Thee and Thou

[FRITZ JUENGLING]

Ambiguity probably played no role either.  The Germans, Dutch, Swedes and a host of other people have no trouble using 'thou' (in their own language, of course) to their dogs, then to God, then to  street urchins and prostitutes, and then to their spouses and close friends.  Why should the English be unable to make such a distinction?  I think--and now I'm in the realm of pure speculation--that it probably was in imitation of courtly and upper class speech. But I have no evidence for that. That just seems much more likely than ambiguity.
Some other interesing questions are why the formal/informal (or familiar) distinction arose at all (I think the answer to that sheds light on my answer to the original question) and why an oblique form came to be used in the nominative. Where the heck is 'ye'?
Fritz J

>>> paul.johnston at WMICH.EDU 09/28/05 09:29AM >>>
Probably because of the ambiguity involved in Early Modern English.
Thouing people could either signal that you were considering someone as
a very close intimate of yours, or treating them as an inferior and
putting them down.  While which meaning was signalled could be clarified
given the context of the interaction, it was risky either to presume a
close tie (which might be unwarranted) or to give someone the idea you
might be putting them down.  You, as the pronoun of respect, was a safer
choice.
        The Quakers used it to show we are all "friends" and fellow, equal
children of God.
        There are British dialects which still use thou--a lot of the
Northern and North Midland group (Cumberland and S Durham down to
Nottinghamshire/Derbyshire), a few Southwestern varieties (E Somerset) &
Insular Scots (Orkney & Shetland).  It is recessive everywhere, and
possibly gone or nearly gone in the SW; the same ambiguities apply as in
EModEng, but the putdown uses seem a little less common (though
possible, esp. in Yorkshire-- Tha knaws tha's a gret fooil (Thou knows
thou is (sic) a great fool) is something I've actually heard said).

Paul Johnston

On Tuesday, September 27, 2005, at 08:36  PM, James A. Landau wrote:

> ---------------------- Information from the mail
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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "James A. Landau" <JJJRLandau at AOL.COM>
> Subject:      Thee and Thou
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> My daughter posed the following question:
>
> My American civ professor was discussing how American English
> dropped the informal 'thee' and 'thou' from our speech
> patterns, and  thought it was strange that in such a
> comparatively informal society, people  started referring to
> each other by the more formal 'you'. Why did this  occur?
>
> - James A.  Landau