Alternative forms

• Himself (honorific)
• himselfe (obsolete)
• himselve (obsolete)

Etymology

From Middle EnglishCategory:English terms inherited from Middle English#HIMSELFCategory:English terms derived from Middle English#HIMSELF hymself, from Old EnglishCategory:English terms inherited from Old English#HIMSELFCategory:English terms derived from Old English#HIMSELF him selfum. Equivalent to him +‎ -selfCategory:English terms suffixed with -self#HIMSELF.

Pronunciation

• IPA^(key): /hɪmˈsɛlf/, /ɪ̈mˈsɛlf/Category:English 2-syllable words#HIMSELFCategory:English 2-syllable words#HIMSELFCategory:English terms with IPA pronunciation#HIMSELF

• Audio (UK):

  (file)

  Category:English terms with audio pronunciation#HIMSELF

• Audio (US):

  (file)

  Category:English terms with audio pronunciation#HIMSELF
• (General Australian) IPA^(key): /hɪmˈself/, /ɪ̈mˈself/Category:English 2-syllable words#HIMSELFCategory:English 2-syllable words#HIMSELFCategory:English terms with IPA pronunciation#HIMSELF
• Hyphenation: him‧self
• Rhymes: -ɛlfCategory:Rhymes:English/ɛlf#HIMSELFCategory:Rhymes:English/ɛlf/2 syllables#HIMSELF

Pronoun

himself (the third person singular, masculine, personal pronoun, the reflexive form of he, feminine herself, neuter itself, plural themselves, gender-neutral singular himself or themselves or themself)Category:English lemmas#HIMSELFCategory:English pronouns#HIMSELFCategory:English entries with incorrect language header#HIMSELFCategory:Pages with entries#HIMSELFCategory:Pages with 1 entry#HIMSELF

1. (reflexive pronounCategory:English reflexive pronouns#HIMSELF) Him; the male object of a verb or preposition that also appears as the subject

   He injured himself.Category:English terms with usage examples#HIMSELF

   • 1897 December (indicated as 1898), Winston Churchill, chapter II, in The Celebrity: An Episode, New York, N.Y.: The Macmillan Company; London: Macmillan & Co., Ltd., →OCLC:

     Sunning himself on the board steps, I saw for the first time Mr. Farquhar Fenelon Cooke. He was dressed out in broad gaiters and bright tweeds, like an English tourist, and his face might have belonged to Dagon, idol of the Philistines.

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

   • 2024 September 9, Hannah Rabinowitz, “Alleged leaders of White supremacist group charged in effort to encourage terrorism and hate crimes”, in CNN‎:

     One Terrorgram user livestreamed himself stabbing five people outside of a mosque in Turkey, she said, and a 19-year-old Slovakian man praised the group in a manifesto before killing two people at an LGBTQ bar in Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia.

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

2. (emphatic) He; used as an intensifier, often to emphasize that the referent is the exclusive participant in the predicate

   He was injured himself.Category:English terms with usage examples#HIMSELF

   • 1611, The Holy Bible, […] (King James Version), London: […] Robert Barker, […], →OCLC, Isaiah 7:14, column 2:

     Therefore the Lord himſelfe ſhal giue you a ſigne: […].

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

   • 2014 June 21, “Magician’s brain”, in The Economist, volume 411, number 8892:

     The [Isaac] Newton that emerges from the [unpublished] manuscripts is far from the popular image of a rational practitioner of cold and pure reason. The architect of modern science was himself not very modern. He was obsessed with alchemy.

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

3. (IrelandCategory:Irish English#HIMSELF, otherwise archaicCategory:English terms with archaic senses#HIMSELF) The subject or non-reflexive object of a predicate; he himself.
   • 1603, Michel de Montaigne, chapter 7, in John Florio, transl., The Essayes […], book II, London: […] Val[entine] Simmes for Edward Blount […], →OCLC:

     Yet it is that himselfe had been liberally gratified by his Unkle with militarie rewards, before ever he went to warres.

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

   • Sir John Denham (1614-1669)

     With shame remembers, while himself was one / Of the same herd, himself the same had done.

   • 1998, Kirk Jones, Waking Ned, Tomboy films:

     Dennis: His glass is there and himself is in the toilet.

     Category:English terms with quotations#HIMSELF

     Category:Quotation templates to be cleaned
4. (IrelandCategory:Irish English#HIMSELF) The subject or non-reflexive object of a predicate; he (used of upper-class gentlemen, or sarcastically, of men who imagine themselves to be more important than others)

   Has himself come down to breakfast yet?Category:English terms with usage examples#HIMSELF

   Have you seen himself yet this morning?Category:English terms with usage examples#HIMSELF

Anagrams

• Flemish, flemish, mehfils