{"id":24728,"date":"2026-08-27T10:23:56","date_gmt":"2026-08-27T10:23:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24728"},"modified":"2026-08-27T10:23:57","modified_gmt":"2026-08-27T10:23:57","slug":"hither-thither","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/?p=24728","title":{"rendered":"Hither &#038; Thither"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>If someone is described as having <strong>come-hither eyes<\/strong>, it means their eyes are seducitve or alluring. If you tell a horse to <strong>come hither<\/strong> though, what would you expect it to do?<\/p>\n<p><a data-flickr-embed=\"true\" href=\"https:\/\/www.flickr.com\/photos\/montecore827\/2998075209\/in\/photolist-S1G3p-83HFBe-4uzTz6-F72yWj-kcoJVF-dLF7KD-UBduPh-7LCMYf-xxbL-6KDfef-2jqUqww-c9N61q-8xmVUD-5yVViT-9DJeqA-daM44m-imjEbv-mFdpwV-79J1T-5h8XQk-4xLq25-9pdwaa-dkTnYz-2j8j5ow-bF2xaY-J5pwqg-2oj1FSf-e6hbUH-dd6gLK-apaLCY-9s6Xo7-2rwpbQY-4ho4D-pXvqh-dsSZs-hJQFX-sMe2e-7F5nYN-Ak7fq-b5Fpdn-azEevd-qzu2eZ-hmmB7-64NSFy-2kukVVV-8gqrHt-2fxuYNo-9RZW5F-7AR1R8-8uWufB\" title=\"Come Hither\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/live.staticflickr.com\/3173\/2998075209_4fa3f43b88_z.jpg\" width=\"640\" height=\"424\" alt=\"Come Hither\"\/><\/a><script async src=\"\/\/embedr.flickr.com\/assets\/client-code.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>The word <strong>hither<\/strong> [\u02c8h\u026a\u00f0\u0259 \/ \u02c8h\u026a\u00f0\u025a] is a literary or archaic word that means to this place, to here or over here. So if you tell a horse to <strong>come hither<\/strong>, you&#8217;d expect it to come towards where you are, but this command actually means move to the left, apparently [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/come_hither#English\">source<\/a>]. <\/p>\n<p><strong>Hither<\/strong> comes from Middle English <em>hider \/ hither<\/em> (to here), from Old English <em>hider<\/em> (to here), from Proto-Germanic <em>*hidr\u00ea<\/em> (to this place, to here, hither), from <em>*hiz<\/em> (this) and <em>*-dr\u00ea<\/em> (directional suffix) [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/hither#English\">source<\/a>]. <\/p>\n<p>Related expressions include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>behither<\/strong> = on this side of (<em>rare, obsolete<\/em>)<\/li>\n<li><strong>hither and thither<\/strong> = to here and to here, one place after another, in different directions, in a disorderly manner<\/li>\n<li><strong>hither and yon<\/strong> = in, at or to various places (<em>dated, literary<\/em>)<\/li>\n<li><strong>hithermost<\/strong> = nearest to this side (<em>archaic<\/em>)<\/li>\n<li><strong>hithertofore<\/strong> = heretofore, so far, thus far (<em>rare<\/em>)<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>What about <strong>thither<\/strong>? It means to that place, or to that point, end or result, and is used mainly in the expression <strong>hither and thither<\/strong>, and in legal language [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/thither#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p>There&#8217;s also <strong>whither<\/strong>, which means to what place, where, to what cause, to which place, in or to any place to which [<a href=\"https:\/\/en.wiktionary.org\/wiki\/whither#English\">source<\/a>].<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/pagead2.googlesyndication.com\/pagead\/js\/adsbygoogle.js?client=ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     crossorigin=\"anonymous\"><\/script><br \/>\n<!-- Blog horizontal --><br \/>\n<ins class=\"adsbygoogle\"\n     style=\"display:block\"\n     data-ad-client=\"ca-pub-5001128073855040\"\n     data-ad-slot=\"1685480124\"\n     data-ad-format=\"auto\"\n     data-full-width-responsive=\"true\"><\/ins><br \/>\n<script>\n     (adsbygoogle = window.adsbygoogle || []).push({});\n<\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>If someone is described as having come-hither eyes, it means their eyes are seducitve or alluring. If you tell a horse to come hither though, what would you expect it to do? The word hither [\u02c8h\u026a\u00f0\u0259 \/ \u02c8h\u026a\u00f0\u025a] is a literary or archaic word that means to this place, to here or over here. So [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104,10,26,33,44],"tags":[164,158,685,138,281,686,687,163],"class_list":["post-24728","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english","category-language","category-middle-english","category-old-english-aenglisc","category-proto-germanic","tag-english","tag-etymology","tag-hither","tag-language","tag-omniglot","tag-thither","tag-whither","tag-words"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24728","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=24728"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24728\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":24729,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24728\/revisions\/24729"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=24728"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=24728"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.omniglot.com\/bloggle\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=24728"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}