Why is the e at the end unreadable? Silent letters

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The English spelling system is known throughout the world for being devoid of rules and meaning. The pattern of phonetic perfection, in which each letter represents only one sound, and each individual sound is represented by only one letter, cannot be applied to the English language, which has 45 sounds or phonemes, and only 26 letters to represent them.

Moreover, in every language, over time there are inconsistencies between the spelling of words and modern pronunciation, because the rules of pronunciation change, and given that written English has existed for about 1,300 years, there are too many such inconsistencies, and one of the most striking examples is the abundance of unreadable letters

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When it comes to unreadable letters, more than half of the letters in the English alphabet are unreadable in at least a few words. If we list them in alphabetical order, they are B, D, E, G, H, K, L, M, N, O, P, R, S, T, W, X and Z. In this post we will tell the origin story of some unreadable or silent letters.

Mute E

Our post mainly examines , but we cannot ignore the most famous silent vowel letter in English language: E. While other silent letters appear only in some words, E is so common that there is even a rule regarding this letter: a silent E at the end of a word affects the pronunciation of the previous vowel, which becomes continuous. We know this rule as "".

According to Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language(Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language), authored by David Crystal, this rule dates back to the 11th century. At that time in English they used various suffixes, indicating the singular and plural, as well as the role of the word in the sentence - whether it is subject or object, for example, if the Old English word "hus", meaning today "house", was written as "huse", this already meant "to a house". Much water has passed under the bridge since then, but the silent ending has survived to this day and defines an open syllable or 1 type of reading.

Unpronounceable consonants

Another rule is the rules for reading the consonant H, which today is not read in words such as honor, hour, as well as in the letter combination GH in words such as thought, through, caught, taught, (k)night.

As you know, the English language is replete with combinations of consonants and of the 23 consonant sounds in modern English, 40 letter combinations appear, some of which are used only in proper names, such as Gwen, or in borrowed words such as schlep (bore). One of the relics of the past is the letter combination KN, in which only the letter N is read in words such as “knife, knee, knowledge.” Another example is WR, in which the W is not pronounced: “wrong, wrestle, wreath”, as well as GN with a silent consonant G in the words gnaw, gnarly, gnat. When we talk about the silent letter G, the word gnome (gnome) [‘nəυmi:] comes to mind, but this is no longer from Old English, but from Greek language, which flooded English with many silent letters.

In addition to the GN in the words gnostic and gnome, letter combinations starting with a silent P have entered the English language from Greek - this is PN in pneumonia, PS in words such as in psychiatry and psalm. The letter combination PT appears in the root "pter-", meaning "wing" in a word such as "pterodactyl".

In addition to silent letters at the beginning of words, there are many at the end, for example, in the word hymn the letter N is not pronounced, but in the derivative word hymnal, when N is followed by a vowel, it is read. There are many similar examples in the English language, for example, in the word condemn the N is not read, but in the word condemnation derived from it, it is pronounced.

Many words with silent consonants came into English from French, where this problem is also relevant. Take, for example, the word rendezvous [ʹrɒnd(e)ı|vu:] (rendezvous) in which there are two silent letters - Z and S. A similar situation is in the case of “coup d'état” [ˌkuːdeɪ'tɑː] (coup d'etat) , where the letters P and T are also silent.

There are many other silent letters whose history is no longer relevant today. There are linguists who propose to carry out spelling reforms in order to bring the English language to perfection, but this sounds unrealistic, and we have to learn the spelling of English words, the lack of spelling rules for which creates many problems for students.

A lot of words in the English language end with the letter “e”. Moreover, the letter “e” itself in this case does not make any sound, that is, it is not readable. Hence the name: “mute “e””. For example: lake - lake. There are actually only six exceptions, when "e" is the only vowel in a very short word. In this case, it is read as in the English alphabet: . These six English words are as follows: be - to be, he - he, me - me, me, me, we - we, she [∫i:] - she, the [ði:] before a vowel sound, [ðə] before a consonant sound - definite article.

So why do we need the letter “e” at the end of words in English if it doesn’t have a sound? Having dealt with this, you can make it easier for yourself to read English words. It turns out that she does a lot of different useful things.

Some useful things that involve the silent English “e” are:

1) to open the previous syllable (open syllables in English are those ending with a vowel; the rule for reading the vowel in a syllable depends on this). It can add one or two consonants from the previous syllable. For example: one consonant: make, ma | ke - to do; two consonants: taste, ta | ste - taste. But if the previous syllable contains 3 consonants, then the syllable remains closed. For example: cattle, cat | tle - cattle;

2) to distinguish an ary open syllable from an ary closed one (arry in English are syllables in which the vowel is followed by the letter “r”; the name of the syllables is based on the sound of this letter). Compare how the sound of the letters “a”, “e” changes depending on the openness of the ary syllable: closed syllable: car - car and open syllable care - care, attention, closed syllable: her - her and open syllable: here - here;

3) so that the English letters “c” and “g” are read as in the alphabet: “s” [s], since - since, since; "g", bridge - bridge; in this case, the first syllable is not opened (since the silent “e” in this case has already been used for another rule); only in the combination “-ange” the syllable is open, for example: change - change, dangerous [‘deındʒərəs] - dangerous;

4) to avoid the letter "s" at the end of a word when it is not the ending English nouns plural or ending English verb in 3rd person singular present tense: sense - meaning; in this case, the first syllable is not opened (since the silent “e” in this case has already been used for another rule);

5) to english letter The "v" was not at the end of the word. In this case, the previous syllable can be either closed or open, it is not known in advance: lives - lives, lives - lives; have - have, behave, be | ha | ve - behave. Even in the abbreviated form of the verb have: “’ve” (I’ve done it.), the letter “v” is accompanied by a silent “e”. Only Russian surnames starting with “-ov” are written without a silent “e” during transliteration: Krasnov, Zaitsev, sometimes “v” is replaced with two “f”: Raspopoff;

6) to distinguish between words with the same root, often a noun and a verb (and at the same time open the first syllable): bath - bath, bathe - swim, breath - breathing, breathe - breathe, strip - strip, stripe - to draw stripes;

7) to observe some traditions of writing words, for example: die - die, dye - paint, check - check, machine - machine. Along the way, the silent English “e” denotes the end of the root of a word when adding suffixes and endings to the root: care - care, attention, careful [‘keəful] - attentive, careless [‘keəlıs] - inattentive, careless; courage [‘kʌrıdʒ] - courage, courageous [‘kʌrıdʒəs] - brave; like - like, similar, likely [‘laıklı] - likely, probably; line - line, lines - lines; move - to move, moves - moves, moved - moved, movement [‘mu:vmənt] - movement.

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The rules of reading in English are extensive and complex, because... there is a huge discrepancy between letters and sounds: there are 26 letters and 44 sounds, so different letters produced in different positions different sounds, which in English are conveyed by conventions called transcription signs. In this post, to make it easier to learn the rules of reading, we denote them partially in Russian letters.

4 Basic Types of Vowel Reading

First, let's learn the 4 main types of reading vowels E, A, Y, U, O, I in stressed syllables in English

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I reading type - open syllable ( a syllable ending in a vowel is considered open, even if it is not pronounced)

Pay attention to the first row of the table. The words same, note, he, fine, my, cube, like all words of this category, end in a silent vowel, and the reading of the vowels in the root of the word coincides with the name of the letters according to the alphabet. Thus, words with silent vowels at the end, i.e. words of type 1 reading same, note, he, fine, my, cube, will sound like “seim, note, hee, fine, may, cube”

Let's consolidate the reading of vowels in a stressed syllable with the following exercise:

Note, lone, mice, rice, type, tune, shy, lay, say, he, hay, name, same, nine, nice, game, came, make, Kate, Pete, five, tie, life, eve, me, size, no, cope, smoke, rose, nose, spine, sly, cry, vine, maze, home, tube, made, fume, cube, pace, lace, sky, hale, spine.

II reading type – closed syllable (a syllable ending in a consonant is considered closed). This is the second row in the table. Pay attention to the words rat, hot, red, bit, myth, run, which do not have a silent vowel at the end. These words sound like "rat, hot, ed, beat, miss, ran."

Cap, pen, bed, ten, not, spot, lot, bad, rat, sit, send, test, pit, in, send, spell, tin, less, ban, mad, fat, Sam, land, did, fit, sat, pet, tin, slip, sad, glad, bag, jam, gap, lag, can, kin, Jim, Jack, yes, ink, cup, run, cod, spin, not, doll, hop, hot, bank, rank, spin, up, us, bus, bun, cut, fun, vet, well, but, nut.

III type of reading – vowel + letter “r” , which affects the sound of the vowel at the root of the word, giving it some prolongation. So the words car, sort, term, fir, Byrd, fur sound like “ka: so:t, te:m, fe: be:d, fe:”.

stern , Far, curt, hard, hart, car, card, cart, fork, cork, work, sort, term, first, Byrd, furs, curl, her, curb, turn, girl, sir, burn, turn, word, born, torn, bird, form, serf, herb.

IVreading type – vowel + letter “r” + vowel. The letter "r" in in this case also unreadable; all three vowels together sound like this: care, store, mere, tire, cure - “kea, hundred:, mie, taie, kue.”

Fare, here, pure, rare, cure, during, mare, fire, bare, mire, stare, tire, sere, mere, store, core, more, care.

Video lesson: Rules for reading the vowel A in English

IN Idea lesson: Rules for reading the vowel E in English

Video lesson: Rules for reading the vowel U in English

Video lesson: Rules for reading the vowel O in English

Video lesson:Rules for reading vowels I,Y

Consonants with two reading options

*s m\z (interdental) – th – there is no such sound in the Russian language. This sound is dull and resembles the Russian sound “s”, but when pronouncing it, the tongue is between the front upper and lower teeth, and through the created narrow gap a stream of air passes with force.

**we pronounce the interdental sound “z” in the same way.

Video lesson: Rules for reading English consonants

Reading chart for vowels combined with consonants

For high-quality assimilation of the sound system and the rules of reading the English language, we recommend repeating the above reading rules daily and trying to read monosyllabic words from the dictionary.

Video lesson: Rules for reading various letter combinations in English

Video lesson: Rules for reading English vowels in unstressed position

For rules for reading unpronounceable consonants, see

• Hint: for control correct pronunciation you can use the audio function of online dictionaries.

We have all been convinced more than once that there are many oddities and incomprehensibility in English that can bring a lot of headaches to English learners. What was the most difficult thing for you? Grammar? Great amount words and synonyms for these words? Pronunciation? At school, the most difficult thing for me seemed to be spelling words, the so-called Spelling. Why do we write many letters but pronounce fewer sounds?

In the Russian language, as a rule, everything is logical: there is the word “beautiful”, pronounce all the written letters, and it will be correct. In English, problems begin when you realize that the rules of the Russian language do not work here. Simple example: beautiful /ˈbjuːtəfl/ – 9 letters and 6 sounds (combination ju- one sound).

I often wondered why unpronounceable letters are needed in English ( silent letters)? What's the point of them if we don't say them? Are there any rules that can explain the use silent letters? Let's look for answers in the article.

History of unpronounceable letters

If we look at English words from a historical perspective, we will see that in the past, about 90% of the words in English were phonemic ( phonemic). That is, the words were pronounced as they were written. Imagine there was (knight), and the word was pronounced as / / (/book/, may the English teachers forgive me for writing the transcription in Russian letters). At that time there were almost no words with unpronounceable letters, but somewhere in the 15th century the trend began to change. During this period, English began to borrow many words from other languages ​​(French and Latin). Borrowings brought with them certain problems: new words did not correspond to the pronunciation norms of the classical English that time. Then the habit of “reinterpreting” original English words in a new manner arose.

Also the English language has accepted with open arms Latin alphabet, which has only 26 letters. These 26 letters were supposed to convey more than 40 sounds of the English language. Since 26 letters are not enough to convey 41 sounds, they began to use combinations of letters to convey one sound. In this way, people were able to preserve all the significant sounds of English. Now in modern English only 40% of words are phonemic.

It turns out that 60% of words in the English language contain unpronounceable letters. This is why it is very important to learn to recognize when a letter is pronounced and when it is not. These subtleties can confuse us, for example when we look up a word in a dictionary. Let's take the floor knowledge. If I don’t know how to spell it, but am guided only by the initial sound, then I will look for this word in the section on the letter N and, naturally, I won’t find anything like it.

How to work with words with unpronounceable letters

There are many rules for silent letters, I will explain some of them in this article. In one sitting, remember all the cases with silent letters, I think it will be impossible. Therefore, banal practice is needed. The more words you encounter orally and in writing, the faster you will be able to establish a certain pattern for writing words. For example, if you are already familiar with the word could, That would It won't seem so strange anymore.

The second method, which will help you remember the spelling and pronunciation of words, is suitable for real lovers of the English language: delve into the etymology (origin) of the word. Try to find the history of the word: where it was borrowed from, what it meant before, how it was pronounced. You will not only remember the spelling of a new word well, but also learn a lot of interesting things about the history of the origin of the concept. For example, in the word (island) is an unpronounceable letter s. Until the 15th century, this word was pronounced / ˈaɪlənd/, just like now, but it was written differently - aeland. When French borrowings appeared, the first part of the word changed in appearance and began to look more like the French version isle- island.

Why are silent letters needed?

How can unpronounceable letters help us, what is the use of them? They can be very useful when you are reading a text and need to understand the difference between homophones - words that are pronounced the same but are spelled differently: no and know, them and there, to and two. Can you understand what is written here?

Do you no wear my sun?
- Eye think his hear.
- Oh, know. His them.

Do you know where my son is?
- I think he’s here.
- Oh, no. He's there.

Unpronounceable letters also affect pronunciation, which generally seems strange, because we do not pronounce them. For example: sin /sɪn/ And sign/saɪn/, rat /ræt/ And rate /reɪt/. Yes, it is important to know if we are committing sin ( to sin) or just put a signature somewhere ( to sign).

Mute e at the end of a word affects the length of the vowel sound in the previous syllable. Tap /tæp/ And tape /teɪp/, mat /mæt/ And mate /meɪt/, fin /fɪn/ And fine /faɪn/. In the first variant the vowel sound is short, in the second it is long. Accordingly, this different words with different meanings.

Rules for using silent letters

I want to make a reservation right away: there are rules, but there are also plenty of exceptions. We will focus on commonly encountered rules.

1. Silent B not pronounced after M at the end of a word: limb /lɪm/, thumb /θʌm/, dumb /dʌm/. We also usually don’t pronounce B before T at the end of a word: debt /det/, doubt /daʊt/, subtle /ˈsʌt(ə)l/.
2. Silent E occurs at the end of a word and affects the previous vowel (making it a long sound): hope /həʊp/, drive /draɪv/, gave /ɡeɪv/.
3. Silent G often not pronounced when coming before N: foreign /ˈfɒrɪn/, sign /saɪn/, champagne /ˌʃæmˈpeɪn/.
4. Silent GH are not pronounced when they come after a vowel: though /ðəʊ /, through /θruː/, daughter /ˈdɔːtə(r)/. Exceptions: words consisting of two roots: doghouse /ˈdɒɡˌhaʊs/, foghorn /ˈfɒɡˌhɔː(r)n/, egghead /ˈeɡˌhed/. G.H. sometimes pronounced as F: rough /rʌf/, laugh /lɑːf/, cough /kɒf/.
5. Silent H not pronounced when coming after W: what /wɒt/, when /wen/, why /waɪ/. Sound H is not pronounced at the beginning of many words; in such words it is important to remember that you need to use the article an: an hour /ˈaʊə(r)/, an honor /ˈɒnə(r)/, an heir /eə(r)/.
6. Silent K not pronounced when at the beginning of a word before N: knee /niː/, knowledge /ˈnɒlɪdʒ/, know /nəʊ/.
7. Silent L not pronounced after vowels A, O, U: calm /kɑːm/, could /kʊd/, yolk /jəʊk/.
8. Silent P not pronounced at the beginning of many words that begin with “ psych" And " pneu”: psychiatrist /saɪˈkaɪətrɪst/, psychotic /saɪˈkɒtɪk/, pneumatic /njuːˈmætɪk/.
9. Silent T is not pronounced in these frequently encountered words: castle /ˈkɑːs(ə)l/, hasten /ˈheɪs(ə)n/, soften /ˈsɒf(ə)n/, fasten /ˈfɑːs(ə)n/, whistle /ˈwɪs(ə)l/, bustle /ˈbʌs(ə)l/.
10. Silent U not pronounced after G and before a vowel within a word. Examples: guitar /ɡɪˈtɑː(r)/, guidance /ˈɡaɪd(ə)ns/, guild /ɡɪld/.
11. Silent W not pronounced at the beginning of a word before R, For example: wrap /rap/, wrong /rɒŋ/, wrestle /ˈres(ə)l/. Also W not pronounced in these words: whose /huːz/, who /huː/, wholesale /həʊl/.

And now I invite you to a lesson with the teacher Ronnie. She will talk about typical unpronounceable letters.

Letter II it's not called for nothing - “AY”, that’s how it’s read, but... not always.
What about English short sound [i]- “I” is written like a printed lowercase letter for a reason i. Letter II can be read [i].
Reading the letter II in open and closed syllables and letter combinations igh:

*** The reading of English vowels is influenced by the other letters that make up the word (see). How to read a letter or combination of letters in English word, exactly show the transcription signs - icons inside square brackets.

Here are examples open syllable, after the letter i there are no other letters, and it is readable :

One letter word I always written with a capital letter and read = "AY" - this is the pronoun "I"
hi- - "hi" - hello

Closed syllable, after a vowel i there is a consonant that “closes” the vowel, making the syllable closed. Letter i read [i]:

big- "BIG" - big
pin- "PIN" - pin

But if you add a vowel at the end of such a word, for example, a silent letter e, the syllable will be open:

pine- "PINE" - pine

Vowel e at the end of such words it is not readable, but forms a second syllable. First stressed syllable is open:

Read:

The letter combination igh reads:

h igh- high
h igh t - height
l igh t - light
n igh t - night
br igh t - bright
...
*** Remember the letter combination gh( t) - "GHS (ti)". It also occurs with other vowels, for example:

dau ght er ["dɔ:tə] - daughter
lau gh- laugh
bou ght- bought
bou gh- bitches
plou gh- (British) plow (American, plow)
borou gh[ˈbʌrə] - (small) city, ...

and [i]!!!

Have you memorized the transcription signs? ("AY") and [i]("AND") ! ?