ablaut

en-noun

ablaut (countable and uncountable, plural ablauts)

Borrowed from German Ablaut (“sound gradation”), which is from ab- or ab (“down, off”), + Laut (“sound”). Ab is used here in the sense of “deviating, varying” as in Abgott (“god other than the true God”), Abart (“different sort, variety, anomality”).

bor+

The Shorter Oxford English Dictionary on Historical Principles

Oxford University Press
w:Oxford University Press

(phonology) The substitution of one root vowel for another, thus indicating a corresponding modification of use or meaning; vowel permutation, distinct from the phonetic influence of a succeeding vowel.


open

en-adj

open (comparative more open, superlative most open)

more open (comparative)
most open (superlative)

closed-source

antonym(s) of “with a free license and no proprietary components”

Adjective from Middle English open, from Old English open (“open”), from Proto-West Germanic *opan, from Proto-Germanic *upanaz (“open”), from Proto-Indo-European *upo (“up from under, over”).
cognates
* Scots apen (“open”)
* Saterland Frisian eepen (“open”)
* West Frisian iepen (“open”)
* Dutch open (“open”)
* Low German open, apen (“open”)
* German offen (“open”)
* Danish åben (“open”)
* Swedish öppen (“open”)
* Norwegian Bokmål åpen (“open”)
* Norwegian Nynorsk open (“open”)
* Icelandic opinn (“open”)
 Compare also Latin supinus (“on one's back, supine”), Albanian hap (“to open”). Related to up.
Verb from Middle English openen, from Old English openian (“to open”), from Proto-West Germanic *opanōn, from Proto-Germanic *upanōną (“to raise; lift; open”), from Proto-Germanic *upanaz (“open”, adjective). Cognate with Saterland Frisian eepenje (“to open”), West Frisian iepenje (“to open”), Dutch openen (“to open”), German öffnen (“to open”), Danish åbne (“to open”), Swedish öppna (“to open”), Norwegian Bokmål åpne (“to open”), Norwegian Nynorsk and Icelandic opna (“to open”). Related to English up.
Noun from Middle English open (“an aperture or opening”), from the verb. In the sports sense, however, a shortening of “open competition”.

inh

at church every time the doors swing open

(phonetics, of a syllable) Ending in a vowel; not having a coda.

Not completed or finalised.
Ending in a vowel; not having a coda.

"Supposing somebody sees you, with all those flowers too? Supposing somebody writes him a letter? Ooooh!" (a pure round open Tamil O.)

1959, Anthony Burgess, Beds in the East (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 421:

(phonetics) Uttered with a relatively wide opening of the articulating organs; said of vowels.

(phonetics) Uttered, as a consonant, with the oral passage simply narrowed without closure.


accent

en-noun

accent (countable and uncountable, plural accents)

From Middle English accent, from Medieval Latin accentus and Old French accent, acent, both from Latin accentus, past participle of accinō (“sing to, sing along”). The word accent had been borrowed into Old English already, but was lost and reborrowed in Middle English.

tongval

distinctive pronunciation associated with a region, social group, etc.

акце́нт

math: mark to distinguish magnitudes of similar kind

pilkku

geometry: mark indicating minutes and seconds of a degree

(prosody, poetry) Stress laid on certain syllables of a verse.


in

PIE word
 *h₁en
Preposition and verb from Middle English in, from Old English in, from Proto-Germanic *in.
Adverb, noun and adjective from Middle English in, from Old English inn and inne, from Proto-Germanic *innai.
Sense 1/2 "in"/"into" are from the original PIE prefix, with locative/accusative case respectively. Sense 3/4 "qualification"/"means" are from the PIE metaphor of all infinitives coming from locatives.

Many English nouns in -is form their plurals in -es.

Used to indicate location, inclusion, or position within spatial, temporal or other limits.


vowel

→ Yoruba: fáwẹ̀lì

From Middle English vouel, from Old French vouel, a variant of voyeul (whence French voyelle), from Latin vōcālis (“voiced”), itself a semantic loan of Koine Greek φωνῆεν (phōnêen). Doublet of vocal and vocalis.

In Welsh, the w usually represents a vowel.

(phonetics) A sound produced by the vocal cords with relatively little restriction of the oral cavity, forming the prominent sound of a syllable.


consonant

→ Swahili: konsonanti

From Middle English consonant or consonaunt, from Old French consonant, from Latin cōnsonāns (“sounding with”), from the prefix con- (“with”) + the present participle sonāns (“sounding”), from sonāre (“to sound”). The Latin is a calque of Ancient Greek σύμφωνον (súmphōnon).

(phonetics) A sound that results from the passage of air through restrictions of the oral cavity; any sound that is not the dominant sound of a syllable, the dominant sound generally being a vowel.

ព្យញ្ជនៈ

pyŭəñcĕəʼnĕəʼ


quantity

quantity (countable and uncountable, plural quantities)

From Middle English quantite, from Old French quantité, from Latin quantitās (“quantity”), from quantus (“how much”).


masculine

en-adj

masculine (comparative more masculine, superlative most masculine)

more masculine (comparative)
most masculine (superlative)

From Middle English masculyne, masculyn, from Old French masculin, from Latin masculīnus, diminutive of masculus (“male, manly”), itself a diminutive of mās (“male”). Displaced native Old English werlīċ (literally “manly”).

mashkullor

having male qualities, not feminine or effeminate

Masculine caesura, masculine catalexis, masculine ending.

(prosody) Following or ending on a stressed syllable.


anterior

Borrowed from Latin anterior (“that is before, foremost”).

bor

(anatomy) Nearer the forward end, especially in the front of the body; nearer the head or forepart of an animal.

(phonetics) Pronounced with an obstruction located in front of the palato-alveolar region of the mouth, e.g. b, p, d, t.


close

en-adj

close (comparative closer, superlative closest)

closer (comparative)
closest (superlative)

open

antonym(s) of “articulated with the tongue body relatively close to the hard palate”

Borrowed from French clos, from Latin clausum, participle of claudō.

close only counts in horseshoes and darts

close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades

(linguistics, phonetics, of a vowel) Articulated with the tongue body relatively close to the hard palate.


merger

From Anglo-Norman merger (verb used as noun).

-ɜː(ɹ)dʒə(ɹ)

the cot-caught merger

(phonology) A type of sound change where two or more sounds merge into one.


GA

General American
General American#English

(England phonology) Abbreviation of General American.


oral

Early 17th century borrowing from Late Latin ōrālis, from ōs (“the mouth”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix).

af

(phonetics, of a speech sound) Pronounced by the voice resonating in the mouth, as the vowels in English.


breath

Breath (disambiguation)
Brill Publishers

From Middle English breeth, breth, from Old English brǣþ (“odor, scent, stink, exhalation, vapor”), from Proto-Germanic *brēþiz (“vapour, waft, exhalation, breath”) (compare German Brodem (“haze, vapor; breath”), of a different but related formation), of unknown origin; perhaps from Proto-Indo-European *gʰwer- (“smell”) or alternatively from *bʰreh₁- (“to blow; breath, vapor, steam”), but without certain Indo-European cognates outside Germanic.

inh

(phonetics, of a consonant or vowel) voiceless, surd; contrasting with voice (breath sounds, voice sounds)


vocal

en-adj

vocal (comparative more vocal, superlative most vocal)

more vocal (comparative)
most vocal (superlative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Mélange a trois-vocal.wav

Late Middle English vocal, borrowed from Latin vōcālis (“uttering a voice, sounding, speaking”), from vōx (“a voice, sound, tone”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix). Doublet of vowel and vocalis. Compare Old French vocal.

af

Of, pertaining to, or resembling the human voice or speech.

(phonetics) Consisting of, or characterized by, voice, or tone produced in the larynx, which may be modified, either by resonance, as in the case of the vowels, or by obstructive action, as in certain consonants, such as v, l, etc., or by both, as in the nasals m, n, ng.

vokaali

characterized by voice or tone produced in the larynx


vocal

(phonetics) A vocal sound; specifically, a purely vocal element of speech, unmodified except by resonance; a vowel or a diphthong; a tonic element; a tonic.


bleed

en-verb

bleed (third-person singular simple present bleeds, present participle bleeding, simple past and past participle bled)

bleeds (present singular third-person)
bleeding (participle present)
bled (participle past)
bled (past)

From Middle English bleden, from Old English blēdan (“to bleed”), from Proto-West Germanic *blōdijan, from Proto-Germanic *blōþijaną (“to bleed”), from *blōþą (“blood”).
Cognates
Cognate with Scots blede, bleid (“to bleed”), Saterland Frisian bläide (“to bleed”), West Frisian bliede (“to bleed”), Dutch bloeden (“to bleed”), Low German blöden (“to bleed”), German bluten (“to bleed”), Danish bløde (“to bleed”), Swedish blöda (“to bleed”).

кровоточи́ть

seldom used, име́ть кровотече́ние (imétʹ krovotečénije), идёт кровь (idjót krovʹ)

Labialization bleeds palatalization.

(phonology, transitive, of a phonological rule) To destroy the environment where another phonological rule would have applied.


foot

en-noun

foot (plural feet or (UK colloquial, unit of measure) foot)

→ Assamese: ফুট (phut)

q

from <i class="Latn mention" lang="en">feet</i>

→ Japanese: フット (futto), フート (fūto); フィート (fīto) (from feet)

→ Russian: фут (fut)

Sranan Tongo: futu

Aukan: futu

Saramaccan: fútu

→ Swahili: futi

→ Thai: ฟุต (fút)

Tok Pisin: fut, put

→ Urdu: فٹ (fuṭ)

→ Phalura: fuṭ

From Middle English fot, fote, foot, from Old English fōt, from Proto-West Germanic *fōt, from Proto-Germanic *fōts, from Proto-Indo-European *pṓds. Doublet of pes, pie (“Spanish unit of length”), and pous.

doublet

not touch something with a ten-foot pole

you cannot put the same shoe on every foot

(prosody) The basic measure of rhythm in a poem.

(phonology) The parsing of syllables into prosodic constituents, which are used to determine the placement of stress in languages along with the notions of constituent heads.


sound

en-noun

sound (countable and uncountable, plural sounds)

→ Cebuano: sawon

→ German: Sound

→ Finnish: saundi

→ Japanese: サウンド (saundo)

→ Indonesian: sound

→ Korean: 사운드 (saundeu)

→ Malayalam: സൗണ്ട് (sauṇṭŭ)

→ Swedish: sound

Tok Pisin: saun

* Noun: from Middle English sownde, alteration of soun, borrowed from Anglo-Norman sun, soun, Old French son, from accusative of Latin sonus, ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *swenh₂- (“to sound, resound”).
* Verb: from Middle English sownden, sounen, borrowed from Anglo-Norman suner, sounder, Old French soner (modern sonner), from Latin sonō.
* The hypercorrect -d appears in the fifteenth century. (Compare dialectal drownd, gownd for the same development.)
Displaced native Middle English swei, from Old English swēġ, from Proto-Germanic *swōgiz.

der

(phonetics) A segment as a part of spoken language, the smallest unit of spoken language, a speech sound.


sound

en-verb

sound (third-person singular simple present sounds, present participle sounding, simple past and past participle sounded)

sounds (present singular third-person)
sounding (participle present)
sounded (participle past)
sounded (past)

The "e" in "house" isn't sounded.

(transitive, phonetics, of a vowel or consonant) To pronounce.


contraction

en-noun

contraction (countable and uncountable, plural contractions)

PIE word
 *ḱóm
From Late Middle English contraccioun, contraxion (“spasm, contraction; constriction, shrinking; act of pressing together”), from Old French contraction (modern French contraction), from Latin contractiō(n) (“a drawing together, contraction; abridgement, shortening; dejection, despondency”), from contrahō (“to draw things together, assemble, collect, gather; to enter into a contract”) + -tiō(n) (suffix forming nouns relating to actions or their results). Contrahō is derived from con- (prefix denoting a bringing together of objects) + trahō (“to drag, pull”) (probably from Proto-Indo-European *dʰregʰ- (“to drag, pull; to run”)). By surface analysis, contract + -ion (suffix denoting actions or processes, or their results).

verkleining

Senses relating to pulling together or shortening.

A (sometimes reversible) contracting or reduction in length, scope, size, or volume; a narrowing, a shortening, a shrinking.

(linguistics, phonology, prosody) Synonym of syncope (“the elision or loss of a sound from the interior of a word, especially of a vowel sound with loss of a syllable”)


feed

en-verb

feed (third-person singular simple present feeds, present participle feeding, simple past and past participle fed)

feeds (present singular third-person)
feeding (participle present)
fed (participle past)
fed (past)

From Middle English feden, from Old English fēdan (“to feed”), from Proto-West Germanic *fōdijan, from Proto-Germanic *fōdijaną (“to feed”), from Proto-Indo-European *peh₂- (“to guard, graze, feed”). Cognate with West Frisian fiede (“to nourish, feed”), Dutch voeden (“to feed”), Danish føde (“to bring forth, feed”), Swedish föda (“to bring forth, feed”), Icelandic fæða (“to feed”), and more distantly with Latin pāscō (“feed, nourish”, verb) through Indo-European. More at food, fodder.

der

give a man a fish and you feed him for a day

teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime

Nasalization feeds raising.

(phonology, of a phonological rule) To create the environment where another phonological rule can apply; to be applied before another rule.


voice

→ Russian: войс (vojs) (slang, from "voice message")

From Middle English voice, voys, vois, borrowed from Anglo-Norman voiz, voys, voice, Old French vois, voiz (Modern French voix), from Latin vōcem, accusative form of vōx (“voice”), from Proto-Indo-European *wṓkʷs, root noun from *wekʷ- (“to utter, speak”). Cognate with Sanskrit वाच् (vāc), Ancient Greek ὄψ (óps), Persian آواز (âvâz). Displaced native Middle English steven (“voice”) (from Old English stefn (see steven)), Old English hlēoþor, and Old English woþ. Broadly overtook Old English reord. Compare advocate, advowson, avouch, convoke, epic, vocal, vouch, vowel. Doublet of vox.

the voice of the people, the voice of God

(phonetics) Sound made through vibration of the vocal cords; sonant, or intonated, utterance; tone; — distinguished from mere breath sound as heard in whispering and voiceless consonants.

صَوْت

sound made through vibration of the vocal cords


voice

en-verb

voice (third-person singular simple present voices, present participle voicing, simple past and past participle voiced)

voices (present singular third-person)
voicing (participle present)
voiced (participle past)
voiced (past)

From Middle English voysen, voicen, from the noun (see above).

(transitive, phonology) To utter audibly, with tone and not just breath.


catch

en-noun

catch (countable and uncountable, plural catches)

From Middle English cacchen, from Anglo-Norman cachier, variant of Old French chacier, from Late Latin captiāre, from Latin captāre, frequentative of capere. Akin to Modern French chasser (from Old French chacier) and Spanish cazar, and thus a doublet of chase. Compare ketch. Displaced Middle English fangen ("to catch"; > Modern English fang (verb)), from Old English fōn (“to seize, take”); Middle English lacchen ("to catch" and heavily displaced Modern English latch), from Old English læċċan.
The verb became irregular, possibly under the influence of the semantically similar latch (from Old English læċċan), whose past tense was lahte, lauhte, laught (Old English læhte), until becoming regularised in Modern English.

gloss

The glottal stop or glottal catch is the sound used in English in the informal words uh-huh 'yes' and uh-uh 'no'.

2006, Mitsugu Sakihara et al., Okinawan-English Wordbook, →ISBN:

(countable, phonetics) A stoppage of breath, resembling a slight cough.


shut

From Middle English shutten, shetten, from Old English scyttan (“to cause rapid movement, shoot a bolt, shut, bolt”), from Proto-Germanic *skutjaną, *skuttijaną (“to bar, bolt”), from Proto-Germanic *skuttą, *skuttjō (“bar, bolt, shed”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kewd- (“to drive, fall upon, rush”).
Cognate with Dutch schutten (“to shut in, lock up”), Low German schütten (“to shut, lock in”), German schützen (“to shut out, dam, protect, guard”).

cog

Whenever a syllable is formed with a long, that is an open vowel, they account the syllable long; and whenever formed with a short, that is a shut vowel, they reckon it short.

1810, Benjamin Humphrey Smart, A practical grammar of English pronunciation, page 344:

(linguistics, phonetics, archaic) Synonym of close


diphthong

/ˈdɪfˌθɒŋ(ɡ)/

/ˈdɪpˌθɒŋ(ɡ)/

PIE word
 *dwóh₁
From French diphtongue, from Late Latin diphthongus, from Ancient Greek δίφθογγος (díphthongos, “two sounds”), from δίς (dís, “twice”) + φθόγγος (phthóngos, “sound”).

der

(phonetics) A complex vowel sound that begins with the sound of one vowel and ends with the sound of another vowel, in the same syllable.


fricative

From New Latin fricativus, from Latin fricāre (“to rub”).

Watt listened for a time, for the voice was far from unmelodious. The fricatives in particular were pleasing.

1953, Samuel Beckett, Watt, 1st American edition, New York, N.Y.: Grove Press, published 1959, →OCLC:

(phonetics) Any of several speech sounds produced by air flowing through a constriction in the oral cavity and typically producing a sibilant, hissing, or buzzing quality; a fricative consonant.


fricative

en-adj

fricative (comparative more fricative, superlative most fricative)

more fricative (comparative)
most fricative (superlative)

(phonetics) produced by air flowing through a restriction in the oral cavity.


International Phonetic Alphabet

the International Phonetic Alphabet (canonical)

/ˌɪntəˈnæʃ(ə)nəl fəˈnɛtɪk ˈælfəˌbɛt/

[ˌɪntəˈnæʃ(ə)nəɫ fəˈnɛtɪk ˈæɫfəˌbɛt]

/ˌɪntɚˈnæʃ(ə)n(ə)l fəˈnɛɾɪk ˈælfəˌbɛt/

[ˌɪntɚˈnæʃ(ə)n(ə)ɫ fəˈnɛɾɪk ˈæɫfəˌbɛt]

The International Phonetic Alphabet is commonly used in books about Shanghainese because none of the existing romanizations are very popular.

(phonetics, phonology) A standardized set of symbols for representing the sounds of human speech.

اَلْأَبْجَدِيَّة الصَّوْتِيَّة الدُّوَلِيَّة

الْأَلِفْبَائِيَّة الصَّوْتِيَّة الدُّوَلِيَّة

халкьуннал дянивсса фонетикалул алфавит

xalqʼunnal daˤniws:a fonetikalul alfawit

אינטערנאַציאָנאַלער פֿאָנעטישער אַלפֿאַבעט


twang

Onomatopoeic. Compare Middle English twengen (“to pinch, tweak”), from Old English twenġen (“to pinch, twinge”); Middle English twingen (“to afflict, torment, oppress”), from Old Norse þvinga (“to weigh down, oppress”); Old English twingan (“to force, press”).

cog

Near-synonym: nasality

nasal twang

(phonetics) The sound quality that appears in the human voice when the epilaryngeal tube is narrowed.


hard

en-adj

hard (comparative harder or more hard, superlative hardest or most hard)

harder (comparative)
more hard (comparative)
hardest (superlative)
most hard (superlative)

→ Finnish: haarti

→ Spanish: hard

From Middle English hard, from Old English heard, from Proto-West Germanic *hard(ī), from Proto-Germanic *harduz, from Proto-Indo-European *kort-ús, from *kret- (“strong, powerful”). Cognate with German hart, Swedish hård, Ancient Greek κρατύς (kratús), Sanskrit क्रतु (krátu), Avestan 𐬑𐬭𐬀𐬙𐬎 (xratu).

صَعْب

requiring a lot of effort to do or understand

There is a hard c in "clock" and a soft c in "centre".

(phonetics, not comparable) Fortis.
Plosive.

Hard k, t, s, ch, as distinguished from soft, g, d, z, j.

(phonetics, not comparable) Fortis.
Unvoiced.


slide

→ Czech: slajd

→ Japanese: スライド (suraido)

→ Persian: اسلاید (eslâyd)

→ Polish: slajd

→ Portuguese: slide

From Middle English sliden, from Old English slīdan (“to slide”), from Proto-West Germanic *slīdan, from Proto-Germanic *slīdaną (“to slide, glide”), from Proto-Indo-European *sléydʰ-e-ti, from *sleydʰ- (“slippery”). Cognate with Old High German slītan (“to slide”) (whence German schlittern), Middle Low German slīden (“to slide”), Middle Dutch slīden (“to slide”) (whence Dutch slijderen, frequentative of now obsolete slijden), Vedic Sanskrit स्रेधति (srédhati, “to err, blunder”).

cog

(phonetics) A sound which, by a gradual change in the position of the vocal organs, passes imperceptibly into another sound.


back

en-adj

back (not generally comparable, comparative more back, superlative most back)

more back (comparative)
most back (superlative)

front

antonym(s) of “near the rear, phonetics”

From Middle English bak, from Old English bæc, from Proto-West Germanic *bak, from Proto-Germanic *baką, possibly from Proto-Indo-European *bʰeg- (“to bend”). The adverb represents an aphetic form of aback.
Compare Middle Low German bak (“back”), from Old Saxon bak, and West Frisian bekling (“chair back”), Old High German bah, Swedish and Norwegian bak. Cognate with German Bache (“sow [adult female hog]”).

The vowel of lot has a back vowel in most dialects of England.

(comparable, phonetics) Pronounced with the highest part of the body of the tongue toward the back of the mouth, near the soft palate (most often describing a vowel).

zadní

phonetics: produced in the back of the mouth


liquid

en-noun

liquid (countable and uncountable, plural liquids)

From Middle English liquide, from Old French liquide, from Latin liquidus (“fluid, liquid, moist”), from liqueō (“to be liquid, be fluid”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *wleykʷ- (“to flow, run”). Doublet of liquidus. As a term for a consonant, it comes from Latin liquida (cōnsōnāns), a calque of Ancient Greek ὑγρὸν (σύμφωνον) (hugròn (súmphōnon), “liquid consonant”).

der

ὑγρὸν (σύμφωνον)

Many female forenames are regarded as euphonyms. What is and is not euphonious is necessarily subjective, but it could be suggested that names containing labials (b, m), sibilants (s, sh) and liquids (l, r) are more likely to be euphonyms than those that do not.

1996, Adrian Room, An Alphabetical Guide to the Language of Name Studies, page 41:

[…]-able does not attach to verbs ending in a postconsonantal liquid […]

1999, Ingo Plag, Morphological Productivity, page 86:

(phonetics) Any of a class of consonant sounds that includes l and r.


liquid

en-adj

liquid (comparative more liquid, superlative most liquid)

more liquid (comparative)
most liquid (superlative)

illiquid

antonym(s) of “having sufficient activity”

der

ὑγρὸν (σύμφωνον)

/l/ and /r/ are liquid consonants.

(phonology) Belonging to a class of consonants comprised of the laterals and the rhotics, which in many languages behave similarly.


narrow

en-adj

narrow (comparative narrower, superlative narrowest)

narrower (comparative)
narrowest (superlative)

From Middle English narow, narowe, narewe, narwe, naru, from Old English nearu (“narrow, strait, confined, constricted, not spacious, limited, petty; limited, poor, restricted; oppressive, causing anxiety (of that which restricts free action of body or mind), causing or accompanied by difficulty, hardship, oppressive; oppressed, not having free action; strict, severe”), from Proto-West Germanic *naru, from Proto-Germanic *narwaz (“constricted, narrow”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ner- (“to turn, bend, twist, constrict”).
Cognate with Scots naro, narow, narrow (“narrow”), North Frisian naar, noar, noor (“narrow”), Saterland Frisian noar (“bleak, dismal, meager, ghastly, unwell”), Saterland Frisian Naarwe (“scar”), West Frisian near (“narrow”), Dutch naar (“dismal, bleak, ill, sick”), Low German naar (“dismal, ghastly”), German Nehrung (“spit, narrow peninsula”), Norwegian norve (“a clip, staple”), Icelandic narrow- (“njörva-”, in compounds).

cog

(phonetics) Formed (as a vowel) by a close position of some part of the tongue in relation to the palate; or (according to Bell) by a tense condition of the pharynx; distinguished from wide.

suppea

phonetics: formed (as a vowel) by a close position of some part of the tongue in relation to the palate


blade

From Middle English blade, blad, from Old English blæd (“leaf”), from Proto-West Germanic *blad, from Proto-Germanic *bladą, from Proto-Indo-European *bʰl̥h₃-o-to-m, from *bʰleh₃- (“to thrive, bloom”).
See also West Frisian bled, Dutch blad, German Blatt, Danish blad, Irish bláth (“flower”), Welsh blodyn (“flower”), Tocharian A pält, Tocharian B pilta (“leaf”), Albanian fletë (“leaf”). Similar usage in German Sägeblatt (“saw blade”, literally “saw leaf”). Doublet of blat. More at blow.

teh

typically sharp-edged working end of a knife or other cutting tool

(chiefly phonetics, phonology) The part of the tongue just behind the tip, used to make laminal consonants.


feminine

en-adj

feminine (comparative more feminine, superlative most feminine)

more feminine (comparative)
most feminine (superlative)

butch

having qualities stereotypical of the female gender

From Middle English feminine, femynyne, femynyn, from Old French feminin, feminine, from Latin fēminīnus, from fēmina (“woman”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁-m̥h₁n-eh₂ (“(the one) nursing, breastfeeding”). Related to fetus, feminism, filial, fellatio.

femëror

of the feminine grammatical gender distinction

Feminine caesura, feminine catalexis, feminine ending.

(prosody) Following or ending on an unstressed syllable.


flat

en-adj

flat (comparative flatter, superlative flattest)

flatter (comparative)
flattest (superlative)

bumpy

antonym(s) of “having no variations in altitude”

→ Portuguese: flat

From Middle English flat, a borrowing from Old Norse flatr (compare Norwegian and Swedish flat, Danish flad), from Proto-Germanic *flataz, from Proto-Indo-European *pleth₂- (“flat”); akin to Saterland Frisian flot (“smooth”), German Flöz (“a geological layer”), Ancient Greek πλατύς (platús), Latvian plats, Sanskrit प्रथस् (prathas, “extension”). Doublet of plat and pleyt.
The noun is from Middle English flat (“level piece of ground, flat edge of a weapon”), from the adjective.
The algebraic sense was coined by Serre in a 1956 paper, originally as French plat.

inh

Without variation in level, quantity, value, tone etc.

(phonetics, of a vowel) Not diphthongal; without variation in height or backness.

(phonetics, dated, of a consonant) Sonant; vocal, as distinguished from a sharp (non-sonant) consonant.


low

en-adj

low (comparative lower, superlative lowest)

lower (comparative)
lowest (superlative)

From Middle English lowe, lohe, lāh, from Old Norse lágr (“low”), from Proto-Germanic *lēgaz (“lying, flat, situated near the ground, low”), from Proto-Indo-European *legʰ- (“to lie”).
Cognate with Scots laich (“low”), Low German leeg (“low, feeble, bad”), Danish lav (“low”), Icelandic lágur (“low”), West Frisian leech (“low”), North Frisian leeg, liig (“low”), Dutch laag (“low”), obsolete German läg (“low”). More at lie.

laag

in a position comparatively close to the ground

слаб

lacking health or vitality; feeble; weak

could eat the arse out of a low flying duck

could eat the crotch out of a low flying duck

could eat the crutch from a low flying duck

mackerel sky and mare's-tails make lofty ships carry low sails

mackerel sky and mare's-tails make tall ships carry low sails

(phonetics) Made with a relatively large opening between the tongue and the palate; made with (part of) the tongue positioned low in the mouth, relative to the palate.

ala-

phonetics: articulated with a low position of part of the tongue in relation to the palate


wedge

en-noun

wedge (countable and uncountable, plural wedges)

From Middle English wegge (“wedge”), from Old English weċġ (“wedge”), from Proto-West Germanic *wagi, from Proto-Germanic *wagjaz.

Turned V is referred to as “Wedge” by some phoneticians, but this seems inadvisable to us, because the haček accent (ˇ) is also called that in names like Wedge C for (č).

1996, Geoffrey Keith Pullum, William A. Ladusaw, Phonetic Symbol Guide, 2nd edition, page 19:

Any symbol shaped like a V in some given orientation.

(phonetics) The IPA character ʌ, which denotes an open-mid back unrounded vowel.


round

en-adj

round (comparative rounder or more round, superlative roundest or most round)

rounder (comparative)
more round (comparative)
roundest (superlative)
most round (superlative)

From Middle English round, rounde, from Old Northern French roünt, rund, Old French ront, runt, reont ( > French rond), from both Late Latin retundus and the original Latin rotundus. The noun developed partly from the adjective and partly from the corresponding French noun rond. Doublet of rotund.

pyöreä

pronounced with the mouth in the shape of an "O"

"Supposing somebody sees you, with all those flowers too? Supposing somebody writes him a letter? Ooooh!" (a pure round open Tamil O.)

(phonetics) Pronounced with the lips drawn together; rounded.

kerekített

Formal, used when number was derived from a more accurate value on some purpose. Contrary, "kerek" refers to any round(ed) number. Eg. "1000 is a round number." vs. "For cash payments in Hungary, final sum is rounded to the nearest 5-HUF value since 2008, in which year coins with smaller denominations (1HUF, 2HUF) have been withdrawn from circulation."


short

→ Cantonese: short

→ Italian: short

→ Japanese: ショート (shōto)

→ Mandarin: 秀逗 (xiùdou)

→ Hakka: 秀逗 (sió-tò)

→ Maltese: xort

From Middle English schort, short, from Old English sċeort, sċort (“short”), from Proto-West Germanic *skurt, from Proto-Germanic *skurtaz (“short”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)ker-.
Cognates
shirt, skirt, curt, Scots short, schort (“short”), French court, Dutch kort, German kurz, Old High German scurz (“short”) (whence Middle High German schurz), Old Norse skorta (“to lack”) (whence Danish skorte), Albanian shkurt (“short, brief”), Latin curtus (“shortened, incomplete”) and Proto-Slavic *kortъkъ. Doublet of curt. More at shirt.

If we compare the nearest conventional shorts and longs in English, as in ‘bit’ and ‘beat’, ‘not’ and ‘naught’, we find that the short vowels are generally wide (i, ɔ), the long narrow (i, ɔ), besides being generally diphthongic as well.

1877, Henry Sweet, A Handbook of Phonetics, page 18:

(phonetics) A short sound, syllable, or vowel.

lyhyt äänne

phonetics: short sound, syllable, or vowel


sharp

sharp (comparative sharper, superlative sharpest)

sharper (comparative)
sharpest (superlative)

bland

antonym(s) of “having an intense and acrid flavour”

From Middle English scharp, from Old English sċearp, from Proto-West Germanic *skarp, from Proto-Germanic *skarpaz, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kerb-, from *(s)ker- (“to cut”).
Cognate with West Frisian skerp, Low German scharp, Dutch scherp, German scharf, Danish skarp. Compare Irish cearb (“keen; cutting”), Latin acerbus (“tart, bitter”), Tocharian B kärpye (“rough”), Latvian skârbs (“sharp, rough”), Russian щерба (ščerba, “notch”), Polish szczerba (“gap, dent, jag, chip, nick, notch”), Albanian harb (“rudeness”). More at shear.

better than a poke in the eye with a sharp stick

(phonetics, dated) Uttered in a whisper, or with the breath alone; aspirated; unvoiced.


high

high (comparative higher, superlative highest)

higher (comparative)
highest (superlative)

Sranan Tongo: hei

From Middle English high, heigh, heih, from Old English hēah (“high, tall, lofty, high-class, exalted, sublime, illustrious, important, proud, haughty, deep, right”), from Proto-West Germanic *hauh (“high”), from Proto-Germanic *hauhaz (“high”), from Proto-Indo-European *kewk- (“to elevate, height”). Cognate with Scots heich (“high”), Saterland Frisian hooch (“high”), West Frisian heech (“high”), Dutch hoog (“high”), Low German hoog (“high”), German hoch (“high”), Swedish hög (“high”), Norwegian høy (“high”), Icelandic hár (“high”), Lithuanian kaukas (“bump, boil, sore”).

der

(phonetics) Made with some part of the tongue positioned high in the mouth, relatively close to the palate.


wide

en-adj

wide (comparative wider or more wide, superlative widest or most wide)

wider (comparative)
more wide (comparative)
widest (superlative)
most wide (superlative)

PIE word
 *dwóh₁
From Middle English wid, wyd, from Old English wīd (“wide, vast, broad, long; distant, far”), from Proto-Germanic *wīdaz, from Proto-Indo-European *h₁weydʰh₁- (“to separate, divide”), a dissimilated univerbation from *dwi- (“apart, asunder, in two”) + *dʰeh₁- (“to do, put, place”).
Cognate with Scots wyd, wid (“of great extent; vast”), West Frisian wiid (“broad; wide”), Dutch wijd (“wide; large; broad”), German weit (“far; wide; broad”), Danish vid (“wide”), Swedish vid (“wide”), Icelandic víður (“wide”), Latin dīvidō (“separate, sunder”), Latin vītō (“avoid, shun”). Related to widow.

compound

(phonetics, dated) Made, as a vowel, with a less tense, and more open and relaxed, condition of the organs in the mouth.


long

From Middle English long, lang, from Old English long, lang (“long, tall, lasting”), from Proto-West Germanic *lang, from Proto-Germanic *langaz (“long”), from Proto-Indo-European *dlongʰos (“long”).
Cognate with Scots lang (“long”), North Frisian long, lung (“long”), Saterland Frisian loang (“long”), Norwegian, West Frisian, Dutch and German lang (“long”), Swedish lång (“long”), Icelandic langur (“long”), Portuguese longo (“long”), Spanish luengo (“long”), French long, Latin longus (“long”), Russian дли́нный (dlínnyj), до́лго (dólgo), Sanskrit दीर्घ (dīrgha, “long”).
The word exceptionally retains the Old English darkening of -a- before nasals. Though there are other such examples in Middle and Modern English (e.g. bond, song, throng, wrong), the o-form may have been reinforced by Old French long, from Latin longus, from the same Indo-European word. Doublet of lungo and lunge.


stop

en-verb

stop (third-person singular simple present stops, present participle stopping, simple past and past participle stopped)

stops (present singular third-person)
stopping (participle present)
stopped (participle past)
stopped (past)
stop (infinitive)

continue

antonym(s) of “to cause to cease moving”

continue

antonym(s) of “to cause to come to an end”

→ Finnish: stop

→ French: stop

→ Greek: στοπ (stop)

→ Hungarian: stop

→ Irish: stop

→ Italian: stop

→ Latvian: stop

→ Ottoman Turkish: استوپ (istop)

→ Polish: stop

→ Portuguese: stop

→ Russian: стоп (stop)

→ Spanish: stop

→ Welsh: stopio

→ Tok Pisin: stap

From Middle English stoppen, stoppien, from Old English stoppian (“to stop, close”), from Proto-West Germanic *stoppōn, from Proto-Germanic *stuppōną (“to stop, close”), *stuppijaną (“to push, pierce, prick”), from Proto-Indo-European *(s)tewp-, *(s)tewb- (“to push; stick”), from *(s)tew- (“to bump; impact; butt; push; beat; strike; hit”).
Cognate with Saterland Frisian stopje (“to stop, block”), West Frisian stopje (“to stop”), Dutch stoppen (“to stop”), Low German stoppen (“to stop”), German stopfen (“to be filling, stuff”), German stoppen (“to stop”), Danish stoppe (“to stop”), Swedish stoppa (“to stop”), Icelandic stoppa (“to stop”), Middle High German stupfen, stüpfen (“to pierce”). More at stuff, stump.
Alternative etymology derives Proto-West Germanic *stoppōn from an assumed Vulgar Latin *stūpāre, *stuppāre (“to stop up with tow”), from stūpa, stīpa, stuppa (“tow, flax, oakum”), from Ancient Greek στύπη (stúpē), στύππη (stúppē, “tow, flax, oakum”). This derivation, however, is doubtful, as the earliest instances of the Germanic verb do not carry the meaning of "stuff, stop with tow". Rather, these senses developed later in response to influence from similar sounding words in Latin and Romance.

megakadályoz

to cause to cease progressing, to prevent

if you find yourself in a hole, the first thing to do is stop digging

th-stopping

(phonetics, transitive) To pronounce (a phoneme) as a stop.


acatalectic

From Late Latin acatalēcticus, from Ancient Greek ἀκατάληκτος (akatálēktos, “leaving off”).

der

(poetry, prosody) Designating a line of verse having the required number of syllables in the last foot


acatalectic

(poetry, prosody) A verse which has the complete number of feet and syllables


pitch

en-noun

pitch (countable and uncountable, plural pitches)

Unknown. Perhaps from the above sense of "inclination", "level", or "degree", or influenced by it.

The pitch of middle "C" is familiar to many musicians.

(music, phonetics) The perceived frequency of a sound or note.


phoneme

From Ancient Greek φώνημα (phṓnēma, “sound”), from φωνέω (phōnéō, “to sound”), from φωνή (phōnḗ, “sound”). By surface analysis, phone (“speech sound”) + -eme (“unit”).

surf

It is crucial for the phoneme structure of Finnish — traditionally /d/ has not been included in the Finnish phonotax, but it fulfils the criteria of a phoneme (Karlsson, 1983: 66-7).

1990, Jarmo Lainio, “Sweden Finnish — development or deterioration?”, in Durk Gorter, editor, Fourth International Conference on Minority Languages: Western and Eastern European papers, Multilingual Matters, →ISBN, page 31:

(phonology) An indivisible unit of sound in a given language. A phoneme is an abstraction of the physical speech sounds (phones) and may encompass several different phones.


theta

→ Malay: teta

Borrowed from Ancient Greek θῆτα (thêta).

(phonology) The voiceless dental fricative represented by θ.


epsilon

en-noun

epsilon (countable and uncountable, plural epsilons or epsila)

From Ancient Greek ἒ ψιλόν (è psilón, “simple Ε”).

uder

(phonetics) In IPA, the phonetic symbol ɛ that represents the open-mid front unrounded vowel.

epsilon

symbol for front half open unrounded vowel


decametre

Borrowed from French décamètre. Equivalent to deca- + metre.

(prosody) A line in a poem having ten metrical feet.

(prosody) A poetic metre in which each line has ten feet.


nucleus

Learned borrowing from Latin nucleus (“kernel, core”). The earliest uses refer to the head of a comet and the kernel of a seed, both recorded in Lexicon Technicum in 1704. The sense in atomic physics was coined by British scientist Michael Faraday in 1844 in a theoretical meaning.

coin

(phonetics, phonology) The central part of a syllable, most commonly a vowel.


AI

en-noun

AI (countable and uncountable, plural AIs)

Audio (US)

(phonetics) Initialism of articulatory index.


acephalous

en-adj

acephalous (comparative more acephalous, superlative most acephalous)

more acephalous (comparative)
most acephalous (superlative)

From French acéphale, from Ancient Greek ἀκέφαλος (aképhalos, “headless”), from ἀ- (a-, “not”) + κεφαλή (kephalḗ, “head”). By surface analysis, a- + -cephalous.

der

They have acephalous or headless Verses, which commence with a short Syllable instead of a long one:

1746, Claude Lancelot, translated by T. Nugent, A New Method of Learning with Greater Facility the Greek Tongue, London: J. Nourse and G. Hawkins, Volume 2, Book 9, p. 348:

Sometimes verse lines “jump” the first syllable (in anapaestic and dactylic measures the first two syllables) of a regular metre. Such lines are said to be acephalous (headless) or, as acrostic writers would put it, “beheaded.”

1934, Robert Swann, Frank Sidgwick, chapter 2, in The Making of Verse: A Guide to English Metres, London: Sidgwick & Jackson, page 16:

(prosody) Deficient in the beginning, as a line of poetry that is missing its expected opening syllable.


phone

From Ancient Greek φωνή (phōnḗ, “sound”).

(phonetics) A speech segment that possesses distinct physical or perceptual properties, considered as a physical event without regard to its place in the phonology of a language.


closed

(phonology) Formed by closing the mouth and nose passages completely, like the consonants /t/, /d/, and /p/.

(phonology) Having the sound cut off sharply by a following consonant, like the /ɪ/ in pin.


pure

en-adj

pure (comparative purer or more pure, superlative purest or most pure)

purer (comparative)
more pure (comparative)
purest (superlative)
most pure (superlative)

contaminated

antonym(s) of “free of foreign material”

corrupt

antonym(s) of “free of immoral behavior”

→ Welsh: piwr

From Middle English pure, pur, from Old French pur, from Latin pūrus (“clean, free from dirt or filth, unmixed, plain”), from Proto-Indo-European *pewH- (“to cleanse, purify”). Displaced native Middle English lutter (“pure, clear, sincere”) (from Old English hlūtor, hluttor), Middle English skere (“pure, sheer, clear”) (from Old English scǣre and Old Norse skǣr), Middle English schir (“clear, pure”) (from Old English scīr), Middle English smete, smeate (“pure, refined”) (from Old English smǣte; compare Old English mǣre (“pure”)).

noncog

(phonetics) Of a single, simple sound or tone; said of some vowels and the unaspirated consonants.

puhdas

phonetics: of a single, simple sound or tone


acute

en-adj

acute (comparative acuter or more acute, superlative acutest or most acute)

acuter (comparative)
more acute (comparative)
acutest (superlative)
most acute (superlative)

From Late Middle English acute (“of a disease or fever: starting suddenly and lasting for a short time; of a humour: irritating, sharp”), from Latin acūta, from acūtus (“sharp, sharpened”), perfect passive participle of acuō (“to make pointed, sharpen, whet”), from acus (“needle, pin”). The word is cognate to ague (“acute, intermittent fever”).
As regards the noun, which is derived from the verb, compare Middle English acūte (“severe but short-lived fever; of blood: corrosiveness, sharpness; musical note of high pitch”).

cog

(phonology, dated, of a sound) Sharp, produced in the front of the mouth. (See Grave and acute on Wikipedia.Wikipedia)


acute

en-verb

acute (third-person singular simple present acutes, present participle acuting, simple past and past participle acuted)

acutes (present singular third-person)
acuting (participle present)
acuted (participle past)
acuted (past)

He acutes his rising inflection too much.

Polyſyllables having their Penultima long by poſition are acuted; as Camíllus: but having it long by nature and the last ſhort, they are circumflected; as, Românus, amâre: except the Compounds of ſit, whose Ultima is acuted; as Malefít, calefít, benefít, ſatisfít.

1696, [William] Lily, W. T., “Prosodia Examin’d and Explain’d by Question and Answer”, in Lily, Improved, Corrected, and Explained; with the Etymological Part of the Common Accidence, London: Printed for R. Bentley, […], →OCLC, page 151:

This word ωροπαροξύνον has been generally underſtood, before Dr. G[ally] undertook to explain it otherwiſe, to ſignify "acuting the antepenultima."

1762, John Foster, “On the Accent of the Old Greeks. […]”, in An Essay on the Different Nature of Accent and Quantity, with Their Use and Application in the Pronunciation of the English, Latin, and Greek Languages; […], Eton, Berkshire: Printed by J. Pote; […], →OCLC, pages 103–104:

O is a broad vowel. When acuted, it is pronounced as o in gone; thus, cron, son; when circumflexed, as o in bone; thus, ôney. And thus it answers to the Greek Omicron and Omega.

1859, John Kelly, “On the Pronunciation of the Manks Letters”, in A Practical Grammar of the Antient Gaelic, or Language of the Isle of Man, usually Called Manks. […] (Manx Society series; 2), Douglas, Isle of Man: Printed for the Manx Society, →OCLC; reprinted London: Bernard Quaritch, […], 1870, →OCLC, page 4:

That the acute accent meant stress is plain from the inherited intonation of the modern Greeks; […] and, if any person objects that the modern Greek not only acutes the last syllables of these words, but makes their quantity long, this is all in favour of my argument; […]

1874, John Stuart Blackie, “On the Place and Power of Accent in Language”, in Horæ Hellenicæ: Essays and Discussions on Some Important Points of Greek Philology and Antiquity, London: Macmillan & Co., →OCLC, paragraph 4, page 347:

(transitive, phonetics) To give an acute sound to.


vanish

Aphetic for obsolete evanish, from Middle English vanyshen, evaneschen, from Old French esvanir, esvaniss- (modern French évanouir), from Vulgar Latin *exvanire (“to vanish, disappear, to fade out”), from Latin evanescere, from vanus (“empty”). Doublet of evanesce.

der

a as in ale ordinarily ends with a vanish of i as in ill.

o as in old ordinarily ends with a vanish of oo as in foot.

The median stres may also on a protracted quantity , slightly resemble respectively that of the radical and of the vanish , by sudenly enlarging in the course of the prolongation and gradualy diminishing ; and by the reverse

1827, James Rush, The Philosophy of the Human Voice:

w:Webster's Dictionary#Webster's New International Dictionary 1909

(phonetics) The brief terminal part of a vowel or vocal element, differing more or less in quality from the main part.


thesis

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel
Johann Gottlieb Fichte

From Late Middle English thesis (“lowering of the voice”) and also borrowed directly from its etymon Latin thesis (“proposition, thesis; lowering of the voice”), from Ancient Greek θέσῐς (thésĭs, “arrangement, placement, setting; conclusion, position, thesis; lowering of the voice”), from τῐ́θημῐ (tĭ́thēmĭ, “to place, put, set; to put down in writing; to consider as, regard”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dʰeh₁- (“to do; to place, put”)) + -σῐς (-sĭs, suffix forming abstract nouns or nouns of action, process, or result). The English word is a doublet of deed.
Sense 1.1 (“proposition or statement supported by arguments”) is adopted from antithesis. Sense 1.4 (“initial stage of reasoning”) was first used by the German philosopher Johann Gottlieb Fichte (1762–1814), and later applied to the dialectical method of his countryman, the philosopher Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831).
The plural form theses is borrowed from Latin thesēs, from Ancient Greek θέσεις (théseis).

der

(music, prosody, originally) The action of lowering the hand or bringing down the foot when indicating a rhythm; hence, an accented part of a measure of music or verse indicated by this action; an ictus, a stress.

(music, prosody, with a reversal of meaning) A depression of the voice when pronouncing a syllables of a word; hence, the unstressed part of the metrical foot of a verse upon which such a depression falls, or an unaccented musical note.


surd

en-adj

surd (comparative more surd, superlative most surd)

more surd (comparative)
most surd (superlative)

First attested in the mid 16th century from Latin surdus (“deaf, mute”), used in mathematics for “irrational,” reflecting ἄλογος (álogos, “irrational, speechless”) as found in Euclid, apparently transmitted via Arabic جِذْر أَصَمّ (jiḏr ʔaṣamm, “deaf root”). The phonetic sense, “voiceless,” emerged in the 18th century.

der

جِذْر أَصَمّ


series

en-noun

series (plural series or (obsolete) serieses)

series (plural)
serieses (obsolete plural)

→ Japanese: シリーズ (shirīzu)

→ Korean: 시리즈 (sirijeu)

→ Burmese: စီးရီး (ci:ri:)

Attested from the 1610s; borrowed from Latin seriēs, from serere (“to join together, bind”), ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ser- (“to bind, put together, to line up”). Related to desert, insert, sermon, and sorcerer.

مُتَسَلْسِلَة

in analysis: sum of the terms of a sequence

(phonology) A set of consonants that share a particular phonetic or phonological feature.


schwa

Borrowed from German Schwa, from Hebrew שווא / שְׁוָא (shva, šəwā, “(mark mostly indicating absence of a vowel sound)”), borrowed from Classical Syriac ܫ̈ܘܰܝܳܐ (š'wayyā, literally “even, equal”), in Syriac a term for a sign consisting of two vertical dots used to separate parts of a sentence. Doublet of shva.

der

The participle has also, owing to the accent, the lightest possible forms; but here there was no reduplication, and so in class I. the "schwa" took the form e before single mutes or fricatives, and elsewhere o.

1882, B. W. Wells, “The Ablaut in English”, in Transactions of the American Philological Association, page 67:

However, word-final unstressed schwa is deleted even by the speakers from South Albania, though to different degrees and dependant on the speech style[…]

2006 April 27, Sylvia Moosmüller, Theodor Granser, “The spread of Standard Albanian: An illustration based on an analysis of vowels”, in Language Variation and Change, volume 18, number 2, Cambridge University Press, →DOI:

(phonetics) An indeterminate central vowel sound as the "a" in "about", represented as /ə/ in IPA.


schwa

en-verb

schwa (third-person singular simple present schwas, present participle schwaing, simple past and past participle schwaed)

schwas (present singular third-person)
schwaing (participle present)
schwaed (participle past)
schwaed (past)

(phonetics, of a vowel sound, rare) To be reduced to schwa.


front

en-adj

front (comparative further front, superlative furthest front)

further front (comparative)
furthest front (superlative)

From Middle English front, frunt, frount, from Old French front, frunt, from Latin frōns, frontem (“forehead”). Doublet of frons.

The English word dress has a front vowel in most dialects.

(comparable, phonetics) Pronounced with the highest part of the body of the tongue toward the front of the mouth, near the hard palate (most often describing a vowel).

etu-

phonetics: pronounced toward the front of the mouth


front

en-verb

front (third-person singular simple present fronts, present participle fronting, simple past and past participle fronted)

fronts (present singular third-person)
fronting (participle present)
fronted (participle past)
fronted (past)

The velar plosives are often fronted through the influence of a following front vowel, and retracted through the influence of a following back vowel.

2005, Paul Skandera, Peter Burleigh, A Manual of English Phonetics and Phonology, page 48:

(phonetics, transitive, intransitive) To pronounce with the tongue in a front position.


glottal stop

(phonetics) A plosive sound articulated with the glottis.


glottal

Her Malay was the Malay of the Staate of Lanchap [...] and she spoke it fierily, with crisp glottal checks, with much bubbling reduplication.

1958, Anthony Burgess, The Enemy in the Blanket (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 256:

(phonetics) Articulated with the glottis.


rhotic

[ˈɹəʊ̯.tʰɪk]

Back-formation from rhotacism, coined in 1968 by John C. Wells.

In the IPA, a rhotic vowel (aka R-coloured vowel, retroflex vowel, vocalic r or rhotacised vowel) is indicated by the affixing of a hook diacritic ( ˞ ) to the right of the regular symbol for the vowel. The rhotic consonants are /r/, /ɾ/, /ɹ/, /ɻ/, /ʀ/, /ʁ/, /ɽ/ and /ɺ/.

What is normally understood by the term "trill" is a rhotic consonant of the type seen in the Spanish word perro 'dog', or the usual pronunciation of the phoneme /r/ in Parisian French.

2007, Robert Blust, “22: The prenasalised trills of Manus”, in Jeff Siegel, John Dominic Lynch, Diana Eades, editors, Language Description, History and Development, John Benjamins Publishing Company, page 297:

The rhotic tokens were analyzed as /r/-ful on both occasions. In addition, the researcher conducting the acoustic analysis of F₃ also held the impression that all analyzed tokens were rhotic. Some tokens were highly constricted and others were more weakly rhotic.

2012, Jennifer Hay, Alhana Clendon, “(Non)-Rhoticity: Lessons from New Zealand English”, in Terttu Nevalainen, Elizabeth Closs Traugott, editors, The Oxford Handbook of the History of English, Oxford University Press, page 765:

The articulatory description of rhotic diphthongs and triphthongs involves the onglide vowel followed by the rhotic or r-colored offglide.

2018, Kathy J. Jakielski, Christina E. Gildersleeve-Neumann, Phonetic Science for Clinical Practice, Plural Publishing, page 83:

(linguistics, phonetics, of a phoneme) Having a sound quality associated with the letter R; having the sound of any of certain IPA symbols, including /ɹ/, /ɻ/, /ɚ/, /ɝ/ and /r/.


rhotic

[ˈɹəʊ̯.tʰɪk]

It is well known that the phonetic realization of rhotics varies considerably from language to language, even from dialect to dialect. Rhotics can be realized as flaps, taps, trills (uvular, coronal or bilabial), or as assibilated or fricative variants.

1997, Eulàlia Bonet, Joan Mascarò, “On the representation of contrasting rhotics”, in Fernando Martínez-Gil, Alfonso Morales-Front, editors, Issues in the Phonology and Morphology of the Major Iberian Languages, Georgetown University Press, page 103:

2012, Rebeka Campos-Astorkiza, 5: The Phonemes of Spanish, José Ignacio Hualde, Antxon Olarrea, Erin O'Rourke (editors), The Handbook of Hispanic Linguistics, John Wiley & Sons (Wiley-Blackwell), page 100,
Spanish also has two rhotics, a tap /ɾ/(vibrante simple) and a trill /r/(vibrante múltiple).

Phonetic transcription of rhotics differs depending on whether the rhotic is a steady-state or dynamic vowel.

(phonetics) A rhotic consonant or rhotic vowel (R-coloured vowel).


final

→ Japanese: ファイナル (fainaru)

→ Swahili: fainali

From Middle English final, fynal, fynall, from Old French final, from Latin fīnālis (“of or relating to the end or to boundaries”), from fīnis (“end”); see fine. Replaced native English endly (“final”).

der

(phonology) The final part of a syllable, the combination of medial and rime in phonetics and phonology.


liaison

en-noun

liaison (countable and uncountable, plural liaisons)

Borrowed from French liaison (“binding”), from Latin ligātiō (stem ligātiōn-; whence the English doublet ligation), derived from ligō (“I bind”), from Proto-Indo-European *leyǵ- (“to bind”).

bor+

(phonology) Fusion of two consecutive words and the manner in which this occurs.

(phonology) The pronunciation of a normally silent final consonant when the next word begins with a vowel.


advanced

en-adj

advanced (comparative more advanced or further advanced, superlative most advanced or furthest advanced)

more advanced (comparative)
further advanced (comparative)
most advanced (superlative)
furthest advanced (superlative)

(phonetics) Pronounced farther to the front of the vocal tract.

előrébb képzett

phonetics: pronounced farther to the front of the vocal tract


gradation

en-noun

gradation (countable and uncountable, plural gradations)

/ɡɹəˈdeɪʃən/

/ɡɹəˈdeɪʃən/

/ˌɡɹeɪˈdeɪʃən/

Borrowed from French gradation. By surface analysis, Blend of grade + -ation.


tap

tap (countable and uncountable, plural taps)

The verb is derived from Middle English tappen, teppen (“to give (something) a knock or tap; to hit (something) lightly, pat, tap”), either:
* imitative of the making of a tapping sound; or
* from Old French tapper, taper (“to tap”) (modern French taper), from Frankish *tappōn, *dabbōn (“to strike”), or from Middle Low German tappen, tapen (“to rap, strike, tap”), both ultimately from Proto-Germanic *dab- (“to strike”), from Proto-Indo-European *dʰebʰ- (“to beat, strike; to stun; to be speechless”). Doublet of dab.
Verb sense 1.1.1 (“to arrest (someone)”) and sense 1.6 (“to choose or designate (someone) for a duty, etc.”) allude to a police officer or other person tapping someone on their shoulder to catch their attention or to select them.
The noun is derived from Middle English tap, tappe (“light blow or hit”), and then either:
* from Middle English tappen (verb) (see above); or
* from Old French tape (“light slap or touch, pat”) (modern French tape), from tapper, taper (verb) (see above).
cognates
* German tappen (“to fumble; to grope”)
* Icelandic tappa, tapsa, tæpta (“to tap”)

der

(phonetics) A single muscle contraction in vocal organs causing a consonant sound; also, the sound so made.


alternation

en-noun

alternation (countable and uncountable, plural alternations)

Latin alternatio; compare French alternation.
Morphologically alternate + -ion


pulse

From Late Middle English pulse, Middle English pous, pouse (“regular beat of arteries, pulse; heartbeat; place on the body where a pulse is detectable; beat (of a musical instrument); energy, vitality”) [and other forms], from Anglo-Norman puls, pous, pus, and Middle French pouls, poulz, pous [and other forms], Old French pous, pulz (“regular beat of arteries; place on the body where a pulse is detectable”) (modern French pouls), and from their etymon Latin pulsus (“beat, impulse, pulse, stroke; regular beat of arteries or the heart”), from pellō (“to drive, impel, propel, push; to banish, eject, expel; to set in motion; to strike”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *pel- (“to beat, strike; to drive; to push, thrust”)) + -sus (a variant of -tus (suffix forming action nouns from verbs)).

nb...

pouce, pounce, pouns, pounse, pousse, pouz, puls

der

(music, prosody) The beat or tactus of a piece of music or verse; also, a repeated sequence of such beats.


homophonous

"Cot" and "caught" are homophonous in some American accents, as are "there" and "they're".

(phonetics, semantics) Having the same pronunciation.

homofon (not infrequently spelled homofón)

azonos kiejtésű, de eltérő jelentésű (és gyakran eltérő alakú)


height

en-noun

height (countable and uncountable, plural heights)

From Middle English heighte, heiȝþe, from Old English hēahþu, hēhþo, hīehþu (“height”), Proto-West Germanic *hauhiþu, from Proto-Germanic *hauhiþō (compare *hauhaz). Equivalent to high + -th.
Cognates
See also Saterland Frisian Höchte, Hööchte (“height”), West Frisian hichte (“height”), Dutch hoogte (“height”), Middle High German hœhede, hœhte (“height”), Old Norse and Old Norse hæð (“height”) (compare Swedish höjd, Norwegian høyde), Gothic 𐌷𐌰𐌿𐌷𐌹𐌸𐌰 (hauhiþa, “height”).

(phonetics) A quality of vowels, indicating the vertical position of the tongue relative to the roof of the mouth; in practice, the first formant, associated with the height of the tongue.

nyelvállás

phonetics: a quality of vowels, indicating the vertical position of the tongue relative to the roof of the mouth; in practice, the first formant


syncopation

syncopation (usually uncountable, plural syncopations)

From syncopate + -ion. The phonological sense was first attested in English in the 1530's, the musical sense in the 1590's.

(linguistics, phonology) The contraction of a word by means of loss or omission of sounds or syllables in the middle thereof.


monoid

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-monoid.wav

(prosody) Containing only one kind of metrical foot.


reduce

en-verb

reduce (third-person singular simple present reduces, present participle reducing, simple past and past participle reduced)

reduces (present singular third-person)
reducing (participle present)
reduced (participle past)
reduced (past)

From Middle English reducen, from Old French reduire, from Latin redūcō (“reduce”); from re- (“back”) + dūcō (“lead”). See duke, and compare with redoubt.

The first vowel of support is reduced to schwa by most English speakers.

(transitive, phonetics, phonology) To pronounce (a sound or word) with less effort.


coda

Borrowed from Italian coda (literally “tail”), from Latin cauda. Doublet of queue.

Holonyms: rime, syllable

The word “salts” has three consonants — /l/, /t/, and /s/ — in its coda, whereas the word “glee” has no coda at all.

(phonology) The optional final sound of a syllable or word, occurring after its nucleus and usually composed of one or more consonants.


radical

en-adj

radical (comparative more radical, superlative most radical)

more radical (comparative)
most radical (superlative)

derivative

antonym(s) of “linguistics, in reference to words”

Inherited from Middle English radical, from Latin rādīcālis (“of or pertaining to the root, having roots, radical”).

der

(phonology, phonetics, not comparable, of a sound) Produced using the root of the tongue.


fortis

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-fortis.wav

Learned borrowing from Latin fortis (“strong”). Doublet of fort and forte.

lbor

All vowels, whether short or complex, are relatively shorter when followed by a fortis consonant and relatively longer when followed by a lenis one or, for those where this is possible, when no consonant follows (in free or unchecked syllables).

2004, Stephan Gramley, Michael Pätzold, A Survey of Modern English, Routledge, →ISBN, page 80:

(phonetics, of a consonant) Strongly articulated, hence voiceless.


trill

From Middle English trillen, from Italian trillo, trillare. Compare German trillern, Norwegian trille, Swedish trilla.

(phonetics) A type of consonantal sound that is produced by vibrations of the tongue against the place of articulation: for example, Spanish ⟨rr⟩, /r/.


dental

en-adj

dental (comparative more dental, superlative most dental)

more dental (comparative)
most dental (superlative)

Borrowed from Middle French dental or Late Latin dentālis, from dēns (“a tooth”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix).

af

dental fricative

(phonetics) Articulated with the tip of the tongue touching the upper front teeth or with the blade of the tongue touching the alveolar ridge, so that the tip of the tongue rests near the teeth.

(phonetics, uncommon) Articulated with the tip or blade of the tongue: coronal.


dental

'Che Normah pronounced the name in the Malay manner, metathetically: Ruperet, the final dental initiated but not exploded.

1958, Anthony Burgess, The Enemy in the Blanket (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 253:


onset

General American, Midland US, Southern US

From on- + set. Compare Old English onsettan (“to impose; oppress, bear down”). For semantic parallels for the meaning to assault, compare cognate Russian насе́сть pf (naséstʹ), наседа́ть impf (nasedátʹ).

cog

Holonym: syllable

(phonology) The initial portion of a syllable, preceding the syllable nucleus.

atako

(phonology) initial portion of a syllable


diaeresis

/daɪˈɛɹɪsɪs/

/daɪˈɪəɹɪsɪs/

/daɪˈɪəɹɪsɪs/

/daɪˈɛɹəsɪs/

/daɪˈɪəɹɪsiːz/

PIE word
 *dwís
Unadapted borrowing from Late Latin diaeresis (“distribution; division of a diphthong into two syllables”), from Ancient Greek δῐαίρεσῐς (dĭaíresĭs, “distribution, division; division of a poetic line when the end of a word and a metrical foot coincide; division of a diphthong into two syllables”), from δῐαιρέω (dĭairéō, “to divide; to distinguish; to resolve a diphthong or contracted form”) + -σῐς (-sĭs, suffix forming abstract nouns or nouns of action, process, or result). Δῐαιρέω (Dĭairéō) is derived from δῐᾰ- (dĭă-, prefix meaning ‘across; through; in different directions’) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *dwís (“doubly, twice; in two”)) + αἱρέω (hairéō, “to grasp, seize, take”) (ultimately from Proto-Indo-European *ser- (“to grasp, seize, take”)).
The plural is borrowed from Latin diaeresēs.

diërese

separation of one syllable (especially a vowel which is a diphthong) into two distinct syllables

Synaeresis, the opposite of Diaëresis, is the throwing of two syllables into one; as, Seest for seëst. Looked for look-ed.

1843, John Forbes, “Prosody”, in A Double Grammar of English and Gaelic, in which the Principles of Both Languages are Clearly Explained; […], Edinburgh: W. Whyte & Co. […], →OCLC, paragraph 7, page 363, column 1:

A separation of one syllable (especially a vowel which is a diphthong, that is, beginning with one sound and ending with another) into two distinct syllables; distraction.

Diæreſis is vvhen tvvo points ouer a vovvell diuide it from another vovvel, as bouë, queuë, read bou-e, queu-e, not bo-ue, que-ue.

1611, Randle Cotgrave, compiler, “Briefe Directions for Such as Desire to Learne the French Tongue. And First, of the Vowels, and Diphthongs.”, in A Dictionarie of the French and English Tongues, London: […] Adam Islip, →OCLC, signature Nnnn, recto, column 2:

The Diæresis is used to divide a diphthong into two syllables; as, Creätor.

1841, William Corry, “Grammatical Terms, with Their Respective Marks and Explanations”, in An English Spelling Book, with Reading Lessons; for the Use of the Parish and Other Schools of New Brunswick, St. John, N.B.: […] Henry Chubb, […], →OCLC, page 8:

An 85-year injustice has been rectified at Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey with the corrected spelling of one of the greatest of all literary names. Reader, it is finally Brontë, not Bronte. An amended memorial to Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë was unveiled on Thursday with added diaereses (two dots) that ensure people pronounce it with two syllables. As if it rhymed with Monty, not font. The memorial was installed in 1939 and, for whatever reason, came without the diaereses that the Brontës used.

2024 September 26, Mark Brown, “Brontë sisters finally get their dots as names corrected at Westminster Abbey”, in Katharine Viner, editor, The Guardian, London: Guardian News & Media, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the original on 2024-10-05:

(orthography) The diacritical mark consisting of two dots (¨) placed over a letter (especially the second of two consecutive vowels) to indicate that it is sounded separately, usually as a distinct syllable.

deelteken

diacritical mark consisting of two dots (¨) placed over a letter to indicate that it is sounded separately

An occurrence of separate vowel sounds in adjacent syllables without an intervening consonant; a hiatus.

(prosody) A natural break in rhythm when a word ends at the end of a metrical foot in a line of verse.


bilabial

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-bilabial.wav

"Oh, yes. He talks a lot about phonemes and semantemes and bilabial fricatives. He has a van with recording apparatus in it. He's a good chap."

1959, Anthony Burgess, Beds in the East (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 545:


bilabial

(phonetics) A speech sound articulated with both lips.

երկշրթնային

a speech sound articulated with both lips


mater lectionis

en-noun

mater lectionis (plural matres lectionis)

Borrowed from New Latin māter lēctiōnis (literally “mother of reading”), calque of Medieval Hebrew אֵם קְרִיאָה (ʾēm qərîʾā).

der

אֵם קְרִיאָה

(phonology) A consonant letter used to represent a vowel sound in Semitic scripts.

أُمّ قِرَاءَة

consonant used to represent a vowel sound


plosive

(phonetics) A speech sound produced by opening a closed vocal tract.


plosive

en-adj

plosive (comparative more plosive or plosiver, superlative most plosive or plosivest)

more plosive (comparative)
plosiver (comparative)
most plosive (superlative)
plosivest (superlative)

(phonetics) Produced from opening a previously closed oral passage.

избушен

produced from opening a previously closed oral passage


mute

From Middle English muet, from Anglo-Norman muet, moet, Middle French muet, from mu (“dumb, mute”) + -et, remodelled after Latin mūtus.

(phonetics, now obsolete) A stopped consonant; a stop.


dentolabial

(phonetics) articulated with the upper lip and lower teeth


linguolabial

(phonetics) articulated with the tongue and the upper lip.


linguolabial

(phonetics) A speech sound that is articulated with the tongue and the upper lip.


bidental

Finally, a position of almost bidental contact can be a paralinguistic voice qualifier or secondary articulation we should acknowledge as a dentalization, that is, the articulation of vowels and consonants 'through one's teeth', which can make the labial kinesic component of normal articulation be still present and vary from lip rounding or protrusion with close front vowels to horizontal distension with close back vowels.

1993, Fernando Poyatos, Paralanguage: A linguistic and interdisciplinary approach to interactive speech and sounds:

dental percussives, produced by clicking maxillary and mandibular teeth together at different speeds, but typically as a bidental chatter, that is, in a repeated rapid way (as in chattering from cold or fear); with bidental percussives resonating in the oral cavity musical notes can be played up and down the scale in various keys.

2002, Fernando Poyatos, Nonverbal Communication Across Disciplines:

The convention for transcribing bidental fricatives, suggested in the expIPA chart, uses the appropriate glottal fricative symbol with a dental diacritic both above and below the symbol.

2013, Nigel Hewlett, An Introduction to the Science of Phonetics:

(phonetics) articulated with both the upper and lower teeth.


pharyngeal

→ New Latin: pharyngeālis

/fəˈɹɪn.d͡ʒəl/

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-pharyngeal.wav

From Late Latin pharyngeus + -al, from pharynx (“the pharynx”) + -eus (adjectival suffix).

af

(phonetics) Articulated with the pharynx; a term usually describing a consonant which is articulated by the rear area of the tongue being raised to below the region between the uvula and the pharyngeal wall. The term cannot apply to a plosive or stop consonant.


pharyngeal

/fəˈɹɪn.d͡ʒəl/

pharyngeal consonant
pharyngeal consonant#English

(phonetics) A sound that is articulated with the pharynx; ellipsis of pharyngeal consonant..


labiodental

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-labiodental.wav

/f/ and /v/ are labiodental consonants.

(phonetics) articulated with the lower lip and upper teeth.

شَفَوِيّ أَسْنَانِيّ (šafawiyy ʔasnāniyy, literally “labial dental”)


labiodental

(phonetics) A speech sound articulated with the lower lip and upper teeth.

շրթնատամնային

a speech sound articulated with the lower lip and upper teeth


uvular

(phonetics) Of a sound, articulated with the uvula.


uvular

(phonetics) A sound articulated with the uvula.


palatal

en-adj

palatal (comparative more palatal, superlative most palatal)

more palatal (comparative)
most palatal (superlative)

(phonetics) Articulated at the hard palate.

غَارِيّ

(phonetics) articulated at the hard palate

(phonetics, uncommon) Articulated at the palate: dorsal.


grave

grave (comparative graver, superlative gravest)

graver (comparative)
gravest (superlative)

From Middle French grave, a learned borrowing from Latin gravis (“heavy, important”). Compare Old French greve (“terrible, dreadful”). Doublet of grief.

(phonology, dated, of a sound) Dull, produced in the middle or back of the mouth. (See Grave and acute on Wikipedia.Wikipedia)


aphetic

Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek ἄφετος (áphetos), equivalent to aphesis + -tic.

lbor

“’Pon” is an aphetic form of “upon”.

(phonetics, linguistics, prosody) Of, relating to, or formed by aphesis.


aphesis

en-noun

aphesis (countable and uncountable, plural apheses)

Attested since 1880. Learned borrowing from Ancient Greek ἄφεσις (áphesis, “letting go”), from ἀφίημι (aphíēmi), from ἀπό (apó, “off”) + ἵημι (híēmi, “send forth”).

lbor

The word "scarp" is derived from "escarp" by aphesis.

(phonetics, linguistics, prosody) The loss of the initial unstressed vowel of a word.


lingual

Learned borrowing from Medieval Latin linguālis, from lingua (“the tongue; a language, speech”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix); equivalent to lingua + -al. Doublet of lingualis.

af

(anatomy, dentistry, relational) Related to, near, or on the side toward the tongue.

(phonetics) Articulated with the tongue.


lingual

(phonetics) A sound articulated with the tongue.


visarga

Borrowed from Sanskrit विसर्ग (visarga).

XXV of Centamil published by the Tamil Sangam at Madura that in ancient times āytam was represented by visarga.

1934, P. S. Subrahmanya Sastri, History of Grammatical Theories in Tamil and Their Relation to the Grammatical Literature in Sanskrit:

(phonology, Sanskrit grammar) the voiceless terminal h in Sanskrit


velar

Borrowed from Latin vēlāris, from vēlum (“sail; veil, awning”).

(phonetics) Articulated at the velum or soft palate.


velar

(phonetics) A sound articulated at the soft palate.


tmesis

en-noun

tmesis (countable and uncountable, plural tmeses)

From Late Latin tmēsis, from Ancient Greek τμῆσις (tmêsis, “a cutting”), from τέμνω (témnō, “I cut”). First attested in 1586.

der

(prosody) The insertion of one or more words between the components of a compound word.

тмезис

insertion of one or more words between the components of a word


soft

en-adj

soft (comparative softer, superlative softest)

softer (comparative)
softest (superlative)

hard

antonym(s) of “giving way under pressure”

firm

antonym(s) of “lacking strength or resolve”

From Middle English softe, from Old English sōfte, alteration of earlier sēfte (“soft”), from Proto-West Germanic *samft(ī) (“level, even, smooth, soft, gentle”) (compare *sōmiz (“agreeable, fitting”)), from Proto-Indo-European *semptio-, *semtio-, from *sem- (“one, whole”). Cognate with West Frisian sêft (“gentle; soft”), Dutch zacht (“soft”), German Low German sacht (“soft”), German sanft (“soft, yielding”), Old Norse sœmr (“agreeable, fitting”), samr (“same”). More at seem, same.

inh

DH represents the voiced (soft) th of English these clothes.

1954, J.R.R. Tolkien, The Lord of the Rings:


velopharyngeal

en-adj

velopharyngeal (comparative more velopharyngeal, superlative most velopharyngeal)

more velopharyngeal (comparative)
most velopharyngeal (superlative)

(phonetics) Articulated at the velopharynx. (Those with cleft palate produce such sounds instead of standard sibilants.)


velopharyngeal

(phonetics) A sound articulated at the velopharynx.


nasal

nasal (comparative more nasal, superlative most nasal)

more nasal (comparative)
most nasal (superlative)

From Middle English, from Medieval Latin nāsālis, from nāsus (“the nose”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix). Doublet of nasalis.

af

nasal vowel

(phonetics) Having a sound imparted by means of the nose; and specifically, made by lowering the soft palate, in some cases with closure of the oral passage, the voice thus issuing (wholly or partially) through the nose, as in the consonants m, n, ng.

أَنْفِي

having a quality imparted by means of the nose

nasal utterance

"Are you sure you're OK?" she said with a nasal Australian accent.

2016, A.K. Brown, Jumpstart (Champagne Universe Series: Book 1), page 2:

(phonetics) Characterized by resonance in the nasal passage.


nasal

(phonetics) Ellipsis of nasal consonant.


stress

en-noun

stress (countable and uncountable, plural stresses)

Hans Selye
Walter Cannon
stress
stress (mechanics)

From a shortening of Middle English destresse, borrowed from Old French destrecier, from Latin distringō (“to stretch out”). This form probably coalesced with Middle English stresse, from Old French estrece (“narrowness”), from Vulgar Latin *strictia, from Latin strictus (“narrow”).
In the sense of "mental strain" or “disruption”, used occasionally in the 1920s and 1930s by psychologists, including Walter Cannon (1934); in “biological threat”, used by endocrinologist Hans Selye, by metaphor with stress in physics (force on an object) in the 1930s, and popularized by same in the 1950s.

Some people put the stress on the first syllable of “controversy”; others put it on the second.

(countable, phonetics, loosely) A suprasegmental feature of a language having additional attention raised to a sound, word or word group by means of of loudness, duration or pitch; phonological prominence.

The shift from pitch to stress appears to happen before the other obliques begin merging in the Proto-Italic, Proto-Germanic, Primitive Irish, and Middle Indo-Aryan. But further investigation into the timeline of sound changes […] shows that, at least in Germanic, the oblique and core noun stems sound quite unpredictably different in all these families by the time of the crucial accent shift from pitch to stress. […] once a language becomes stress-sensitive, there seems to be a strong tendency in early Indo-European languages to shift the stress to the first syllable. This change happens shortly after the change to stress accent in Proto-Germanic, Proto-Italic, and Proto-Celtic, and even Thessalian, with evidence from Dybo's Law and Verner's Law left behind to show that sound changes happened after the changes to stress accent.

2020 September 7, Steve Rapaport, “Parallel syncretism in early Indo-European”, in Bridget Drinka, editor, Historical Linguistics 2017: Selected Papers from the 23rd International Conference on Historical Linguistics, San Antonio, Texas, 31 July – 4 August 2017, →DOI, page 59:

(countable, phonetics, strictly) The suprasegmental feature of a language having additional attention raised to a sound by means of loudness and/or duration; phonological prominence phonetically achieved by means of dynamics as distinct from pitch.


click

Imitative of the "click" sound; first recorded in the 1500s. Compare Saterland Frisian klikke (“to click”), Middle Dutch clicken (Modern Dutch: klikken (“to click”)), Old High German klecchen (Modern German: klecken, klicken (“to click”)), Danish klikke (“to click”), Swedish klicka (“to click”), Norwegian klikke (“to click”), Norwegian klekke (“to hatch”).

onomatopoeic

Imitative

tsk is a click in English.

(phonetics) An ingressive sound made by coarticulating a velar or uvular closure with another closure.


cacuminal

en-adj

cacuminal (comparative more cacuminal, superlative most cacuminal)

more cacuminal (comparative)
most cacuminal (superlative)

From cacūmin- (the stem of the Latin cacūmen (“extremity, point, peak”) + -al.

uder

1942, George Leonard Trager, Studies in Linguistics, Volumes 1-7, page 52,
/L/ and /n/, slightly more cacuminal than the alveolar series, are very rare, and occur only in word-final position.

The cacuminal s is produced by raising the tongue-tip to a point behind the alveoli, with a concavity in its upper surface;

1951, William James Entwistle, The Spanish Language: Together with Portuguese, Catalan and Basque, page 218:

1992, Anatoly Liberman, Vowel lengthening before resonant + another consonant and svarabhakti in Germanic, Irmengard Rauch, Gerald F. Carr, Robert L. Kyes (editors), On Germanic Linguistics: Issues and Methods, Trends in Linguistics: Studies and Monographs 68, page 190,
It is a trill, because the choice can be only between a cacuminal trill or a cacuminal lateral, but cacuminal l already exists in the system […] .

(phonology, dated) Pronounced using a concave or retroflexed tongue.


cacuminal

(phonology, dated) A sound pronounced using a retroflexed tongue.


lateral

en-adj

lateral (comparative more lateral, superlative most lateral)

more lateral (comparative)
most lateral (superlative)

Borrowed from Latin laterālis (“belonging to the side”), from latus (“the side or flank”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix).

af

(phonetics, phonology) (of a consonant, especially the English clear l) Pertaining to speech sounds generated by partially blocking the egress of the airstream with the tongue, leaving space on one or both sides of the occlusion for air passage.


level

en-adj

level (comparative leveler or leveller, superlative levelest or levellest)

leveler (comparative)
leveller (comparative)
levelest (superlative)
levellest (superlative)

From Middle English level, from Old French livel, liveau m, later nivel, niveau, from Latin libella f (“a balance, a level”), diminutive of libra f (“a balance, a level”); see libra, librate. Doublet of libella and niveau.
The verb is from Middle English levelen, from the noun.

Intonation or tone is either level, rising, or falling, marked respectively

1891, Henry Sweet, A History of English Sounds from the Earliest Period:

(phonetics) Of even tone; without rising or falling inflection; monotonic.


medial

medial (comparative more medial, superlative most medial)

more medial (comparative)
most medial (superlative)

LL-Q1860 (eng)-I learned some phrases-medial.wav

Borrowed from Latin mediālis (“middle”), from medius (“that is in the middle or midst”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix).

среден

Situated in or near the middle; not at either end.

(phonetics, linguistics) (of a speech sound, or a character or sequence thereof) In the middle of a word.

Thus, when he drew up instructions in lawyer language, he expressed the important words by an initial, a medial, or a final consonant, and made scratches for all the words between; his clerks, however, understood him very well.

1892, Walter Besant, “Prologue: Who is Edmund Gray?”, in The Ivory Gate […], New York, N.Y.: Harper & Brothers, […], →OCLC:

(phonetics) (of a consonant) Central: produced when air flows across the center of the mouth over the tongue.


sonant

Indo-Germanic sonants and consonants


labial

Borrowing from Medieval Latin labiālis (“of or pertaining to the lips”), from labium (“a lip”) + -ālis (“-al”, adjectival suffix); equivalent to labium + -al.

af

(linguistics, phonetics) Articulated by the lips, as the consonants b, m and w.


labial

The motions of the Tongue, Lips, Throat, Palate, & c. which go to the making of the ſeveral Alphabetical Letters are worthy inquiry, and pertinent to the preſent Inquiſition of Sounds: But becauſe they are ſubtil and long to deſcribe, we will refer them over, and place them amongſt the Experiments of Speech. The Hebrews have been diligent in it, and have aſſigned which Letters are Labial, which Dental, which Guttural, & c

1670, Francis Bacon, Sylva sylvarum : or, a natural history in ten centuries, Natural History, Century II, pp 197-98

You have but the same four letters to describe the salute which you perform on your grandmother’s forehead, and that which you bestow on the sacred cheek of your mistress; but the same four letters, and not one of them a labial.

1848 November – 1850 December, William Makepeace Thackeray, chapter 47, in The History of Pendennis. […], volume (please specify |volume=I or II), London: Bradbury and Evans, […], published 1849–1850, →OCLC:

Those were his first words of the voyage, and they were spoken with unstuttered labials.

1959, Anthony Burgess, Beds in the East (The Malayan Trilogy), published 1972, page 578:

(linguistics, phonetics) A consonant articulated by the lips.


biceps

en-noun

biceps (plural biceps or bicepses or bicipites)

biceps (plural)
bicepses (plural)
bicipites (plural)

PIE word
 *dwóh₁
From Latin biceps (“double-headed, two peaked”), from bis (“double”) + caput (“head”). See there for more details.

der

Also it is advisable to distinguish this ( ˘ ˘ ) — ˘ ˘ — rhythm, where the princeps was probably shorter in duration than the biceps (as in the dactylic hexameter), from true (marching) anapaests, in which they were equal.

1987, Martin Litchfield West, Introduction to Greek Metre:

This means that in the metrical sequence[…] recited in ordinary speech rhythm, the princeps occupied a slightly shorter time than the biceps (5:6), and if a long syllable was used to fill the biceps it had to be dragged a little[…]

2000, James I. Porter, Nietzsche and the Philology of the Future, page 347:

(prosody) A point in a metrical pattern that can be filled either with one long syllable (a longum) or two short syllables (two brevia)


dissimilation

en-noun

dissimilation (countable and uncountable, plural dissimilations)

/ˌdɪsɪmɪˈleɪʃən/

From dis- + -similation, after assimilation.

Brimstone is "properly" *brinstone, displaying an ancient careless pronunciation made respectable by being called "dissimilation".

1985, Robert Burchfield, The English Language, Oxford: Oxford University Press, page 112:

(phonology, phonetics) A phenomenon where one of a pair of similar adjacent consonant or vowel sounds in a word becomes less similar.

disimilim

(phonology) A phenomenon whereby similar consonant or vowel sounds in a word become less similar


flap

From Middle English flap, flappe (“a slap; blow; buffet; fly-flap; something flexible or loose; flap”), related to Saterland Frisian Flappert (“wing, flipper”), Middle Dutch flabbe (“a blow; slap on the face; fly-flap; flap”) (modern Dutch flap (“flap”)), Middle Low German flabbe, vlabbe, flebbe, from the verb (see below). Related also to English flab and flabby.

cog

(phonetics) A consonant sound made by a single muscle contraction, such as the sound /ɾ/ in the standard American English pronunciation of body.


flap

en-verb

flap (third-person singular simple present flaps, present participle flapping, simple past and past participle flapped)

flaps (present singular third-person)
flapping (participle present)
flapped (participle past)
flapped (past)

From Middle English flappen (“to flap, clap, slap, strike”), related to Dutch flappen (“to flap”), German Low German flappen (“to flap”), German flappen (“to flap”), Dutch flabberen (“to flit, flap”). Probably ultimately imitative.

onomatopoeic

imitative

(phonetics, transitive) To pronounce (something) as a flap consonant.

(phonetics, intransitive) To be pronounced with a flap consonant.


leash

From Middle English leesshe, leysche, lesshe, a variant of more original lease, from Middle English lees, leese, leece, lese, from Old French lesse (modern French laisse), from Latin laxa (“thong, a loose cord”), feminine form of laxus (“loose”); compare lax. Doublet of laisse.

(prosody) A kind of metrical construct in Skeltonics.


tetrameter

en-noun

tetrameter (countable and uncountable, plural tetrameters)

(prosody) A poetic metre in which each line has four feet.


release

release (countable and uncountable, plural releases)

From Middle English relesen, relessen, from Old French relaisser (variant of relascher).

отцепване

a device adapted to hold or release a device or mechanism as required

(phonetics, sound synthesis) The act or manner of ending a sound.


short form

"Tux" is a short form of "tuxedo".

"Rob" is a short form of "Robert".

(phonetics) A word with the same meaning as another formed by removing one or more of the syllables of the longer word, and considered a word in its own right rather than an abbreviation.

forme tronquée

word formed by removing syllables from another


epenthesis

epenthesis (countable and uncountable, plural epentheses)

Middle of 16th century: via Late Latin, from Ancient Greek ἐπένθεσις (epénthesis), from ἐπεντίθημι (epentíthēmi, “I insert”), from ἐπί (epí) + ἐντίθημι (entíthēmi, “I put in”), from ἐν (en, “in”) + τίθημι (títhēmi, “I put, place”).

(phonetics, prosody) The insertion of a phoneme, letter, or syllable into a word, usually to satisfy the phonological constraints of a language or poetic context.

epentese

insertion of a phoneme or letter into a word


ejective

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-ejective.wav

(phonetics) A nonpulmonic consonant formed by squeezing air trapped between the glottis and an articulator further forward, and releasing it suddenly.


explosive

en-adj

explosive (comparative more explosive, superlative most explosive)

more explosive (comparative)
most explosive (superlative)

From Latin explōs-, stem of the perfect passive participle of explōdō + the suffix -ive.

the explosive consonants


shell

From Middle English schelle, from Old English sċiell, from Proto-West Germanic *skallju, from Proto-Germanic *skaljō, from Proto-Indo-European *(s)kelH- (“to split, cleave”).
Compare West Frisian skyl (“peel, rind”), Dutch schil (“peel, skin, rink”), Low German Schell (“shell, scale”), Irish scelec (“pebble”), Latin silex (“pebble, flint”), siliqua (“pod”), Old Church Slavonic сколика (skolika, “shell”). More at shale.
Doublet of sheal.
* (computing): From being viewed as an outer layer of interface between the user and the operating-system internals.

cog

(phonology) The onset and coda of a syllable.


intrusion

en-noun

intrusion (countable and uncountable, plural intrusions)

/ɪnˈtɹuːʒən/

From Middle English intrusioun, from Old French intrusion, from Medieval Latin intrūsiō, from intrūdō, from Latin in- + trūdō.

A current challenge in recent work on Spanish sound structure is to understand the conditions that determine vowel intrusion and the consequences vowel intrusion may have on Spanish phonology.

2009, Benjamin Schmeiser, edited by Marine Vigário, Sónia Frota, and M. João Freitas, Phonetics and Phonology: Interactions and Interrelations, →ISBN, page 181:

(phonology) The insertion of a phoneme into the pronunciation of a word despite its absence from the spelling. (e.g. intrusive r)


semivowel

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-semivowel.wav

(phonetics) A sound in speech which has some qualities of a consonant and some qualities of a vowel.


tonic

(phonetics) A tonic element or letter; a vowel or a diphthong.


CV

CV (countable and uncountable, plural CVs)

Abbreviation
* (anime, Japanimation): From Japanese CV (CV), from English character+voice
* (aircraft carrier): Initialism of cruiser (“croiseur”) + French voler (“to fly”).

initialism of

(phonetics) Initialism of cardinal vowel.


voiceless

(phonetics, of a consonant or vowel) Spoken without vibration of the vocal cords; unvoiced, surd, breathed. Examples: [t], [s], [f], [m̥], [u̥].

مَهْمُوس

phonetics, of a consonant: spoken without vibration of the vocal cords


laryngeal

/ləˈɹɪn.d͡ʒəl/

Derived from New Latin laryngeus + -al, from larynx (“larynx”) + -eus (adjectival suffix). By surface analysis, laryng- + -al or -ial.

af

(phonetics, relational) (of a speech sound) Made by or with constriction of the larynx with only the front part of the vocal cords vibrating, giving a very low frequency and producing what is known as "creaky voice."


laryngeal

/ləˈɹɪn.d͡ʒəl/

(phonetics) A sound uttered by using the larynx.


preantepenultimate

Nominal sense attested since 1746; adjectival sense attested since 1791: pre- + antepenultimate.

Accent the Preantepenultimate.

1830, John Walker, A Key to the Classical Pronunciation of Greek, Latin, and Scripture Proper Names, New York, N.Y.: J.F. Dove, page 169:

(chiefly phonetics, obsolete, rare) preantepenult


preantepenultimate

First or Preantepenultimate Milk-molar; Second or Ante- penultimate Milk-molar.

1874, Andrew Leith Adams, On the Dentition and Osteology of the Maltese Fossil Elephants, Zoological Society of London, page 10:

In the tautala leaga [colloquial Samoan] the shortening of normal vowels in the antepenultimate and preantepenultimate syllables is very common.

1992, Ulrike Mosel, Even Hovdhaugen, “Phonology and orthography”, in Samoan Reference Grammar, Oslo: The Institute for Comparative Research in Human Culture; Scandinavian University Press, via National Library of Norway, →ISBN, page 27:

…PWs with preantepenultimate and even fifth-but-last stress occur,…

2010, Editors Martin Maiden, John Charles Smith, Adam Ledgeway, The Cambridge History of the Romance Languages: Volume 1, Structures, Cambridge University Press, →ISBN, page 82:

(chiefly phonetics and biology) Three before the end; fourth to last.


iambic

en-adj

iambic (comparative more iambic, superlative most iambic)

more iambic (comparative)
most iambic (superlative)

From Middle French ïambique, from Late Latin iambicus, from Ancient Greek ἰαμβικός (iambikós), from ἴαμβος (íambos) + -ικός (-ikós).

[J]ust before the rhythm becomes iambic, there will be a point reached at which the rhythm can hardly be said to be more iambic than it is trochaic.

1908, Frank Gilbert Bruner, The Hearing of Primitive Peoples, page 17:

(prosody) Consisting of iambs (metrical feet with an unstressed-stressed pattern) or characterized by their predominance. [from 16th c.]

iàmbic

consisting of iambs or characterized by their predominance


iambic

(prosody) An iamb; a line or group of lines of iambs.


alveolar

(phonetics) Formed with the tongue touching or approaching the inner ridge of the gums of the upper front teeth.

لِثَوِيّ

formed with the tongue touching or approaching the ridge behind the upper teeth


anaptyxis

en-noun

anaptyxis (countable and uncountable, plural anaptyxes)

Learned borrowing from New Latin anaptyxis, from Ancient Greek ἀνάπτυξις (anáptuxis).

lbor

(phonetics) The epenthesis (insertion) of a vowel.


soften

en-verb

soften (third-person singular simple present softens, present participle softening, simple past and past participle softened)

softens (present singular third-person)
softening (participle present)
softened (participle past)
softened (past)

From Middle English softenen, softnen, equivalent to soft + -en.

(transitive, intransitive, phonology) To become or make (a consonant) more lenis, to lenite.


initial

From Middle French initial or directly from its Latin etymon initiālis (“of the beginning, incipient, initial”), from initium (“a going in, entrance, beginning”), from inire (“to go in, enter upon, begin”), from in (“in”) + ire (“to go”).

(phonology) onset, part of a syllable that precedes the syllable nucleus in phonetics and phonology.


emphasis

en-noun

emphasis (countable and uncountable, plural emphases)

From Latin emphasis, from Ancient Greek ἔμφασις (émphasis, “significance”), from ἐμφαίνω (emphaínō, “I present, I indicate”), from ἐν- (en-, “in”) + φαίνω (phaínō, “I show”).

der

(phonology) The phonetic or phonological feature that distinguishes emphatic consonants from other consonants.

emfaasi

phonology: the phonetic or phonological feature that distinguishes emphatic consonants from other consonants


pulmonic sounds

(phonetics) sounds in which the air stream originates in the lungs.


flapping

en-noun

flapping (countable and uncountable, plural flappings)

(phonology) A phonological process found in many dialects of English, especially American English and Canadian English, by which intervocalic /t/ and /d/ surface as the alveolar flap [ɾ] before an unstressed syllable, so that words such as "metal" and "medal" are pronounced similarly or identically.


systole

LL-Q1860 (eng)-Flame, not lame-systole.wav

Borrowed from New Latin, from Ancient Greek συστολή (sustolḗ), from συστέλλω (sustéllō, “to contract”), from σύν (sún, “together”) + στέλλω (stéllō, “to send”).

(prosody) A shortening of a naturally long vowel.


aspiration

aspiration (countable and uncountable, plural aspirations)

From aspirate + -ion or borrowed from Latin aspīrātiō.

(phonetics) A burst of air that follows the release of some consonants.


vibrant

From French vibrant, from Latin vibrans, present participle of vibrare (“to vibrate”). See vibrate.

(phonetics) Any of a class of consonants including taps and trills.


paragoge

paragoge (countable and uncountable, plural paragoges)

/pæɹəˈɡəʊd͡ʒi/

From Late Latin paragoge, from Ancient Greek παραγωγή (paragōgḗ, “derivation, addition”).

der

(grammar, prosody) The addition of a sound, syllable or letter to the end of a word, either through natural development or as a grammatical function.

lostkresk

the addition of a sound, syllable or letter to the end of a word


apocope

en-noun

apocope (countable and uncountable, plural apocopes)

Learned borrowing from Late Latin apocopē, from Ancient Greek ἀποκοπή (apokopḗ), ἀποκόπτω (apokóptō, “cut off”).

lbor

(phonetics, prosody, strictly) The loss or omission of the last vowel in a word, together with any consonants that follow it.


resonant

Borrowed from French résonnant or Latin resonāre (“to resound”).

(phonetics) A sonorant vowel or consonant.


syllabic

From Medieval Latin syllabicus, from Ancient Greek συλλαβικός (sullabikós), from συλλαβή (sullabḗ, “syllable”).


pyrrhic

From Latin pyrrhichius, from Ancient Greek πυρρίχιος (purrhíkhios), from πυρρίχη (purrhíkhē, “war dance”).

(prosody) Of or characterized by pyrrhics (metrical feet with two short syllables).


pyrrhic

(prosody) A metric foot with two short or unaccented syllables.


glide

en-verb

glide (third-person singular simple present glides, present participle gliding, simple past glided or glid or (archaic) glode, past participle glided or glid or glidden or (archaic) glode)

glides (present singular third-person)
gliding (participle present)
glided (past)
glid (past)
glode (archaic past)
glided (participle past)
glid (participle past)
glidden (participle past)
glode (archaic participle past)

From Middle English gliden, from Old English glīdan, from Proto-West Germanic *glīdan, from Proto-Germanic *glīdaną, from Proto-Indo-European *ǵʰleydʰ-.
Cognate with West Frisian glide, glydzje, Low German glieden, Dutch glijden, German gleiten, Norwegian Nynorsk gli, Danish glide, Swedish glida, Finnish liitää.

(phonetics) To pass with a glide, as the voice.


glide

(phonology) A transitional sound, especially a semivowel.


homorganic

/ˌhɑmɔɹˈɡænɪk/

/ˌhɒmɔːˈɡænɪk/

Two identical consonants (redoubled) in second and third position are frequently found (they are called verba mediae geminatae), but two homorganic consonants are not.

2011 March 1, Eulàlia Vernet i Pons, “Semitic Root Incompatibilities and Historical Linguistics”, in Journal of Semitic Studies, volume 56, number 1, →DOI, page 4

place of articulation
place of articulation

(phonetics) Of consonants: having the same place of articulation. For example, labial m, b, p, alveolar n, d, t, velar ŋ, g, k. Indic alphabets such as Devanagari, as well as the Korean hangul alphabet, are rationally arranged so that homorganic consonants are grouped together.


homorganic

/ˌhɑmɔɹˈɡænɪk/

/ˌhɒmɔːˈɡænɪk/

(phonetics) A consonant having the same place of articulation as another.


cluster

→ Catalan: clúster

→ French: cluster

→ German: Cluster

→ Italian: cluster

→ Japanese: クラスター (kurasutā)

→ Portuguese: cluster

→ Russian: кла́стер (kláster)

→ Spanish: clúster, cluster

→ Swedish: kluster

High Performance Computing Center, Stuttgart

The noun is derived from Middle English cluster (“bunch, cluster, spray; compact body or mass, ball”) [and other forms], from Old English cluster, clyster (“cluster, bunch, branch”), from Proto-Germanic *klas-, *klus- (“to clump, lump together”) (possibly from Proto-Indo-European *gel- (“to ball up; to clench; to amass”)) + *-þrą (suffix forming nouns denoting an instrument or tool). The English word is probably a doublet of clot.
The verb is derived from the noun.
cognates
* Dutch klister (“cluster”) (dialectal)
* Icelandic klasi (“cluster; bunch of grapes”)
* Low German Kluuster (“cluster”)
* Swedish kluster (“cluster”)

nb...

closter, clostre, clouster, clowster, clustre, clustyr

բույլ

The word scrub begins with a cluster of three consonants.

A bunch or group of several discrete items that are close to each other.

(phonetics) A pronounceable group of consonants that occur together: a consonant cluster.

shluk

group of pronounceable consonants that occur together


sonorous

en-adj

sonorous (comparative more sonorous, superlative most sonorous)

more sonorous (comparative)
most sonorous (superlative)

Borrowed from Latin sonōrus, from sonor (“sound”), early 17th century.

Vowels are more sonorous (acoustically powerful) than consonants, and so we perceive them as louder and lasting longer.

2001, Michael Dobrovolsky, “Phonetics: The Sounds of Language”, in William O'Grady, John Archibald, Mark Aronoff, Janie Rees-Miller, editors, Contemporary Linguistics, →ISBN, page 21:

(linguistics, phonetics) Produced with a relatively open vocal tract and relatively little obstruction of airflow.