This question I swiped off from somewhere else on the web.
Why do we say “AN historic moment” but not
“AN horse or AN hospital” ?
En Francais, tout les Hs sont muet et l’article en avant et déterminé par la seconde lettre (probablement une voyelle).
Translation: In french, all Hs are silent at the beginning of words and the articles in front of them are determined by the second letter of the word, usually a vowel.
In English, it generally has to do with the pronunciation. If it is a hard h, then a, if it is a soft h then an. It’s a common sense thing, say An horse to yourself… it’s more than just the accostumation (is that a word? oh well…) of having heard it that way your whole life… it just doesn’;t roll off the tongue.
Although, i have this impression of the british being the same as the french ( heaven forbid) and saying An hippopotamus… try it in a birtish accent… it rolls much better.
My $0.02
“C’mon, it’s not even tomorrow yet…” - Rupert
If you need a graphic solution, http:\ alk.to\Piglet
Yes, in my case. It’s also common not to use ‘an’ before any of these. I don’t think anyone uses it before a primary-accented syllable beginning with ‘h’. I also doubt it would used before a secondary-accented such syllable, but I can’t think of a word of construction, right off.
‘An’ before initial ‘h’ has recently been the subject of a thread here, but I wouldn’t want to try to fing that thread.
Ray
Somehow, I missed the “why”; it is, of course:
The ‘n’ of ‘an’ is primarily used for, and only for, separating the vowel of the indefinite article ‘a’ from an initial vowel sound of its following word – just because speakers of English aren’t comfortable with such a state of affairs. You don’t ask such questions as why that is.
Then, if you tend to sense a (somewhat) pronounced ‘h’ at the beginning of an unaccented syllable following the indefinite article as too weak to interfere with the above situation, you also use ‘an’ in that case, as in ‘historical’; if you don’t sense such, you don’t use ‘an’. But you definitely don’t sense that in the case of a following ‘h’-initiated primary-accented syllable, such as in ‘horse’, and I don’t think you would in the case of a secondary-accented one either, such as in ‘hippopotamus’.
Ray (Who asked the French to to this party? Their rules don’t apply to English, and an unpronounced ‘h’ has no effect on this English rule that ignores spelling.)
So what about “an harmonica”?
I always thought that saying “an historic” was strictly a way to advertise that either 1) you are a television or radio announcer or 2) you’re incredibly snooty. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I don’t remember hearing people say “an historic” up until about 10 years ago - it was always “a historic” and “a hippo” and “a harmonica”.
And what’s up with HARassment instead of harASSment? Same thing, in my book. But then again, I mispronounce words on an incredibly frequent basis. I read too much, and have made up my own pronounciations for way too many words. Also, people in the UP just have their own way of saying lots of words (the Chevy Impala is pronounced IMPala instead of imPALa up there…) and I end up getting many strange looks quite often.
I’ve never used “an” with any word starting with a soft H. “A historic…” sounds correct to my ear and fits the rules I know.
To really drive yourself nuts listen to the Monty Python sketch Eric The Half A Bee.
John Cleese: “'e’s a 'alubut”
Michael Palin: “A what?”
J.C.: <enunciating carefully> “an halibut”
They don’t call me the colonel because I’m some dumb ass army guy.
In some words the soft h is so soft that it is almost (or IS) silent-- this is a question of pronounciation and not spelling. Some people say “Istoric” like we say “Erb” instead of “HHHHerb” which is a name. We do not say “a herb.” We do say ‘an’ before any vowel sound. So if the newscaster is saying “an HHHistoric event” that is misguided pretension. They should say “An Istoric” or “A Historic.”
My $.017 rounded up.
I’ve heard the origin of “humble pie” explained in a related way. Humble pie is made from deer numbles (guts) - it would have been called “a numble pie”. So then someone construed that as “an 'umble pie” which then naturally got turned into “an humble pie” and then “a humble pie”. Don’t know if that theories true though.
Speaking of apocryphal tales, I thought I read once that there was a Federal rule against government officials using “an” in front of “historical”, which meant that every time Reagan said that, he was violating Federal law. Also don’t know if it’s true.
This site should tell you what you need to know:
http://www.randomhouse.com/wotd/?date=19970804
I will never use ‘an’ before words starting with ‘h’, unless it is herb, in which case the ‘h’ is silent. It just doesnt sound right to me to say “an historic”. My rule is, use ‘a’ with words where the initial consonant is voiced. If the initial consonant is silent, as in ‘herb’, then use ‘an’