Etymologically
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please

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Pronunciation

  • IPA: /pliːz/[1]

Etymology

It is inherited from Middle English plesen,[2][3][4] borrowed from Old French plaisir (“to please, give pleasure to, satisfy”), plesir (modern French plaire),[2][3][5] from Latin placēre (“to be acceptable, be liked or approved”),[2][3][4] related to plācāre (“to soothe, quiet”) (see placate),[2][3][6] from Proto-Indo-European *plāk- (“to be pleasant, agree”).[4][3] Etymonline compares Tocharian plak- “to agree”,[3][7] and Merriam-Webster and Weekley relate the root to Ancient Greek πλάξ (pláx, “flat surface”).[8][9] Merriam-Webster gives the Anglo-French source as Anglo-Norman plaisir, pleire.[10] The modern French form plaire is perhaps due to the analogy of faire;[3] the old infinitive plaisir survives as a noun and gave English pleasure.[9][11]

Earliest recorded meaning

To satisfy, placate or appease, especially God (about 1303, in Mannyng's Handlyng Synne).[12][3][13]

Semantic evolution

By the mid-14th century please meant “to satisfy a person, be agreeable to”, and by the late 14th century “to delight, amuse”;[3][2] the sense “to appease, propitiate” died out in the 16th century.[13] The verb originally governed a dative, as in please God and in impersonal constructions such as if it please you, common from the mid-14th century;[3][9][6] in if you please the original dative you came to be taken as the subject, the same inversion seen in like.[3][9] The intransitive sense “to like, choose”, as in do as you please, dates from about 1500, in Dunbar's poems.[12][3] The polite imperative please grew out of may it please you, please you (in Shakespeare, 1600) and please to (1620s);[12][3][14] according to the Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins Shakespeare did not know please on its own.[14] The adverb used in requests is dated 1667 by Merriam-Webster's Collegiate, but 1771 by the Unabridged and the Historical Thesaurus.[10][8][13] Please as a scornful exclamation of disbelief (oh, please) is a later use.[10][15]

Timeline

  • c. 1303 – plesen, to satisfy, appease.[12]
  • mid-14th century – to be agreeable to; impersonal it pleases.[3]
  • c. 1380 – to delight.[2][3]
  • c. 1500 – intransitive, to like, choose.[12][3]
  • 1530 – if you please.[2]
  • 1600 – please you, in Shakespeare.[12]
  • 1620s – please to with an imperative.[3][12]
  • 1667 – as an adverb in polite requests.[10]
  • 1771 – the same use, in the Unabridged and HTOED.[8][13]

Modern meaning

Verb

  1. To give pleasure or satisfaction to; to make glad.
  2. To give pleasure or satisfaction; to be agreeable: eager to please.
  3. To wish or think fit: do as you please.
  4. (formal) To be the will of: may it please the court.
  5. To gratify oneself; to do as one likes (please yourself).

Adverb

  1. Used to make a request polite or emphatic: please come in.
  2. Used to accept an offer politely: yes, please.
  3. Used to express scorn or disbelief: oh, please.

Word family

  • pleaser
  • pleasable
  • pleasedness
  • outplease
  • overplease
  • pleasing
  • displease
  • pleasant
  • pleasurable
  • pleasure
  • placate
  • placid
  • placebo
  • complacent
  • complaisant
  • implacable
  • plea
  • plead

Usage notes

The American Heritage Dictionary groups please with delight, gladden, gratify and tickle, all meaning to give pleasure to someone.[4] The proverbs you can't please everyone and little things please little minds go back to the late 15th and late 16th centuries.[14]

References

  1. ^ Jones, Daniel (2011), Cambridge English Pronouncing Dictionary, 18th ed., ed. Peter Roach, Jane Setter and John Esling, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press
  2. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K., ed. (1995), The Barnhart Concise Dictionary of Etymology, New York: HarperCollins
  3. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
  4. ^ a b c d The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1992), 3rd ed., Boston: Houghton Mifflin
  5. ^ Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
  6. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
  7. ^ Partridge, Eric (1966), Origins: A Short Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, 4th ed., London: Routledge & Kegan Paul
  8. ^ a b c Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  9. ^ a b c d Weekley, Ernest (1921), An Etymological Dictionary of Modern English, London: John Murray
  10. ^ a b c d Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2003), 11th ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
  11. ^ Skeat, Walter W. (1911), A Concise Etymological Dictionary of the English Language, new ed., Oxford: Clarendon Press
  12. ^ a b c d e f g Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
  13. ^ a b c d Kay, Christian; Roberts, Jane; Samuels, Michael; Wotherspoon, Irené, eds. (2009), Historical Thesaurus of the Oxford English Dictionary, Oxford: Oxford University Press; online edition (2024)
  14. ^ a b c Cresswell, Julia (2021), Oxford Dictionary of Word Origins, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
  15. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org