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Re:Ask HN: How to handle Asian-style “Family name first” whe... by mhink on Thursday August 31, 2023 @10:51AM (#37338061)
> Marcus, can thee get the car, please.

Two notes:

First, you'd use "thou" here, as it's the nominative case, and the correct conjugation would be "canst".

Secondly, "thee" and "thou" were very much the form used to speak to a close friend or social inferior in early modern English. "You" functioned more like French "vous" or German "Sie"- as either a plural formation or a formal address of a social superior.

With that in mind, it would probably be more accurate to say that they should be rendered "Marcus, can you get the car, please?" and "Mrs. Miller, canst thou get the car, please?" And notice the parallel between "canst thou" and "kannst Du"!

Re:Ask HN: How to handle Asian-style “Family name first” whe... by weinzierl on Friday September 01, 2023 @07:44AM (#37349520)
Thank you, I wondered when I wrote it, if its that simple and if I should try to given an English equivalent at all, but did't have time to research it. Your comment saved me from that.