Heth (letter)
Encyclopedia : H : HE : HET : Heth (letter)
| Ḥet | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arabic | Syriac | Hebrew | Aramaic | Phoenician |
| ح | ܚ | ח |
| 
|
| Pronunciation (IPA): | ||||
| Position in alphabet: | 8 | |||
| Gematria/Abjad value: | 8 | |||
, Syriac ḥēth ܚ, Hebrew ḫet (also ḥet, heth) ח, and Arabic ḥāʼ ح (in abjadi order).Heth originally represented a voiceless fricative, either pharyngeal ([ħ]), or velar ([x]) (the two Proto-Semitic phonemes having merged in Canaanite). In Arabic, the letter was split in two: unmodified ḥāʼ ح represents [ħ], while ḫāʼ ﺥ represents [x].
The Phoenician letter gave rise to the Greek Eta (Η), Etruscan 
𐌇, Latin H and Cyrillic И. While H is still a consonant in the Latin alphabet, the Greek and Cyrillic equivalents have come to represent vowel sounds.
Origins
The letter shape ultimately goes back to a hieroglyph for "courtyard",
The corresponding South Arabian letters are 
ḥ and 
ḫ, corresponding to Ge'ez Ḥauṭ ሐ and Ḫarm ኀ.
Hebrew Heth
| Hebrew alphabet | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| א | ב | ג | ד | ||
| ה | ו | ז | ח | ט | י |
| כך | ל | מם | נן | ס | ע |
| פף | צץ | ק | ר | ש | ת |
| History · Transliteration Niqqud · Dagesh · Gematria Cantillation · Numeration | |||||
| The Arabic alphabet | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| History · Transliteration Diacritics · hamza {{ar Numerals · Numeration | ||||||
| Syriac alphabet | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Aleph (letter)>ܐ | Beth (letter)>ܒ | Gimel (letter)>ܓ | Dalet>ܕ | ||
| He (letter)>ܗ | Waw (letter)>ܘ | Zayin>ܙ | Heth (letter)>ܚ | Teth>ܛ | Yodh>ܝ |
| Kaph>ܟܟ | Lamedh>ܠ | Mem>ܡܡ | Nun (letter)>ܢܢ | Samekh>ܣ | Ayin>ܥ |
| Pe (letter)>ܦ | Tsade>ܨ | Qoph>ܩ | Resh>ܪ | Shin (letter)>ܫ | Taw (letter)>ܬ |
Pronunciation
In official Modern Israeli Hebrew, the letter Heth is usually pronounced as a voiceless pharyngeal fricative (IPA /ħ/) in accordance with oriental Jewish traditions, although it is commonly a voiceless velar fricative (IPA /x/) due to European influence.Variations
Heth, along with Aleph, Ayin, Resh, and He, cannot receive a dagesh. As the voiceless fricative is difficult for most English speakers to pronounce, it is usually Anglizised to /h/. Thus challah (חלה), pronounced as xala or ħala by Hebrew speakers is prounced hala by most English speakers. It is often possible to tell a person's place of origin by their pronunciation, especially of Heth. If it is pronounced softly, like a voiceless pharyngeal fricative, then the person is probably of Eastern origin. If it is pronounced like an English H, then the person is probably a native English speaker.Significance
In gematria, Heth represents the number eight, and when used at the beginning of Hebrew years, it means 8000 (i.e. חתשנד in numbers would be the date 8754).In chat rooms and online forums, the letter Heth repeated denotes laughter, similar to the English lol.
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