thence

Etymology

It is formed from Middle English thenne (“from that place”) + -es (“adverbial genitive ending”), first written thannes and thennes;^[2][3][4][5] the Middle English Dictionary also records thens and thence.^[6] The base, thenne or thanne, is from Old English þanon or þanone (“from that place”), recorded in “Beowulf”,^[3][7][5] from Proto-Germanic *þanana,^[7][8] which also gave Old Saxon thanana, Old Frisian thana, Old High German danana, German dannen and Old Norse þana or þanan.^[7][4][3][8] These are built with suffixes on the demonstrative stem of that and the,^[3] and Etymonline traces it to Proto-Indo-European *to-, the demonstrative base.^[7] The later spelling with c kept the voiceless s sound when final -s in inflections came to be voiced, as in hence, once and pence.^[2][9][10]

Earliest recorded meaning

From that place, usually with a sense of motion away from it: about 1290, in the South English Legendary.^[2][7] Barnhart dates thannes to about 1300 and thennes to before 1325.^[3]

Semantic evolution

From the start the adverb could also mean "away from there, distant", now used chiefly in stating distances.^[2][11] The sense "from that time" is recorded in Chaucer's translation of Boethius (about 1374),^[2][7] where thenceforth also first appears;^[3] Chaucer used thennes 17 times.^[12] The redundant from thence is found from 1388, in the Wycliffite Bible,^[2][7] and Johnson (1755) called it "a barbarous expression", since thence already implies "from"; he also gave the senses "from that time" and "for that reason".^[13] The logical sense, from that source or premise, therefore, is dated to 1652 by the OED.^[2][7] The word is now chiefly literary.^[2][9]

Timeline

• c. 1290 – from that place; also, away from there, distant.^[2]
• c. 1374 – from that time, thenceforth.^[2][7]
• 1388 – with redundant from: from thence.^[2]
• before 1450 – as a relative, from which place (now obsolete).^[2]
• 1652 – from that source or cause; therefore.^[2][7]

Meanings

Adverb

1. (chiefly literary) From that place; from there: They sailed to Lisbon and thence to Madeira.^[14][11][2]
2. Away from there, used in stating distances: The farm lay three miles thence.^[11][2]
3. From that fact or cause; therefore: A conclusion follows thence.^[14][11][2]
4. (archaic) From that time; thenceforth.^[11][2][14]

Word family

• thenceforth
• thenceforward

Related words

• hence
• whence
• thither
• then
• that
• the

References

1. ^ Wiktionary, the free dictionary, https://en.wiktionary.org
2. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q Oxford English Dictionary Online (accessed March 2026), Oxford: Oxford University Press
3. ^ a b c d e f Barnhart, Robert K. (1988), The Barnhart Dictionary of Etymology
4. ^ a b Klein, Ernest. A Comprehensive Etymological Dictionary of the English Language. 2 vols. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 1966–1967.
5. ^ a b Hoad, T. F., ed. (1986), The Concise Oxford Dictionary of English Etymology, Oxford: Clarendon Press
6. ^ Kurath, Hans; Kuhn, Sherman M.; Lewis, Robert E., eds. (1952–2001), Middle English Dictionary, Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press; online edition ed. Frances McSparran et al. (2000–2018)
7. ^ a b c d e f g h i j Harper, Douglas. Online Etymology Dictionary, https://www.etymonline.com
8. ^ a b Orel, Vladimir (2003), A Handbook of Germanic Etymology, Leiden / Boston: Brill
9. ^ a b Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles (2002), 5th ed., ed. William R. Trumble and Angus Stevenson, Oxford: Oxford University Press
10. ^ Stevenson, Angus, ed. (2010), Oxford Dictionary of English, 3rd ed., Oxford: Oxford University Press
11. ^ a b c d e Merriam-Webster Unabridged Dictionary (2024), online ed., Springfield, Mass.: Merriam-Webster
12. ^ Benson, Larry D., Glossarial Concordance to Middle English (Chaucer, Gower), Johns Hopkins University, github.com/jhu-digital-manuscripts/gcme
13. ^ Johnson, Samuel (1755), A Dictionary of the English Language, London; 4th ed. 1773; Johnson's Dictionary Online, ed. Beth Rapp Young et al.
14. ^ a b c Collins English Dictionary (2023), Glasgow: HarperCollins