wearing a T-shirt with the slogan
Norf London, representing "North London" with
th-fronting The first reference to
th-fronting is in the "low English" of London in 1787, though only a single author in that century writes about it, and it was likely perceived as an idiosyncrasy, rather than a full-fledged dialect feature of Cockney English, even into the early half of the twentieth century. The feature was presumed to be reasonably common in London speakers born around 1850 and in Bristol by 1880. The use of the labiodental fricatives and for the dental fricatives and was noted in Yorkshire in 1876. In his 1892 book
A Grammar of the Dialect of Windhill,
Joseph Wright noted variable
th-fronting in his district in words such as
think,
third and
smithy. In some words,
th-fronting has been
lexicalised. For example, the word
without was lexicalised to
wivoot in some dialects of Northern England and Scotland. In the
Survey of English Dialects of the 1950s and early 1960s,
th-fronting was found in two main areas of England. One was the area around Bristol in the West Country. The other was in the area around London and Essex. It was also noted in the
Suffolk dialect by AOD Claxton in 1968, albeit only for certain words (e.g.
three and
thumb but not
thaw or
thought). Comparing his studies over time in
Norwich,
Peter Trudgill concluded that
th-fronting had been completely absent in 1968 and then very common amongst younger people by 1983. Although
th-fronting is found occasionally in the middle and upper (middle) class
English accents as well, there is still a marked social difference between working and middle class speakers.
Th-fronting is regarded as a 'boundary marker' between Cockney and
Estuary English, as depicted in the first descriptions of the latter form of English and confirmed by a phonetic study conducted by researcher Ulrike Altendorf. Nevertheless, Altendorf points out that
th-fronting is found occasionally in middle class (Estuary) speech as well and concludes that "it is currently making its way into the middle class English accent and thus into Estuary English". In popular music, the singer
Joe Brown's 1960s backing band was christened
The Bruvvers (that is, "the brothers" with
th-fronting). The 1960 musical ''
Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be'' was stated to be a Cockney Comedy. Rock musician
Keith Richards is commonly referred to as "Keef". Up until the late 20th century,
th-fronting was common in speakers of Australian English from North Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast of Queensland. This may stem from the relatively high number of London cockneys who settled there during the Queensland gold rushes of the 19th century. The practice is gradually dying out as the influx of interstate and international immigrants increases. ==Example==