Every language has its quirks. One of the issues with modern English is its curious lack of the second person plural, which can give rise to confusion when it’s not clear whether the speaker is referring to one or more people.
Also lacking in modern English is a word to mean ‘the two of us.’ But in the English spoken about 1000 years ago, there was a word that meant just that: ‘wit’, which meant ‘we two,’ and was accompanied by other terms relevant to twos, including ‘unker’ (‘our’ for two people) and ‘git’ (‘you two people’). These words have not been used since about the thirteenth century.
What happened? Because language tends to retain the simplest form, these words may have faded out of use because there were other viable alternatives, like ‘we,’ which can be used for two or more people. Because of the waves of conquest and migration in England from the Middle Ages onwards, English also changed dramatically, in response to exposure to other languages and changing social mores.
And maybe the English also became less romantic than before? The idea of a word that means ‘just the two of us’ suggests a level of intimacy that’s hard to capture in modern English. Perhaps this is one archaic usage we should bring back.
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