Talk:Mind your Ps and Qs

Only One Clear Origin
"mind your Ps and Qs" meaning "mind your manners" is quite obviously from "mind your pleases and thank-yous". It is parental baby talk, mimicking the child's simplification of consonant groups in "please" and simply contracting in "thank-you", which latter the plays of Bernard Shaw for example render simply as "Kew". It is to Wikipedia's credit that it gives the true explanation first, although it does give excessive space and credit to the various silly folk-etymologies. The earliest citations will probably found in children's books. 110.143.186.35 (talk) 04:34, 14 September 2015 (UTC)
 * From the article, it is clear it is not "obvious" and to assume your theory is correct borders on the arrogant. When this is added to your suggestion that other ideas are "various silly folk-etymologies" you are no longer on the borders of arrogant but a couple of days hard ride into being just plain rude. It's worth noting that the expression appeared in print, referring to Pint and Quarts over 120 years before GBS was born MrMarmite (talk) 13:27, 14 September 2015 (UTC)

You got it all wrong it goes like this "tittles tills en's and em's mind your P's and Q's. Cross your t's and dot your I's watch your spacing as you please." it refers to printing and putting letters in the right box of the lower case while en's and em's are the spacing between letters and words. a p look like a q since it is backward BTW upper case and lower case are the 2 cases of type used for printing https://www.straightdope.com/columns/read/761/whats-the-origin-of-the-expression-mind-your-ps-and-qs/ — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.23.181.134 (talk) 01:18, 13 April 2018 (UTC)


 * Thank you all! I love wikipedia, and all these multiple origin stories are why we still say MIND YOUR Ps and Qs -- a good practice on WP itself :-) 192.80.96.39 (talk) 15:25, 8 May 2024 (UTC)

Merger proposal
Why not to joint this article with http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ps_and_Qs —Preceding unsigned comment added by 127.0.0.1 (talk) 14:10, 13 February, 2008 (UTC)
 * I agree. Cenarium (talk) 18:25, 17 February 2008 (UTC)
 * I've redirected Ps and Qs here; the article was unreferenced, apart from one blog site, so I have not merged content. Pretty much all was covered here anyway. Note that there is some discussion at Talk:Ps and Qs about theories, but the refernces mentioned there don't seem reliable either. Gwinva (talk) 20:58, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Title needs to be changed
The title needs to be changed. Wikipedia's style for article titles is sentence case, so neither p nor q should be capitalized. This title would properly be styled as follows, according to CMOS 7.59 (16th edition): Mind your p's and q's

The title needs to be changed to 'Mind your Ps and Qs.'. RdCrestdBreegull (talk) 21:43, 10 March 2008 (UTC)


 * totally agree. It looks illiterate at the moment MrMarmite (talk) 22:20, 10 March 2008 (UTC)


 * Done. Incidentally if you're wondering how this is done, you need to click on the 'move' tab at the top of screen. Jefferson61345 (talk) 10:27, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Logic origins?
i thought that the expression meant logic.. i.e. in the phrase "somebody doesn't know their Ps and Qs". In some logic branch of mathematics, and apparently philosophy, two things are often compared with p's and q's. i.e. p=the car is red, q=the car is blue; if p then not q. i'm relatively sure that i've heard the expression "looks like someone didn't study their ps and qs in school" before. if i can find any info on this (sources), then i'll check back here. various wiki pages with what i'm talking about:
 * Logical implication
 * Contraposition
 * Transposition (logic)
 * Symbolic logic
 * Modal logic
 * Conversion (logic)

although Im not positive, it appears these concepts fall under "term logic". Nnnudibranch 08:07, 18 June 2008 (UTC)


 * I agree, & was about to say roughly the same thing. Formal logic seems to me to be one of the more likely origins of the expression. Leitermann (talk) 21:08, 23 December 2008 (UTC)


 * Being an Honors Geometry student, I recently came out of conditionals, converses, biconditionals, and contrapositives, so I can understand where this is coming from. I don't really think that it's the actual origin of the saying, but it could easily be used by a teacher in modern times. Venku Tur&#39;Mukan (talk) 15:58, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

curious observation
"Cornish is from the 'P' Celtic family. The P and the Q is used to differentiate between British (Brythonic) and Gaelic because of words like 'Penn' in Cornish would become 'Ceann' in Gaelic. A placename example would be Kintyre in Scotland being essentially the same name as Pentire in Cornwall. The other name for the 'P' Celtic languages is British or Brythonic. "

(from: http://www.cornish-language.org/english/faq.asp)  141.243.112.20 (talk)  —Preceding undated comment added 04:27, 25 May 2009 (UTC).

Welsh "Map" and Scottish "Maq"
Maybe a wive's tale, I've heard that "minding your P's and Q's" is more ancient...the Welsh "Map" and the Scot "Maq" —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.189.42.79 (talk) 14:32, 8 August 2010
 * Hi; I moved this comment from the article to the talk page. Please feel free to discuss it here - I'm curious if anyone knows more about this theory!  Thank you,
 * -- Joren (talk) 19:34, 8 August 2010 (UTC)
 * The Celtic language classification is a scientific fact. But in relationship to Mind your Ps and Qs it is a conjecture (not a theory). Sadly, it is a false conjecture. Consider the Welsh word map and the Scottish Gaelic word mac. They both mean son, and are in clear evidence in surnames today. This is the same classification of another posting about Cornish (where son is also map). These are founded scientifically in the complementary p-Celtic and Q-Celtic branches of the Celtic family of languages.


 * Unfortunately, this is not the source of Mind your Ps and Qs, firstly for the obvious reason that almost nobody was fluent in English, one of the p-Celtic, and one of the q-Celtic languages. Secondly the choice of q to represent the c of mac was a modern choice to avoid confusion with the soft c sound (as in cereal).


 * With thanks from ChrisJBenson (talk) 05:34, 15 December 2013 (UTC)

Irony
I ironically consider the digraph ȹ when thinking of this phrase which exhorts to distinguish them set part. 01:44, 11 September 2010 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 67.171.248.22 (talk)

Another theory
From Zzzhuh

MrMarmite deleted the correct answer to this question, in order to retain a full page of: "I don't know the answer but I'll guess anyway."

The correct definition is "Mind your Polites and Quiets because Children should be seen and not heard". BUT MrMarmite insists that the page be filled with theories of the Origin without any definition, and deleted any attempt to correct the page. Ignorance marches on thanks to MrMarmite


 * I have moved your somewhat rude comment to the correct place at the end of the comments. You have failed to sign your comment, but that does not surprise me. A simple read of the article will show you that there is no consensus on what the etymological history of this expression is, and thus your claim is treated as no more valid as any other, in fact, less so as you give no citation of reference to your grammatically awkward suggestion. Perhaps you will take the time to educate yourself in how to edit wikipedia and how to carry on a respectful conversation in the talk section. Good day. MrMarmite (talk) 20:08, 27 June 2012 (UTC)


 * Furthermore, "Mind your Polites and Quiets" has zero google hits. MrMarmite (talk) 00:45, 28 June 2012 (UTC)


 * This is not aimed at anybody other than the truth (or rather verifiability) ...
 * A much better resource than current Google hits is the Google Ngram Viewer, showing published usage over time. It shows the reasonable expectation for "Pints and Quarts" from 1730 to now, with odd spikes in the years 1743, 1775, 1785, and 1814. But a similar query for "Polites and Quiets" shows it never appeared in printed literature (between 1700 and 2000. Never means negligible, perhaps one or two published instances. ChrisJBenson (talk) 08:03, 16 December 2013 (UTC)


 * what about the spoon.when stirring.? 197.229.7.198 (talk) 00:29, 8 January 2022 (UTC)

Kentish version theory
My family always explained it according to the Myth of Sisyphus. ie: that p and q represent the base thoughts that you're having and accepting as truth whereas b and d represent your outward actions and speech. Rocks and Hills.

Also, the notion that the native non-German/Roman (Geuisse and Saxon) populations would have had no "q" before the romans is absurd -- "Honi Soyt Qui Mal Y Pense" is inscribed somewhere in any structure remaining in England if it dates back to Carolingian times. This expression originates from a time when there was no real difference between the English and French aside from the fact that they supported local governance over that of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation -- who would not have had the Q at that time but would certainly have been able to read French. Its important to remember that the Normans were natively Danish as well, not French. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 170.160.32.1 (talk) 15:51, 23 October 2012 (UTC)

Apostrophes?
70.90.170.210 (talk) 21:24, 28 August 2013 (UTC)
 * What about them? MrMarmite (talk) 09:31, 15 December 2013 (UTC)
 * I believe the anonymous contributor was suggesting they may have been the source of the phrase "Mind your Ps and Qs". I too have heard but dismiss such claims. Growing up in Britain, we called them inverted commas, whereas Americans tend to call them quotation marks, regardless of their specific purpose. In traditional printing and Microsoft Word, there is a difference between the starting set and the concluding set, analogous to and in some fonts appearing like Ps and Qs. With thanks from ChrisJBenson (talk) 23:29, 10 January 2014 (UTC)

A bit late to this party, but what he means is (correctly) that it should be “P’s and Q’s” and not “Ps and Qs”. Following an acronym or a single letter is the only time there should be an inverted comma before the S in a plural, because 2 I’s is clearer than 2 Is. Cripipper (talk) 21:19, 28 March 2021 (UTC)

Pints & Quarts origin cultural observation
In Fellowship of the Ring, in the Prancing Pony, Merry says, "Mind your Ps and Qs..." (p. 151 of the New Line Cinema version published by Houghton Mifflin). In this scene in the movie, Peter Jackson has Pippin say of the mug of ale: "They come in pints?" Undoubtedly, irrelevant. But, who knows... :)
 * It is meant to be humorous. It never occurred to Pippin to consider a drink of less volume than a quart. A quart is 40 fluid ounces in Middle Earth and the Great Britain of J.R.R. Tolkein. ChrisJBenson (talk) 15:03, 15 January 2014 (UTC)

Another reason for P and Q
I learned in tradition logic that a conditional syllogism has a proposition and a consequent. It would be abbreviated to P and Q. Eg. A modus ponens syllogism:


 * If P, then Q
 * P
 * Therefore Q


 * If this a talk page, then this is a submission
 * This is a talk page
 * Therefore, this is a submission

And if you were to commit a fallacy, I think you would need to mind your P's and Q's in an argument. Just a suggestion of the origin. JibuWoooooooooooah (talk) 19:23, 5 September 2018 (UTC)

The phrase originates with handset type where popular lower case fonts had ps and qs which were very similar. An error in sorting used type back into it's respective bins in the typecase could earn a beating for the printer's devil who didn't pay close attention to his ps and qs. Esperienta doche. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 64dodge (talk • contribs) 03:20, 17 July 2019 (UTC)

Why spell p's and q's.
According to Farlex Partner Idioms Dictionary © Farlex 2017, one obvious guess on where the saying came from is seeing the difference between p and q. Therefore, the page should be renamed "Mind your p's and q's".—SkippyJackson (talk) 17:42, 8 April 2021 (UTC)

Pee and Kew
"Bring in a quart of Maligo, right true: And looke, you Rogue, that it be Pee and Kew"

Here is a conjecture: Maligo is Malaga Wine, from Andalusia, made with Pedro Ximénez grapes. To this day you can find Sherry marked PX, indicate it is made with Pedro Ximénez grapes. Could it be that circa 1600 certain casks of "Maligo" were marked PX to indicate these grapes, and a Q (or Cedilla, or other character mistaken for a Q) to indicate something else, perhaps something like "Qualificada" to indicate it passed inspection or proofing, or "Quince" to indicate the length of aging, and these PXQ (or PX-Cedilla) was understood as P&Q (easy to do the X was marked in one fluid motion) and indicated a preferred quality of wine? Blyden (talk) 03:38, 4 February 2023 (UTC)

P comes before Q
P originated from the Phoenician letter “pey”, while Q derived from the Phoenician “qoph”. The Phoenician alphabet arranged letters in order of their sounds, with p-sounds coming before harder k/q-sounds. This alphabetical order was retained when the Latin alphabet adapted these letters. Hence, the expression could point to the fact that one should abide by norms and conventions. Phonetic hierarchy in "irreversible" binomials seems to play a larger role than we can evidence! What comes first, thunder or lightning? (or has it to with that diphthong in the second?) Stjohn1970 (talk) 23:39, 1 October 2023 (UTC)

French connection
I doubt that queues refers to wigs. I asked a French lady, and it seems that the tail coat (queue de pie). 'Pie' because it is more likely to that. The tail can be shaped like the magpie's tail. They call it 'queue de pie'. ( Ha! Qs and Ps ! )  lol Stjohn1970 (talk) 00:32, 2 October 2023 (UTC)

Another origin suggestion
I just stumbled across someone suggesting that the saying comes from the thin-lens equation, a variation that uses the variable p for the object distance and the variable q for the image distance. (Something I haven't heard before, and a formula variation I've never seen before.) 173.225.193.193 (talk) 20:14, 18 February 2024 (UTC)