# What is the origin of the French expression "nous autres"



## bloomhaven

I am an Anglo Canadian, but lived in Quebec for a while some years ago. I have long been fascinated with the expressions "nous autres", "vous autres", and "eux autres" that are used in Quebec, and I believe also in Louisiana. Does anyone know the origin of these expressions? I have often wondered if they have any relation to the Spanish words "nosotros" and "vosotros".


----------



## OBrasilo

- bloomheaven: Yes, they are indeed related to those Spanish words, as both come from Latin _nos altres_, _vos altres_, and _illi altres_.


----------



## CapnPrep

OBrasilo said:


> Yes, they are indeed related to those Spanish words, as both come from Latin _nos altres_, _vos altres_, and _illi altres_.


The individual _words_ come from Latin, of course, but not the _expressions_. The pronoun _alter_ was rarely used in the plural in Latin (and the correct form was _alteri/alteros_, not _altres_ ).

The development of Spanish _nosotros/vosotros_ is relatively recent (14th/15th century).

_Nous autres _and _vous autres_ are also found in French in the same period, and they are still used in modern standard French, but always with contrastive force ("exclusive we" vs. "the rest of you"). In Quebec French these expanded forms have mostly lost this function and they are used as emphatic pronouns (in the same way that the emphatic form of _je/me_ is _moi_). The third person form _eux autres_ developed by analogy with the other two forms (and this Wikipedia article sort of explains why _elles autres_ does not exist).


----------



## jmx

CapnPrep said:


> The individual _words_ come from Latin, of course, but not the _expressions_. The pronoun _alter_ was rarely used in the plural in Latin (and the correct form was _alteri/alteros_, not _altres_ ).
> 
> The development of Spanish _nosotros/vosotros_ is relatively recent (14th/15th century).


The words _nosotros/vosotros_ probably appeared in the 14th/15th century in the *written* language. They might have been around for several centuries in the spoken language.

I think the correspondence between these words seems too much of a coincidence:

- Spanish _nosotros / vosotros_ 
- Catalan _nosaltres / vosaltres_
- French _nous autres / __vous autres_ 
- Italian _noialtri / voialtri_


----------



## Hamlet2508

CapnPrep said:


> The individual _words_ come from Latin, of course, but not the _expressions_. *The pronoun alter was rarely used in the plural in Latin *(and the correct form was _alteri/alteros_, not _altres_ ).



Which is not quite true I'm afraid.
regards,
Hamlet


----------



## Frank06

Hi,



Hamlet2508 said:


> Which is not quite true I'm afraid.
> regards



To be afraid or not to be afraid, Hamlet, that's not the question.

The question is: can you please explain us why you don't think it's true, can you give some background information, can you elaborate? We're here to learn, but you're reply doesn't give any food for thought.

I mean, I would love to learn more about the reasons why you say it's not true!

Thanks!

Frank


----------



## Goerzer

I wonder if the Italian words _noialtri / voialtri_ are a Spanish influence on Italian language.


----------



## Hamlet2508

Frank06 said:


> The question is: can you please explain us why you don't think it's true, can you give some background information, can you elaborate? We're here to learn, but you're reply doesn't give any food for thought.
> 
> I mean, I would love to learn more about the reasons why you say it's not true!



I didn't realize you wanted textual evidence.
Well,there are a few works listed below[I am sorry but I'm a bit rushed at the moment] where the plural is quite frequently used:

M. Fabii Quintiliani Institutio Oratoria
Marci Tullii Ciceronis  Orator ad M. Brutum
Marci Tullii Ciceronis  De Oratore ad Quintum Fratrem
L. Iunii Moderati Columellae  De Re Rustica.

Regards,
Hamlet


----------



## Frank06

Hi,



Hamlet2508 said:


> I didn't realize you wanted textual evidence.


Nope, neither do I need titles of 4 texts (by 3 authors).



> [I am sorry but I'm a bit rushed at the moment]


Then take your time to give slightly more convincing arguments.

Groetjes,

Frank


----------



## Hamlet2508

I merely wanted to point out that that the suggestion of "*alteri*" being rarely used in the plural is not quite true,because there is  evidence both in classical Latin prose as well as Latin poetry of this period.

If you wanted more convincing arguments than examples of usage in Cicero Suetonius Quintilian you would have to go to the Head of the Classics Department, who will most  certainly make time for your request,if adequately phrased.


----------



## Cecilio

This type of personal pronouns is also present in Occitan:

- nosautres - nosautras.
- vosautres - vosautras.

I found the information in this web-page, which looks quite helpful.


----------



## sokol

Hamlet2508 said:


> I merely wanted to point out that that the suggestion of "*alteri*" being rarely used in the plural is not quite true,because there is  evidence both in classical Latin prose as well as Latin poetry of this period.


I have tried to follow the discussion and now it is partly clear to me; you might have told us in the first place that you refer to "alter" and _only _"alter" (and its use in plural) as described by CapnPrp in the post above which was posted by him as a sidenote only, and about which you've written that it is not correct, that the use of 'alter' in plural were not rare indeed. (And that you didn't refer to "nous autres" in particular. )

Now it might well be true that the plural of "alter" was widely used (this is far beyond my knowledge of Latin so I couldn't possibly comment) but I still would be interested in the original question referring to French (and other Romance) expressions like "nous autres" (even though I haven't yet posted here I'm still reading  but even though I'm interested in the outcome sadly I can't contribute to the original question).

Is there any significance as to if Latin 'alter' had been used frequently in plural, or not so frequently, concerning the development of this phrase (of nosotros, nous autres, nosaltres, ...)? If so I have to say that I personally can't see the relation.
(In the linked text of Horace, Odes IV 'alter' is used three times; now I have to admit that my Latin has become _really _rusty so please correct me if I am wrong but I can't identify a single use of it_ in connection with a personal pronoun. _- And the second link, unfortunately, is invalid or probably links to a protected site or whatever.)


----------



## CapnPrep

I actually did mean and write "rarely used", which is not the same thing as "never used"… 

I think that there are probably examples of plural pronoun + _alteri_ already in Classical Latin, but as a free combination with contrastive meaning. This usage is still found in many modern Romance languages (e.g. standard French). But as I understood it, the question of the original poster — who has apparently moved on to greener pastures — was about languages where the expression "pronoun + _autres/otros_" has undergone grammaticalization (losing its contrastive meaning) and supplanted the simple pronoun.

For Spanish, this specific development has been dated to the 14th/15th centuries, and I don't think there would be "several centuries" of lag between spoken and written language for such a change in this period, which is well documented by texts of many different genres.


----------



## sokol

CapnPrep said:


> I think that there are probably examples of plural pronoun + _alteri_ already in Classical Latin, but as a free combination with contrastive meaning. (...) But as I understood it, the question of the original poster (...) has undergone grammaticalization (losing its contrastive meaning) and supplanted the simple pronoun.


This is also how I see it, but if there had been already uses of pronoun + alteri in (Classical) Latin this would be a starting point (use of alteri without pronoun aren't of much help I'd guess).

But probably the answer anyway would lie in Vulgar Latin rather than Classical Latin: that is, if a common ancestry of those forms in several Romance languages were to be found.
As I can only guess I'll stop here now, and go back to reading only ...


----------



## wonderment

bloomhaven said:


> I am an Anglo Canadian, but lived in Quebec for a while some years ago. I have long been fascinated with the expressions "nous autres", "vous autres", and "eux autres" that are used in Quebec, and I believe also in Louisiana. Does anyone know the origin of these expressions? I have often wondered if they have any relation to the Spanish words "nosotros" and "vosotros".





CapnPrep said:


> I think that there are probably examples of plural pronoun + _alteri_ already in Classical Latin, but as a free combination with contrastive meaning. This usage is still found in many modern Romance languages (e.g. standard French). But as I understood it, the question of the original poster — who has apparently moved on to greener pastures — was about languages where the expression "pronoun + _autres/otros_" has undergone grammaticalization (losing its contrastive meaning) and supplanted the simple pronoun.
> 
> For Spanish, this specific development has been dated to the 14th/15th centuries, and I don't think there would be "several centuries" of lag between spoken and written language for such a change in this period, which is well documented by texts of many different genres.





sokol said:


> This is also how I see it, but if there had been already uses of pronoun + alteri in (Classical) Latin this would be a starting point (use of alteri without pronoun aren't of much help I'd guess).
> 
> But probably the answer anyway would lie in Vulgar Latin rather than Classical Latin: that is, if a common ancestry of those forms in several Romance languages were to be found.



In classical Latin, the primary meaning of _alter_ (most relevant to this discussion is the entry at I.2.g) is “the other of two, one of two, the other” (from which we get “alternative”). _Alius_ also means “other”, but in the particular sense of “another, different” (as in “alias”, another identity). In medieval Latin, _alius_ gradually disappeared and _alter_ came to assume its meaning. So it is from _alter _that we get Spanish _otro_ and French _autre_. 

In classical Latin, _alter _can be used “to mark the similarity of one object to another in qualities, etc., a second, another (as in English, a second father [_alter pater_], my second self [_alter ego_], and the like).”

The only use of _alter _+ pronoun that I’m familiar with is _alter ego _(‘another I’) to refer to a close friend or kindred spirit. We have from Cicero (Fam. 7, 5): _vide quam mihi persuaserim te me esse alterum_ (‘See how I have convinced myself that you are another me (i.e. my other self)'). And famously (Lael. 21, 82): _amicus est tamquam alter idem_ ('A friend is one’s other self.’ Or more literally, ‘A friend is like another the same’). 

To my knowledge, Latin did not make the “exclusivity” distinction in the use of pronouns. (In verb conjugation, 3rd 1st person plural was sometimes used for 1st person singular, but that’s more like an “inclusive” _I_.) I suspect that _nous autres _(“exclusive we”) developed from this sense of _alter_. So _nous autres_ would designate “I and others like me” (but not you, the addressee). The switch to the plural form should be obvious for semantic reason. The same argument could be extended to _vous autres_ and _eux autres_.

Sorry I haven't any idea when or how "pronoun + autres/otros" underwent grammaticalization, or how _noialtri_ came to be used as an emphatic pronoun. 

-----------
Edit add: I just realized that _noialtri_ is the exact equivalent of _nous autres_; it's a "contrastive" emphatic pronoun. As for the grammaticalization of _nosotros_, it loses the contrastive meaning but gains the grammatical distinction between subject (_nosotros_) and object pronoun (_nos_). _Nosotros_ remains an emphatic pronoun of sort since the subject pronoun is not necessary as it's already built into the conjugation.


----------



## sokol

wonderment said:


> Sorry I haven't any idea when or how "pronoun + autres/otros" underwent grammaticalization, or how _noialtri_ came to be used as an emphatic pronoun.


No need to excuse yourself of course, I think you've _really _shed some light on the issue.


----------



## jmx

wonderment said:


> As for the grammaticalization of _nosotros_, it loses the contrastive meaning but gains the grammatical distinction between subject (_nosotros_) and object pronoun (_nos_). _Nosotros_ remains an emphatic pronoun of sort since the subject pronoun is not necessary as it's already built into the conjugation.


Just to make things precise, _nosotros_ is not only the subject pronoun, but also the stressed object pronoun (used with a preposition), corresponding to the unstressed object pronoun _nos _(used with no preposition). For example in these sentences:
_Viene con nosotros._
_Lo hizo para nosotros._


----------



## CapnPrep

wonderment said:


> I suspect that _nous autres _(“exclusive we”) developed from this sense of _alter_. So _nous autres_ would designate “I and others like me” (but not you, the addressee). The switch to the plural form should be obvious for semantic reason. The same argument could be extended to _vous autres_ and _eux autres_.


The argument only really works for the first person (exclusive "we"); with _vous_ and _eux_, _autres_ is simply a plural marker, with no additional notion of exclusion. But just as _alter_ was commonly used in correlative structures in Latin ("the one… the other…", "the former… the latter…"), it would be natural to use _vous/eux autres_ in combination with _nous autres_.

The need to mark plurality was apparently enough to cause _vosotros_ to replace _vos_ in (most varieties of) Spanish. The pronoun _vos_ was originally plural but it ended up having singular reference in many contexts (e.g. polite plural). So _vosotros_ became the normal 2nd person plural disjunctive pronoun (in subject position, after a preposition, and in emphatic use), and _nosotros_ subsequently replaced _nos_ by analogy.

The same development is conceivable for Quebec French (with a further analogical step for _eux autres_) but I have not seen this documented anywhere.


----------



## virgilio42

Hi,
I was wondering myself about the origin of noialtri/nosotros/nous autres  and found  a very interesting and convincing explanation provided by  Petrarca, the Italian poet, in an essay by Tiziana Piras ("Petrarca nello Zibaldone di Leopardi"). According to  Petrarca, the pronouns derive from Latin "nos ceteri", which was used in  spoken language to distinguish the "nos" used as a plural from the  "nos" used as a singular, i.e. instead of "ego".


----------



## bo-marco

jmartins said:


> The words _nosotros/vosotros_ probably appeared in the 14th/15th century in the *written* language. They might have been around for several centuries in the spoken language.
> 
> I think the correspondence between these words seems too much of a coincidence:
> 
> - Spanish _nosotros / vosotros_
> - Catalan _nosaltres / vosaltres_
> - French _nous autres / __vous autres_
> - Italian _noialtri / voialtri_



It's the same in EMILIANO
http://it.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialetto_modenese
- nosotros=_nosaltres__=__nous autres=_*Nuèter
*- vosotros=_v__osaltres__=__vous autres=*V*_*uèter*


----------



## Peano

If the French expression *ne pas* was developed as an emphatic version of *ne*, I guess *nous autres* might alike be developed as an emphatic version of *nous*.


----------



## terredepomme

Romance languages originally being a dialect continuum, there are many expressions found in some French dialects that are also found in other Romance languages. For example À cette heure= quest'ora (Italian)


----------



## cheriedd

Hi All,

So does Nous-autres/vous-autres/eux-autres means we all/ you all/ they all or simply we/you/they? I came across this in a document and just wanted to know what is the correct English equivalent. Could you please help?
Thank you...


----------



## rgauthier

I'm from Québec. I use vous autres when trying to distinguish the plural vous from the singular form, if needed. It is oftentimes followed by vous. E.g. Vous autres, vous employez Angular pour le développement web(You guys use Angular for web development). This can refer to a group likewise(e.g. a company). Otherwise, you are stuck with, "Vous, je veux dire votre compagnie..." or "Votre compagnie". The same is true in English, except there are expressions like, "You guys use Angular for web development". It is obviously referring to the collective group. That's how we accomplish this without having to refer to the group by name like in English.

Nous autres contrasts that, but, that can be done through "on": "On fait le développement web avec React pour la plupart" — We(probably my company) do web development with React mostly. There is no equivalent in English I can think of. If I'm already referring to On(my group), I don't need to compare to vous autres, because the vous is mostly like another group compared to my group. E.g. On fait la cuisine comme ça, mais vous, vous le faites ainsi. We cook like this, but you guys cook like that.

I hope this is helpful. I wrote it rather quickly . It's relation to Latin or Spanish doesn't concern me and I couldn't comment on it.


----------



## rgauthier

rgauthier said:


> I'm from Québec. I use vous autres when trying to distinguish the plural vous from the singular form, if needed. It is oftentimes followed by vous. E.g. Vous autres, vous employez Angular pour le développement web(You guys use Angular for web development). This can refer to a group likewise(e.g. a company). Otherwise, you are stuck with, "Vous, je veux dire votre compagnie..." or "Votre compagnie". The same is true in English, except there are expressions like, "You guys use Angular for web development". It is obviously referring to the collective group. That's how we accomplish this without having to refer to the group by name like in English.
> 
> Nous autres contrasts that, but, that can be done through "on": "On fait le développement web avec React pour la plupart" — We(probably my company) do web development with React mostly. There is no equivalent in English I can think of. If I'm already referring to On(my group), I don't need to compare to vous autres, because the vous is mostly like another group compared to my group. E.g. On fait la cuisine comme ça, mais vous, vous le faites ainsi. We cook like this, but you guys cook like that.
> 
> I hope this is helpful. I wrote it rather quickly . It's relation to Latin or Spanish doesn't concern me and I couldn't comment on it.



In short, English and French have the same problem. Plural and singular 2nd person pronouns are identical and depend on context. In Spanish this is solved by Usted/Ustedes, Tú/Vosotros(only in Spain).

Vous autres helps distinguish vous singular and plural. It is followed by vous oftentimes. Same issue in English. You vs you guys, yall, etc, depending on what region you live in. If you just say, "you", people may think that you are speaking to them specifically vs the group. I've had this happen to me and seen it happen to others quite a few times. Hence the need for, you guys, all of you, yall, etc.

Nous autres can be replaced by On. If not, it is in contrast to vous plural. Because you are generally contrasting Nous autres with a plural group, you don't say, "nous autres..., vous autres...". You just say, if you use nous autres instead of on, "nous autres, on fait..., vous faites...".

Also, someone mentioned about whether or not it was looked down on. There is a huge difference between the way one writes and the way one speaks in most languages. When writing, you are generally writing to the, "you", so it is clear who the "you" is. So, there is no ambiguity generally between vous plural and singular or you singular or plural. If needed, I'd put something like, "votre compagnie", if in an email, e.g. In speech, it is just expected, because it is needed to distinguish the two. Just as, in English, saying, "All of you" or "You guys" isn't looked down upon in speech, but wouldn't be used in writing because your context is very clear. If giving a speech how you speak is likewise different in any language. How you speak to your close friends is different than how you'd speak to your boss most likely, e.g.

If you speak how you write that is looked down upon likewise. It's weird. It doesn't show sophistication as much as a limited vocabulary most likely and that you don't know how to use different registers of the language and the context in which each is used.

I hope that's more succinct.


----------



## Cossue

CapnPrep said:


> The development of Spanish _nosotros/vosotros_ is relatively recent (14th/15th century).



In Galician _nosoutros_, _vosoutros _are now dialectal, but they are already attested since around 1300 (Corpus Xelmírez - Resultados da consulta).

Edit: grammar


----------



## bearded

In current Italian, _noialtri/voialtri_ are colloquial words only , and sound somewhat northern-dialectal. Such pronouns would never appear in a literary work (or maybe only to reproduce some character's colloquial speech).


----------



## alfaalfa

Ciao,
here, in the part of Marche Region where I live, we could play a football match _nuà _Vs _vuà. _


----------



## bearded

Ciao,
Interesting!  (For foreigners: -à as abbreviation of _altri, _no doubt).


----------



## alfaalfa

bearded said:


> For foreigners


For most of Italian people too


----------



## symposium

And in Venetian, too, the standard plural pronouns are "nialtri/noaltri" and "voaltri".


----------



## Olaszinhok

symposium said:


> noaltri" and "voaltri".


The same forms are used in my area, in the Marche Region.


----------



## Penyafort

In *Standard Catalan*, it's *nosaltres*, which allows three standard pronunciations: nu'zaɫtɾəs ; (Western) no'zaɫtɾes ; (Majorcan) no'zaɫtɾəs.

However, in spoken Catalan, there are more than 30 ways of pronouncing that very word, depending on the area. And the word is already attested in Archaic Catalan. These two facts alone point to the fact that the combination _nos + alteros_ must have already been present in Vulgar Latin / Proto-Romance as a variant for 'we'. (Old Catalan also had the simple _*nós *_for 'we', but as a nominative form it didn't survive the Middle Ages)


----------



## merquiades

bearded said:


> In current Italian, _noialtri/voialtri_ are colloquial words only , and sound somewhat northern-dialectal. Such pronouns would never appear in a literary work (or maybe only to reproduce some character's colloquial speech).


Why are such useful words considered dialectal and/or wrong in standard Italian?


----------



## bearded

merquiades said:


> Why are such useful words considered dialectal and/or wrong in standard Italian?


Probably because the classical pronouns _noi, voi _(from Lat. nos, vos) are available and normal.  In dialects, and dialect-influenced colloquial, the -_altri_ part  (originally expressing a contraposition meaning, like we/you _on the contrary)_ today doesn't add anything to noi/voi. It has just remained as a lower-register expression, and for the contraposition meaning you would have to add ''on the contrary/on the other side'' or similar.


----------



## jazyk

Penyafort said:


> These two facts alone point to the fact that the combination _nos + alteros_ must have already been present in Vulgar Latin / Proto-Romance as a variant for 'we'.


Right. It's also sometimes found in old Portuguese: "nós outros" - Google Search
Nós e "nós outros" - Ciberdúvidas da Língua Portuguesa


----------



## merquiades

bearded said:


> Probably because the classical pronouns _noi, voi _(from Lat. nos, vos) are available and normal.  In dialects, and dialect-influenced colloquial, the -_altri_ part  (originally expressing a contraposition meaning, like we/you _on the contrary)_ today doesn't add anything to noi/voi. It has just remained as a lower-register expression, and for the contraposition meaning you would have to add ''on the contrary/on the other side'' or similar.


Ok, I can understand it if it doesn't indicate this contrast anymore.


----------



## bearded

merquiades said:


> if it doesn't indicate this contrast anymore


In the dialect of Bologna (my hometown) for example, in order to say 'we' there is no other form than _nuèter _(noialtri), and to say you (pl.) _vuèter _(voialtri).  Uneducated people there normally say in Italian noialtri/voialtri - sort of translation from dialect - instead ov noi/voi, without any 'contrast' whatsoever.


----------



## Dymn

Cossue said:


> In Galician _nosoutros_, _vosoutros _are now dialectal, but they are already attested since around 1300 (Corpus Xelmírez - Resultados da consulta).


Aren't they used in the contrastive way: _vós blablabla e nosoutros_ (on the contrary)?


----------



## Olaszinhok

Dymn said:


> Aren't they used in the contrastive way: _vós blablabla e nosoutros_ (on the contrary)?


Also in *Standard Italian *_noialtri/voialtri or noi altri e voi altri _can be used in  the contrastive way._ Noi la pensiamo così e voi altri pensatela come vi pare.  
nói in Vocabolario - Treccani_


----------



## bearded

@ Olaszinhok
That's true, I think however that it's an outdated or literary way of expressing the contrast (see my #37: ''originally expressing a contraposition'').
In current Italian I'd rather say _Noi/voi invece _or _noi/voi però._. In your example I would say:...._ ma voi pensatela pure come vi pare._


----------



## Dymn

By the way, I once read that the use of _nosotros/vosotros_ without contrastive value in Spanish could initially be an influence from the East (Navarre-Aragon), that gained ground in the 15th century. Link (pp. 76-78).


----------



## Olaszinhok

bearded said:


> outdated or literary way of expressing the contrast (see my #37: ''originally expressing a contraposition'').


To be honest, it does not sound that outdated, nor literary to me. It find it to be rather colloquial instead and _noialtri/voialtri _with contrastive value can also be used in a very "spontaneous" utterence, in my view._ Noi facciamo così, voi altri fate quel che volete_.


----------



## bearded

Olaszinhok said:


> To be honest, it does not sound that outdated, nor literary to me. It find it to be rather colloquial and noialtri/voialtri in a contrastive way can also be used in a very "spontanous" utterence, in my view.


Ok, then it might be a regional difference.


----------



## Cossue

Dymn said:


> Aren't they used in the contrastive way: _vós blablabla e nosoutros_ (on the contrary)?



They were, mostly: now they are still used this way, sometimes, in the literary language, and also by some older speakers in the west. But in general either you use _nós_, _vós_ (central and southern Galicia and younger speakers) or _nosoutros_, _vosoutros _(northeastern Galicia and the Galician speaking region of Asturias).


----------



## Sobakus

I've done a little bit of searching and have some interesting conclusions to share.

Gehling (2004), "Ich", "du" und andere briefly explores the topic, albeit mentioning just one other study, and concludes that there cannot have existed an exclusivity distinction in the history of the Romance languages, just as there isn't one now. Besides not being attested, such a distinction only seems to make sense in the first person. The actually attested meaning everywhere in Romance looks to be that of emphasis, and I think I have a convincing explanation of how it has most likely arisen. At the beginning of this thread the expressions _alter ego_ and _alter īdem_ are mentioned - these are relevant, but even more so are the following two:

… Rōmānus et Agilis, quōs ut *nōs alterōs* tibi commendāmus  ('… whom I recommend to you *as I would myself*', Augustine, 4-5th c. AD)
… <Pompeius> mē prīncipem nōmināvit et ad omnia mē *alterum sē* fore dīxit ('… <Pompey> named me first, and said that I should be *his alter ego* [=just like his own self] for all purposes', Cicero, 1th c. BC)
This is precisely the kind of emphatic usage that would be the origin of the Romance forms.


----------



## bearded

Sobakus said:


> whom I recommend to you *as I would myself*'


I would rather translate ''whom I recommend to you as if they were myself'' (lit. whom we recommend to you as (if) being ourselves).  ''Nos alter*os*'' is accusative case (predicative of the object).


----------



## Sobakus

bearded said:


> I would rather translate ''whom I recommend to you as if they were myself'' (lit. whom we recommend to you as (if) being ourselves).  ''Nos alter*os*'' is accusative case (predicative of the object).


'whom I recommend to you *as I would myself*' is an idiomatic way to say 'whom I recommend to you as if they were myself', which sounds awkward. Specifically the bold part is idiomatic, where _recommend_ is implied, and it is precisely parallel to the Latin _nōs alterōs_ (being the object), while the other version is not.


----------



## bearded

Can't  ''as I would myself'' be understood as  ''as I  myself would  do'' in English? I find the expression at least very ambiguous.
Ex. _You should get out of that horrible house, as I would myself._

My objection concerns only the grammar.  The meaning is clear, however it's not simple to regard that 'myself' as accusative.


----------



## Sobakus

Roughly speaking, meaning is made up of grammar, semantics and pragmatics. In our case it is mainly a question of grammar, there is only one possible semantic content to the individual words - the uncertainty is whether the phrase is the subject or the object. Pragmatics doubly help disambiguate this: firstly, because 'I recommend him as I myself would recommend him' is a senseless utterance; and secondly and more importantly, because 'as I would myself' is an idiomatic expression (something pragmatics deals with) which is used to express precisely this sort of object-object comparison. You will find many examples of this usage if you google the phrase. There's also some help from grammar - a by-product of the fact that this construction is idiomatic with coordinate objects is that a dummy verb is commonly used to express coordinate subject: _You should get out of that horrible house, as I would *do* myself._ Without the _do_, it feels like the two constructions (the idiomatic and the non-idiomatic one) have been mixed, although judging by google results this usage also seems to be common.


----------



## bearded

Sobakus said:


> "I would recommend him as I myself would recommend him" is a senseless utterance


You are certainly right.  Please note that I wrote ''the meaning is clear'', so I find that the meaning should precisely not be expressed through a phrase which (in my view) can be easily misunderstood as a senseless utterance.



Sobakus said:


> You will find many examples of this usage if you google the phrase.


I did google the phrase, but apparently it is mostly understood as ''as I would do myself'', or with 'myself' being a reflexive pronoun referring to the subject anyway..
As I would myself


----------



## Sobakus

bearded said:


> You are certainly right.  Please note that I wrote ''the meaning is clear'', so I find that the meaning should precisely not be expressed through a phrase which (in my view) can be easily misunderstood as a senseless utterance.


You seem to still be missing the facts that, firstly, it's idiomatic to use this phrase in this meaning, and secondly, that it's impossible to understand a something in a way that makes no sense. There is no ambiguity where there is only one possible meaning. Language is full of constructions that could be grammatically parsed in many ways, but are not because this would result in nonsense.



> I did google the phrase, but apparently it is mostly understood as ''as I would do myself'', or with 'myself' being a reflexive pronoun referring to the subject anyway..
> As I would myself


In order to find a continuous phrase in google, you need to enclose it quotes like this: ''as I would myself''. Your link doesn't contain quotes, but this forum seems to delete them any way, so I'm not sure whether you actually found the correct results. i'm sure it's obvious that my conclusions don't agree with yours, otherwise I wouldn't be claiming that it's an idiomatic usage. For even more unambiguous examples, search for "as you would yourself", again with quotes.


----------

