulgar yah, yer, also yez pron.).
Whereas the historical forms given for thou are:
OE–ME ðu, OE–ME þu, (ME tu, tou, -te), ME (þe, þeou), ðhu, ME þou, ME–15 thu, (ME þouȝ), ME þow, ( -tow), ME–15 thow, ME, 15 (18 dial.) th-, th’, (ME thowe), ME– thou. (Mod. dial. thau, thaw, thah, tha; theau, theow, thoo, thu; tau, taw, ta, tay; teau, teaw, teu, too, tou, tow; doo, dou, du, etc.: see Eng. Dial. Dict.)
There’s a lot more than that there if you check out the OED entries for ye, thou, and you.
Postscript
It looks like Georgia doesn’t like ȝ (U+021D LATIN SMALL LETTER YOGH) very much.
Hm, I don’t imagine there’s any way to get the font’s small capitals? That would certainly be useful.
tchrist
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It seems Middle English developed the distinction between formal (you) and informal (thou) versions: this distinction did not exist in Old English. The formal pronoun you was originally a plural form of thou; it can be seen in many languages that a plural form is seen as more polite, which is probably related to the Majestic Plural ("we, King blah blah, grant..."). German Sie comes from plural 3rd person sie; French vous comes from plural Latin 2nd person vos/vester.
Therefore current formal pronouns seem to be relatively modern, convergent developments. I have never heard of formal pronouns in PIE. In classical Latin and Greek, no real formal pronouns were in use either; in Japanese, on the other hand, there are said to be more complex forms of formal pronouns and other words.
Cerberus - Reinstate Monica
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1@Noldorin: Thanks! Indeed it was. I could see his first version only; I'd have cancelled mine if I had seen his edit. – Cerberus - Reinstate Monica Jan 24 '11 at 17:41
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1Yeah, that's what I gathered. Also, I find it very interesting how the TV distinction only appeared in the Middle Ages, in both Romance and Germanic languages, but does not exist in any early IE languages, as you say. It seems to have all stemmed from the Late Roman Empire, but that doesn't easily explain why non-Romance languages have the distinction. – Noldorin Jan 24 '11 at 17:46
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1@Noldorin: True. While the Germanic languages may have emulated the Romance languages, I think the Asian languages must have developed their versions independently. – Cerberus - Reinstate Monica Jan 24 '11 at 18:09
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1Absolutely. It seems highly likely that the Germanic languages were influenced by Rome, but that's it. The East Asian languages are totally unrelated of course, and (correct me if I'm before it appeared in Europe - or at least before there was significant contact between them. – Noldorin Jan 24 '11 at 21:55
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What happened in English pretty much happened in German, and other European languages.
Both German and English started off around 1500 or so, with singular and plural second person pronouns:
- English þu / ye and German du / ihr
Then the nobility started to require more politeness, and
as is always the case, the unnobility found ways to comply.
In doing so, they followed two basic principles of sociolinguistics,
viz:
Third person is more formal (and therefore more polite) than second person.
➤ Form a polite version of second-person pronouns from third-person forms
-- and the more elaborate, the better
(English Your Ladyship ~ Her Ladyship, German polite Er/Sie ist --3sg, cf Tieck, ca 1800)Plural is more formal (ditto) than singular.
➤ Form a polite version of first- and second-person pronouns from plural forms
(English polite you in singular, "royal We", German polite Sie sind --3pl)
Similar remarks can be made, mutatis mutandis, for Spanish tu/usted and French tu/vous
John Lawler
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3In Spanish would be tu/vos (note that in South Spain and Latam vos is now singular and ustedes plurar) And usted comes from vuestra merced – Alberto Dec 19 '14 at 16:34
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Maybe. It is also possible that the word comes from Ustaad, "teacher" (Ar.) The RAE doesn't like to concede the many Arabic roots of Spanish: it took them years to recognize that "ojalá" was insh'allah and they still haven't conceded on paella. But you may nonetheless be right. – user26732 Dec 24 '23 at 22:09
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Just to clarify since I see it alluded to but not clearly said, you was, originally, the objective plural.
As said, originally, there was no "polite" form. Thou (thu, þu) was the singular subjective/nominative and ye was plural subjective/nominative. After the Norman-French Takeover, some began to try to graft the T-V distinction onto the English pronouns. This led to a lot of confusion and resentment. After it was all said and done, both thou and ye were dropped in favor of you serving as both the sing. and pl. as well as subj. and obj. forms.
Genesis 19:8 KJV is a good byspel to see the subj./obj. forms (Lot speaking to a crowd):
Behold now, I have two daughters which have not known man; let me, I pray you (obj pl), bring them out unto you (obj pl), and do ye (subj pl) to them as is good in your (poss pl) eyes: only unto these men do nothing; for therefore came they under the shadow of my roof.
Personally, I'm very glad that the "polite" form didn't take hold in English. I find it to be a pain when speaking other tongues. Many have informally solved the plural problem with y'all or youse or even you guys.
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2@Jon Hanna - The polite form not only took hold in English: it effectively made the singular forms obsolete, to the point that most English natives do not even know this is the original formal pronoun. – Pablo Straub Jan 08 '17 at 17:15
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1@PabloStraub yes, leading to his incorrect answer, though use of thou for familiar address with T-V distinction was still found in some parts of the Anglosphere well into the 20th century (c.f. the use of thou in D H Lawrence's novels). Even when thou had been mostly obsolete in south England, people still knew the implications well-enough that when the Quakers tried to introduce an egalitarian thou as part of their "plain speaking" it would sometimes result in their being beaten up with the assailant claiming they were provoked by the rudeness of being addressed with thou. – Jon Hanna Jan 08 '17 at 20:53
Ön(more polite, works like 'Sie' in German) andmaga(from slightly to quite rude) in Hungarian. (Quite common, standard usage. But there is also a unorganized movement for trying to avoid them, because they are sometimes slightly-to-quite associated with an unwelcome way of being formal, or using that as an excuse to get rid of empathy. It's a bit demanding to avoid them but not impossible. One attempt is to use the equivalent of old thou as the Quakers, an other way is using some kind of proper names, or simply try to avoid addressing alltogether.) – n611x007 Jun 27 '13 at 08:06It might be good if they did; there's something about the German usage that I think is positive, but that's another discussion.
– Carlos Jan 06 '14 at 15:35Along with that you tend not to have a conversation about being "dus", which I've had several times down here.
– Carlos Feb 14 '14 at 21:59