Grammar girl here, this week Constance Hale, author of Sin and Sin Tax, is going to help

us understand the Royal Wee.

The pronouns a writer chooses may seem like a wee little thing, but these little stand-ins

for nouns can have an outsize impact, setting the point of view of a passage as well as

its tone, and making some pretty grand or grandiose statements.

Take for example the use of the first person plural pronoun by a speaker who means

I, but says we.

The most sanctioned example of this is the Royal Wee or Pluralis Majestatus.

Don't be fooled by the Latin, the Royal Wee has enjoyed popularity far beyond Rome

by monarchs, popes, and even university rectors.

The origin of this pronoun has been traced variously to 1169, when the English King Henry

II used it to mean God and I, and to King Richard I, whose use of the pronoun bolstered

his claim to be acting in concert with the deity, and to be the ruler by divine right.

A more recent example of the Royal Wee would be Queen Victoria's oft-quoted Wee are

not amused.

It's amazing how easily politicians slide into this more majestic Me, especially when

they become presidents or prime ministers.

In that case they usually mean not God and I, but my campaign and I, or later my administration

and I.

But when Margaret Thatcher went so far as to say we have become a grandmother, she earned

widespread gafas.

Editors or editorial columnists also use the Royal Wee, calling it the editorial Wee,

...