“A Heraldic dragon sits atop the Temple Bar monument in London, England”
or
“An Heraldic dragon sits atop the Temple Bar monument in London, England”
I think technically “an” is correct here, but “a” sounds right to me.
Depends on whether you’re pronouncing the H in ‘Heraldic’
A Heraldic
an 'eraldic
Huh… pronouncing the H is optional? I always have, but then again I’m Canadian so all bets are off.
Thanks.
En anglais, le “h” est toujours aspiré.
Not entirely true (there is “hour”), but in general if you pronounce the “h” it’s “a.”
A Heraldic dragon.
A history book.
A historian (though in the UK, it’s “an” for some reason).
Not just in the UK, and the reason is what has already been mentioned. To elaborate, in words beginning with “h” that are accented on the second syllable, the initial “h” is often dropped, in which case “an” is used. Google on “an historical” initial h for more info.
And a few others - including honest, honour
plus historic and herb (in some dialects).
An preceeds a vowel sound, not necessarily a word starting with a vowel letter.
Not if you speak English correctly.
But there’s a rather alarmingly large number of people who refuse to pronounce H’s at the beginning of a great many words. The technical term for these people is “bloody limeys.”
Since “a” and “an” depend entirely on your pronunciation of the upcoming word, there’s no single answer.
“An historian” is very rarely used in formal speech - it is simply incorrect.
The same applies to “an hotel” or “an historic” too.
Some people hold onto it as an affectation, or through mis-information, but it should not be used in normal or formal speech, academic discourse, or journalism.
In speech where the initial “h” is dropped you will use “an”, but unless rendering dialogue it should be avoided in written form.
What e-logic said - don’t believe what you read about us crazy Brits saying “an historian” or “an hotel”. We just don’t. Well, OK, a few crusty types might, but the usage is very rare and becoming rarer.
I just pulled up the most recent 10 example of “a/an historian” in a database of UK national newspapers, and only one used “an” (in The Times, which is clearly not consist as another threre articles in the same paper used “a”).
As an editor, I’d change “an historian” to “a historian” every time.
Why do I have this vision of Audrey Hepburn talking about Hartford, Hereford and Hampshire? 
Isn’t Hartford in Connecticut?
Yes. Hertford (pronounced the same, give or take an English accent) is just north of London.
How 'bout the pronunciation of the “a”.
Either (eyether) AYE like in “fate” or UH, as in “Adonis.”
AYE historic landmark may sound better than UH historic landmark. Opposed to what I ofter hear, andprobably say, An 'istoric landmark.
Not sure which is which, but if your not gonna drop the H and say “AN” changing your pronunciation of the “A” may feel better.
There is not universal agreement on this. The American Heritage Book of English Usage states "These usages [an historical, an hysterectomy, an hereditary trait] are acceptable in formal writing:
Well, the Economist suggests in its style guide that:
And The Times goes with:
… so it does appear that opinion is split.
I can only offer my experience as a native Britain - when I studied for a post-grad Literature degree at Cambridge Uni in 2001, we would never have written “an historic” or “an hotel”, and this usage will mark you out as slightly archaic / pompous (IMHO).
However, it’s clearly not as officially frowned upon as I thought!
We debated some issues like this recently. Saying that something is “simply incorrect” is a dicey enough proposition at the best of times when we’re talking about usage, and your own citations, and those of Gary T, show that there’s far from universal agreement on this issue. I’ll say here what i said in the other thread:
English usage guides, like the third edition of Fowler’s Modern English Usage (ed. R.W. Burchfield) recommend “an historical.” American usage guides, like Bryan Garner’s Dictionary of Modern American Usage, says that:
Even more interestingly, Garner notes that the 1926 edition of Fowler’s Modern English Usage, written by Fowler himself, “advocated a before historic(al) and humble.” It seems that the current preference for an in Fowler’s is the new editor, Burchfield’s, contribution to the volume.
Huh?
So, if you’re talking, you say “I will wait for an hour,” but if you’re writing about someone, you write “He waited for a hour”?
That’s something i’ve never heard of in my life.
That’s odd - I now realise that I would naturally say “an habitual”, but not any of the others. Maybe the influence of the opening credits of Porridge!
I do find it odd that Fowler would give credence to “an harassed schoolteacher”, as that seems to indicate that he favoured the American pronunciation of “harassed”, with the stress on the second syllable. AFAIK, the usual British pronunciation has always had the stress on the first syllable, though the American pronunciation has gained ground in recent years.
You misread my post. The quotation is not from Fowler, but from Bryan Garner’s Dictionary of Modern American Usage.
Some people say things like “an historian” or “an heraldic symbol” because it is difficult to pronounce the “H” between the article and the word, because there’s no opportuntity to expel the puff of air that equates to “pronouncing the H”. Therefore when spoken, at least in rapid American English, it does sound like “a 'istorian” or “a 'eraldic symbol” That’s because without the opportunity in the flow of speech to add the “H” puff, the words elide together and
“I’ll ask a historian” sounds like
“I’ll ask Astorian” and
“It’s a heraldic symbol” sounds like
“It’s Araldic symbol”
People don’t say “a apple” or “a incident” for the same reason: the article and the subject get slurred together. To maintain the independence of the article from the subject, some people automatically employ the rule they’ve been taught since early childhood for words beginning with a vowel, and switch the article in “a 'istorian” or “a 'eraldic symbol” from “a” to “an.”
Thus, this is not always an “affectation,” neither is it done from “misinformation” and you probably do speakers a disservice by assuming those reasons, as opposed that it is something that is subconsciously done.