History Analysis / YeOldeButcheredeEnglishe

Similarly, we have words like "whence", "thence", and "hence", which mean "from where", "from there", and "from here", respectively. Some writers will use the words redundantly -- ''e.g.'' "from whence", when just "whence" will do. It's not strictly speaking ''wrong'', as both Shakespeare and the King James Bible did this, but it's still redundant. There's also "whither", "thither", and "hither", respectively meaning "to where", "to there", and "to here", respectively. "Where", "there", and "here" were generally only used to refer to a location and not a goal or a source. This means that "the road there", "the road thither", and "the road thence" mean completely different things.

The conjunctive of "to be" is not exactly the same as we'd necessarily see in modern usage. Nowadays, you might hear [[Theatre/FiddlerOnTheRoof "If I were a rich man"]], which is technically correct but in the past tense (deriving from "I was a rich man") -- proper present-tense conjunctive would leave us with "If I ''be'' a rich man", which just sounds more old-timey -- and now you know why.

"Archaic" English also made use of fancy pronouns, which not everyone used correctly. For example, "wherefore" isn't a fancy way of saying "where", but rather asking ''why'' -- so when [[Theatre/RomeoAndJuliet Juliet asks]], "Wherefore art thou, Romeo?", she's not wondering where he is, she's wondering [[StarCrossedLovers why he has to be who he is]]. Modern English still uses "therefore", which is similar to "because" -- if you think of it meaning "because of that", "wherefore" means "because of what" -- ''i.e.'' "why".

English of the time preserved what linguists call the "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TV_distinction T-V distinction]]", with different second-person pronouns for singular and plural, with the plural also being used in formal circumstances. "You" was the plural version, whereas "thou" and "thee" were the second-person singular "you". The distinction is very much preserved in many other modern European languages, like French (''tu'' for singular, ''vous'' for plural), German (''du'' for singular, ''ihr'' for plural), and Spanish (''tú'' for singular, ''vosotros'' for plural). But other European languages might fudge these for reasons of formality as well -- in French, ''vous'' is also a singular second-person formal pronoun, whereas Spanish has its own (''usted'')[[note]] This only applies to European Spanish. Latin American Spanish never uses ''vosotros'', and exclusively uses ''usted'' as the plural "you," formal or informal. [[/note]] as does German (''Sie''). This causes a bit of confusion regarding where exactly the dichotomy lies with the Middle English "you", which started out as just an all-purpose second-person plural pronoun but picked up the singular-formal version after the Normans invaded England -- and brought their silly French distinctions with them. You can also tell how English started out as a Germanic language by the similar-sounding "thou" and "du" likely coming from the same place.

As stated in the main page, the "ye" derives from an attempt to render "þe" without having the benefit of the "þ" character (sometimes called the ''thorn''), because imported printing type came from Germany and the Netherlands, which didn't have the letter. It's pronounced with the same consonant as the modern "the". In modern-day Icelandic, which isn't ''too'' different from Early Modern English (as you can see in our article on the UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish), you still see "þ" (and "ð", which is for the sound in "that", though the two letters were interchangable in Old English).

!![[Characters/StarWars Yoda]] didn't [[StrangeSyntaxSpeaker speak old English]]

The "ſ" (not pronounced "f") is also more than just a fancy "s" -- there are rules on where to put it. Until the early 19th century, this was how to render an "s" at the beginning and middle of a syllable. This is why they don't double up -- a word ending in "ss" would be rendered with "ſs" (''e.g.'' succeſs). It also comes from German, which calls the character an ''Eszett'' or sharp "s", which was also sometimes written with a second "z" instead of an "s" -- in fact, "ſz" was made into another funny-letter ligature seen in modern German, "ß" (not pronounced "b").[[note]]"ſ" is also not to be confused with "ʃ", a similar-looking letter used in the International Phonetic Alphabet to reference the "sh" sound.[[/note]].

"Yon" is a sort of [[TakeAThirdOption third option]] to "this/here" and "that/there", for things and places far away from both the speaker and the addressee, ''i.e.'' "over there". As alternative forms, it also has "yond" and "yonder", which also goes with "hither" and "thither" (''e.g.'' being [[ReassignedToAntarctica reassigned yonder]]). "Yon" and these alternatives could also be used as a determiner, and they didn't have a plural form; while you would say "this house" and "these houses", it's "yon house" and "yon houses".

As stated in the main page, the "ye" derives from an attempt to render "þe" without having the benefit of the "þ" character (sometimes called the ''thorn''), because imported printing type came from Germany and the Netherlands, which didn't have the letter. It's pronounced with the same consonant as the modern "the". You still see "þ" (and "ð", which is for the "thin" sound) in modern-day Icelandic, which isn't ''too'' different from Early Modern English (as you can see in our article on the UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish).

The "-en" ending for first- and third-person plurals also existed in very old English (''e.g.'' "we asken thee"), much as they exist in modern German. You see this ''occasionally'' in Shakespeare and his contemporaries, but that was designed to be archaic -- ''i.e.'' Shakespeare [[JustForFun/TheZerothLawOfTropeExamples did it first]].[[note]]Ben Jonson noted in his grammar that it had died out by the reign of King Henry VIII -- which he complained about, because he liked the disambiguity of it and thought that its disuse would be "a great blemish to our tongue."[[/note]] Shakespeare also occasionally used "-s" (and even "-eth") with a plural subject, which was mostly considered by later grammarians and editors as either outright mistakes or hammering the words in to fit the rhythm or rhyme.

"Yon" is a sort of [[TakeAThirdOption third option]] to "here" and "there", for things far away from both the speaker and the addressee. However, "yon" is actually for a thing, akin to "this" or "that"; for a place, it's "yond", and "yonder" goes with "thither" and "thither" (''i.e.'' being [[ReassignedToAntarctica reassigned yonder]]). "Yon" would also be used as a determiner, and it didn't have a plural form; while you would say "this house" and "these houses", it's "yon house" and "yon houses".

Early Modern English and Modern English reverse the word order in questions in different ways. While a modern English speaker would say, "Where did he see it?", in Early Modern English that wouldn't have been wrong, but you'd be more likely to say, "Where saw he it?" This is actually simpler than how modern English does it -- it just moves the subject on the other side of the verb, not having to use an extra linking verb (in this case "did" or "do"). You still see this sometimes in modern English with the verbs "be" or "have", but it's seen as excessively formal or old-fashioned (''e.g.'' "Have you any money to spare?").

Speaking of "haven't", contractions were slightly different in Early Modern English as well -- they tended to do it more often. Early Modern English preferred to attach contractions to the pronoun than the verb -- ''e.g.'' while you could say "I wouldn't", it would be more common to say "I'd not". You also see things like "e'en" for "even", "th'" for "the", "'t" for "it", and "o'er" for "over".

!![[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]] didn't [[StrangeSyntaxSpeaker speak old English]]

See, English is actually a pretty easy language for verb conjugation, because the vast majority of words only change in the third-person singular (''e.g.'' I love, you love, he[=/=]she[=/=]it love'''s''', we love, you love, they love). But basically every other European language has five or six different such forms, including German (ich liebe, du liebst, er[=/=]sie[=/=]es liebt, wie lieben, ihr liebt, sie lieben). And if you can see how the German works, you can see how older English conjugation works -- "du liebst" becomes "thou lovest", and "er liebt" becomes "he loveth". Even with the irregular conjugations it can be obvious -- ''e.g.'' "du hast" becomes "thou hast", and "du würdest" becomes "thou wouldst". You're starting to see a trend -- it helps if you know German.

See, English is actually a pretty easy language for verb conjugation, because the vast majority of words only change in the third-person singular (''e.g.'' I [[LoveTropes love]], you love, he[=/=]she[=/=]it love'''s''', we love, you love, they love). But basically every other European language has five or six different such forms, including German (ich liebe, du liebst, er[=/=]sie[=/=]es liebt, wie lieben, ihr liebt, sie lieben). And if you can see how the German works, you can see how older English conjugation works -- "du liebst" becomes "thou lovest", and "er liebt" becomes "he loveth". Even with the irregular conjugations it can be obvious -- ''e.g.'' "du hast" becomes "thou hast", and "du würdest" becomes "thou wouldst". You're starting to see a trend -- it helps if you know German.

Similarly, we have words like "whence", "thence", and "hence", which mean "from where", "from here", and "from there", respectively. Some writers will use the words redundantly -- ''e.g.'' "from whence", when just "whence" will do. It's not strictly speaking ''wrong'', as both Shakespeare and the King James Bible did this, but it's still redundant. There's also "whither", "thither", and "hither", respectively meaning "to where", "to there", and "to here", respectively. "Where", "there", and "here" were generally only used to refer to a location and not a goal or a source. This means that "the road there", "the road thither", and "the road thence" mean completely different things.

In fact, this creates some issues in pronouncing words in the past tense ending in "-ed" -- in the old days, the vowel in "-ed" was pronounced, something you still hear in modern words like "crooked" or "learned" (as in "learned society"). If you see "'d" endings in old poetry, this was meant to indicate that the vowel was to be contracted (and thus pronounced much like we do today). Nowadays, some texts will do the opposite and use an accent to indicate that the vowel ''is'' pronounced (''e.g.'' "learnèd").

"Ye" is a little problematic in this sense -- it was an ''actual'' word at the time, being the second-person plural accusative case -- it was to "you" as "thou" is to "thee" and "I" is to "me". People also kind of struggle with this distinction between "thou" and "thee", as well as possessives "thy" and "thine" (which should be used the same as "my" and "mine", respectively). But there's a twist with the possessives -- it's "thine" before a word starting with a vowel (''e.g.'' "thine eyes"), but the same applies to "mine" (''e.g.'' "[[EyeScream Mine eyes!]]"), which is another one of those "archaic" English things that Hollywood doesn't always get right.[[note]]"None" for "no" is another one of these vowel things -- by Shakespeare's time it had already fallen out of use, but the King James Bible still used it on occasion, ''e.g.'' "none effect".[[/note]]

"Ye" is a little problematic in this sense -- it was an ''actual'' word at the time, being the second-person plural nominative case -- it was to "you" as "thou" is to "thee" and "I" is to "me". People also kind of struggle with this distinction between "thou" and "thee", as well as possessives "thy" and "thine" (which should be used the same as "my" and "mine", respectively). But there's a twist with the possessives -- it's "thine" before a word starting with a vowel (''e.g.'' "thine eyes"), but the same applies to "mine" (''e.g.'' "[[EyeScream Mine eyes!]]"), which is another one of those "archaic" English things that Hollywood doesn't always get right.[[note]]"None" for "no" is another one of these vowel things -- by Shakespeare's time it had already fallen out of use, but the King James Bible still used it on occasion, ''e.g.'' "none effect".[[/note]]

English of the time preserved what linguists call the "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TV_distinction T-V distinction]]", with different second-person pronouns for singular and plural, with the plural also being used in formal circumstances. "You" was the plural version, whereas "thou" and "thee" were the second-person singular "you". The distinction is very much preserved in many other modern European languages, like French (''tu'' for singular, ''vous'' for plural), German (''du'' for singular, ''ihr'' for plural), and Spanish (''tú'' for singular, ''vosotros'' for plural). But other European languages might fudge these for reasons of formality as well -- in French, ''vous'' is also a singular second-person formal pronoun, whereas Spanish has its own (''usted'') as does German (''Sie''). This causes a bit of confusion regarding where exactly the dichotomy lies with the Middle English "you", which started out as just an all-purpose second-person plural pronoun but picked up the singular-formal version after the Normans invaded England -- and brought their silly French distinctions with them. You can also tell how English started out as a Germanic language by the similar-sounding "thou" and "du" likely coming from the same place.

!!Spellinge is harde

Works use "old English" incorrectly all the time. There's actually a lot to unpack from just the name of the trope:

Works use "Old English" incorrectly all the time. There's actually a lot to unpack from just the name of the trope:

As stated in the main page, the "ye" derives from an attempt to render "þe" without having the benefit of the "þ" character (sometimes called the ''thorn''), because imported printing type came from Germany and the Netherlands, which didn't have the letter. It's pronounced with the same consonant as the modern "the". You still see "þ" (and "ð", which is for the "thin" sound) in modern-day Icelandic, which isn't ''too'' different from Old English (as you can see in our article on the UsefulNotes/HistoryOfEnglish).

The verb "to be" has the most irregular conjugation, in both modern and Old English, so it's again not so simple to just say "he beest" or "he art" -- it actually hasn't changed much from back in the day, and you can see how different the words are from each other (I am, you are, he[=/=]she[=/=]it is, we are, they are). The main addition is "thou", which as you'll know is "thou art". "He art" or anything like that is again incorrect. There was an old subjunctive form "beest" (albeit already out of use by the time of the King James Bible or Creator/WilliamShakespeare), and the past tense "wast" (and occasional subjunctive variant "wert") could be seen as well.

!![[Franchise/StarWars Yoda]] didn't [[StrangeSyntaxSpeaker speak Old English]]

Old English and Modern English reverse the word order in questions in different ways. While a modern English speaker would say, "Where did he see it?", in Old English that wouldn't have been wrong, but you'd be more likely to say, "Where saw he it?" This is actually simpler than how modern English does it -- it just moves the subject on the other side of the verb, not having to use an extra linking verb (in this case "did" or "do"). You still see this sometimes in modern English with the verbs "be" or "have", but it's seen as excessively formal or old-fashioned (''e.g.'' "Have you any money to spare?").

Negatives worked the same way -- whereas a modern English speaker would say, "I do not know", Old English would be more likely to drop the "do" and simply say, "I know not." It's a bit more complicated with a direct object, as it's equally valid in Old English to say, "he loves not me" and "he loves me not" (the latter is what German would do). And again, there are remnants of this in modern English with certain verbs (''e.g.'' "I haven't the foggiest idea").

Speaking of "haven't", contractions were slightly different in Old English as well -- they tended to do it more often. Old English preferred to attach contractions to the pronoun than the verb -- ''e.g.'' while you could say "I wouldn't", it would be more common to say "I'd not". You also see things like "e'en" for "even", "th'" for "the", "'t" for "it", and "o'er" for "over".

The use of grammatical ''mood'' in Old English was somewhat stricter than we see today. You know the indicative mood (''i.e.'' most sentences), and you know the imperative mood (which is why you say "{{get out}}" instead of "gets out"). But then there's the subjunctive mood, which is usually used for conditionals -- ''e.g.'' "{{if I had a nickel}}" instead of "if I have a nickel". There's a certain distinction to these two sentences -- the latter implies that you don't know if you have a nickel, while the former implies that you know you don't have a nickel, you're just thinking about what you'd do if you did. Unfortunately, writers tend to think of the subjunctive as a fancy way of speaking in Old English and use it for the indicative mood -- some medieval peasant would say "had I a gold coin" whether or not he knew he had a gold coin. Consider also the difference between "though he slay men" and "though he slays men" -- because the former implies doubt that he actually ''does'' slay men, so "though" should really mean "even if". It's admittedly a bit tricky.

!!Common mistakes
* One particularly pervasive example appears in the title of this article: the substitution of "ye" for "the". No speaker of early Modern English would do this, as it derives entirely from the fact that the Old English letter "thorn" (Þ) was used to render "th" in writing at the time[[note]]and even then, it had already fallen so far out of favour that "the" was pretty much the only word it was used for[[/note]], and in some UsefulNotes/{{Fonts}} (especially blackletter), it looked very much like a "y". Since the patent on printing presses was German, and England's earliest printers imported types from the Netherlands, the presses lacked the Anglo-Saxon letter, and "y" was substituted instead. Don't confuse this with the second person plural pronoun "ye," meaning "you," as in "Gather round, ye lads and lassies," which is a different word entirely and is pronounced as written.
* Similarly, in the English-speaking world until the early 19th century, the letter "s", at the beginning or middle of a syllable, was written as with the long "s": ''ſ'' The character ß (''Eszett'' or sharp "s") in modern German (pronounced and sometimes written "ss") [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ß originated as a ligature]] of ſz. In addition, the integral symbol and the IPA letter ''esh'' (representing the "sh" sound) were both derived from the italic version of ''ſ '' and look nearly identical [[note]]Well, at least in typefaces that have proper italics and not just obliques[[/note]].
* Regarding the second-person singular forms of "be":
** For the present, the present indicative is "art", which modern writers generally have no problems with. "Beest" was a subjunctive form that was never used by the King James Bible (it always used "be"), and was used by Shakespeare (who used "be" as well) always with conjunctions that often used the subjunctive.
** For the past, "wast" is always used in the indicative (never subjunctive), and "wert" was occasionally used by Shakespeare as the indicative (he generally had it as the subjunctive). The King James Bible strictly reserved "wast" for indicative and "wert" for subjunctive.
* Incorrectly following the T-V distinction. "Thou" was informal, and "you" formal, but because "you" later replaced "thou", many modern speakers erroneously think that "thou" is formal. In works such as the King James Bible, however, no such distinction exists; the difference depends on number, not on the status of the speaker and the addressee. So it's not necessarily an error if the author does not follow this distinction; it's an error only if he confuses which pronoun is appropriate, if he does mean to follow the distinction in his work.
** Incidentally, Quakers notoriously adopted use of "thee" as a pronoun as part of their tradition of "plainspeaking", in order to make the point that they eschewed ''all'' forms of flowery respectful formal speech, even ones that were centuries old and no one thought of as "respectful" anymore like addressing people as "you". The unkind stereotype, of course, is that since they started doing this in the 18th century long after "thou" had passed out of common use they did so incorrectly -- "Quaker speech" stereotypically just uses "thee" all the time without regard for nominative or objective case.
* "Whence", "thence" and "hence" mean "from where", "from there" and "from here", respectively. Therefore, saying "from whence" is redundant, although it's hard to argue that it's outright ''wrong'' since it does have precedent in the works of Shakespeare and the King James Bible.
** On that note, "whither", "thither", and "hither" mean "to where", "to there", and "to here", respectively. "Where", "there", and "here" were generally restricted to refer only to location and not goal or source. So "the road there", "the road thither", and "the road thence" mean completely different things.
* Some writers seem to think that "thou" can be plural, possibly because they just think it's an older word for "you", and "you" can be plural. In case it needs to be said, "thou" is ''always'' singular. "You" can be singular or plural (if the T-V distinction is followed) or exclusively plural (if the King James Bible model is followed, in which case "you" is used as the objective case of "ye").
* Getting the cases wrong. "Thou" is the nominative case, "thee" is the objective, and "thy" and "thine" are the possessive. In particularly wretched examples, you may see "thou", "thee", "thy", and "thine" used interchangeably, which is pretty much the second person equivalent of using "I", "me", "my", and "mine" interchangeably. Also, "thyself" was used as the reflexive pronoun.
* "Ye" and "you" were used pretty much interchangeably by many writers of Shakespeare's time, with a lot more tendency to use "you" for both nominative and objective cases. But in the King James Bible model, "ye" is only nominative, and "you" only objective. So any writing using archaic language to sound solemn or biblical or perhaps a bit more precise would not mix the two up. Incidentally, the reflexive pronoun would be "yourselves".
* Using "mine" and "thine" in front of consonants. They were used in front of vowels, just like how "an" is used today.[[note]]"No" and "none" also once worked the same way, the former before consonants, the latter before vowels. By Shakespeare's time, this distinction had died, but one relic of this rule is found in the King James Bible as "none effect".[[/note]]
* Only the main verb of the clause is inflected to match the person and number of the subject. So "Dost thou thinkest" is always wrong, since "dost", the main verb, is already conjugated to agree with "thou", the subject; the correct version is "dost thou think"[[note]]Grammatically, "think" here is a plain infinitive, which has no ending in Modern English[[/note]].
* Similarly, the imperative mood has no ending and is used as it is in today's English. So "Eateth thy food" is wrong; it should be "eat thy food".
** Regarding the imperative mood, for the subject of the verb to be explicitly stated, the pronoun goes ''after'' the verb. So "Find the boy" can also be stated as "Find thou the boy" or "Find ye (or "you") the boy" (which pronoun is used depends on whether the imperative is singular or plural).
* The pronunciation of the past tense ending "-ed" can be tricky, as it depends on whether the text indicates that the vowel is to be pronounced. You know those "'d" endings you see in some old poetry? There's a good reason for that: it's to indicate that the ending is contracted. For example, "kissed" has two syllables, but "kiss'd" is just one syllable and pronounced as "kisst". Interestingly, the contracted past tense endings became their regular pronunciation in today's English, which is why the original pronunciation of "-ed" trips people up[[note]]Remnants of this pronunciation remain in words like "crooked" or "learned" (as in "learned society")[[/note]]. A grave accent is sometimes used to clarify the pronunciation (e.g., "kissèd").
* Verbs in the past indicative ("be" excepted) have the same form for all persons and numbers, except for the second-person singular. The suffix "-est" is used for irregular verbs (e.g., sawest, knewest, tookest) and "-edst" for regular verbs and irregular verbs whose present and past tense forms are the same (e.g., killedst, steppedst, castedst). Special forms include "didst", "hadst", and "wouldst". Thus, "thou loved me" is wrong; it should be "thou lovedst me".
* The third-person singular suffix "-eth" works exactly the same way as "-s", in that it is used for only the present indicative. It is not used for the past tense, so such forms as "lovedeth" or "tooketh" are always wrong.
* Similarly, the plural of all persons and both present and past tenses has no special ending, just as it does in today's English. There are a few notes of interests, however:
** Shakespeare and a few other poets ''very rarely'' used "-en" for the plural (e.g., we asken, ye weren). But even then, they meant to sound archaic (Edmund Spenser used it quite frequently in one of his works, but he still meant to sound archaic). The suffix had been much more frequent in Middle English, but by Early Modern English, it had died out.[[note]]Ben Jonson noted in his grammar that it had died by King Henry VIII's reign. Incidentally, Jonson complained that it was no longer used, confident that its disuse would be found "a great blemish to our tongue".[[/note]]
** Shakespeare sometimes used "-s" (and occasionally with "-eth") with a plural subject, but those uses were seen by later grammarians and modern editors as errors, dialectal or antiquated usage, uses done for the sake of the rhythm or rhyme, or uses done for no adequate explanation (consequently, modern editions of Shakespeare's works erase many of these supposed mistakes wherever they can). For comparison, the King James Bible, quite conservative in its language, reserves "-eth" only for the third-person singular, has no plural ending, and does not use "-s" at all. And if the English grammar written by Ben Jonson, a learned contemporary of Shakespeare's, indicates anything, the correct use for those suffixes lies in only the third-person singular. It's safe to say that "-eth" and "-s" were correctly used only for the third-person singular.
* Pronouncing "saith" as "sayeth". "Saith", like "says", sounds quite a bit different from "say", as it is more accurately pronounced as "seth". "Sayeth" was a later invention and is pronounced exactly as it appears. The second-person singular was less consistent (it could be "sayst" or "sayest").
* Unlike almost all other auxiliaries, "must" has absolutely no change in form, not even for the second-person singular.[[note]]It once did, in Middle English, but the "-est" suffix was discarded probably to make it a monosyllable and thus ease communication.[[/note]]
* The past tense of the auxiliary "dare" was "durst" (which incidentally has the same form in the second-person singular, i.e., "thou durst"). "Dared" was not used for that purpose.
* Frequently using contractions such as "haven't" or "isn't". It was much more usual to contract the auxiliary with the subject instead of "not" (e.g., "he's not" instead of "he isn't", "I'll not" instead of "I shan't" or "I won't"), and contracting the verb with "not" became more frequent after the mid-17th century, long after Shakespeare's death.
* Interrogatives. It was not wrong to say "Where did he see it?", but an absence of "Where saw he it?" would be unusual and distinctively Modern English.[[note]]More precisely, an interrogative is formed merely by reversing the order of the subject and the verb; the verb is placed before the subject. e.g., the interrogative of "I know you" would be "Know I you?". In today's English, however, that applies only to auxiliaries, "be", and "have" in the sense of possession, e.g., Have you any money to spare?[[/note]]
* Similarly, negatives. It was not wrong to say "I do not know", but an absence of "I know not" would look quite modern.[[note]]To negate the main verb of the sentence, simply put "not" after the verb, e.g., the negative of "I love him" would be "I love not him" or "I love him not". But in today's English, that applies only to auxiliaries, "be", and "have" in the sense of possession, e.g., I haven't the foggiest idea.[[/note]]
* Misusing "yon". It wasn't just some archaic equivalent for "that"; it indicated something over in the distance. In other words, "yon" suggests that something is much more distant but still noticeable to the speaker than "that" would. More precisely, "this" refers to what is close to the speaker, "that" to what is close to the addressee, and "yon" to what is distant but still noticeable to both (i.e., "over there"). And "yon", "yond", and "yonder" could be used interchangeably as adjectives and adverbs, in case you were wondering. Also, "yon" had no plural form, unlike "this" or "that", so "yon window" and "yon windows" are both correct.
* The forms of the subjunctive mood were used where we now use those of another mood or a certain auxiliary of the subjunctive. Many people may unfortunately misread the subjunctive forms as indicative ones or mistakes and miss the intended meaning. It doesn't help that even old writers did not always discriminate between the different forms.
** Conditionals and concessive clauses are tricky. "If the hero be guilty" and "if the hero is guilty" mean two different things. The former has the speaker doubt whether the hero is guilty, whereas the latter has the speaker assume the hero's guilt to be true. The same applies for "though he slay men" and "though he slays men" (except this time the time of the verb with the subjunctive form is either present or future, and "though" there really means "even if"). The subjunctive shows doubt, and the indicative shows actuality or reality.
** For time clauses, the subjunctive form is used because the subordinate verb has not occurred in relation to the verb in the main clause (e.g., "Leave before my master find thee").
** For purpose clauses, the subjunctive form is used because the speaker means to indicate desire (e.g., "Gather everything in order that nothing be lost", "See to it that they be given the treasure"). Even today, we use the subjunctive form for "lest" clauses (e.g., "Leave lest he catch you").
** A bit less obvious, but expressions such as "be it enacted" or "God bless America" are really subjunctives, which is made clearer since the verbs are not inflected for the third-person singular in those phrases. They really are archaic ways to say "let it be enacted" (imperative in form) and "May God bless America".
** The main clause of unreal conditionals might not use the subjunctive form you're used to seeing. "It were foolish to do that if I were in his shoes" really means "It would be foolish to do that if I were in his shoes". And "if it had not rained, he had arrived there" really means "if it had not rained, he would have arrived there". In fact, the more extensive use of the simple past subjunctive form is where expressions such as "had rather" ("would rather" appeared later) or "had better" come from.[[note]]An identical sentence structure for those conditionals is used in German, in which language it is much more obvious that the verbs in both the condition clause and the main clause are subjunctives.[[/note]]
* Elizabethan English contracts many words that we don't contract today. For instance, "e'en" for "even", "th'" for "the", "'t" for "it", and "o'er" for "over". Many old poems even treat "heaven" as a monosyllable, awkward though it may seem.
* The past tense forms of several irregular verbs are not necessarily the same as those we use today. For instance, "brake" might be used for "broke", "gat" for "got", and "spake" for "spoke". Also, some irregular verbs of today seemed to be regular verbs back then. For instance, "builded" for "built" and "digged" for "dug". And some regular verbs of today seemed to be irregular verbs back then. For instance, "clomb" for "climbed", and "holp" for "helped".
* Technically, the possessive form of the neuter pronoun "it" was not "its" but "his" (this non-personifying use can be found in Old English). This can be seen in "if the salt have lost his savour" from the King James Bible. Other alternatives used by the Elizabethans were plain "it" and "thereof" (e.g., "this text and the author thereof"). So if you really want to be historically faithful, using "its" for an Elizabethan's dialogue will not be right. That said, this hasn't stopped modern editions of Shakespeare's works from using "its", so using "its" in archaic-sounding dialogue or text may not be seen as a mistake even by those who know better.

* Don't expect most people to distinguish thou art/wast from thou beest/wert. The former pair is in the indicative mood, whereas the latter is in the subjunctive.[[note]]Later writers, though, used "wert" as the past indicative of "be", and some used "were" as the past subjunctive of "be" for the second-person singular. Also, "be" was already the present subjunctive of "be" for all persons and numbers, even in Shakespeare's time.[[/note]]

* Pronouncing "saith" as "sayeth". "Saith", like "says", sounds quite a bit different from "say", as it is more accurately pronounced as "seth". "Sayeth" was a later invention and is pronounced exactly as it appears. It was almost certainly so for the second-person singular; "saist" (which, oddly enough, is not spelled as consistently as "saith") sounds more like "sest".

* Elizabethan English contracts many words that we don't contract today. For instance, "e'en" for "even", "th'" for "the", "'t" for "it", and "o'er" for "over". Many old poems even seem to treat "heaven" as a monosyllable, awkward though it may seem.

** Shakespeare rarely used "-s" and "-eth" with a plural subject, but those uses were in the vast minority and were seen by later grammarians and modern editors as errors, dialectal or antiquated usage, or uses done for the sake of the rhythm or for no adequate explanation. For comparison, the King James Bible, quite conservative in its language, reserves "-eth" only for the third-person singular, has no plural ending, and does not use "-s" at all. And if the English grammar written by Ben Jonson, a learned contemporary of Shakespeare's, indicates anything, the correct use for those suffixes lies in only the third-person singular. It's safe to say that "-eth" and "-s" were correctly used only for the third-person singular.

** The main clause of unreal conditionals might not use the subjunctive form you're used to seeing. "It were foolish to do that if I were in his shoes" really means "It would be foolish to do that if I were in his shoes". And "if it had not rained, he had arrived there" really means "if it had not rained, he would have arrived there". In fact, the more extensive use of the past subjunctive is where expressions such as "had rather" ("would rather" appeared later) or "had better" come from.[[note]]An identical sentence structure for those conditionals is used in German, in which language it is much more obvious that the verbs in both the condition clause and the main clause are subjunctives.[[/note]]
* Elizabethan English contracts many words that we don't contract today. For instance, "e'en" for "even", "th'" for "the", "'t" for "it", and "o'er" for "over".

* Don't expect most people to distinguish thou art/wast from thou beest/wert. The former pair is in the indicative mood, whereas the latter is in the subjunctive.[[note]]Later writers, though, used "wert" as the past indicative of "be". Also, "be" was already the present subjunctive of "be" for all persons and numbers, even in Shakespeare's time.[[/note]]

* Interrogatives. It was not wrong to say "Where did you go?", but an absence of "Where went you?" would be unusual and distinctively Modern English.[[note]]More precisely, an interrogative is formed merely by reversing the order of the subject and the verb; the verb is placed before the subject. e.g., the interrogative of "I know you" would be "Know I you?". In today's English, however, that applies only to auxiliaries, "be", and "have" in the sense of possession, e.g., Have you any money to spare?[[/note]]

* Verbs in the past indicative ("be" excepted) have the same inflection for all persons and numbers, except for the second-person singular. The suffix "-est" is used for irregular verbs (e.g., sawest, knewest, tookest) and "-edst" for regular verbs and irregular verbs whose present and past tense forms are the same (e.g., killedst, steppedst, castedst). Special forms include "didst", "hadst", and "wouldst". Thus, "thou loved me" is wrong; it should be "thou lovedst me".

* Unlike almost all other auxiliaries, "must" has absolutely no change in inflection, not even for the second-person singular.[[note]]It once did, in Middle English, but the "-est" suffix was discarded probably to make it a monosyllable and thus ease communication.[[/note]]

* The forms of the subjunctive mood were used where we now use those of another mood or a certain auxiliary of the subjunctive. Many people may unfortunately misread the subjunctive inflections as indicative ones or mistakes and miss the intended meaning. It doesn't help that even old writers did not always discriminate between the different inflections.
** Conditionals and concessive clauses are tricky. "If the hero be guilty" and "if the hero is guilty" mean two different things. The former has the speaker doubt whether the hero is guilty, whereas the latter has the speaker assume the hero's guilt to be true. The same applies for "though he slay men" and "though he slays men" (except this time the time of the verb with the subjunctive inflection is either present or future, and "though" there really means "even if"). The subjunctive shows doubt, and the indicative shows actuality or reality.
** For time clauses, the subjunctive inflection is used because the subordinate verb has not occurred in relation to the verb in the main clause (e.g., "Leave before my master find thee").
** For purpose clauses, the subjunctive inflection is used because the speaker means to indicate desire (e.g., "Gather everything in order that nothing be lost", "See to it that they be given the treasure"). Even today, we use the subjunctive inflection for "lest" clauses (e.g., "Leave lest he catch you").

** The main clause of unreal conditionals might not use the subjunctive inflection you're used to seeing. "It were foolish to do that if I were in his shoes" really means "It would be foolish to do that if I were in his shoes". And "if it had not rained, he had arrived there" really means "if it had not rained, he would have arrived there". In fact, the more extensive use of the past subjunctive is where expressions such as "had rather" ("would rather" appeared later) or "had better" come from.[[note]]An identical sentence structure for those conditionals is used in German, in which language it is much more obvious that the verbs in both the condition clause and the main clause are subjunctives.[[/note]]

* The past tense inflections of several irregular verbs are not necessarily the same as those we use today. For instance, "brake" might be used for "broke", "gat" for "got", and "spake" for "spoke". Also, some irregular verbs of today seemed to be regular verbs back then. For instance, "builded" for "built" and "digged" for "dug". And some regular verbs of today seemed to be irregular verbs back then. For instance, "clomb" for "climbed", and "holp" for "helped".

* The inflections of the subjunctive mood were used where we now use those of the indicative or a certain auxiliary of the subjunctive. Many people may unfortunately misread the subjunctive inflections as indicative ones or mistakes and miss the intended meaning. It doesn't help that even old writers did not always discriminate between the different inflections.

** A bit less obvious, but expressions such as "be it enacted" or "God bless America" are really subjunctives, which is made clearer since the verbs are not inflected for the third-person singular in those phrases. They really are archaic ways to say "let it be enacted" and "May God bless America".
** The main clause of unreal conditionals might not use the subjunctive inflection you're used to seeing. "It were foolish to do that if I were in his shoes" really means "It would be foolish to do that if I were in his shoes". And "if it had not rained, he had arrived there" really means "if it had not rained, he would have arrived there". In fact, the more extensive use of the past subjunctive is where expressions such as "had rather" ("would rather" appeared later) or "had better" come from.[[note]]An identical sentence structure for those conditionals is used in German, in which language it is much more obvious that the verbs in both the condition and the main clause are subjunctives.[[/note]]

* Misusing "yon". It wasn't just some archaic equivalent for "that"; it indicated something over in the distance. In other words, "yon" suggests that something is much more distant but still noticeable to the speaker than "that" would. And "yon", "yond", and "yonder" could be used interchangeably as adjectives and adverbs, in case you were wondering. Also, "yon" had no plural form, unlike "this" or "that", so "yon window" and "yon windows" are both correct.
* The inflections of the subjunctive mood were used where we now use those of the indicative or an auxiliary of the same mood. Many people may unfortunately misread the subjunctive inflections as indicative ones or mistakes and miss the intended meaning. It doesn't help that even old writers did not always discriminate between the different inflections.
** Conditionals and concessive clauses are tricky. "If the hero be guilty" and "if the hero is guilty" mean two different things. The former has the speaker doubt whether the hero is guilty, whereas the latter has the speaker assume the hero's guilt to be true. The same applies for "though he slay men" and "though he slays men" (except this time the time of the verb with the subjunctive inflection is future, and "though" there really means "even if"). The subjunctive shows doubt, and the indicative shows actuality or reality.

* Pronouncing "saith" as "sayeth". "Saith", like "says", sounds quite a bit different from "say", as it is more accurately pronounced as "seth". "Sayeth" was a later invention and is pronounced exactly as it appears.

** The main clause of unreal conditionals might not use the subjunctive inflection you're used to seeing. "It were foolish to do that if I were in his shoes" really means "It would be foolish to do that if I were in his shoes". And "if it had not rained, he had arrived there" really means "if it had not rained, he would have arrived there". In fact, the more extensive use of the past subjunctive is where expressions such as "would rather" or "had better" come from.[[note]]An identical sentence structure for those conditionals is used in German, in which language it is much more obvious that the verbs in both the condition and the main clause are subjunctives.[[/note]]

** For purpose clauses, the subjunctive inflection is used because the verb indicates desire (e.g., "Gather everything in order that nothing be lost", "See to it that they be given the treasure"). Even today, we use the subjunctive inflection for "lest" clauses (e.g., "Leave lest he catch you").

* The past tense inflections of several irregular verbs are not necessarily the same as those we use today. For instance, "brake" might be used for "broke", "gat" for "got", and "spake" for "spoke".

** For purpose clauses, the subjunctive inflection is used because it indicates desire (e.g., "Gather everything in order that nothing be lost", "See to it that they be given the treasure"). Even today, we use the subjunctive inflection for "lest" clauses (e.g., "Leave lest he catch you").