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| What and its derivatives had a wide range of interrogative and exclamatory uses, many of which are still found today; the chief difference in Shakespearian English is their reference to people as well as things, where today we would use who. Whatever shows very little other difference, apart from the way its elements can be split as what ... ever. Whatsoever is generally equivalent to whatever, and is still found in emphatic use in modern English (though not in the -e’er form). |
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Syntactic usage occasionally varies, as in ‘As if that whatsoever god who leads him’ (Cor II.i.211) and ‘what and if / His sorrows have so overwhelmed his wits?’ (Tit IV.iv.9), where modern English drops the and - ‘what if’. The examples below distinguish uses of the compound forms as adjective and conjunction. |
what
Item
|
Location
|
Example
|
Gloss
|
|
what |
AYL II.iv.85 |
What is he that shall buy his flock and pasture? |
who |
|
what |
KL V.iii.98 |
What in the world he is / That names me traitor |
whoever |
|
what |
2H4 I.ii.114 |
What tell you me of it? |
why, what for |
|
what |
Mac III.iv.125 |
[Macbeth] What is the night? [Lady Macbeth] Almost at odds with morning |
how much time has passed? |
|
what though (conj.) |
2H6 I.i.156 |
What though the common people favour him |
what happens if, what does it matter if
|
|
what though (as elliptical sentence) |
AYL III.iii.46 |
here we have no temple but the wood ... But what though? |
so what?, what if it is so? |
what-
Item
|
Location
|
Example
|
Gloss
|
|
whatever, whate’er |
AYL II.vii.110 |
But whate’er you are ... in this desert inaccessible |
whoever |
|
what ... ever |
Oth III.iii.466
|
to obey shall be in me remorse, / What bloody business ever |
whatever |
|
whatsoever, whatsoe’er (adj.) |
2H6 IV.x.29 |
rude companion, whatsoe’er thou be |
whatever |
|
whatsoever, whatsoe’er (conj.) |
MM IV.ii.117 |
Whatsoever you may hear to the contrary |
whatever |
|
whatsoever, whatsoe’er (conj.) |
R3 III.iv.65 |
doom th’offenders: whatsoever they be |
whoever |
|
whatsomever, whatsome’er (adj.) |
Ham I.ii.249 |
And whatsomever else shall hap tonight |
whatever |
|
whatsomever, whatsome’er (conj.) |
AC II.vi.97 |
All men’s faces are true, whatsome’er their hands are |
whatever |
|
whatsomever, whatsome’er (conj.) |
AW III.v.50 |
Whatsome’er he is |
whoever |
 WHO AND WHO-
|
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