USAGE: Hither, thither and yon (was Re: Weekly Vocab 26)

On 19 Oct 2003 at 11:55, Roger Mills wrote:

> Padraic Brown wrote:
>
>
> > --- Christian Thalmann <cinga@...> wrote:
> > > Note:  I took the liberty to replace "whither"
> > > with "whence", which appears to make more
> > > sense here.
> >
> > Whither as in "where did it go!? I had it, but
> > now it's gone."
> >
> I have to admit, it took a while for me to figure out this archaism,
> although Indonesian makes the distinction:
>
> Hither -- 'to here' as in "come-hither looks" (kesini)
> Whither-- 'to where' as in "Whither goest thou?" (the translation of the old
> novel/movie "Quo Vadis?" (kemana)
> Thither -- 'to there' not encountered enough to have a catch-phrase (kesitu,
> kesana)
What about the phrase "Hither, thither and yon", which I've
encountered in quasi-archiac contexts (i.e. from my Grandparents)
meaning "All over the place"? Is this something unique to both sets
of my grandparents (from different regional and social lects), or is
it just British, or is it archaic, or what is the exact distribution?




Paul

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