Once in a while you hear somebody pronounce, say, Richard III as “Richard Third” without the the. My questions are:[ul]
[li]How did this get started? Why?[/li][li]Is there a particular school or tendency of historians that prefers this pronunciation?[/li][li]Nobody talks like this any more… or do they?[/li][/ul]
That’s interesting. I’ve never heard it that way myself in English, but that’s how they do it in French - e.g., Louis Seize. Am curious to hear what the answer to this is.
I’ve never heard that in English, either.
friedo, I remember my 9th grade history teacher talking like this, back in the early 1970s. I’m not sure, but I think I remember hearing it a few times since then.
Yeah, missbunny, I kind of expected someone would compare it to the French phrasing without the definite article. But it doesn’t match. Louis Seize literally means ‘Louis Sixteen’. Not ‘Sixteenth’ — that would be Seizième. Using the cardinal numbers without the article is normal in English too: we pronounce Nightmare on Elm Street VII as “Nightmare on Elm Street Seven” — not “Seventh.” We pronounce “Super Bowl XXXIX” as “Super Bowl Thirty-Nine,” not “Thirty-Ninth.”
But if you put an ordinal after someone’s name you expect it to have “the” in between.
Actors and other distinguished theatrical people usually pronounce the Shakespeare’s plays titles without inserting a “the”:
Examples: Richard II, Richard III, Henry IV, Henry V, Henry VI (Parts 1, 2 and 3).
None of these play titles contain the word “THE”. It always sounded strange to me, but they were very experienced actors, so I thought it must be the traditional way to say the titles. I think most of them even say “Henry Four” (which always makes it sound like part of the “Rocky” series).
Spanish also doesn’t use an article between the leader and the ordinal, as in “Carlos Quinto” (Charles the Fifth).
This doesn’t answer the question, but I was interested enough in Hakluyt’s usage (late 16th and early 17th centuries) to make a note of it. In the edition I saw, he used the definite article and the cardinal number spelled out. As in King Henry the eight.
In my opinion it is the same reason American English speakers (generally) do not use the indefinite article in numbers while
British English speakers do
In the USA, this is the year two thousand three.
In Britain, it is two thousand and three.
In America I would write a check for two hundred fifty dollars, while at home I would write a cheque for two hundred and fifty euro.
People follow the convention for the country in which they live
Maybe I’ve been away for far too long, but I thought Americans did use the “and” quite often. I certainly do say “two thousand and three.” But half the time I do omit it… On checks, though, I reserve the “and” for the pennies part.
Jomo Mojo, I can’t believe I wrote that Louis Seize was Louis Sixteenth! I am so embarrassed - I speak French and that was a very dumb mistake.
:o Never mind to everything I said :o
My Spanish-speaking wife and I were just trying to sort this mess out this weekend. I know she says “Louis quince” (Louis 15), but also “Isabella Segunda” (Elizebeth Second) or “Henrico Octavo.” What I want to know are
(1) why the change between ordinal and cardinal numbers?
(2) Why do they change the names of the monarchs? Isabella? She’s a Spanish queen, not English.
I don’t think we anglocize other monarchs’ names, do we? King Carl of Spain? King Elizebeth of Spain?
OK, here’s a bit for Balthizar:
It is customary in Spanish to have dynastic ordinals above the tenth be referred to by the cardinal. Thus: Alfonso VII-Séptimo, but Alfonso XIII-Trece. Or with the popes: Pío IX-Noveno(or Nono), but Pío XII-Doce.
This in part because Spanish ordinals above “décimo” quickly become big compound mouthfuls. Example: Pope Juan Vigésimotercero vs. Juan Veintitrés, net economy of four whole syllables. In English, it’s just the cardinal number with a -th or -eth tacked on at the end, much easier.
It is the traditional styling of the people in charge of heraldry and the such in Spain to have the Christian names of Royalty rendered into the Spanish. Thus, Reina Isabel(*), Príncipe Guillermo, Reina Beatriz, Princesa Carolina, Rey Carlos Gustavo. And since they already went thru the trouble, the rest of the Spanish-speaking world tends to follow suit.
(*NOT “Isabella”!)
Historically this had been the case in many Western nations – when you think about it, “way back when” official documents would be in Latin, and the document could get translated integrally to the vernacular right down to personal names.
In Spanish, the application of this to people at large lasted well past 1900: Tomás A. Edison, Teodoro Roosevelt, Víctor Manuel (King of Italy), José Stalin. However, already there were changes in this from centuries past – Henry Ford did not become “Enrique Ford”. As rapid communications and mass media kept proliferating, the use of the native names of foreign figures became standard.
Here’s kind of a related question: Naming and numbering a monarch’s name seems to refer as far back as William the Conqueror. In the unlikely event that a new monarch took a name that predated 1066, would they continue the numbering from that earlier name (i.e. Boadicea II)? Is there an instance of an English monarch having the same name as a pre-Norman monarch, but starting the numbering over with I?
When did numbering the ruler begin? Was it only with William theConqueror? They number the ancient pharaohs of Egypt too, like Amenhotep II, Amenhoteb III, his son Amenhotep IV who later changed his name to Akhenaten, but at first he was A. IV. Also, emperors or the Eastern Roman Empire have numbers, such as Constantine IX, for instance, and many in the ancient world. Cleopatra of most historical fame was Cleopatra VII. Surely awareness of these numbers must preced William the Conqueror. Also in Sweden ther were lots of medieval Erics with numbers, and on and on, back in the Dark Ages.
‘the’ is defintely included, if someone drops the defintive article it is probably the result of laziness than anything else.
‘The’ is included as it comes from the earlier tradition of giving kings nicknames (e.g. Alfred the great, Aethelred the Unready, William the Conquerer/Bastard).
Krokodil, the numbering scheme only includes post-1066 kings (though some historians do use a seperate numbering scheme for the various Anglo Saxon Kings of England named Edward, who proceed the 8 post-1066 Edwards, who are numbered seperately), before this kings of the same name were distinguished by their nickname.
I’ve also heard US actors use the following nicknames for Shakespeaean plays:
Richard III is “Dick Trip”
Henry V is “Hank Cinq”
don willard,
I neglected to mention that I was referring only to English monarchs. Sorry.
IIRC, when the liner to replace the old “Queens” (Elizabeth and Mary) was launched, the name was kept a closely guarded secret and was the subject of much speculation. At the launch the ship was named as “Queen Elizabeth Two” by Queen Elizabeth the Second - a deliberate choice of words to show that the name was derived from the earlier liner and not the reigning sovereign.
The “the” is normally included in the sovereign’s name because “Queen Elizabeth the Second” is a contraction of the old form “Queen Elizabeth, the second of that name”.
“And” is a conjunction. “An” is an indefinite article.
Does anyone refer to the current year as “Twenty aught three”?
But most, if not all, of them are entirely mythical.