It was characterised by the extreme loss of inflections , almost complete standardisation of the plural to ' s ' and the introduction of a large number of norman french and low german words .
When two people become a couple the brain extends its idea of self to include the other ; instead of the slender pronoun " I " a plural self emerges who can borrow some of the other 's assets and strengths .
There is a basic confusion between singular and plural and a less basic one between " precedents " , which was what the bank surely meant to say , and " precedence " , which means a ceremonial order of rank and is something else entirely .