# Who invented silent letters? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 26, 2013, 6:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418 "2013-05-26T18:08:11Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2013, 11:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/41 "2013-05-27T23:11:39Z")
At least, every letter will _sometimes_ (usually, actually) have a sound. Silent letters are only silent in certain words. Not so in modern Hebrew. The language has two letters that are _always_ silent. But there are reasons for that. Hebrew letters are consonants only. Vowels aren’t written. You just have to know what vowel sounds to pronounce in each word. But a typical syllable consists of a consonant followed by a vowel sound (open syllable), or a consonant-vowel-consonant (closed syllable). So, to create a syllable that consists of a vowel sound _only,_ they use the letter א (aleph) as, in effect, a “placeholder consonant” to provide a place for the vowel to be. The letter ע (ayin) is also silent in modern Hebrew, and for practical purposes, also serves as a placeholder for a vowel. But it was not silent in classic Biblical-era Hebrew. (Although I don’t know quite what kind of sound it was – It’s usually described as some kind of “gutteral” sound.) It may also still be pronounced in some regional dialects. ---
**Author:** ![gracer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/8e7dd6/32.png) [@gracer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gracer)\ **Post date:** [May 27, 2013, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/42 "2013-05-27T23:59:24Z")
> [@Nava](#): > > I suspect that doesn’t quite apply to Dutch. The Academy of the Spanish Language was founded in 1713, inspired by the French one that hails from 1635. That’s right, the first standardisation of Dutch was in 1618 and there had been previous attempts that just hadn’t caught on. ---
**Author:** ![Giles](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/giles/32/60_2.png) [@Giles](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Giles)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 12:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/43 "2013-05-28T00:54:23Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Sometimes it’s just plain stupidity (masked as intelligence). The “s” in “island” was added when learned numbskulls thought the word derived from Latin words such as “insula” and it got added in. Folk entomologies have had a surprising effect on language. Another case like that is “rhyme”, which used to be spelled “rime” until it was changed to be closer to “rhythm”. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 1:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/44 "2013-05-28T01:55:28Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > Sometimes it’s just plain stupidity (masked as intelligence). […] Folk entomologies have had a surprising effect on language. You see this especially in sections of language like academic writing. But try not to let it bug you too much; the natural linguistic development beat’ll go on. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/45 "2013-05-28T02:52:54Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Bear in mind, however, that standardized spelling is a relatively recent invention. As recently as the late 1700’s (late American colonial days), spelling was all over the place. Standardization appears to be an American innovation, spearheaded by early American lexicographers like Noah Webster. Well, standardized spelling may be a recent invention, but it seems it was only a passing fad. I fear we’re **loosing** the standardization that we briefly enjoyed. ---
**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:** [May 28, 2013, 3:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/46 "2013-05-28T03:00:54Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > Well, standardized spelling may be a recent invention, but it seems it was only a passing fad. I fear we’re **loosing** the standardization that we briefly enjoyed. Please. Spelling changes constantly, and did so even after the introduction of dictionaries and spellers. And yes, many of those changes were because of mistakes that were embraced by the public (some just mentioned). There was never a perfect Golden Era in which everybody spelled words properly to fall from. ---
**Author:** ![I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/i_love_me_vol.i/32/521_2.png) [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/I_Love_Me_Vol.I)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 3:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/47 "2013-05-28T03:07:56Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Please. Spelling changes constantly, and did so even after the introduction of dictionaries and spellers. And yes, many of those changes were because of mistakes that were embraced by the public (some just mentioned). There was never a perfect Golden Era in which everybody spelled words properly to fall from. OK. Then why bother standardizing English spelling? Why not just have everyone spell things as they would like? I would say that at any given moment we are in a “perfect Golden Era”. IOW, at any one time there is a canon of correct spelling. That canon may change over time—in the future the correct spelling of “lose” may become “loose”. But right now, if you spell it that way, you’re just a goof, IMO. ---
**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:** [May 28, 2013, 3:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/48 "2013-05-28T03:32:50Z")
> [@I\_Love\_Me\_Vol.I](#): > > OK. Then why bother standardizing English spelling? Why not just have everyone spell things as they would like? > > I would say that at any given moment we are in a “perfect Golden Era”. IOW, at any one time there is a canon of correct spelling. That canon may change over time—in the future the correct spelling of “lose” may become “loose”. But right now, if you spell it that way, you’re just a goof, IMO. That’s not close to what you said earlier, that standardized spelling seems to be only a passing fad. That’s not true today anymore than it was true over the past 200 years or is likely to be in the future. Your new point is almost as dismissible, though. Every single year for the past 200 years, the era of the modern dictionary, scads of people have bemoaned the scandalous lack of understanding of the language by almost everyone other than themselves. The vulgar public couldn’t spell, didn’t know basic grammar - let alone advanced grammar, skewered the meaning and usage, dreadfully mispronounced words, and lacked the ability to write a comprehensible sentence, orderly paragraph, or coherent essay. And all that was probably true every single year. Remember that fewer than half of Americans even graduated high school until 1950. The notion that 60+% of the population would have some post-graduate education, as is true today, was inconceivable. (And yes, I do know what that word means.) All those fabled English teachers of the past either clearly failed in their task or were badly taught and incompetent themselves, almost certainly the latter. I will bet with 99% accuracy that any thread that starts with “my high school English teacher said” will contain linguistic nonsense. That’s because for their own protection and sanity they tried to perpetrate a number of “rules” that never existed in the language. I don’t fault them for this: again almost certainly the vast majority of students’ writing would have been far better off for obeying the rules, whether they made sense to people who truly understood the language or not. Prescriptivism today is a dead horse. Why people keep beating it is, well, inconceivable. People make foolish mistakes today, just as they always have, except that those foolish mistakes are easily seen by the whole world. Yet, “good” writing - the writing of the professionals in all fields - has equally never been more available and accessible. “Good” writing will win out, as it always has. Mostly because any mistakes that are gathered into the language become “good” writing with time. Go ahead and complain about outright solecisms like “loose” instead of “lose.” But it will either become accepted or will stay like “ain’t” and other “word’s” that are not used in “good” English. It’s probably the latter, but if it ain’t you can be sure that in 50 years some prescriptivist will use these and other bad word’s in their complaint against whatever the vogue mistakes of the day are. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 4:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/49 "2013-05-28T04:01:57Z")
> [@pulykamell](#): > > Almost. While “c” is normally pronounced as “ts” in Polish, when it is followed by an “i” it “softens” the “c” into a “ch”-type sound, so in English, without using IPA, I’d render it as “shchecheen.” Ah yes, but don’t omit that the Polish “cz” and “ć/ci” are _two different sounds!_ Just like “sz” and “ś/si” are two different sounds, and likewise “ż/rz” and “ź/zi” are two different sounds. In Polish orthography, the difference is shown accurately and clearly. But in an anglicized orthography (“ch,” “sh,” “zh”), the distinction would be lost. [Explanation](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Polish_phonology#The_consonant_system): Note the distinction between the laminal retroflex sounds (sz, ż, cz, dż) and the corresponding alveolo-palatals (ś, ź, ć, dź) – both of these series sound similar to the English palato-alveolar consonants (the sh and ch sounds and their voiced equivalents). The alveolo-palatals are pronounced with the body of the tongue raised to the palate. The series are known as “rustling” (_szumiący_) and “hushing” (_ciszący_) respectively. ---
**Author:** ![Johanna](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/johanna/32/8318_2.png) [@Johanna](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Johanna)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 4:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/50 "2013-05-28T04:04:14Z")
> [@JRDelirious](#): > > …Unless you pronounce “out” with an Atlantic Canadian accent? No unless. It’s still a diphthong in Canadian. The only difference is the first half of the diphthong is raised higher in Canadian than it is in American. ---
**Author:** ![Kimstu](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/ecd19e/32.png) [@Kimstu](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kimstu)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 5:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/51 "2013-05-28T05:10:40Z")
> [@Exapno\_Mapcase](#): > > Prescriptivism today is a dead horse. Why people keep beating it is, well, inconceivable. Prescriptivism is a natural part of language use, just as language modifications that violate prescriptivist rules are. People naturally have a negative reaction to modifications in written or spoken language that look or sound “wrong” to them. That’s not to say that such negative reactions automatically ought to have power to dictate how other people write or speak, of course. But language change and resistance to language change are the systole and diastole of linguistic evolution. Both are normal, neither is doing language any harm, and it seems a bit silly to get one’s knickers seriously in a twist about either of them. Having a good sneer or scold is always fun, but I doubt that any intelligent language user would seriously argue either that every instance of linguistic variation is wrong or that none of them are. Consequently, language is always going to keep changing and people are always going to keep arguing over where the boundary between acceptable and unacceptable changes is currently situated. I don’t see anything wrong with that. [QUOTE=Exapno Mapcase] People make foolish mistakes today, just as they always have, except that those foolish mistakes are easily seen by the whole world. […] “Good” writing will win out, as it always has. Mostly because any mistakes that are gathered into the language become “good” writing with time. Go ahead and complain about outright solecisms like “loose” instead of “lose.” But it will either become accepted or will stay like “ain’t” and other “word’s” that are not used in “good” English. [/quote] It’s all in the timing. The art lies in knowing when a particular modification still counts as a “foolish mistake” or “solecism” and when it has crossed the line to “become accepted”, after which point the anti-prescriptivists will scold you for complaining about it. ---
**Author:** ![dtilque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/d6d6ee/32.png) [@dtilque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dtilque)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 10:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/52 "2013-05-28T10:59:28Z")
> [@Senegoid](#): > > Bear in mind, however, that standardized spelling is a relatively recent invention. As recently as the late 1700’s (late American colonial days), spelling was all over the place. Standardization appears to be an American innovation, spearheaded by early American lexicographers like Noah Webster. This is not true. Standardization of English spelling started in the early 15th century with the [Chancery Standard](http://www.1066andallthat.com/english_middle/standard_04.asp). But it was a long slow process to get to the point where almost all words had a single agreed-upon spelling. Noah Webster tried to create a separate American spelling standard. He was only partially successful. ---
**Author:** ![Hypno-Toad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b2d939/32.png) [@Hypno-Toad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hypno-Toad)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 12:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/53 "2013-05-28T12:13:44Z")
When bailing a friend out of Guilford-Knight-Turner prison in Miami, I noticed that the signs were in three languages: English, Spanish and one that I couldn’t figure out. It looked Germanic with Ks and Zs and such. But when read phonetically, it sounded like French. That’s when I realized it was Haitian. French with English phonetic spelling. Kind of says something about Miami that those are the necessary languages for prison life. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 12:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/54 "2013-05-28T12:34:08Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > Ah yes, but don’t omit that the Polish “cz” and “ć/ci” are _two different sounds!_ Just like “sz” and “ś/si” are two different sounds, and likewise “ż/rz” and “ź/zi” are two different sounds. In Polish orthography, the difference is shown accurately and clearly. But in an anglicized orthography (“ch,” “sh,” “zh”), the distinction would be lost. Yes, they are two different sounds (which is why I refer to them as " ‘ch’-type" sounds instead of just “ch” sounds.) I just didn’t think the distinction was important in trying to explain how it’s approximately pronounced in English, and what the “i” does to a “c,” “s,” or “z,” in Polish orthography. ---
**Author:** ![blood63](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/97f17d/32.png) [@blood63](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blood63)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 1:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/55 "2013-05-28T13:09:20Z")
I’m not sure if it has been mentioned but it is worth noting that written words were more or less standardized with the invention of fixed type printing in the 1400’s. While oral language has changed, the spelling of words has remained the same. And since English is a conglomeration of several languages, the spelling of words often does not match the way they sound. ---
**Author:** ![Septima](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/dc4da7/32.png) [@Septima](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Septima)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 2:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/56 "2013-05-28T14:13:42Z")
In some languages, it’s a way to distinguish between homophones, or to denote some grammatical aspect which would otherwise be indicated by a change in tone. ---
**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:** [May 28, 2013, 4:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/57 "2013-05-28T16:09:55Z")
> [@Kimstu](#): > > It’s all in the timing. The art lies in knowing when a particular modification still counts as a “foolish mistake” or “solecism” and when it has crossed the line to “become accepted”, after which point the anti-prescriptivists will scold you for complaining about it. I agree it’s an art. But that leads to two major points. A) Most people are not artists; they are naive users. B) Art is the polar opposite of prescriptivism. Reformed prescriptivist speaking. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 4:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/58 "2013-05-28T16:42:56Z")
> [@Septima](#): > > In some languages, it’s a way to distinguish between homophones, or to denote some grammatical aspect which would otherwise be indicated by a change in tone. This is true of Thai, where a consonant (ห) normally sounding ‘H’ can be prefixed, silently, to a syllable to change its tone class and eliminate the need for a tone mark. (This isn’t as trivial a win as it might seem, since there is a rule that proper names should not have any tone marks! … but are allowed such ห prefixes.) > [@Senegoid](#): > > So, to create a syllable that consists of a vowel sound _only,_ they use the letter א (aleph) as, in effect, a “placeholder consonant” to provide a place for the vowel to be. Thai has vowel symbols, but still has a rule that every syllable must begin with a consonant – for one thing you need the consonant to hang vowel and tone marks on. Thus a special consonant (อ, which is separately employed as an ‘AH’ vowel sound), is prefixed to syllables otherwise without initial consonant. (It functions as a glottal stop – I don’t know if those are considered “silent.”) There are several other examples of silent consonants or vowels in Thai writing. Thais cannot pronounce an S at the end of a syllable, so when a foreign word like ‘JONES’ is transcribed into Thai, the ‘S’ may be preserved but a silencing mark is added on top of it. ---
**Author:** ![robert\_columbia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e79b87/32.png) [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 9:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/59 "2013-05-28T21:42:59Z")
Sumer is icumen in. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [May 28, 2013, 9:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418/60 "2013-05-28T21:57:14Z")
> [@Johanna](#): > > No unless. It’s still a diphthong in Canadian. The only difference is the first half of the diphthong is raised higher in Canadian than it is in American. A diphthong, yes - but to my ears, a diphtong is TWO sounds flowing into each other, not “_A_ sound that _neither_ indicates alone” (added emphasis mine). [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/who-invented-silent-letters/659418.md?page=4)