my

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English mī,^[2][3][4][5] a reduced form of mīn,^[2][5][4][6] inherited from Old English mīn,^[7][8][6] which lost its final -n originally before consonants other than h,^{[9][2][5][6][10]} so that it is a variant of mine.^[9][11][10] The Old English word served as the genitive of ic (“I”),^[8] and comes from Proto-Germanic *mīnaz,^{[5][2][12][13]} also the source of Old Frisian mīn, Old Saxon mīn, Old High German mīn, Dutch mijn, German mein, Old Norse minn and Gothic 𐌼𐌴𐌹𐌽𐍃 (meins).^{[5][12][13][2]} Hoad and Orel derive it from the Indo-European stem Proto-Indo-European *mei of me, with an adjective suffix *-no-,^[2][13] and Kroonen gives *h₁meino-.^[12] The interjection is probably short for “my God”,^[3][5][7] or “my goodness” and “my word” according to Ayto.^[10]

Earliest recorded meaning

Of or belonging to me: about 1175, in a copy of Ælfric's homily on the Nativity,^[9] and Dictionary.com gives 1125–75,^[4] Collins and Merriam-Webster the 12th century,^[14][8] and Etymonline about 1200.^[5] The OED also notes isolated mi in manuscripts of the West Saxon Gospels from the first half of the 11th century, perhaps only scribal carelessness.^[9]

Semantic evolution

At first my stood only before consonants, as in my father beside mine enemy.^[5][15] It became general before consonants in the north by the end of the 13th century and elsewhere in the 14th and 15th centuries,^[9][10] and it appears before vowels and h from the early 15th century.^[9] Mine before a vowel became rarer during the 17th century, and only at the end of the 18th did my become universal in the standard language, except in archaic or poetic use.^[9] Johnson (1755) records the change under way: mine was used "anciently and properly" before a vowel, but my was "now commonly used indifferently before both".^[16] Since then mine has stood where no noun follows.^[5][10] Uses widened with the gerund (about 1390)^[9] and in terms of address, from my dear to the patronizing my good woman.^[9][11] The exclamation is dated to 1707 in the revised OED,^[9] the early 18th century by Ayto^[10] and 1825 by Barnhart and Etymonline;^[3][5] Weekley regarded it as especially American.^[15] In dialect it has many forms, such as ma in Scotland, Northumberland and Devon, mah in Yorkshire, and me in Shetland, Orkney, Ireland and the north of England.^[17]

Timeline

• c. 1175 – of or belonging to me.^[9]
• c. 1225 – in address, with terms of endearment, in the Ancrene Riwle.^[9]
• before 1300 – of something less closely tied to the speaker, such as a target or a field of study.^[9]
• c. 1390 – with a verbal noun or gerund, in Chaucer's Nun's Priest's Tale.^[9]
• before 1425 – before the name of the person addressed, in Chaucer's Troilus and Criseyde.^[9]
• 1592 – in disparaging or ironic set phrases (obsolete by 1817).^[9]
• 1621 – in the names of games.^[9]
• 1707 – interjection of surprise or admiration.^[9] Barnhart and Etymonline date it to 1825.^[3][5]
• 1781 – of a period of time, in not my day.^[9]
• 1844 – reduplicated, my, my! and my oh my!.^[9]

Meanings

Determiner

1. Of, belonging to or connected with me: I left my umbrella on the train.^[14][8][9]
2. Showing me as the doer of an action, as before a gerund: She objected to my leaving early.^[14][8][9]
3. Used in forms of address, affectionately or familiarly: my dear, my friend, my lord.^[14][9][11]
4. Used in exclamations: my goodness!, my word!.^[14][9][11]

Interjection

1. Expressing surprise or admiration, also repeated as my, my!: My, how tall the trees have grown!^[14][9][3]

Word family

• milady
• milord
• my word

Related words

• mine
• me
• myself

References

1. ^ a b Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
3. ^ a b c d e Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b c Dictionary.com Unabridged (2016), based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, New York: Random House
5. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
6. ^ a b c Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
7. ^ a b The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (online 2024), 5th ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
8. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
9. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ a b c d e f Ayto, John (2005), Word Origins: The Secret Histories of English Words from A to Z, 2nd ed., London: A & C Black
11. ^ a b c d Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
12. ^ a b c Kroonen, Guus (2013), Etymological Dictionary of Proto-Germanic, Leiden Indo-European Etymological Dictionary Series 11, Leiden / Boston: Brill
13. ^ a b c Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
14. ^ a b c d e f Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins
15. ^ a b Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
16. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
17. ^ Wright, Joseph, ed. (1898–1905), The English Dialect Dictionary, 6 vols., Oxford: Henry Frowde; via EDD Online 4.0, University of Innsbruck (CC BY 4.0)