# their
## English
### Alternative forms

* thair, theire, theyr, theyre, thir (archaic)

### Etymology

From Old Norse þeirra. Replaced native Old English heora.

### Pronunciation

* (Received Pronunciation) IPA: /ðɛə/, /ðɛː/
** Audio (UK):(file)
* (US) IPA: /ðɛɚ/
** (unstressed form) IPA: /ðɚ/
* (Midwestern US) IPA: /ðɑː(ɹ)/
** Audio (US, stressed form); /ðɛɚ/:(file)
* (Canada) IPA: [ðeːɹ]
* (General Australian) IPA: /ðeː/
* (New Zealand, cheer–chair merger) IPA: /ðiə/
* (New Zealand, without the cheer–chair merger) IPA: /ðeə/
* (Scotland) IPA: /ðeɹ/
* (Lancashire, fair–fur merger) IPA: /ðɜː(ɹ)/
* (Indic) IPA: /d̪ɛjə(ɾ)/, /d̪ɛː(ɾ)/
* (th-alveolarisation) IPA: /zɛə(ɹ)/
* Homophones: there, they're
* Rhymes: -ɛə(ɹ), -ɑː(ɹ)

### Determiner

their
* Belonging to, from, of, or relating to, them (plural).
    they will meet tomorrow at their convenience
    this is probably their cat
** 1831, Thomas Carlyle, “Symbols”, in Sartor Resartus: The Life and Opinions of Herr Teufelsdröckh. […], London: Chapman and Hall, […], →OCLC, 3rd book, page 155:For all things, even Celestial Luminaries, much more atmospheric meteors, have their rise, their culmination, their decline.
** 2012 May 5, Phil McNulty, “Chelsea 2-1 Liverpool”, in BBC Sport:For Liverpool, their season will now be regarded as a relative disappointment after failure to add the FA Cup to the Carling Cup and not mounting a challenge to reach the Champions League places.
** 2013 July 20, “The attack of the MOOCs”, in The Economist, volume 408, number 8845:Since the launch early last year of […] two Silicon Valley start-ups offering free education through MOOCs, massive open online courses, the ivory towers of academia have been shaken to their foundations. University brands built in some cases over centuries have been forced to contemplate the possibility that information technology will rapidly make their existing business model obsolete.
* Belonging to someone (one person, singular), or occasionally to something.
** c. 1594 (date written), William Shakespeare, “The Comedie of Errors”, in Mr. William Shakespeares Comedies, Histories, & Tragedies […] (First Folio), London: […] Isaac Iaggard, and Ed[ward] Blount, published 1623, →OCLC, [Act IV, scene iii], line 1172:There's not a man I meet but doth salute me As if I were their well-acquainted friend […]
** 2006, St. John Ambulance, First on the Scene: Student Reference Guide, →ISBN, Lesson 2, page 3:Place the casualty on their back with feet and legs raised—this is called the shock position. [emphasis in original] Once the casualty is positioned, cover them to preserve body heat, but do not overheat.
** 1980, Bill Oddie, Bill Oddie's Little Black Bird Book, page 112:I prefer to think that birds have a sufficiently developed sense of humour to enjoy the spectacle of a human being hunched beneath a bush kissing the back of their hand.
** 2007, J. K. Rowling, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, (quoted edition: London: Bloomsbury, 2008, →ISBN, page 93):‘I mean ... if somebody made a mistake,’ Harry went on, ‘and let something slip, I know they didn’t mean to do it. It’s not their fault,’ he repeated, again a little louder than he would usually have spoken.
** 2021, Stern, Moore, Grundy, Young & Binzel, editor, The Pluto System after New Horizons, page 38:The only object ... showing the signature of N$_2$ in their spectra is Sedna.
** For more quotations using this term, see Citations:their.

#### Usage notes

* Regarding the use of singular their, see they.
* The words their, there, and they're are homophones in most English accents today. This often causes confusion between the three in writing.

#### Related terms

* they, them (personal pronouns, subject and object case)
* theirs (possessive pronoun)

#### Translations

Arabic: لَهُم (lahum), ـهُمْ (ar) m (-hum), ـهُنَّ (ar) f (-hunna), ـهُمَا du (-humā)
Egyptian Arabic: ـهم (-hum)
Armenian: նրանց (nrancʻ), իրենց (hy) (irencʻ)
Old Armenian: նոցա (nocʻa)
Aromanian: (a) lor m or f
Asturian: so (ast), sos (ast) pl
Azerbaijani: onların
Belarusian: іх (ix), і́хні (íxni), і́хны (íxny)
Bulgarian: те́хен (téhen), им (bg) (im)
Catalan: llur (ca)
Cebuano: ila (preposed), nila (postposed)
Chinese:
Cantonese: (formal, written) 他們的 / 他们的 (ta$^1$ mun$^4$ dik$^1$), (vernacular) 佢哋嘅 (keoi$^5$ dei$^6$ ge$^3$)
Hokkien: 𪜶 (zh-min-nan) (in)
Mandarin: 他們的 / 他们的 (zh) (tāmen de), 她們的 / 她们的 (zh) (tāmen de) (of females)
Coptic: ⲡⲟⲩ m (pou), ⲧⲟⲩ f (tou), ⲛⲟⲩ m pl or f pl (nou)
Czech: jejich (cs)
Danish: deres (da), sin (da)
Dutch: hun (nl)
Egyptian: (Old and Middle Egyptian) (.sn), (Late Egyptian) (.w)
Esperanto: ilia (eo), iliaj (eo) pl
Faroese: teirra, hjá teimum, sín, hjá sær
Finnish: (if owners are people) heidän (fi); (if owners are not people) niiden (fi), niitten (fi)
French: leur (fr) sg, leurs (fr) pl
Friulian: lôr
Galician: seu (gl) m, súa f, seus m pl, súas f pl
Georgian: მათი (mati), იმათი (imati), თავიანთი (tavianti)
German: ihr (de), ihre (de)
Gothic: 𐍃𐌴𐌹𐌽𐍃 (seins)
Greek:
Ancient: αὐτῶν (autôn) (gen. of personal pronoun), τούτων (toútōn) (gen. of medial demonstrative), ἐκείνων (ekeínōn) (gen. of distal demonstrative), τῶνδε (tônde) (gen. of proximal demonstrative), σφῶν (sphôn) (gen. of personal pronoun), σφέτερος (sphéteros) (adjective)
Hawaiian: (dual) ko lāua, kā lāua, (plural) ko lākou, kā lākou
Hebrew: שלהם pl (shelahém)
Hindi: उनका (hi) (unkā)
Hungarian: -uk, -ük, -juk, -jük
Icelandic: þeirra (is), sinn (is) m, sín (is) f, sitt (is) n
Ido: lia (io)
Interlingua: lor
Irish: a (ga)
Istriot: luri
Italian: il loro m sg, la loro f sg, i loro m pl, le loro f pl, loro (it)
Japanese: 彼らの (ja) (かれらの, karera no)
Kapampangan: karela, ila
Khmer: របស់គេ (rɔbɑh kei)
Korean: 그들의 (geudeurui)
Kyrgyz: алардын (ky) (alardın)
Latin: suus (la), illorum m or n, illarum f, eorum (la) m or n, earum (la) f, horum (la) m or n, harum (la) f
Latvian: viņu (lv)
Louisiana Creole French: yê
Macedonian: нивен (niven)
Maltese: tagħhom
Maori: tā rāua (singular dominant referring to two people), tō rāua (singular subordinate referring to two people), ā rāua (plural dominant referring to two people), ō rāua (plural subordinate referring to two people), tā rātau (singular dominant referring to three or more people), tō rātau (singular subordinate referring to three or more people), ā rātau (plural dominant referring to three or more people), ō rātau (plural subordinate referring to three or more people)
Marathi: त्यांचा m (tyāñcā), त्यांचे n (tyāñce), त्यांची f (tyāñcī)
Norwegian:
Bokmål: deres (no), sin (no) dems (nonstandard)
Nynorsk: deira (nn), sin
Occitan: lor (oc)
Persian: ـشان (fa) (-e-šân)
Pipil: in-
Polish: ich (pl)
Portuguese: seu (pt), seus (pt)
Romani: lenqo m, lenqi f, lenqe pl
Romanian: lor (ro) m or f, săi m, sale (ro) f
Romansch: lur
Russian: их (ru) (ix)
Scots: thair
Scottish Gaelic: aca, an, am
Serbo-Croatian:
Cyrillic: њихов
Roman: njihov
Sinhalese: ඔවුන්ගේ (owungē)
Slovak: ich (sk), svoj
Slovene: njíhov (sl)
Sorbian:
Lower Sorbian: jeju (referring to two people or things), jich (referring to three or more people or things)
Spanish: su (es) sg, sus (es) pl
Swedish: deras (sv), sin (sv) (c, singular), sitt (sv) (n, singular), sina (sv) pl
Tagalog: kanila (preposed), nila (postposed)
Thai: ของเขา (kŏng kăo)
Tlingit: has du
Turkish: onların (tr)
Ukrainian: їх (uk) (jix), ї́хній (jíxnij)
Urdu: ان کا (un kā)
Venetan: so (vec), suo (vec)
Vietnamese: của họ
Volapük: (masculine) omsik (vo), (feminine) ofsik, (neuter or of mixed or unspecified gender) onsik (vo)
Walloon: leu (wa) c, leus (wa) c pl
Welsh: eu
West Frisian: har, harren
Yiddish: זייער (zeyer)
Yoruba: wọn
Zulu: possessive concord + -bo class 2 (usually for people), -yo class 4, -wo class 6, -zo class 8, -zo class 10 :

### Adverb

their
* Misspelling of there.

### Contraction

their
* Misspelling of they’re.

### See also

| | | | personal pronoun | personal pronoun | personal pronoun | possessive pronoun | possessive determiner |
| | | | subjective | objective | reflexive | possessive pronoun | possessive determiner |
| first person | singular | singular | I me (colloquial) | me | myself me mysen | mine | my mine (before vowels, archaic) me |
| first person | plural | plural | we | us | ourselves ourself oursen | ours | our |
| second person | singular | standard, formal | you | you | yourself yoursen | yours yourn (obsolete outside dialects) | your |
| second person | singular | archaic, informal | thou | thee | thyself theeself thysen | thine | thy thine (before vowels) |
| second person | plural | standard | you ye (archaic) | you | yourselves | yours yourn (obsolete outside dialects) | your |
| second person | plural | colloquial | you all y'all you guys | you all y'all you guys | y'allselves | y'all's you guys' your guys' (proscribed) | y'all's your all's (nonstandard) you guys' your guys' (proscribed) |
| second person | plural | informal / dialectal | (see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries) | (see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries) | (see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries) | (see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries) | (see list of dialectal forms at you and inflected forms in those entries) |
| third person | singular | masculine | he | him | himself hisself (archaic) hissen | his hisn (obsolete outside dialects) | his |
| third person | singular | feminine | she | her | herself hersen | hers hern (obsolete outside dialects) | her |
| third person | singular | neuter | it hit | it hit | itself hitself | its his (archaic) | its his (archaic) hits |
| third person | singular | genderless | they | them | themself, themselves | theirs | their |
| third person | singular | genderless, nonspecific (formal) | one | one | oneself | – | one's |
| third person | plural | plural | they | them hem, 'em | themselves theirsen | theirs theirn (obsolete outside dialects) | their |

### Anagrams

* Erith, Reith, Rieth, Thier, rithe, tehri, theri-

## Middle English
### Determiner

their
* Alternative form of þeir

## Scottish Gaelic
### Pronunciation

* IPA: /heɾʲ/
* (Uist) IPA: [veɾʲ]

### Verb

their
* future of abair

#### Usage notes

* The dependent form is abair.
* Canaidh is more frequently used by most speakers nowadays.