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What happened to “the” ?

(34 Posts)
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MawB Mon 07-Oct-19 08:39:39

My memory may be playing tricks, but didn’t we used to refer to the Queen Mary, the Titanic, the QE2 and the Royal Yacht Britannia?
Didn’t Nelson fight the battle of Trafalgar on the Victory and didn’t I take visiting friends to see the Curry Sark at Greenwich or the Mary Rose?
I am increasingly aware of this definite article’s disappearance and wonder when it happened.
This morningI have just read the following
Boris Johnson is considering plans to replace Royal Yacht Britannia with two £150 million ships paid for by the foreign aid budget
The new ships, one called “Britannia” and the other named the “Florence Nightingale” or “Mary Seacole”, would be used by members of the Royal family for overseas tours to the Commonwealth and other countries
Without getting into the political argument, does anybody perhaps with Naval connections, know when or why this change occurred? .

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sarahellenwhitney Tue 08-Oct-19 11:47:44

Don't know about the other royals

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Rufus2 Tue 08-Oct-19 13:40:02

we used to sing God save our Queen

And we used to sing "God save our Gracious Queen! as well as paying homage to our "Noble Queen"!
Eliminates complaints from the "the" pedants! grin

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grandtanteJE65 Tue 08-Oct-19 17:04:02

At my school we sang, "God save the Queen " in both the first and the last line.

I agree MawB, ships were referred to as the plus their name.

Newspapers, however, seem to drop the article probably because they feel it gives more impact to the sentence.

What annoys me even more is hearing newscasters talking of the Education Ministry instead of the Ministry of Education.

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Madmaggie Tue 08-Oct-19 18:46:42

I am irked by TV presenters saying "vee" instead of versus - it really hits a nerve and I'm normally pretty laid back. Until they say it that is ?

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grapefruitpip Tue 08-Oct-19 20:13:55

Maw, I think I know what happened to your " the".....it was overused in Scotland!

the morn, the forenoon and so on. It came back to me, my granny saying it.

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MawB Tue 08-Oct-19 22:22:25

“The morn’s morn” was one I remember!
And the eve of Selkirk Common Riding is universally known as “The Nicht Afore the Morn “ smile

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Callistemon Wed 09-Oct-19 01:02:54

I understand that Wirral is just that - Wirral.

Not The Wirral as everyone seems to call it.

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TwinLolly Wed 09-Oct-19 10:46:47

I'm going to drop a similar spanner in the works. In some newspaper articles and magazines I've noticed that the words Mr/Mrs/Ms/Miss have been dropped and only surnames are used. hmm

I get terribly confused as to who is who and often have to revert back to the beginning of the story to see who they are talking about. confused

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