Contents Introduction The development of personal pronouns in English

3. Development of demonstrative pronouns
Demonstrative pronouns in the Old English period
There are two groups of demonstrative pronouns in Old English. In one of them, the meaning of pointing is significantly weakened; in the second it is fully manifested. The first group is used more widely and more often than the second.
Both groups have categories of gender, two numbers and five cases (the fifth case is instrumental).
The root starting with đ corresponds to Greek to, Russian that; it is also present in the Germanic languages ​​(for example, in German der, die, das).
The pronouns of this group accompany the noun without expressing indicative; they are very close to the modern definite article, and some linguists consider them to be an article already. But sē, seo, đ1t can be used anaphorically in a sense close to that of personal pronouns. The article cannot replace a noun or function without a noun. Therefore, despite the undoubted proximity of the demonstrative pronouns of the first group to the article, it still seems premature to consider that they already are.
Anaphoric substitution is especially common in subordinate clauses: secwaef) to anum of his leorning cnihta, se" waes Zepa Philippus "said to one of his students, he called himself Philip." From the point of view of the syntax of modern language, se could be taken as a relative pronoun 'which.' But such an analysis would not take into account the forms of the pronoun, demonstrative in origin. Often, se is combined with the particle pyo (§ 304), which has a relative meaning: sepe - 'that which'. In this case, no doubt, se participates in the transfer relative connection of parts of the sentence
Demonstrative⁹ pronouns in the Middle English period
The 1st group of demonstrative pronouns breaks up in Middle English. For a short time (until the middle of the 20th century) there are still remnants of the declension -ben, bon in the accusative case; in the future they disappear, and the invariable form the remains, which is the determiner of the noun - the article.
The neuter nominative form that functions alongside the until the 14th century; further its demonstrative meaning is strengthened and that is fixed in the group of demonstrative pronouns.
The feminine nominative form, as above, merged with heo to form the feminine personal pronoun
The plural form is Old English đǎ, from the middle of the 13th century. đo— persists through the Middle English period. The 2nd group of demonstrative pronouns retains inflectional forms during the 11th-12th centuries; in the south they are occasionally found in the 13th century. In the XIII-XIV centuries. there is a generalization of forms; the gender category is lost, and the former neuter form this crowds out the other forms. The plural form đǒs is gradually disappearing. In the south, along with the disappearing form thos, new plural forms thise, these are formed, apparently from the old đīs, đēs. These is fixed as the plural form of this; at the end of the 15th century. the plural form those appears, which, according to Brunner, is hardly a continuation of the old thos, but rather an analogous new formation with the plural ending -s from the form đo (tho).
The series this—these/that—those is contrasted by the meaning of “proximity/distance”: this indicates close in time (future) or space; that - to more distant in space and to the past in time (this week - the current week; that week - the one that was mentioned in connection with past events).
In common parlance, the pronoun them has acquired the function of a demonstrative pronoun. It appeared from the 17th century: he should speak them words (Bunyan).