THE ancient notion of English grammar was one of certain categories of words, and certain rules for their proper use. This is still the idea implied in most of the dictionary definitions of the word.

The case of an august part of old English grammar being regarded as a vulgar American import is an odd one. Writers of usage guides have tended to be a conservative lot.

→ How America saved old-fashioned English grammar; From the October 19th 2019 edition. Discover stories from this section and more in the list of contents.

Bruce Mitchell, An Invitation to Old English and Anglo Saxon England (Oxford, 1995) B. Mitchell and F. C. Robinson, A Guide to Old English, 6th edn (Oxford, 2001) – more detailed and challenging if ...

Nowhere in Old English grammar is there actually a precise ancestor for ‘the’. But some time over the 1100s it entered our language. Men say ‘the’ significantly more frequently than women.