Etymograph

English

tho

Tho is a simplified reform spelling of though, popular in early-20th-century American English.

  1. English1500–presentthough1
  2. Englishearliest quotation 1579tho1

attested reconstructed ? uncertain or disputed deepest recorded ancestor

  1. 1 Wiktionary, English tho
  2. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1579, Immeritô pseudonym; Edmund Spenser, Ianuarye. Ægloga Prima.: “Tho to a hill his faynting flocke he ledde.”.

Lineage

  1. English1500–presentthoughWiktionary, English tho
  2. Englishearliest quotation 1579thoWiktionary, English tho. Earliest quotation in Wiktionary’s entry: 1579, Immeritô pseudonym; Edmund Spenser, Ianuarye. Ægloga Prima.: “Tho to a hill his faynting flocke he ledde.”

Word family

English words that share an ancestor with tho, grouped by the ancestor they share, most familiar first.

through Proto-Indo-European *to- ‘that’

  • though ← thogh ← *þóh ← *þauh ← *þau
  • thot ← thoucht ← thought ← thogh ← þēah

1 more relative in the full family tree

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Today it means

adv Then; thereupon.

Sources

Sources: Wiktionary, “tho”. By Wiktionary contributors, CC BY-SA 4.0, via kaikki.org (dump of Oct 3 2026); text adapted and restructured. Language periods are conventional ranges, not dates for this word. License.

Etymograph / English though / tho