An Old and Middle English letter has become a false friend in modern English: the letters thorn ( þ ) and eth ( ð ) were used interchangeably to represent voiced and voiceless dental fricatives now written in English as th ( as in " thick " and " the ").

They reveal that their alphabet used a single letter character known as the " thorn " which has a " th " sound in English.

( This makes it comparable to the Latin-based Icelandic alphabet, which includes the runic letter thorn.

The word riding is descended from late Old English * þriðing or * þriding ( recorded only in Latin contexts or forms, e. g., trehing, treding, trithing, with Latin initial t here representing the Old English letter thorn ).

The letter originated from the rune in the Elder Fuþark, called thorn in the Anglo-Saxon and thorn or thurs (" giant ") in the Scandinavian rune poems, its reconstructed Proto-Germanic name being Thurisaz.

The modern digraph th began to grow in popularity during the 14th century ; at the same time, the shape of thorn grew less distinctive, with the letter losing its ascender ( becoming similar in appearance to the old wynn (), which had fallen out of use by 1300 ) and, in some hands, such as that of the scribe of the unique mid-15th century manuscript of The Boke of Margery Kempe, ultimately becoming indistinguishable from the letter Y.

The following were abbreviations during Middle and Early Modern English using the letter thorn:

An example of the last vestige of the letter thorn in the English language.

A handwritten form of thorn that was similar to the letter " y " in appearance with a small " e " written above it as an abbreviation for " the " was common in early Modern English.

The Icelandic language is the only living language to retain the letter thorn ( in Icelandic ; þ, pronounced þoddn, ) in common usage.

The thorn is a letter of the alphabet of the Talossan language, in which it may also be seen represented ( for convenience ) by the digraph TG.

* The letter thorn ( þ ), which was already being replaced by th in Middle English, finally fell into disuse.

In Middle English, thou was sometimes abbreviated by putting a small " u " over the letter thorn:.

** Þ ( called thorn ; lowercase þ ) is also a Runic letter.

When printing with movable type was invented around 1450, typefaces included many ligatures and additional letters, such as the letter þ ( thorn ) which was first substituted in English with y ( e. g. ye olde shoppe ), but later written as th.

In the early days of the printing press, the letter y was used in place of the thorn ( þ ), so many modern instances of " ye " ( such as in " Ye Olde Shoppe ") are in fact examples of " the " ( definite article ) and not of " you ".

* ye the article, pronounced as if spelled with a y instead of the printer's mark for Þ, the letter thorn.

Þ is the letter thorn, which in Icelandic mostly represents a voiceless dental fricative, as in th in the English word thick.

* The letter < Þ > ( thorn ) was still in use during the Early Modern English period, though increasingly limited to hand-written texts.

The use of the term " ye " to mean " the " is based in Early Modern English, in which the could be written as þe, employing the Old English letter thorn, þ.

In the Anglo-Saxon rune poem it is called thorn, whence the name of the letter þ derived from it.

The War Department wrote Mr. Manuel a letter and said he was a hero.

Mr. Justice Taney's Dred Scott decision in 1857 was unpopular in the North, and soon became a dead letter.

nor was she moved by a letter from Wright pointing out that if he was not `` compelled to spend money on useless lawyer's bills, useless hotel bills, and useless doctor's bills '', he could more quickly provide Miriam with a suitable home either in Los Angeles or Paris, as she preferred.

At this time Harriet wrote in a letter which after their finally landing in India was sent to her mother:

An accompanying sympathetic letter explained that inside the envelope was a name for Mrs. Coolidge's first granddaughter.

The use of map coordinates was begun when the senior officers began to select tactical points by designating a spot as `` near the letter o in the word mountain ''.

The result was that I found myself in the ridiculous position of having made a formal engagement by letter for the next week, only two days before my departure from London.

It need hardly be remarked that Thompson was not generally known for his scrupulosity about keeping his social engagements, which makes his irritation in this letter all the more significant.

After Thompson came to London to live, he received a letter from Katie, which was dated February 8, 1897.

In a letter to Meynell, which was written in June, less than a month before Katie's wedding, he was highly melodramatic in his despair and once again announced his intention of returning to the life of the streets: ``

And Pike never did find out if Robinson was really responsible for the `` Vale '' letter.

The latter was so upset on learning of the death of Morris, that he wrote Morgan a letter, showing his own warmhearted generosity.

But Morgan did not leave before he had written a letter to a William Pickman in Salem, Massachusetts, apparently an acquaintance, praising Washington and saying that the slanders propagated about him were `` opposed by the general current of the people to exalt General Gates at the expense of General Washington was injurious to the latter.

When Fosdick showed the letter to Baker his negative response was: `` For God's sake, Raymond, don't show this to the President or he'll stop the war ''.

Adrian Quiney wrote to his son Richard on October 29 and again perhaps the next day, since the bearer of the letter, the bailiff, was expected to reach London on November 1.

But I was deeply moved by his letter of resignation as rector of St. Luke's Church in Atlanta.

but the letter went on: she had cried, she had implored, she had been miserable at his refusal, and finally he had relented -- and now how happy she was, how expectant!!

At the end of its letter was the information that applicants for this position `` must also be prepared to teach costume design and advertising art ''.

In June, 1960, an early draft of the questionnaire, along with a cover letter, was mailed to fourteen companies in the state of Washington.

Each questionnaire was mailed with a cover letter addressed personally to the president or other executive of each firm.

the `` sober opinion '' of his letter to Noyes, written when Hardy was eighty years old, is essentially that of his first `` philosophical '' notebook entry, made when he was twenty-five: `` The world does not despise us: it only neglects us '' ( Early Life, p. 63 ).

Still another, annoyed by the brevity of a recently received missive, wrote: `` yore letter was short and sweet, jist like a roasted maget ''.