Its = possessive form of “it”
It’s = contraction of “it is”
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How Commas Are (Were) Made
Comma History
“In the 3rd century BC, Aristophanes of Byzantium invented a system of single dots (distinctiones) that separated verses (colometry), and indicated the amount of breath needed to complete each fragment of text, when reading aloud. (1) The different lengths were signified by a dot at the bottom, middle, or top of the line. For a short passage (akomma), a media distinctio dot was placed mid-level ( · ). This is the origin of the concept of a comma, although the name came to be used for the mark itself, instead of the clause it separated.
The mark used today is descended from a diagonal slash, or virgula suspensiva ( / ), used from the 13th to 17th centuries to represent a pause, and was first used by Aldus Manutius.” (2) (3)
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Found at Wikipedia.
Citing:
(1) Truss, Lynn (2004). Eats, Shoot & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation. New York: Gotham Books. p. 72. ISBN 1-59240-087-6.
(2) Reading Before Punctuation – Introduction to Latin Literaturepamphlet, Haverford College
(3) Manuscript Studies, Medieval and Early Modern – Palaeography: Punctuation glossary
It’s a contraction of the words “could” and “have”!
The Subjunctive Mood
The subjunctive is a grammatical mood. Many languages use subjunctive verb forms to indicate varying degrees of uncertainty and unreality.
It is sometimes difficult to distinguish subjunctive in English because the verb form is identical to forms in the indicative mood. In some other languages, like Spanish, the subjunctive verb forms are visually and functionally distinct from the indicative forms. The following is a classic example of the subjunctive mood in English.
“I wish I were a movie star.” (Subjunctive)
(“I wish I was …” is incorrect as it does not use the subjunctive verb form, which looks the same as, but is functionally different from, the past simple for both second person singular and third person plural.)
Here are some more subjunctive examples:
“Maybe he went to the game.”
“I wish this car went faster.”
“If I were you, I would read your homework.”
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