antedating of y'all (1672) [was: (1704)]

[Jonathan Lighter]

Dryden's monosyllabic, elided "y'all" is actually required by scansion,
just like his "Heav'n." To have written "you all," which obscures the
elision, would have violated formal poetic convention.

JL


On Sat, Jan 18, 2014 at 1:17 PM, Joel S. Berson <Berson at att.net> wrote:

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> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster:       "Joel S. Berson" <Berson at ATT.NET>
> Subject:      Re: antedating of y'all (1672)  [was: (1704)]
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> If anyone is interested in the 1672 publication of _The conquest of
> Granada_, it's in EEBO (rather than ECCO, presumably because ECCO
> really means what it says about its period).  As well as at Harvard's
> Houghton Library.
>
> Joel
>
> At 1/17/2014 03:25 PM, David Parker wrote:
> >Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit
> >
> >---- Because I've seen
> >This Day, what 'tis to hope to be a Queen!
> >Heav'n, how y'all watch'd each Motion of her eye!
> >
> >
> >John Dryden, _ The conquest of Granada by the Spaniards. Acted at
> >the Theatre-Royal_.   London: printed for J. Tonson, and T. Bennet:
> >and sold by J. Knapton at the Crown in St. Paul's Church-Yard, G.
> >Strahan and W. Davis over-against the Royal Exchange in Cornhill, 1704.
> P. 13
> >
> >But according to WorldCat, this play was first published in 1672 "in
> >the Savoy, Printed by T.N. for Henry Herringman, and are to be sold
> >at the Anchor in the Lower Walk of the New Exchange."
> >
> >Again, from Gale's Eighteenth Century Collections Online.
> >
> >And now, back to my real work.
> >
> >
> >David B. Parker
> >Professor of History
> >Assistant Chair,
> >   Dept. of History & Philosophy
> >Kennesaw State University
> >
> >------------------------------------------------------------
> >The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
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