■ pronoun [ third person plural ]
1》 used as the object of a verb or preposition to refer to two or more people or things previously mentioned or easily identified.
↘used after the verb ‘to be’ and after ‘than’ or ‘as’.
2》 referring to a person of unspecified sex (used in place of either ‘him’ or ‘him or her’).
3》 archaic ~selves.
■ determiner informal or dialect those.
Origin
ME: from ON theim 'to those, to ~', dative plural of sá ; related to their and they .
Usage
On the use of ~ in the singular to mean ‘him or her’, see usage at they .