Learn English – Is Shakespeare’s Double Negative Grammatically Wrong

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In Act I Scene I of The Merchant of Venice Shakespeare's character Salarino uses a double negative in the phrase Not in love neither?, is this grammatically wrong or was this acceptable at the time?

[Antonio is sad, his friend Salarino tries to cheer him up]

SALARINO
Why, then you are in love.
ANTONIO
Fie, fie!
SALARINO
Not in love neither? Then let us say you are sad,
Because you are not merry: and 'twere as easy
For you to laugh and leap and say you are merry,
Because you are not sad.

(Shakespeare.mit)

I have looked around a bit and in most modern and old Romance Languages, some Germanic Languages and Old English1 double negation is simply used to reinforce a negative or simply to make it grammatically correct, so it is possible that Shakespeare intended for it to mean a negative2 – as opposed to the more modern double negative = positive. However, from the context, it would seem that Shakespeare intends this to mean the modern equivalent of 'Not in love either?'; ruling out that answer.

Alternatively, this could be litotes, which is used to understate a piece of speech or simply a classic Shakespearian mistake.

Using this as context, would this sort of double negation be common or even understood?

Would it have been grammatically correct then?

Footnotes:

1: Honestly, French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese , Greek and Latin, Afrikaans, Some dialects of Old English and Welsh

2: http://nfs.sparknotes.com/merchant/page_4.html 'translates' the Shakespeare to say You’re not in love either? backing up the negative intention view. (Thanks to @Keep these mind for raising this)

Best Answer

No, Shakespeare's double negative was not grammatically wrong. According to David & Ben Crystal, the rule that two negatives make a positive was not applied to most uses of language:

[T]he strict mathematical logic was used only in a few formal styles of expression.

A double negative was just a way of intensifying a negative. (One could say that this usage closer to the mathematical formula (-x) + (-x) = -2x.)

The idea that using a double negative always results in a positive became dominant through the works of prescriptive grammarians in the 18th century, for example Robert Lowth's book A Short Introduction to English Grammar (1762). (At least, this claim is made on the page Early Modern English (c. 1500 - c. 1800) on the website The History of English, which also mentions a few similar works.)

David & Ben Crystal also point out that Shakespeare even used triple negatives.

(See also my website for more examples of double negatives in Shakespeare's work.)

Update: curiousdannii pointed out in a comment that this is also known as negative concord. (The term is also mentioned in the Wikipedia article double negative.)

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