Thou, thine, thy, what is the difference? Why did these things go out of common use? Are there more words like these? I’m curious.
Thou – you (pronoun)
Thy – your (possessive adjective)
Thine – yours (noun)
Why does any word get replaced?
Excuse me, my good man --> Yo, dude!
Originally, “you” was plural, used only for addressing more than one person, and “thou” and its associated forms (thee, thine, thy) were singular. Eventually, “you” became the polite singular form as well, like vous in French, while “thou” remained the familiar singular. In other words, you’d always use “you” if you were addressing two or more people, but you’d also use it if you were addressing one person who was your social superior, or someone you didn’t know well who was your social equal; “thou” was for addressing social inferiors, children, and intimate friends or family members (or strangers you wanted to insult). Slowly, “you” became the default pronoun, possibly because people generally want to err on the side of politeness, and “thou” faded out and became noticeably archaic-sounding.
In Shakespeare, you can often see characters of roughly equal social status switching between “you” and “thou” in ways that convey all kinds of social nuances; lines 1925 and following in this scene are a good place to see this in action. Benedick is pressing for greater intimacy with his repeated use of “thou” and “thee”; Beatrice is holding him off, taking the verbal equivalent of a step back, by remaining in “you” mode. It’s one of the cooler features of early modern English, but I imagine it must also have been a minefield for socially anxious people like me, so I’m not sorry we’ve gotten rid of it.
Other European languages (like German, with its “du” and “Sie,” and, as Porpentine mentions, French) still maintain a distinction between the formal and familiar second-person pronouns.
In recent centuries, the main place that average English speakers have encountered “thou” and its ilk has been in the King James Bible and other works derived from or influenced by it, such as hymns and prayers. This has led many people to associate these words with religiosity and/or formality, an association which they did not originally have.
That reminds me… why do we address God with the familiar Thee instead of the formal You? Isn’t God a major social superior by definition? Do other languages use the familiar du or tu for Gott/Dieu?
It was explained to me that, within the Protestant tradition, God is one’s familiar, with whom one has a Deep Personal Relationship, and so the familiar pronoun was used.*
If one was addressing an animal, by the way, one of course used Thou, unless the animal was a horse. Horses were considered a noble animal, and so one used You.
So talking to their horse was the only time a monarch (who was by the Grace of God the social superior of everyone else in the country) said You.
*Catholics, of course, don’t cotton to that whole “God is my Buddy” thing and don’t even address Him directly most of the time, channelling their prayers to various saints who might actually be His buddy and could put in a word for them.
Is there such a difference between the King James and other Anglican versions and contemporary Catholic translations of the Bible?
I had always assumed it was just about translation accuracy. If the author used a familiar you, then so did the translation.
Umm, you might find that there are a lot of Catholics who do cotton to it. The whole “intercession” thing was pretty passé in the parishes I grew up in. But one might pray to a saint for help in the area the saint represents or the saint who’s day you were born on.
The Lord’s Prayer in Spanish uses the familiar tu rather than the formal su when referring to God.
I just found the 1635 Douai bible (Catholic English Translation), and it uses thou and thine. Here’s part of Psalm 138 (Spelling somewhat modernized)
A WAG but perhaps it originated in the original use of thou as the singular pronoun rather than the informal pronoun. God was addressed by the singular pronoun to emphasize monotheism. Referring to God in the plural might sound like there was a divine pantheon rather than one supreme being.
Thou, thine and thy are still in use in some dialects of English, Cumbrian for example, e.g.“Howay man, thou ain’t gawr owt tha’s thy’s t’givvus fer it!” = “Come on now, you haven’t got anything that is yours to give me for it!”
Not quite. Thy and thine are both possessive; thy is used before a word starting with a consonant - thy face, thy television set, and thine is used before a word starting with a vowel - thine eyes, thine iPhone.
And as I understand it Yorkshiremen are occasionally wont to resent a “thou” from someone who is not a close acquaintance, and to say “Don’t thee thou me, thee thou thysen and see how thee likes thy thouin’ then!”
Erm… so where does the Te Deum come from, then?
Because He isn’t our Father (with the current respectful and distant connotations of addressing a progenitor in that way) so much as our Daddy (again, progenitor and not meat market video). We’re supposed to trust in Him like a baby trusts all those people at whom he’ll gurgle a happy “ab-bbbbaaaaaa!”
While true, “thine” is also used as a possessive pronoun, in the same way “mine” is used today.
In a dialect with that usage, a similar distinction is likely to be made with “my” and “mine”, e,g. “Mine eyes” in the Battle Hymn of the Republic. However, I doubt if many present-day English speakers do this.
I understand that the “thou / thee / thy / thine” usage lingered for a long time, at least in part, among members of the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers). People of this persuasion opined – especially strongly as at the movement’s foundation, I believe in the 17th century – that all humans were equally low and wretched before God, and it was thus inappropriate to treat any human with marked reverence: so they eschewed the respectful “you”, and addressed everyone, up to and including the monarch, with the “thou” etc. form.
Over time, I understand Quakers became rather less meticulous in this observation; and that they took to using “thou” in both subject, and object, role, with “thee” being eclipsed. A couple of decades ago I had a boss who came from Quaker roots: he sometimes addressed us as “thou” – but this was just a random and occasional thing.
This is about the only place I’ve encountered “thou” other than Shakespeare and the Bible–in books that feature dialogue by Quakers, such as Uncle Tom’s Cabin.
I’ve always thought it odd, that the Quakers had the same idea as everybody else–get rid of the distinction between you and thou–but they went about it backwards, addressing everybody as thou while the rest of the world was addressing everybody as you.
As a result, Quaker dialogue today sounds stilted and formal, whereas the intention was exactly the opposite.