Hersel

Part of speech: pronoun

Definitions

1. A dialect or informal spelling of herself, used to refer back to a female person or animal as the subject or object of an action
2. The reflexive pronoun for a woman or girl, used in Scots and other dialects to point back to the female doer of an action
3. An informal Scottish and northern English form of the feminine reflexive pronoun, referring back to a female subject

Etymology: "Hersel" is a Scots and northern English form of "herself," used for emphasis or reflexive purposes. Its origins lie in Old English "hire" (her, the feminine genitive/dative of "heo," she) combined with "self," which goes back to Old English "self" meaning "same" or "very." Compounds of this type, pairing a pronoun with "self," developed in Middle English as speakers began marking reflexive and intensive uses more explicitly. The final "-el" in "hersel" is a dialectal reshaping rather than a separate suffix. In Scots, the "-sel" ending (also seen in "mysel" and "yersel") preserves an older pronunciation pattern, where the "-f" of "self" weakened to an "l"-like sound, and the vowel of "her" shifted toward the form written here. The result is a spelling that tracks speech rather than the standard written "herself."