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Origin and history of that

that(pron.)

Old English þæt, "that, so that, after that," neuter singular demonstrative pronoun ("A Man's a Man for a' that"), relative pronoun ("O thou that hearest prayer"), and demonstrative adjective ("Look at that caveman go!"), corresponding to masc. se, fem. seo. From Proto-Germanic *that, from PIE *tod-, extended form of demonstrative pronominal base *-to- (see -th (1)).

With the breakdown of the grammatical gender system, it came to be used in Middle English and Modern English for all genders. Germanic cognates include Old Saxon that, Old Frisian thet, Middle Dutch, Dutch dat "that," German der, die, das "the."

Generally more specific or emphatic than the, but in some cases they are interchangeable. From c. 1200 opposed to this as indicating something farther off. In adverbial use ("I'm that old"), in reference to something implied or previously said, c. 1200, an abbreviation of the notion of "to that extent," "to that degree." As a conjunction ("Not that I loved Caesar less, but that I loved Rome more") it originally was the neuter pronoun or adjective that used practically as a definite article qualifying the whole sentence.

Slang that way "in love" is attested by 1929 (also, by 1960, "homosexual"). That-a-way "in that direction" is recorded from 1839. "Take that!" said while delivering a blow, is recorded from early 15c. That is, for "that is to say," is by late 12c. That's what "just so" is by 1790. The intensifier at that "as well, to boot" is by 1830, U.S. colloquial, perhaps from "(cheap) at that (price)," etc.

Entries linking to that

the

definite article, late Old English þe, nominative masculine form of the demonstrative pronoun and adjective. After c. 950, it displaced earlier se (masc.), seo (fem.), þæt (neuter), and probably represents se altered by the th- form which was used in the masculine oblique cases.

Old English se is from PIE root *so- "this, that" (source also of Sanskrit sa, Avestan ha, Greek ho, he "the," Irish and Gaelic so "this"). For the þ- forms, see that. The s- forms were superseded in English by mid-13c., with a slightly longer dialectal survival in Kent.

Old English used 10 different words for "the," but did not distinguish "the" from "that." That survived for a time as a definite article before vowels (that one or that other).

In adverbial use, in clauses such as the more the merrier, the first the is a different word, a fossil of Old English þy, the instrumentive case of the neuter demonstrative (see that), used with relative force: "by how much more ____, by so much more ____." Of the common phrases, the sooner the better, is by 1771; the less said the better from 1680s.

In emphatic use, "the pre-eminent, par excellence, most approved or desirable," by 1824, often italicized. With relations (the wife, etc.) by 1838.

this(pron.)

"that is now present or at hand, what is present in place or thought," Old English þis, neuter demonstrative pronoun and adjective (masc. þes, fem. þeos), probably from a North Sea-region Germanic pronoun *tha-si-, formed by combining the base *þa- (see that) with -s, which is probably identical with Old English se "the" (representing here "a specific thing"), or with Old English seo, imperative of see (v.) "to behold." Compare Old Saxon these, Old Frisian this, Old Norse þessi, Middle Dutch dese, Dutch deze, Old High German deser, German dieser.

Once fully inflected, with 10 distinct forms; the oblique cases and other genders gradually fell away by 15c. The Old English plural was þæs (nominative and accusative), which in Northern Middle English became thas, and in Midlands and Southern England became thos. The Southern form began to be used late 13c. as the plural of that (replacing Middle English tho, from Old English þa) and acquired an -e (apparently from the influence of Middle English adjective plurals in -e; compare alle from all, summe from sum "some"), emerging early 14c. as modern those.

About 1175 thes (probably a variant of Old English þæs) began to be used as the plural of this, and by 1200 it had taken the form these, the final -e acquired via the same mechanism that put one on those.