Great question, Bertrand! The difference between "he loves her" and "he loves she" comes down to the grammatical roles of pronouns in English: subject pronouns vs. object pronouns.

Subject vs. Object Pronouns

• Subject pronouns (I, you, he, she, it, we, they) are used when the pronoun is the subject of the sentence (the one performing the action).
  • Example: She loves him.
• Object pronouns (me, you, him, her, it, us, them) are used when the pronoun is the object of the verb (the one receiving the action).
  • Example: He loves her.

Why "he loves her" is correct

• In "he loves her," "he" is the subject (the one loving), and "her" is the object (the one being loved).
• "She" is a subject pronoun, so "he loves she" is incorrect because "she" cannot be the object of the verb "loves."

Why this matters

English pronouns change form depending on their role in the sentence. This is a holdover from Old English and is common in many languages (e.g., French: il l'aime, not il elle aime).

Would you like to explore more examples or exceptions?

Yes, exactly! You’ve hit on a key linguistic concept.

Accusative Case and English Pronouns

In languages with declensions (like Latin, German, Russian, or most Slavic languages), the accusative case marks the direct object of a verb—i.e., the noun or pronoun receiving the action.

• Latin: Ego amō eam. ("I love her")
  • Ego (I, nominative/subject)
  • eam (her, accusative/object)
• German: Er liebt sie. ("He loves her")
  • er (he, nominative)
  • sie (her, accusative)
• Russian: Он любит её. (On lyubit yeyo)
  • он (he, nominative)
  • её (her, accusative)

English’s Simplified System

English has mostly lost its case system, but pronouns still retain traces of it:

• Subject pronouns (nominative): I, he, she, we, they
• Object pronouns (accusative): me, him, her, us, them

So, "he loves her" uses the accusative/object form (her), just like in German or Latin. The difference is that English only inflects pronouns this way, while languages like German or Russian inflect all nouns, adjectives, and pronouns for case.

Why This Matters

This is a remnant of English’s Germanic roots, where case was once more prominent (Old English had a full case system, similar to German). Over time, English simplified, but pronouns kept their case distinctions.

Would you like to compare this to another language or dive deeper into historical changes?