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Is Europe is a singular or plural noun?

Ursula von der Leyen said in an EU speech "long live Europe" instead of "long lives Europe".

A quick search turn up sites like this, which simply says "Singular", which is inconsistent with the usage above, and provides no explanation.

jimm101
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silfida
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1 Answers1

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It's not a matter of singular or plural it's about the mood; "long live [whatever]" expresses a desire for the future, "long lives [whatever]" would be a statement of the present state of affairs, if anyone said it that way. The origin of the phrase "long live Europe" is probably le roi est mort, vive le roi or the king is dead, long live the king, the first king being the dead Charles VI and the second his son who became Charles VII from that moment on but the sentiment is probably much older.

Ash
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    The question is off-topic in my opinion (ELL or duplicate) so I have not answered it, but your answer is incorrect. It is not a question of tense, it is a question of mood. Here "live" is present subjunctive — one of the relatively few remaining uses of the subjunctive in English. – David Jul 22 '19 at 12:14
  • @David I'd have said it's a furture-invocative statement since the phraseology has a French, not English, origin. – Ash Jul 22 '19 at 12:21
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    “God save our gracious queen, Long live our noble queen…” Not English? – David Jul 22 '19 at 12:28
  • @David Not originally, it comes from the Norman French phrase le roi est mort, vive le roi; the king is dead, long live the king, first used in 1422, before modern English was being spoken anywhere. – Ash Jul 22 '19 at 12:32
  • @Ash: It's still the English subjunctive, and was originally a direct translation of the French subjunctive, translated back when the subjunctive was widely used in English. – Peter Shor Jul 22 '19 at 12:57
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    @Ash It’s much older than 1422, and it doesn’t originate in French. That’s just a very well-known example of the construction. Classical Latin had many examples of viva(n)t X, for example. There is no future involved (I don’t know what exactly you mean by ‘future-invocative’); it is a simple present subjunctive used to stand in for a third-person imperative (as is also the case in both the French and Latin version; this is often called a jussive subjunctive). – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 22 '19 at 12:57
  • @PeterShor It's Optative (not invocative, my apologies), and that's not a mood/tense in English okay I stand corrected. – Ash Jul 22 '19 at 13:12
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I was thinking of "Optative" and typing too fast. – Ash Jul 22 '19 at 13:16
  • @Ash The optative is used for similar purposes in languages that have it, such as Ancient Greek and Sanskrit (though those also have true third-person imperatives and would probably be equally likely to use those instead). The Latin subjunctive historically comes from a merger of the old subjunctive and optative, so it is halfway optative, in a way. – Janus Bahs Jacquet Jul 22 '19 at 13:39
  • Phew, that's a relief. I thought there was something grammatical called the future invocative that I'd never heard of. Can't find anything googling. Long live the subjunctive! (Although I doubt it.) – David Jul 22 '19 at 21:10
  • @JanusBahsJacquet I've always thought frozen forms like Devil take the hindmost! to be as close to a third-person imperative as English is apt to see without adding let or may. Their absence is what weirds people out, which helps illustrate that this is no longer productive. – tchrist Jul 23 '19 at 12:13