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The kn and gn letter combinations usually indicate a Germanic origin of the word. In Old English , k and g were not silent when preceding n . Cognates in other Germanic languages show that the k was probably a voiceless velar plosive in Proto-Germanic .
Silent letters may give an insight into the meaning or origin of a word; e.g., vineyard suggests vines more than the phonetic *vinyard would. Silent letters may help the reader to stress the correct syllable (compare physics to physiques). The final fe in giraffe gives a clue to the second-syllable stress, where *giraf might suggest initial-stress.
The letter "y" could also be used in Late West Saxon in place of original i, e.g. in ċyriċe for ċiriċe. [79] After the merger of y, e in Kentish, y could be used as a "reverse" spelling for /e/, as in Kentish ċyrð. [80] Before unstressed vowels, c g sc can be palatal or velar depending on
The English language is notorious for its use of silent letters. In fact, about 60 percent of English words contain a silent letter. In many cases, these silent letters actually were pronounced ...
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The change affected words like gnat, gnostic, gnome, etc., the spelling with gn-being retained despite the loss of the /ɡ/ sound. The cluster is preserved in some Scots dialects. [23] The song The Gnu jokes about this silent g and other silent letters in English.
Circled Latin capital letter C ¤ Currency sign: Square lozenge ("Pillow") various Currency symbols † ‡ Dagger: Obelus: Footnotes, Latin cross – — Dash: Hyphen, Hyphen-minus, minus sign: Em dash, En dash ° Degree sign: Masculine ordinal indicator * * * Dinkus: Asterism, Fleuron, Dingbat (many) Dingbat: Dinkus, Fleuron ⌀ Diameter
In the list, letters with diacritics are arranged in alphabetical order according to their base, e.g. å is alphabetised with a , not at the end of the alphabet, as it would be in Danish, Norwegian and Swedish. Substantially-modified letters, such as ſ (a variant of s ) and ɔ (based on o ), are placed at the end.