I
[aɪ] pronoun, noun, numeral
Forms me my mine myself I's Is ies ich eye
- pronoun The speaker or writer, referred to as the grammatical subject, of a sentence. “I drove my sister and myself to school.”
- pronoun (nonstandard) The speaker or writer, referred to as the grammatical object, of a sentence. “Mom drove my sister and I to school.”
- noun (metaphysics) The ego.
- numeral The ninth numeral symbol of the English alphabet, called i and written in the Latin script.
- noun The name of the Latin script letter I/i.
Synonyms
ich ch my ass m'ass muggins yours truly Ah me iodine iodin atomic number 53 one 1 ace single unity ane
Etymology
From Middle English a, hi, hich, hij, I, ic, ich, ichc, ichs, ick, ig, ih, ik, j, jch, y, from Old English ic, ich, ih, ᛁᚳ (ic), ᛁᚴ (ik, “I”), from Proto-West Germanic *ik (“I”), from Proto-Germanic *ek, *eka, *ik (“I”), from Proto-Indo-European *eǵh₂óm (“I”).
Cognate with Scots A, I, Ik (“I”), Yola Ich (“I”), North Frisian ick, ik, 'k (“I”), Saterland Frisian iek (“I”), West Frisian ik (“I”), Alemannic German i, ich, ig (“I”), Bavarian and Mòcheno i (“I”), Central Franconian eich, ich (“I”), Cimbrian i, ich (“I”), Dutch ick, ik, ikke (“I”), Low German eck, ick, ik, öck (“I”), German ich (“I”), Limburgish ich, iich (“I”), Luxembourgish ech (“I”), Vilamovian ych (“I”), West Flemish 'k (“I”), Yiddish איך (ikh), יאַך (yakh, “I”), Danish jeg, jæ (“I”), Elfdalian ig (“I”), Faroese eg, jeg (“I”), Icelandic eg, ég, ek, jeg (“I”), Jutish æ (“I”), Norn eg (“I”), Norwegian Bokmål jeg (“I”), Norwegian Nynorsk eg, æg (“I”), Swedish i, jag (“I”), Crimean Gothic ich (“I”), Gothic 𐌹𐌺 (ik, “I”); also Asturian, Aragonese, and Spanish yo (“I”), Catalan jo (“I”), French je (“I”), Galician and Portuguese eu (“I”), Italian io (“I”), Leonese and Mirandese you (“I”), Latin ego (“I”), Ancient Greek ἐγώ (egṓ, “I”), Latvian es (“I”), Lithuanian aš (“I”), Armenian ես (es, “I”), Belarusian, Russian, and Ukrainian я (ja, “I”), Bulgarian аз (az, “I”), Czech já (“I”), Macedonian јас (jas, “I”), Polish and Slovak ja (“I”), Serbo-Croatian jȃ (“I”), Slovene jȁz (“I”), Northern Kurdish ez (“I”), Sanskrit अहम् (ahám, “I”), Hittite 𒌑𒊌 (ūk, “I”). See also English ich. Doublet of ego and Ich.
Capitalized since the 13th century to mark it as a distinct word and prevent misreading and omission (due to cursive writing).
Abbreviation.
From Latin i, minuscule of I.
From Old English iċ.
Webster’s 1913
- pronoun The nominative case of the pronoun of the first person; the word with which a speaker or writer denotes himself.
Etymology [OE. i, ich, ic, AS. ic; akin to OS. & D. ik, OHG. ih, G. ich, Icel. ek, Dan. jeg, Sw. jag, Goth. ik, OSlav. az', Russ. ia, W. i, L. ego, Gr. aham. sq. root179. Cf. Egoism.]
Sources: Wiktionary · WordNet 3.0 · Webster’s 1913 — from the Wiktionary entry “I”, CC BY-SA 4.0. Details