# Reverse Alliteration? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 22, 2003, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reverse-alliteration/203089 "2003-09-22T14:19:02Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Pabst](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/e68b1a/32.png) [@Pabst](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pabst)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reverse-alliteration/203089/1 "2003-09-22T14:19:02Z")
Okay - so I’m at work and I get to thinking my usual idiotic thoughts and I am perplexed by a term for a language phenomenon (exciting, eh?) What is it called when there is a two word phrase, wherein the last part of the first word flows into the first sound of the second word? For example, (the one that triggered this thought at work) the phrase “Abe Books” or Top Post. It seems to be some sort of reverse alliteration if such a thing exists. I do not feel like digging through a Steven Pinker book or Noam Chomsky on Language. Useless I know, but curious I am. My gratitude to the scholar who solves this query. If nobody does, I can’t say I will be surprised. Thank you, :wally ---
**Author:** ![outside\_artist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/7993a0/32.png) [@outside\_artist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/outside_artist)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reverse-alliteration/203089/2 "2003-09-22T19:14:08Z")
I don’t know if there is a name for it, But I would imagine that it is something that many writers and orators would like to avoid, since it makes for awkward speech. If one were to say.Joe Bob Baker, he would have to say the ‘B’ at the end of the word, and the immediately say it again for the second. It uncomfortable to do and to hear, because for a second, the person sounds like she is saying two Bs right after each other. b-b. Silly. Just my theory. ---
**Author:** ![Roches](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/bc8723/32.png) [@Roches](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Roches)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reverse-alliteration/203089/3 "2003-09-22T19:49:59Z")
Such sounds are _long consonants_ grammatically. There are some languages where two words can differ only in the length of one consonant, such as in Italian (the only example I remember is _papa_ “pope” versus _pappa_ “porridge”). In English, long consonants only exist between words or in compounds, as in _Bob Baker_ or _bookkeeper_. There’s nothing wrong with sounds like this, but it isn’t really a literary or rhetorical device either. I imagine this was because most of the rhetorical devices in English come from Latin or Greek, where it was difficult to find words ending with the same sound as the beginning of the next word because the ends of most words were inflected. In English, such a construction leads to a double or ‘long’ consonant, which may be viewed by some listeners as unusual and interesting and by some as awkward. There are some rhetorical devices that are close to this, though. Repetition of a whole word at the end of one clause and the beginning of the next is called _anadiplosis_: “We shall build cities, cities larger than any yet seen.” Repetition of the same word or phrase at the end of several consecutive clauses is _antistrophe_. Repetition of the same sound in words close to each other is _assonance_, and this is probably the closest thing to what you were talking about. If two words end in the same sound, of course, it’s _rhyme_. Ending in the same letter isn’t enough to constitute rhyme; the final syllables have to end in the same vowel(s) (‘nucleus’) and share the same consonant sounds after that vowel (‘coda’). Incidentally, the nucleus and coda of a syllable are called its ‘rhyme’. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [September 22, 2003, 8:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/reverse-alliteration/203089/4 "2003-09-22T20:09:40Z")
Elision is close to what you are asking: From [dictionary.com](http://dictionary.com): > [@](#): > > e·li·sion n. > > Omission of a final or initial sound in pronunciation. > Omission of an unstressed vowel or syllable, as in scanning a verse. > The act or an instance of omitting something. > > * * * > > [Latin lsi, lsin-, from lsus, past participle of ldere, to strike out. See elide.] > > Source: The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth Edition > Copyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company. > Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved. > [Buy it] > elision > > n : omission of a sound between two words (usually a vowel and the end of one word or the beginning of the next) > > Source: WordNet ® 1.6, © 1997 Princeton University