ABSTRACT
After a brief historical introduction concerning the emergence of the identity theories, its most popular version is taken up. This states that a true proposition is identical with a fact. It is argued that, based on some assumptions, this thesis may be true of some propositions, but it cannot be generalized to account for all true propositions, from which it is concluded that the identity theory cannot be taken to be a general theory of truth. There are, however, interesting implications of the identity theory that may shed new light on the referential theory. To demonstrate this a new version of the identity theory is proposed under which a sentence may be such that its referent is a state or a fact which is identical with the proposition expressed by it. This may be the case if we presuppose an extended version of the direct reference theory (or Millianism), according to which not only simple singular terms but also some simple predicates directly refer to their referents. A sentence that contains only directly referential terms (called a purely referential sentence) could then refer to a state or a fact which may be identical to the proposition expressed by that sentence.
