When to use “The” in English is the most common problem for English learners. For simplicity, they always explain it like this: “If we are talking about a certain subject, then we put “The” before it.” But this is not the whole rule.

Here is a cheat sentence

The Queen the French one of the Tudors lived at the Hilton Hotel in the US on the Earth, read the Times in the morning, sunbathed on the beach on the east coast, saw the first and the most interesting film about the last Ice Age, talked to the Chinese on the English language about the weather, was the only visitor in the Louvre, played the guitar, and floated on the Titanic in the Atlantic near the Bahamas.

And now, point by point. Definite article “The” is used with specific things and people, in particular with:

• titles / positions (the Queen, the President, etc.)

• nationalities (the French, the Chinese, etc.)

• families (the Tudors, the Ivanovs, etc.)

• hotels and restaurants, unless named after a person (the Hilton, the Golden Lion, etc.)

• countries in the plural or a group of islands / states (the USA, the Netherlands, the Bahamas, etc.)

• countries in a plural form or a group of islands / states (the USA, the Netherlands, the Bahamas, etc.)

• unique things (the Earth, the Titanic, the weather, etc.)

• the names of newspapers and famous buildings, works of art, museums, parks and monuments (the Times, the Louvre, etc.)

• word only boldly sculpt the (the only)

• superlative adjectives and ordinal numbers (the most interesting, the first, the last, etc.)

• geographic names and names of rivers, lakes, seas, oceans (the East, the Atlantic Ocean, etc.)

• muse with instruments (the guitar, the piano, the cello, etc.)

• languages, if with the word language (the Russian language, etc.)

So far we have collected all the insidious moments of “The” article in one post. Keep it for yourself and improve your speech!