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What is the difference between a contraction and a portmanteau?
What is the difference between an abbreviation and a contraction?
What are some examples of contractions?
To address the primary question, you can use more than "y'all" with the following contraction of "would not have", for example "I'dn't've".
Actually, I would not normally contract "y'all" along with the following. I'd more likely say "Y'all wudn'tve", or even "Y'all'd" for 'you all would ...".
For clarification, there's no standard way to write whatever you're trying to say as a contraction because contractions beyond two words are not really standardized in formal writing by style guides, though popular informal instances may try to write out longer sequences of contractions similarly according to general English spelling principles like "shouldna" or "shouldn't've" for "should not have". So any question should expect leeway in writing. Frankly also leeway in pronunciation because the phonology is a bit fuzzy in natural informal sped-up speech.
Never heard/seen it used in that form. 'Round here (eastern NC), it's I/you/y'all wouldn't've/couldn't've/shouldn't've, &c.
Wiktionary says:
Abbreviation of wollnot or woll + not, negations of archaic form of will.
The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology agrees:
XVII. contr. of wonnot, assim. of wol not
As to other forms, Etymonline only mentions wynnot:
first recorded mid-15c. as wynnot, later wonnot (1580s) before the modern form [won't] emerged 1660s.
Won’t actually has a pretty interesting and complex history. Ultimately it does come from a contraction of will and not, but it all happened in a rather roundabout way.
It all started off with the Old English verb willan/wyllan, meaning to will, wish, or want. Even in Old English it was used occasionally to denote a future intent. “Ic wille gan” could mean “I want to go” or “I will go”, depending on context.
Now, the thing about negatives in Old English is that they were often reduced:
na(w)ðer = nahwæðer = ne + hwæðer
neither = not + whethernæfre = ne + æfre
never = not + evernabbað = ne + habbað
haven’t = have + notWe nabbað naðor ne hlaf ne wæter.
We have neither bread nor water.
Not comes from naht via noht. Related to nawiht meaning naught, it originally meant in no way, but came to be used as an emphatic form of ne. Subsequently it became unstressed and supplanted ne altogether. This is an example of Jespersen’s Cycle.
All these things combined led to a new negative form of willan, wynnot. The past forms of willan began with wold-, which is where we get would. Under the influence of these forms and the related verb wol, wynnot became wonnot by the late 1500s.
Finally, the modern form won’t emerged by the 1660s as a result of reducing the final vowel in wonnot. It appears to be the first word so contracted; most of the other -n’t contractions we use today (can’t, couldn’t, shouldn’t, &c.) arose in the 1700s, modelled after won’t. In modern English, cannot is the only uncontracted -not compound that survives.
As for the other contractions such as -’ll and -’ve, their history is just as long, though perhaps slightly less convoluted. But that’s a story for a different question. ;)
Also, remember that spelling in Old English was less standardised than in modern English. There were often several equally valid ways to spell the same word, especially when you took different accents and dialects into account. So sometimes it’s difficult to get a good historical account of pronunciation and usage changes. Still, as far as I can tell, this is basically how it went down.
Source: The Online Etymology Dictionary.
- You can contract "is" and "has" when they are auxiliary verbs to 's
- You can contact "are" to "'re" and "am" to "'m"
- You can contract "have" when it is an auxiliary verb to 've
- You can contract "had" and "would" (auxiliary) to 'd.
- You can contract "will" and "shall" to "'ll"
- You can contract "not" to n't when forming the negation of a verb
- You can contract "can not" to "can't", "do not" to "don't" and "will not" to "won't"
- There are a number of other colloquial and idiomatic contractions such as "gonna" for "going to" or "aint" for "am not/is not"
- Contractions are less common when the subject of the verb is not a pronoun, at least in written English.
*Rules are subject to editing as I think of more examples
You can't contract any of these auxiliary verbs when they are fronted in a question or otherwise inverted. So "What am I to do" but never "What'm I to do".
All contractions are somewhat informal and avoided in the most formal written or spoken English.
Double contractions are rare and to be avoided, even if possible. So I'd avoid "mustn't've" in writing (even though it follows the rules above)
In you example, the contraction wouldn't be a problem, but the underlying grammar is incorrect:
You should say "I don't see how that's relevant"
(Expanding the contraction in your example gives I do not see how is that relevant. But the object of "see" must be a noun phrase and not a question, so the correct noun phrase is "how that is relevant". This confusion between a question like "What is it?" and a noun phrase like "what it is" is common and has been asked and answered here before)
You can't contract "do" to "'o" so "how do not" cannot be contracted to how'on't
See also https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:List_of_English_contractions
Most informal contractions like these will be written down when the writer is conveying spoken English. Then anything the reader can understand is acceptable.
In your example you want
but I don't see how that's relevant
The way you wrote it the contracted "is" is in the wrong place.