Aspirated h

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In French spelling, aspirated "h" (French: "h" aspiré) is an initial silent letter “h” that represents a hiatus at a word boundary, in this case between the word in question's first vowel and the preceding word’s last vowel. At the same time, the aspirated “h” blocks the normally expected processes of contraction and liaison from occurring.^[1] The name of this now silent “h” refers not to aspiration but to its former pronunciation as the voiceless glottal fricative [h] in Old French and in Middle French.

List of French words which begin with an aspirated ⟨h⟩

The following list contains only the dictionary head entries and not all the forms that can be derived from them, for example (it does not contain past participles or transitive verbs when used as adjectives or nouns), nor does include composite words, except in cases where the omission might cause confusion among homonyms distinguished only by diacritic signs.

• In all French words that begin with the letter ⟨h⟩, the following letter is invariably a vowel.
• Most, but not all aspirated h words are derived from Germanic languages.^[2]
• The h is generally not aspirated in words of Latin and Greek origin.^[3]
• Among the rare words that use a ⟨y⟩ after an initial ⟨h⟩, none has an aspirated ⟨h⟩. Likewise, ⟨h⟩ is rarely aspirated before a following ⟨i⟩.
• For the other vowels, the ⟨h⟩ is often aspirated, except for those coming from the oldest Greek language roots.
• The ⟨h⟩ is aspirated in onomatopoeia.
• There are numerous exceptions where the h does not obey commonly observed rules regarding its status as aspirated, and often etymology cannot yield a satisfactory answer as to why.^[4]

In French dictionaries, words with an initial aspirated ⟨h⟩ are traditionally prefixed with an asterisk but with no effect on their alphabetical arrangement. The following list is compiled from the Dictionnaire du Trésor de la langue française and the Dictionnaire de l'Académie française. It lacks many proper names and recent borrowings. In general, if a borrowed word is pronounced with an [h] in its language of origin, the ⟨h⟩ will be conserved in French orthography, and it will be aspirated.

Words beginning with ⟨ha⟩

Words beginning with ⟨he⟩

Hélas

The ⟨h⟩ in the word Hélas is not aspirated in classical poetry.

• Hélas ! Que cet hélas a de peine à sortir. Corneille.

This is indicated here by the use of cet rather than ce.

Words beginning with ⟨hi⟩

The aspiration of ⟨h⟩ nowadays is often optional in words beginning with ⟨hi⟩ shown here, and the liaison (with a mute ⟨h⟩) is generally accepted, except in those recent anglicisms of current usage, in interjections, or in the case of homophones with another word. In this list, beside the very productive and learned Greek root hiéro-, the majority of words are quite recent and of Germanic origin (German, Dutch, Modern English), or the ⟨h⟩ is lightly pronounced, or are recent and learned borrowings from more distant languages.

Words beginning with ⟨ho⟩

The majority of words starting with ⟨ho⟩ have an aspirated ⟨h⟩. The exceptions concern mostly

• those Latin roots which are most widely used in which the ⟨h⟩ has lost its voicing through assimilation to common language (in hôte, hospice or hôpital all derived from hospes/hospitis,
• cases in which the ⟨h⟩ has been assimilated to the following ⟨s⟩; or the case of heure/horo-, taken from hora, in which the ⟨h⟩ has been assimilated to the preceding adjectives,
• cases of confusion among various roots (for example homme derived from the Latin root homo, which is in conflict with the form derived from the non-aspirated Greek root homo.

Words beginning with ⟨hu⟩

Almost all the words beginning with ⟨hu⟩ have an aspirated ⟨h⟩. The exceptions in this list concern

• some terms for which the ⟨h⟩ is not etymological, but was introduced for orthographic reasons with the purpose of distinguishing different roots that begin with a ⟨u⟩ or a ⟨v⟩, but which were homographs in ancient Latin writing (therefore, huile, huis, or huître are not aspirated)
• or cases in which the vowel has changed because of similarity with the Latin root (humanus after homo) which is not aspirated.

Illustrative examples

a) nos héros /noeʀo/ ‘our heros’

b) *nos héros /nozeʀo/ ‘our heros’ ^[5]

This example illustrates how the aspirated h word ‘héros’ blocks liaison, where the otherwise silent word-final consonant is pronounced preceding the first vowel of the following word. Because the h is aspirated, the second entry is incorrect, because the hiatus prevents the final /z/ from being phonetically realized.

a) le hibou /ləibu/ ‘the owl’

b) *l’hibou /libu/ ‘the owl’ ^[6]

This example illustrates how the aspirated h word ‘hibou’ blocks elision, where the schwa of the definite article ‘le’ is dropped.^[7] The second entry is incorrect because elision is not allowed in the word ‘hibou’ because of the hiatus imposed by its aspirated h.

Historical and sociolinguistic aspects

One part of the major phonological changes between Latin and Early Old French was the loss of the consonant /h/, which would later return with the introduction of Germanic words into the language.^[8] The aspirate h ceased to be pronounced once more in either the sixteenth or seventeenth century, although some grammarians kept insisting that it be pronounced into the early part of the twentieth century. Since the phonological behavior of aspirate h words cannot be predicted through spelling, prescriptively correct usage requires a considerable amount of memorization. Hence, they are often used to demonstrate one’s education and social status. As early as the seventeenth century, noted grammarian Claude Favre de Vaugelas described the incorrect pronunciation of aspirated h words as typical of French spoken on the southern side of the Loire. Further discussion of this phenomenon is found in almost every collection of remarks on the French language through to the present day, with mistakes generally being ascribed to class differences or inattention. In modern usage, the blocking of liaison and elision with aspirated h words appears to be gaining ground in formal French, while losing ground in less guarded speech.^[9]

References

See also

• Hiatus (linguistics)
• Sandhi