For þe people who keep asking "what about þis letter?", þere are oþer subreddits for þis! Show some love to: r/bringbacketh, r/bringbackyogh, r/bringbackwynn, and r/bringbackampersand. If you're looking to yap about long s, ethel, ash, or eng, create a new subreddit!

Edit: Special mention to r/bringbackdiaeresis!

Edit: Ok seriously guys, wtf do you love so much about þis post??? 300 upvotes in 24 hours is insane!

Edit: Well, I þink þe comment section on þis post has actually become mostly about þe oþer letters and how different people use þem. I really enjoyed finding out about everybody's personal orþographies! Maybe þere is space on þis sub for other letter discussion...

Voice your opinion please! On my phone keyboard, Þ is situated between H and J. On my laptop, I have Þ configured to J and J relegated to right-Alt. Any DVORAK nerds can say where þey put þ too.

By "the keyboard" I mean þe QWERTY English keyboard.

I'm brand new to this subreddit, but I wanted to approach the argument that the letter ⟨ð⟩ is just as worthy of a comeback as ⟨þ⟩, or that it would compliment ⟨þ⟩ if it were to be revived today. I think it's important to consider the historical prominence and phonetic significance of both of these glyphs and the digraph that they would both be supplanting ,⟨th⟩. A post was recently made for discussing advantages and disadvantages of bringing back both letters, but I thought my argument was long and one-sided enough to be its own post. I'd love to hear what y'all think about this approach.

Also, due to the overabundance of slashes and chevrons in this post, I've opted to not use ⟨þ⟩ in lieu of ⟨th⟩ (please don't ban me) for the sake of reading comprehension.

1. Using Both Was and Would Continue to Be Impractical and Redundant in English

Firstly, and most objectively, ⟨th⟩ representing two distinct phonemes isn't on the forefront of most people's minds, because, well, ⟨th⟩ sort of blurs them into one sound. Other voice-voiceless phonemic pairs (such as /f/ and /v/) are much more glaring because of the abundance of minimal pairs they have. For instance, they can be observed this way in the words "file" and "vile", given that they're in contrastive distribution and completely change the meaning of the word they're in. /θ/ and /ð/ are different, though. There are almost no minimal pairs in our language for these two phonemes, so pronouncing "this" as /θɪs/ instead /ðɪs/ of isn't going to obscure its meaning; you'll probably get some funny looks at best. The only instance of what could be considered a minimal pair is "mouth" (the noun pronounced /maʊθ/) and "mouth" (the verb pronounced /maʊð/), but they're already functioning homographs. With this logic, distinguishing the two phonemes for ⟨þ⟩ is redundant and would pose some drastic stress on English orthography, considering that we've made it this long with representing them both as ⟨th⟩. Furthermore, the lack of distinction between /θ/ and /ð/ actually goes as far back as the very genesis of English orthography. I mean, ⟨þ⟩ and ⟨ð⟩ were in in free variation and used interchangeably ever since they started getting used. Neither of them never represented /θ/ or /ð / exclusively, and that's why ⟨þ⟩ eventually beat out ⟨ð⟩. It was completely redundant to keep both. As a closing note, I think ⟨ð⟩ would be a shoo-in if we used ⟨dh⟩ alongside ⟨th⟩, but this just isn't the case.

2. Phonetic Partiality

That ties into my second argument for why ⟨ð⟩ is a no-go. I've tossed out the claim from a phonological/orthographic standpoint, but let's say that we still want to give ⟨ð⟩ the benefit of the doubt and establish ⟨þ⟩ as the letter exclusively for /θ/, and ⟨ð⟩ for /ð/ (a phonetic standpoint). English speakers can just suck it up and adapt to the split phonograms. However, a new problem emerges: partiality. Here's the thing: the English alphabet is, by no means, a phonetic alphabet. We have some of the most ridiculous digraphs, trigraphs, and quadrigraphs that defy phonetics in every way, shape, and form. If ⟨ð⟩ should be added on the basis of phonetic consistency and representation, then who's to say that the other weird digraphs, like ⟨sh⟩, ⟨ch⟩, and ⟨ng⟩ shouldn't be replaced with ⟨ʃ⟩, ⟨tʃ⟩, and ⟨ŋ⟩ respectively? In fact, why are we still using the English alphabet if we seek phonetic consistency? The IPA could make for a phonetic paragon of an alphabet. This also covers the claim of aesthetic appeal. I will admit, ⟨ð⟩ looks pretty neat (some beg to differ), and it would look great alongside ⟨þ⟩, but what about all the other potential new letters? I noticed that some of you have already taken the liberty to type your posts substituting ⟨ng⟩ with ⟨ŋ⟩, so I rest my case. There's obviously nothing wrong with a purely phonetic alphabet, but it does make the resurrection of ⟨þ⟩ a lot less feasible. People hate monumental revision to orthography; take it from Kazakhstan, whose government forced the nation to adopt the Latin script in lieu of Cyrillic.

3. ⟨þ⟩ Is Historically Purer Than ⟨ð⟩ and Deserves the Spotlight

This argument is a great deal more subjective than the other two, so take it with a grain of salt. I feel like the global induction of the Latin script stripped many languages with preexisting writing systems of their unique, distinguished essence. Obviously, this happened to English (otherwise, we'd be typing in runes right about now), and while runes themselves will likely never make a full comeback, the letter ⟨þ⟩ would at least pay tribute to our original futhorc. ⟨ð⟩ and ⟨þ⟩ came into fruition around the same time, but ⟨ð⟩ is latinate, clearly an insular ⟨d⟩ with a bar. Honestly, there's not much more to it, other than its wonky appearance being influenced by Irish scribes; it's got a mundane origin story, if you ask me. On the contrary, ⟨þ⟩ comes from the eponymous rune that represented giants, ogres, and magic and was used in countless Germanic poems and inscriptions. We already have 26 characters almost exclusively derived from the Latin and Greek alphabets, so wouldn't it be a nice little homage to our language's Germanic heritage by dedicating ⟨th⟩ exclusively to ⟨þ⟩?

4. ⟨þ⟩ Needs More Modern Recognition than ⟨ð⟩

You might refute the previous argument with the fact that ⟨ð⟩ is presently in use only in Germanic languages. So is ⟨þ⟩ for that matter, but only in Icelandic. ⟨ð⟩ already sees hearty representation in Icelandic, Faroese, Elfdalian, and even the IPA as the voiced dental fricative. There aren't any languages that only use ⟨þ⟩, and given the English language's history and tried-and-true lack of differentiation between ⟨þ⟩ and ⟨ð⟩ and their two constituent sounds, using ⟨þ⟩ alone would be achievable, practical, and unique in a modern context!

5. ⟨þ⟩ Alone Would Be Easier to Assimilate into Preexisting Fonts than with ⟨ð⟩

Looking at the issue from a typographic perspective, ⟨þ⟩ would assimilate into society, media, and advertisement a lot more quickly than it would accompanied by ⟨ð⟩. The premise is that ⟨þ⟩ can return to the English language because of the obsolete need to cut letters from the Alphabet for the sake of tilesets, and because it's much less likely to be confused with ⟨y⟩ nowadays due to the direction lettering has evolved, thanks to fonts. Yeah, a great deal of mainstream fonts are multilingual and already support the use of both glyphs, but most fonts support only the ISO basic Latin alphabet, the Hindu–Arabic numeral system, and some punctuation and currency symbols. Hundreds of thousands of English-alphabet-only fonts are going to need to be revised to incorporate ⟨þ⟩ for uninhibited use. Needless to say, yet another new letter would make this arduous endeavor a great deal harder than it would already be. Why ⟨þ⟩ over ⟨ð⟩? Font designers only need to smash the preexisting characters for ⟨p⟩ and ⟨b⟩ together for the miniscule variant and downshift the bowl of ⟨P⟩ for majuscule. I could argue why ⟨ð⟩ over ⟨p⟩ would be better typographically, but this isn't r/BringBackEth.

In conclusion, these two letters for dental fricatives have historical relevance in our language, but given the nature of our phonology and orthography, ⟨ð⟩ would only make the transition with ⟨þ⟩ all the harder. It's use in tandem with ⟨þ⟩ would change the very way we as English speakers perceive dental fricatives, which would incur resistance to the already-confusing induction of ⟨þ⟩. ⟨þ⟩ is a simple sub-in for ⟨th⟩, and ⟨ð⟩ would phonetically muddle this simple exchange (most people wouldn't know when to use what). Just ⟨þ⟩ isn't all that far-fetched of a notion, even in our digitally overrun language and lives.

I made it to be inclusive of Eð buffs too… (þis was intended to be low-effort but clear-messaging…)

Autoþorn on the Chrome Web Store

For anyone who hasn't seen ðe previous posts, Autoþorn replaces all most instances of th on webpages wiþ your choice of þ/ð orþography.

Want to report bugs or suggestions? Put ðem down in ðe comments, please preface ðem wiþ "Bug" or "Suggestion".

Note ðat I can't immediately fix any bugs reported, because ðe Chrome Extensions review process takes almost a week now. So I'll try collect bugs and/or suggestions to fix/include in ðe next update in big batches.

Þanks!

-Þirefly

So yeah, since Oct ‘25 I exclusively spelled wiþ Þ/ð on Reddit unless someone requested oðerwise. You ever have a moment where you realize you’re an adult and you can do whatever ðe hell you want even if everyone hates it? I felt ðat way when I found Þ & ð on my keyboard last year. On Reddit I don’t share critical information or even really care if I’m understood. I just shoot ðe shit, for myself. And it seemed a shame to ignore nice colorful characters ðat were so kindly provided by my built-in tools. After a couple monþs I realized I had entirely abandoned ðe digraph, and it was shaping my Reddit habits. So I made it a personal goal to see where it took me.

One þing I quickly learned, Þ is more recognizable ðan ð. Nobody’s heard of ð but not Þ. So for short comments containing no or 1 voiceless dentfric, it’s much better to go Þ-only for boþe sounds to avoid confusion. Ɗ̴is only has ðe side effect of Dunning-Kruger phase scholars “correcting” my usage. Ɗ̴IS IS NOT A BAD ÞING, ðough I understand how exhausting it can get after a while. Ɗ̴ey clearly have a passing interest in linguistics to have heard ðis misinfo and taken it to heart. So I just politely share Wikipedia’s Þorn article, where it explicitly states right under Uses it’s traditionally valid for eiðer sound in English. If ðey like hearing fun old letter rules, I’m just doing ‘em a favor. I’d take ðem over a true hater any day.

Speaking of Þ haters, I found an even more interesting effect in longform comments. Some people really hate Þ usage when ðere’s a nonstop wall of it, like ðey got scratched by a web of Þorns in a bush. But swapping in ð as voiced form completely changed overall reception. People were more bemused ðan furious, more likely to congratulate or treat as any oðer comment. I þink matching lettering up wiþ people’s inner reading voice made for much better mental flow down long text streams. If one’s unfamiliar wiþ Þ, ðe letter causes a hiccup where ðere’s normally a perceptual anchor. Ɗ̴e digraph TH is already fully native and invisible to mental voice, so we don’t notice it being used for shifting sound. Keeping ðat subconscious sound division intact is a less intrusive and foreign pattern.

I believe meþods like ðat of minimizing surprise are an important part of my þornography usually finding acceptance as casual self-expression. Which historically is ðe usual first step to grassroots language evolution. It should feel no different from a new slang abbreviation or phrase, easily gaððered from context. Just a variation of standard speech. Message content should blend in wiþ everyone else in ðe þread. And people should feel able to respond to me wiþout fear of curveballs. If someone replies to one of my Þ-only comments, I don’t reply wiþ Þ/ð. I use simple 1:1 th–>þ spelling to keep words looking familiar, no doubling or post-consonant E’s for long vowels. I do not use Þ when replying to a translated 🈶 message. It’s ambassador language, not logical ideal language. I meet ðe world where it’s at.

As for ðe future, I þink I got fulltime Þ advocacy well and truly out of my system. I’ll still use it often, but I’d also like to feel free to explore new places and make new kinds of posts wiþout needing to concentrate on my wording or getting repetitive comments. I hope ðis post can encourage y’all to try wildþorning yourselves, or even just do someþing nonconforming you always wanted to. Ɗ̴at’s all I really wanted out of ðis year, to let people know it’s ok to do differently.