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(obsolete (in use until the 20th c.))enPR: ā′thə(r)IPA(key): /ˈeɪ.ðə(ɹ)/
In the UK, /aɪ/ is used more in Southern England, and /iː/ is more usual in Northern England. In North America, /iː/ is the most common, but /aɪ/ is predominant in some regions. Note that even if one pronunciation is more common in a region, the pronunciation used varies by individual speaker and sometimes by situation. /eɪ/ was once heard in Northern England, but has now largely fallen into disuse.[1]
There is a locomotive at either end of the train, one pulling and the other pushing.
1667, John Milton, “Book III”, in Paradise Lost., London: [Samuel Simmons], and are to be sold by Peter Parker; nd by Robert Boulter; nd Matthias Walker,, →OCLC; republished as Paradise Lost in Ten Books:, London: Basil Montagu Pickering, 1873, →OCLC:
Jonathan Swift (1726) Gulliver's Travels, 1st edition:
I hope you will be ready to own publicly, whenever you shall be called to it, that by your great and frequent urgency you prevailed on me to publish a very loose and uncorrect account of my travels, with directions to hire some young gentleman of either university to put them in order, and correct the style, as my cousin Dampier did, by my advice, in his book called “A Voyage round the world.”
They entreat, they pray, they beg, they supplicate (will either of these do, Miss Clary?) that you will make no scruple to go to your uncle Antony's […].
Usage notes
When there are more than two alternatives, in the sense of “one of several” or “one of many”, any is now often used instead. Use of either with more than two (mutually exclusive) options remains common informally,[2] but a usage prescription against it is so widely known that it is usually avoided formally. This fact about eitheror is likewise true of neithernor.
He made me two offers, but I did not accept either.
2013 September 7, Daniel Taylor, “Danny Welbeck leads England's rout of Moldova but hit by Ukraine ban”, in The Guardian:
Hodgson may now have to bring in James Milner on the left and, on that basis, a certain amount of gloss was taken off a night on which Welbeck scored twice but barely celebrated either before leaving the pitch angrily complaining to the Slovakian referee.
a.1627 (date written), Francis , “Considerations Touching a VVarre vvith Spaine.”, in William Rawley, editor, Certaine Miscellany VVorks of the Right Honourable Francis Lo. Verulam, Viscount S. Alban., London: I. Hauiland for Humphrey Robinson,, published 1629, →OCLC:
Scarce a palm of ground could be gotten by either of the three.
But Richmond[…]appeared to lose himself in his own reflections. Some pickled crab, which he had not touched, had been removed with a damson pie; and his sister saw[…]that he had eaten no more than a spoonful of that either.
Usage notes
After a positive statement, too is commonly used: “I like him, and I like her too.”
Either is sometimes used, especially in North American English, where neither would be more traditionally accurate: “I’m not hungry.” “Me either.”
Thus, when he drew up instructions in lawyer language[…]his clerks[…]understood him very well. If he had written a love letter, or a farce, or a ballade, or a story, no one, either clerks, or friends, or compositors, would have understood anything but a word here and a word there.
The translations below need to be checked and inserted above into the appropriate translation tables. See instructions at Wiktionary:Entry layout § Translations.
^ "Pronunciation: Either". Reader's Digest. (1964). The Complete Atlas of the British Isles, p. 123.
^ Pullum, Geoffrey K. (2024) The Truth About English Grammar, Polity Press, →ISBN, pages 84-85: “And regardless of how many coordinates there are, when the coordinator is or, you can put the determinative either in front of it to emphasize the fact that the coordinates present alternatives: either toast, hash browns, or pancakes.”