Dagesh

Dagesh

ּ
ḥazaq: [ː] (gemination)
Biblical qal: [v]~[β]→[b], [ɣ]→[ɡ],
IPA [ð]→[d], [x]→[k],
[f]~[ɸ]→[p], [θ]→[t]
Israeli [v]→[b], [x]~[χ]→[k], [f]→[p]
ḥazaq: doubling of consonant
Biblical qal: none
Transliteration
(SBL transliteration system[1])
Israeli v→b, kh→k, f→p
Same appearance mappiq, shuruk
Example

‫ָדּ ֵגשׁ‬
"Dagesh" in Hebrew. The center dot on the rightmost
character is a dagesh.
Other Niqqud
Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol · Patach · Kamatz ·
Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe ·
Sin/Shin Dot
The dagesh (‫ ) ָדּ ֵגשׁ‬is a diacritic used in the
Hebrew alphabet. It was added to the
Hebrew orthography at the same time as
the Masoretic system of niqqud (vowel
points). It takes the form of a dot placed
inside a Hebrew letter and has the effect
of modifying the sound in one of two
ways.

An identical mark, called mappiq, has a

different phonetic function, and can be
applied to different consonants; the same
mark is also employed in the vowel
shuruk.
Dagesh and mappiq symbols are often
omitted in writing. For instance, ‫ בּ‬is often
written as ‫ב‬. The use or omission of such
marks is usually consistent throughout
any given context. The two functions of
dagesh are distinguished as either kal
(light) or ḥazak (strong).

Dagesh kal
A dagesh kal or dagesh qal (‫דגש קל‬, or
‫דגש קשיין‬, also "dagesh lene", "weak/light
dagesh", opposed to "strong dot") may be
placed inside the consonants ‫ ב‬bet, ‫ג‬
gimel, ‫ ד‬dalet, ‫ כ‬kaf, ‫ פ‬pe and ‫ ת‬tav. They
each had two sounds: the original "hard"
(plosive) sound, and a "soft" (fricative)
sound. Before the Babylonian captivity, the
soft sounds did not exist in Hebrew, but
were added as a result of Aramaic-
influenced pronunciation of Hebrew after
this point in history. The letters take on
their hard sounds when they have no
vowel sound before them, and take their
soft sounds when a vowel immediately
precedes them, across word boundaries in
Biblical Hebrew, but not in Modern Hebrew.
When vowel diacritics are used, the hard
sounds are indicated by a central dot
called dagesh, while the soft sounds lack a
dagesh. In Modern Hebrew, however, the
dagesh only changes the pronunciation of
‫ ב‬bet, ‫ כ‬kaf, and ‫ פ‬pe (traditional
Ashkenazic pronunciation also varies the
pronunciation of ‫ ת‬tav, and some
traditional Middle Eastern pronunciations
carry alternate forms for ‫ ד‬dalet).

With dagesh Without dagesh

Symbol Name Transliteration IPA Example Symbol Name Transliteration IPA Example

‫בּ‬ bet b /b/ bun

‫ב‬ vet v /v/ van

‫כּ‬
[2]

kaph k /k/ kangaroo

‫ כ ך‬khaph kh/ch/ḵ /χ/ loch

‫ךּ‬
‫פּ‬
[3] ‫פ‬
pe p /p/ pass phe f/ph /f/ find

‫ףּ‬ ‫ף‬
* Only in Ashkenazi pronunciation Tav
without a dagesh is pronounced [s], while
in another traditions it is assumed to have
been pronounced [θ] at the time niqqud
was introduced. In Modern Hebrew, it is
always pronounced [t].

** The letters gimmel (‫ )ג‬and dalet (‫ )ד‬may

also contain a dagesh kal. This indicates
an allophonic variation of the phonemes
/ɡ/ and /d/, a variation which no longer
exists in modern Hebrew pronunciation.
The variations are believed to have been:
‫[=גּ‬ɡ], ‫[=ג‬ɣ], ‫[=דּ‬d], ‫[=ד‬ð]. The Hebrew
spoken by the Jews of Yemen (Yemenite
Hebrew) still preserves unique phonemes
for these letters with and without a
dagesh.[4]

*** The letter hey (‫ )ה‬when word final is

usually silent in order to indicate the
presence of a word-final vowel. But when it
receives a dagesh kal, the hey is
pronounced instead of being silent. This is
the rule in historic pronunciation, but in
Modern Hebrew, this rule is generally
ignored. However, when a non-silent word-
final hey (‫ )הּ‬occurs, it can take a furtive
patach.

Pronunciation …
In Israel's general population, the
pronunciation of some of the above letters
has become pronounced the same as
others:

Letter pronounced like Letter

‫ב‬ (without dagesh) like ‫ו‬

vet vav

‫כ‬ (without dagesh) like ‫ח‬

khaf chet

‫תּ‬ (with dagesh) like ‫ט‬

tav tet

‫כּ‬ (with dagesh) like ‫ק‬

kaf qof

Dagesh hazak
Dagesh ḥazak or dagesh ḥazaq (‫דגש חזק‬,
"strong dot", i.e. "gemination dagesh", or
‫דגש כפלן‬, also "dagesh forte") may be
placed in almost any letter, this indicated a
gemination (doubling) of that consonant in
the pronunciation of pre-modern Hebrew.
This gemination is not adhered to in
modern Hebrew and is only used in careful
pronunciation, such as reading of
scriptures in a synagogue service,
recitations of biblical or traditional texts or
on ceremonious occasions, and then only
by very precise readers.

The following letters, the gutturals, almost

never have a dagesh: aleph ‫א‬, he ‫ה‬, chet ‫ח‬,
ayin ‫ע‬, resh ‫ר‬. (A few instances of resh
with dagesh are masoretically recorded in
the Hebrew Bible, as well as a few cases
of aleph with a dagesh, such as in
Leviticus 23:17.)

The presence of a dagesh ḥazak or

consonant-doubling in a word may be
entirely morphological, or, as is often the
case, is a lengthening to compensate for a
deleted consonant. A dagesh ḥazak may
be placed in letters for one of the following
reasons:

The letter follows the definite article, the

word "the". For example, ‫ָשׁ ָמיִם‬
shamayim "heaven(s)" in Gen 1:8 is
‫ ַה ָשּׁ ַמיִם‬Hashshamayim "the heaven(s)"
in Gen 1:1 . This is because the definite
article was originally a stand-alone
particle ‫ ַהל‬hal, but at some early stage
in ancient Hebrew it contracted into a
prefix ‫' ַה‬ha-', and the loss of the ‫' ל‬l' was
compensated for by doubling the
following letter.[5] In this situation where
the following letter is a guttural, the
vowel in 'ha-' becomes long to
compensate for the inability to double
the next letter - otherwise, this vowel is
almost always short. This also happens
in words taking the prefix ‫' ַל‬la-', since it
is a prefix created by the contraction of
‫' ְל‬le-' + ‫' ַה‬ha-'. Occasionally, the letter
following a He which is used to indicate
a question may also receive a dagesh,
e.g. Num 13:20 ‫ַה ְשּׁ ֵמנָ ה ִהוא‬
Hashshemena hi? - "whether it is fat".

The letter follows the prefix ‫' ִמ‬mi-'

where this prefix is an abbreviation for
the word min, meaning "from". For
example, the phrase "from your hand", if
spelled as two words, would be ‫ִמן יָ ֶד‬
min yadekha. In Gen. 4:11, however, it
occurs as one word: ‫ ִמיָּ ֶד‬miyyadekha.
This prefix mostly replaces the usage of
the particle ‫ ִמן‬min in modern Hebrew.
The letter follows the prefix ‫' ֶשׁ‬she-' in
modern Hebrew, which is a prefixed
contraction of the relative pronoun ‫ֲא ֶשׁר‬
asher, where the first letter is dropped
and the last letter disappears and
doubles the next letter. This prefix is rare
in Biblical texts, but mostly replaces the
use of ‫ ֲא ֶשׁר‬asher in Modern Hebrew.
It marks the doubling of a letter that is
caused by a weak letter losing its vowel.
In these situations, the weak letter
disappears, and the following letter is
doubled to compensate for it. For
example, compare Ex. 6:7 ‫ָל ַק ְח ִתּי‬
lakachti with Num 23:28 , where the first
letter of the root ‫ ל‬has been elided: ‫וַ יִּ ַקּח‬
vayyikkach. Lamed only behaves as a
weak letter in this particular root word,
but never anywhere else.
If the letter follows a vav consecutive
imperfect (sometimes referred to as vav
conversive, or vav ha'hipuch), which, in
Biblical Hebrew, switches a verb
between perfect and imperfect. For
example, compare Judges 7:4 ‫יֵ ֵל‬
yelekh "let him go" with Deu. 31:1 ‫וַ יֵּ ֶלך‬
vayyelekh "he went". A possible reason
for this doubling is that the ַ‫' ו‬va-' prefix
could be the remains of an auxiliary verb
ַ‫ ָהוַ י‬hawaya (the ancient form of the verb
‫ ָהיָ ה‬hayah, "to be") being contracted into
a prefix, losing the initial 'ha', and the
final 'ya' syllable disappearing and
doubling the next letter.
In some of the binyan verbal stems,
where the Piel, Pual and Hitpa'el stems
themselves cause doubling in the
second root letter of a verb. For
example:
Ex. 15:9 ‫ ֲא ַח ֵלּק‬achallek "I shall
divide", Piel Stem, first person future
tense

in the phrase ‫ ָה ֵלּלוּ יַ הּ‬hallelu yah

"praise the LORD", where hallelu is in
 Piel Stem, masculine plural
Imperative form

Gen. 47:31 ‫ וַ יִּ ְת ַחזֵּ ק‬vayyitchazzek,

"he strengthened himself", Hitpael
stem

Rafe
In Masoretic manuscripts the opposite of
a dagesh would be indicated by a rafe, a
small line on top of the letter. This is no
longer found in Hebrew, but may still
sometimes be seen in Yiddish and Ladino.

Unicode encodings
In computer typography there are two
ways to use a dagesh with Hebrew text.
Here are Unicode examples:

Combining characters:
bet + dagesh: בּ ‫= בּ‬
U+05D1 U+05BC
kaf + dagesh: כּ ‫= כּ‬
U+05DB U+05BC
pe + dagesh: פּ ‫= פּ‬
U+05E4 U+05BC
Precomposed characters:
bet with dagesh: בּ ‫= בּ‬
U+FB31
 kaf with dagesh: כּ ‫= כּ‬
U+FB3B
pe with dagesh: פּ ‫= פּ‬
U+FB44

Some fonts, character sets, encodings,

and operating systems may support
neither, one, or both methods.

See also
Analogous to Dagesh Hazak, is the
Shadda, in written Arabic
Hebrew spelling
Yiddish spelling
Ladino spelling
 Mappiq
Rafe
Geresh
Niqqud
Biblical Hebrew
Modern Hebrew

Notes
1. Resources for New Testament
Exegesis – Transliteration Standards
of The SBL Handbook of Style
2. "‫ "ךּ‬is rare but exists, e.g. last word in
Deuteronomy 7 1 (‫דברים פרק ז׳ פסוק‬
‫ )א׳‬in the word " ָ‫ – " ִמ ֶמּךּ‬see here
 3. "‫ "ףּ‬is rare but exists, e.g. second word
in Proverbs 30 6 (‫)משלי פרק ל׳ פסוק ו׳‬
in the word "‫תּוֹס ְףּ‬
ְ " – see here

4. "Vocalization of Hebrew Alphabet" .

Archived from the original on 2015-
04-28. Retrieved 2018-09-20.
5. Weingreen, J. (1963-03-26). A
Practical Grammar for Classical
Hebrew . OUP Oxford. pp. 23 (§16).
ISBN 978-0-19-815422-8.

Further reading
 Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §12, §13
M. Spiegel and J. Volk, 2003. "Hebrew
Vowel Restoration with Neural
 Networks," Proceedings of the Class of
2003 Senior Conference, Computer
Science Department, Swarthmore
College, pp. 1–7: Open Access Copy

External links
alanwood.com Hebrew
alanwood.com Alphabetic presentation

Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Dagesh&oldid=1006474646"

Last edited 22 hours ago by Citation bot

Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless

otherwise noted.
Hebrew alphabet

The Hebrew alphabet (Hebrew: ‫ף־בּית‬

ֵ ‫אָל‬ֶ
‫ ִע ְב ִרי‬,[a] Alefbet ivri), known variously by
scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script,
square script and block script, is an abjad
script used in the writing of the Hebrew
language and other Jewish languages,
most notably Yiddish, Judeo-Spanish,
Judeo-Arabic, and Judeo-Persian. It is an
offshoot of the Imperial Aramaic alphabet,
which flourished during the Achaemenid
Empire and which itself derives from the
Phoenician alphabet.
 Hebrew alphabet

Script type Impure abjad

Time period 2nd–1st century BCE

to present[1]

Direction right-to-left 

Languages

Languages Hebrew, Yiddish,

Ladino, Mozarabic

Related scripts

Parent systems Egyptian hieroglyphs

Proto-Sinaitic script
Phoenician
alphabet
 Aramaic
alphabet
Hebrew
alphabet
Child systems Yiddish alphabet
Square Aramaic
Alphabet

Sister systems Arabic

Nabataean
Syriac
Palmyrene
Mandaic
Pahlavi scripts
Sogdian

ISO 15924

ISO 15924 Hebr, 125: Hebrew

 Unicode
Unicode alias Hebrew

Unicode range U+0590 to U+05FF

Hebrew,
U+FB1D to U+FB4F
Alphabetic
Presentation Forms

This article contains Hebrew text.

Without proper rendering support, you
may see question marks, boxes, or other
symbols instead of Hebrew letters.

Historically, two separate abjad scripts

have been used to write Hebrew. The
original, old Hebrew script, known as the
paleo-Hebrew alphabet, has been largely
preserved in a variant form as the
Samaritan alphabet. The present "Jewish
script" or "square script", on the contrary, is
a stylized form of the Aramaic alphabet
and was technically known by Jewish
sages as Ashurit (lit. "Assyrian script"),
since its origins were alleged to be from
Assyria.[3]

Various "styles" (in current terms, "fonts")

of representation of the Jewish script
letters described in this article also exist,
including a variety of cursive Hebrew
styles. In the remainder of this article, the
term "Hebrew alphabet" refers to the
square script unless otherwise indicated.

The Hebrew alphabet has 22 letters. It

does not have case. Five letters have
different forms when used at the end of a
word. Hebrew is written from right to left.
Originally, the alphabet was an abjad
consisting only of consonants, but is now
considered an "impure abjad". As with
other abjads, such as the Arabic alphabet,
during its centuries-long use scribes
devised means of indicating vowel sounds
by separate vowel points, known in
Hebrew as niqqud. In both biblical and
rabbinic Hebrew, the letters ‫ א ה ו י‬can
also function as matres lectionis, which is
when certain consonants are used to
indicate vowels. There is a trend in Modern
Hebrew towards the use of matres
lectionis to indicate vowels that have
traditionally gone unwritten, a practice
known as "full spelling".

The Yiddish alphabet, a modified version

of the Hebrew alphabet used to write
Yiddish, is a true alphabet, with all vowels
rendered in the spelling, except in the case
of inherited Hebrew words, which typically
retain their Hebrew consonant-only
spellings.
The Arabic and Hebrew alphabets have
similarities because they are both derived
from the Aramaic alphabet, which in turn
derives either from paleo-Hebrew or the
Phoenician alphabet, both being slight
regional variations of the Proto-Canaanite
alphabet used in ancient times to write the
various Canaanite languages (including
Hebrew, Moabite, Phoenician, Punic, et
cetera).

History

Paleo-Hebrew alphabet
The Aleppo Codex, a tenth century Masoretic Text of
the Hebrew Bible. Book of Joshua 1:1

A Hebrew variant of the Phoenician

alphabet, called the paleo-Hebrew
alphabet by scholars, began to emerge
around 800 BCE.[4] Examples of related
early Semitic inscriptions from the area
include the tenth-century Gezer calendar,
and the Siloam inscription (c. 700 BCE).[5]
The paleo-Hebrew alphabet was used in
the ancient kingdoms of Israel and Judah.
Following the exile of the Kingdom of
Judah in the 6th century BCE during the
Babylonian captivity, Jews began using a
form of the Imperial Aramaic alphabet,
another offshoot of the same family of
scripts, which flourished during the
Achaemenid Empire. The Samaritans, who
remained in the Land of Israel, continued
to use the paleo-Hebrew alphabet. During
the 3rd century BCE, Jews began to use a
stylized, "square" form of the Aramaic
alphabet that was used by the Persian
Empire (and which in turn had been
adopted from the Assyrians),[6] while the
Samaritans continued to use a form of the
paleo-Hebrew script called the Samaritan
alphabet. After the fall of the Persian
Empire in 330 BCE, Jews used both scripts
before settling on the square Assyrian
form.

The square Hebrew alphabet was later

adapted and used for writing languages of
the Jewish diaspora – such as Karaim, the
Judeo-Arabic languages, Judaeo-Spanish,
and Yiddish. The Hebrew alphabet
continued in use for scholarly writing in
Hebrew and came again into everyday use
with the rebirth of the Hebrew language as
a spoken language in the 18th and 19th
centuries, especially in Israel.

Description

‫י ט ח ז ו ה ד ג ב א‬
‫פ ע ס ן נ ם מ ל ך כ‬
‫ ת ש ר ק ץ צ ף‬ •  ‫ﭏ‬
Features: Abjad • Mater lectionis • Begadkefat
Variants: Cursive • Rashi • Solitreo • Braille
Numerals: Gematria • Numeration
Ancillaries:
Diacritics • Punctuation • Cantillation
Translit.:Romanization of Hebrew • Hebraization
of English • IPA • ISO
Computers:Keyboard • Unicode and HTML
General …

In the traditional form, the Hebrew

alphabet is an abjad consisting only of
consonants, written from right to left. It
has 22 letters, five of which use different
forms at the end of a word.

Vowels …

In the traditional form, vowels are

indicated by the weak consonants Aleph
(‫)א‬, He (‫)ה‬, Waw/Vav (‫)ו‬, or Yodh (‫)י‬
serving as vowel letters, or matres
lectionis: the letter is combined with a
previous vowel and becomes silent, or by
imitation of such cases in the spelling of
other forms. Also, a system of vowel
points to indicate vowels (diacritics),
called niqqud, was developed. In modern
forms of the alphabet, as in the case of
Yiddish and to some extent Modern
Hebrew, vowels may be indicated. Today,
the trend is toward full spelling with the
weak letters acting as true vowels.

When used to write Yiddish, vowels are

indicated, using certain letters, either with
niqqud diacritics (e.g. ‫ ָא‬or ‫ )יִ‬or without
(e.g. ‫ ע‬or ‫)י‬, except for Hebrew words,
which in Yiddish are written in their
Hebrew spelling.
To preserve the proper vowel sounds,
scholars developed several different sets
of vocalization and diacritical symbols
called nequdot (‫ניקודות‬, literally "points").
One of these, the Tiberian system,
eventually prevailed. Aaron ben Moses ben
Asher, and his family for several
generations, are credited for refining and
maintaining the system. These points are
normally used only for special purposes,
such as Biblical books intended for study,
in poetry or when teaching the language to
children. The Tiberian system also
includes a set of cantillation marks, called
trope or te'amim, used to indicate how
scriptural passages should be chanted in
synagogue recitations of scripture
(although these marks do not appear in
the scrolls). In everyday writing of modern
Hebrew, niqqud are absent; however,
patterns of how words are derived from
Hebrew roots (called shorashim or
"triliterals") allow Hebrew speakers to
determine the vowel-structure of a given
word from its consonants based on the
word's context and part of speech.

Alphabet …

Unlike the Paleo-Hebrew writing script, the

modern Ashuri script has five letters that
have special final forms,[c] called sofit
(Hebrew: ‫סופית‬, meaning in this context
"final" or "ending") form, used only at the
end of a word, somewhat as in the Greek
or in the Arabic and Mandaic alphabets.[b]
These are shown below the normal form in
the following table (letter names are
Unicode standard[7][8]). Although Hebrew is
read and written from right to left, the
following table shows the letters in order
from left to right.

Alef Bet Gimel Dalet He Waw/Vav Zayin Chet Tet Yod Kaf

‫כ‬
‫ג ב א‬ ‫ה ד‬ ‫ו‬ ‫י ט ח ז‬
‫ך‬
Lamed Mem Nun Samech Ayin Pe Tsade Qof Resh Shin Tav

‫נ מ‬ ‫פ‬ ‫צ‬
‫ל‬ ‫ע ס‬ ‫תש ר ק‬
‫ן ם‬ ‫ף‬ ‫ץ‬

Pronunciation
Alphabet …

The descriptions that follow are based on

the pronunciation of modern standard
Israeli Hebrew.
 Name of letter Pronunciation

Modern Yiddish /
letter IPA Approximate western
Unicode[7][8] Hebrew[9] Hebrew Ashkenazi
European equivalent[10]
pronunciation pronunciation

(never written) ʔalways

‫א‬
spoken ʔat the beginning
[ʔ], ∅ ʼAlef ‫אָלף‬
ֶ /ʔalɛf/ /ʔaləf/
ʔof words with vocal
ʔanlaut

‫בּ‬ [b] ‫ֵבּית‬ /bet/ /bɛɪs/, /bɛɪz/ b as in black

Bet

‫ב‬ [v] ‫ֵבית‬ /vet/ /vɛɪs/, /vɛɪz/ v as in vogue

‫ג‬ [ɡ] Gimel ‫ימל‬

ֵ ‫ִגּ‬ /ˈɡimel/ /ˈɡiməl/ g as in gold

‫ד‬
/ˈdalɛt/, / /ˈdaləd/, /
[d] Dalet ‫ָדּ ֶלת‬ d as in doll
ˈdalɛd/ ˈdaləs/

‫ה‬
[h]~[ʔ],
He ‫ֵהא‬ /he/, /hej/ /hɛɪ/ h as in hold
∅

‫ו‬ [v], [w] Vav ‫וָ ו‬ /vav/ /vɔv/ v as in vogue

‫ז‬
/ˈzajin/, /
[z] Zayin ‫זַ יִן‬ /ˈzajin/ z as in zoo
ˈza.in/

‫ח‬ [x]~[χ] Het ‫ֵחית‬ /χet/ /χɛs/ ch as in challah

‫ט‬ [t] Tet ‫ֵטית‬ /tet/ /tɛs/ t as in tool

[j] Yod ‫יוֹד‬ /jod/, /jud/ /jud/ y as in yolk

‫י‬
‫כּ‬ [k] ‫ַכּף‬ /kaf/ /kɔf/ k as in king

‫כ‬ [x]~[χ] ‫ַכף‬ /χaf/ /χɔf/ ch as in challah

Kaf
‫ַכּף‬
‫ךּ‬ [k]
‫סוֹפית‬
ִ
/kaf sofit/ /ˈlaŋɡə kɔf/ k as in king

‫ַכף‬
‫ך‬ [x]~[χ]
‫סוֹפית‬
ִ
/χaf sofit/ /ˈlaŋɡə χɔf/ ch as in challah

‫ל‬ [l] Lamed ‫ָל ֶמד‬ /ˈlamɛd/ /ˈlaməd/ l as in luck

‫מ‬ ‫ֵמם‬ /mem/ /mɛm/ m as in mother

[m] Mem
‫ֵמם‬
‫ם‬ ‫סוֹפית‬
ִ
/mem sofit/ /ˈʃlɔs mɛm/ m as in mother

‫נ‬ ‫נוּן‬ /nun/ /nun/ n as in night

[n] Nun

‫ן‬ ‫סוֹפית‬
ִ ‫ נוּן‬/nun sofit/ /ˈlaŋɡə nun/ n as in night

‫ס‬ [s] Samekh ְ‫ָס ֶמך‬ /ˈsamɛχ/ /ˈsaməχ/ s as in sight

‫ע‬
/ʕajin/, /
[ʕ], ∅ ʻAyin ‫ַעיִן‬ /ʕajin/ (silent)
ʕa.in/

Pe
‫פּ‬ [p] ‫ פה‬,‫ֵפּא‬ /pe/, /pej/ /pɛɪ/ p as in pool

[f]
‫פ‬ ‫ פה‬,‫ֵפא‬ /fe/, /fej/ /fɛɪ/ f as in full
 ‫ֵפּא‬ /pe sofit/, /ˈlaŋɡə fɛɪ/ f as in full
‫ף‬ ,‫סוֹפית‬
ִ /pej sofit/

‫פה‬
‫סופית‬

,‫ַצ ִדי‬
‫צ‬
/ˈtsadi/, /
/ˈtsadi/ ts as in cats
‫צדיק‬ ˈtsadək/

[t͡s] Tsadi ‫ַצ ִדי‬ /ˈlaŋɡə

,‫סוֹפית‬
ִ
‫ץ‬
ˈtsadik/, /
/ˈtsadi sofit/ ts as in cats
‫צדיק‬ ˈlaŋɡə

‫סופית‬ ˈtsadək/

‫ק‬ [k] Qof ‫קוֹף‬ /kuf/, /kof/ /kuf/ k as in king

‫ר‬ [ɣ]~[ʁ] Resh ‫ֵרישׁ‬ /ʁeʃ/ /ʁɛɪʃ/ r as in ripe

‫שׁ‬ [ʃ] ‫ִשׁין‬ /ʃin/ /ʃin/ sh as in shop

Shin

‫שׂ‬ [s] ‫ִשׂין‬ /sin/ /sin/ s as in sight

‫תּ‬ ‫תּו‬ /tav/, /taf/ /tɔv/, /tɔf/ t as in tool

[t] Tav

‫ת‬ ‫ָתו‬ /θav/, /θaf/ /sɔv/, /sɔf/ th as in thought

Note that dotless tav, ‫ת‬, would be

expected to be pronounced /θ/ (voiceless
dental fricative), but this pronunciation
was lost among most Jews due to its not
existing in the countries where they lived
(such as in nearly all of Eastern Europe).
Yiddish modified this /θ/ to /s/ (cf. seseo
in Spanish), but in modern Israeli Hebrew,
it is simply pronounced /t/.

Shin and sin …

Shin and sin are represented by the same

letter, ‫ש‬, but are two separate phonemes.
When vowel diacritics are used, the two
phonemes are differentiated with a shin-
dot or sin-dot; the shin-dot is above the
upper-right side of the letter, and the sin-
dot is above the upper-left side of the
letter.

Symbol Name Transliteration IPA Example

‫( שׁ‬right dot) shin sh /ʃ/ shower

‫( שׂ‬left dot) sin s /s/ sour

Historically, left-dot-sin corresponds to

Proto-Semitic *ś, which in biblical-Judaic-
Hebrew corresponded to the voiceless
alveolar lateral fricative /ɬ/, as evidenced
in the Greek transliteration of Hebrew
words such as balsam (‫( )בּ ֶֹשׂם‬the ls - '‫)'שׂ‬
as is evident in the Targum Onkelos.

Dagesh …
Historically, the consonants ‫ ב‬beth, ‫ג‬
gimel, ‫ ד‬daleth, ‫ כ‬kaf, ‫ פ‬pe and ‫ ת‬tav each
had two sounds: one hard (plosive), and
one soft (fricative), depending on the
position of the letter and other factors.
When vowel diacritics are used, the hard
sounds are indicated by a central dot
called dagesh (‫)דגש‬, while the soft sounds
lack a dagesh. In modern Hebrew, however,
the dagesh only changes the pronunciation
of ‫ ב‬bet, ‫ כ‬kaf, and ‫ פ‬pe, and does not
affect the name of the letter. The
differences are as follows:
 With dagesh Without dagesh
Name
Symbol Transliteration IPA Example Symbol Transliteration IPA Example

bet/vet
‫בּ‬ b /b/ bun
‫ב‬ v, ḇ /v/ van

kaf ‫כּךּ‬k
[11] /k/ kangaroo
‫ כ ך‬kh, ch, ḵ, x /χ/ loch

pe
‫פּףּ‬ p /p/ pass
‫ פ ף‬f, p̄, ph /f/ find

In other dialects (mainly liturgical) there

are variations from this pattern.

In some Sephardi and Mizrahi dialects,

bet without dagesh is pronounced [b],
like bet with dagesh
In Syrian and Yemenite Hebrew, gimel
without dagesh is pronounced [ɣ].
In Yemenite Hebrew, and in the Iraqi
pronunciation of the word "Adonai", dalet
 without dagesh is pronounced [ð] as in
"these"
In Ashkenazi Hebrew, as well as
Romaniote Hebrew, tav without dagesh
is pronounced [s] as in "silk"
In Iraqi and Yemenite Hebrew, and
formerly in some other dialects, tav
without dagesh is pronounced [θ] as in
"thick"
Sounds represented with diacritic
geresh …

The sounds [t͡ʃ], [d͡ʒ], [ʒ], written ⟨‫⟩צ׳‬, ⟨‫⟩ג׳‬,

⟨‫⟩ז׳‬, and [w], non-standardly sometimes
transliterated ⟨‫⟩וו‬, are often found in slang
and loanwords that are part of the
everyday Hebrew colloquial vocabulary.
The apostrophe-looking symbol after the
Hebrew letter modifies the pronunciation
of the letter and is called a geresh.

Hebrew slang and loanwords

Name Symbol IPA Transliteration Example

‫ג׳‬
Gimel with a
[d͡ʒ] ǧ[12] ǧáḥnun [ˈd͡ʒaχnun] ‫׳חנוּן‬
ְ ‫ַגּ‬
geresh

‫ז׳‬
Zayin with a
[ʒ] ž[12] koláž [koˈlaʒ] ‫קוֹלאז׳‬
ַ
geresh

‫צ׳‬
Tsadi with a
[t͡ʃ] č[12] čupár (treat) [t͡ʃuˈpar] ‫צ׳וּפּר‬
ָ
geresh

‫ וו‬or ‫( ו׳‬non
Vav with a
awánta
geresh [w] w [aˈwanta] ‫אַוַ ונְ ַטה‬
(boastful act)
or double Vav standard)[]

The pronunciation of the following letters

can also be modified with the geresh
diacritic. The represented sounds are
however foreign to Hebrew phonology, i.e.,
these symbols mainly represent sounds in
foreign words or names when
transliterated with the Hebrew alphabet,
and not loanwords.

Transliteration of non-native sounds

Arabic
Name Symbol IPA Example Comment
letter

Dalet Dhū al-

‫ * ד׳ו‬Also used for English voiced th
‫ד׳‬
Dhāl (‫)ذ‬
with a [ð] Ḥijjah (‫ذو‬
Voiced th ‫חיג׳ה‬-‫ * אל‬Often a simple ‫ ד‬is written.
geresh ‫)اﻟﺤﺠﺔ‬

Tav Thāʼ (‫)ث‬

with a
geresh
‫ת׳‬ [θ] Voiceless Thurston ‫ת׳רסטון‬
th

* Unlike the other sounds in this table, the

sound [χ] represented by ‫ ח׳‬is indeed a
native sound in Hebrew; the geresh is
Chet however used only when transliteration

‫ח׳‬
Sheikh
with a [χ] Khāʼ (‫)خ‬ ‫ שייח׳‬must distinguish between [χ] and [ħ], in
(‫)ﺷﻴﺦ‬
geresh which case ‫ ח׳‬transliterates the former
and ‫ ח‬the latter, whereas in everyday
usage ‫ ח‬without geresh is pronounced [ħ]
only dialectically but [χ] commonly.

Resh ‫ ר׳‬or Ghajar

Sometimes an ʻayin with a geresh (‫ )ע׳‬is
used to transliterate ‫ – غ‬inconsistently
with a [ʁ] Ghayn (‫)غ‬ ‫ר׳ג׳ר‬
(‫)ﻏﺠﺮ‬
‫ע׳‬
with the guidelines specified by the
geresh
Academy of the Hebrew Language
A geresh is also used to denote acronyms
pronounced as a string of letters, and to
denote a Hebrew numeral. Geresh also is
the name of one of the notes of
cantillation in the reading of the Torah, but
its appearance and function is different.

Identical pronunciation …

In much of Israel's general population,

especially where Ashkenazic
pronunciation is prevalent, many letters
have the same pronunciation. They are as
follows:
 Letters Transliteration Pronunciation (IPA)

Usually when in medial word position:

/./
(separation of vowels in a hiatus)
not
When in initial or final word position,
‫א‬ ‫ע‬
transliterated
sometimes also in medial word
position:
Alef* Ayin*
silent
alternatingly
/ʔ/
ʼ
(glottal plosive)

‫ב‬ ‫ו‬ v /v/

Bet (without
Vav
dagesh) Vet

‫ח‬ ‫כ‬ kh/ch/h /χ/

Kaf (without dagesh)
Chet*
Khaf*

‫ט‬ ‫תּ‬ t /t/

Tet Tav

‫כּ‬ ‫ק‬ k /k/

Kaf (with
Qof
dagesh)

‫ס‬ ‫שׂ‬ s /s/

Samekh Sin (with left dot)

and ts/tz /ts/

‫צ‬ ‫תס‬ ‫תשׂ‬
Tsadi* Tav- Tav-
 Samekh* Sin*

‫צ׳‬ ‫טשׁ‬ and

‫תשׁ‬ ch/tsh (chair) /tʃ/
Tsadi (with Tav-
Tet-Shin*
geresh) Shin*

* Varyingly

Ancient Hebrew pronunciation …

Some of the variations in sound

mentioned above are due to a systematic
feature of Ancient Hebrew. The six
consonants /b ɡ d k p t/ were pronounced
differently depending on their position.
These letters were also called BeGeD
KeFeT letters /ˌbeɪɡɛdˈkɛfɛt/. The full
details are very complex; this summary
omits some points. They were pronounced
as plosives /b ɡ d k p t/ at the beginning of
a syllable, or when doubled. They were
pronounced as fricatives /v ɣ ð x f θ/ when
preceded by a vowel (commonly indicated
with a macron, ḇ ḡ ḏ ḵ p̄ ṯ). The plosive and
double pronunciations were indicated by
the dagesh. In Modern Hebrew the sounds
ḏ and ḡ have reverted to [d] and [ɡ],
respectively, and ṯ has become [t], so only
the remaining three consonants /b k p/
show variation. ‫ ר‬resh may have also been
a "doubled" letter, making the list BeGeD
KePoReT. (Sefer Yetzirah, 4:1)

‫ ח‬chet and ‫ ע‬ayin represented

pharyngeal fricatives, ‫ צ‬tsadi
represented the emphatic consonant
/sˤ/, ‫ ט‬tet represented the emphatic
consonant /tˤ/, and ‫ ק‬qof represented
the uvular plosive /q/. All these are
common Semitic consonants.

‫ שׂ‬sin (the /s/ variant of ‫ ש‬shin) was

originally different from both ‫ שׁ‬shin and
‫ ס‬samekh, but had become /s/ the
same as ‫ ס‬samekh by the time the
vowel pointing was devised. Because of
cognates with other Semitic languages,
this phoneme is known to have originally
been a lateral consonant, most likely the
voiceless alveolar lateral fricative /ɬ/
(the sound of modern Welsh ll) or the
 voiceless alveolar lateral affricate /tɬ/
(like Náhuatl tl).
Regional and historical variation …

The following table contains the

pronunciation of the Hebrew letters in
reconstructed historical forms and
dialects using the International Phonetic
Alphabet. The apostrophe-looking symbol
after some letters is not a yud but a
geresh. It is used for loanwords with non-
native Hebrew sounds. The dot in the
middle of some of the letters, called a
"dagesh kal", also modifies the sounds of
the letters ‫ב‬, ‫ כ‬and ‫ פ‬in modern Hebrew (in
some forms of Hebrew it modifies also the
sounds of the letters ‫ג‬, ‫ ד‬and/or ‫ ;ת‬the
"dagesh chazak" – orthographically
indistinguishable from the "dagesh kal" –
designates gemination, which today is
realized only rarely – e.g. in biblical
recitations or when using Arabic
loanwords).
 Pronunciation

Symbol Reconstructed Arabic

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite
Tiberian Mishnaic Biblical equivalent

‫א‬ [ʔ, -] [-] [ʔ, -] [ʔ, -] [ʔ, -] [ʔ, -] [ʔ] ‫ا‬

‫בּ‬ [b] [b] [b] [b] [b] [b] ‫ب‬

[b]

‫ב‬ [v] [v~v̥] [b~β~v] [β] [v] [β] ‫ؤ\ڤ‬

‫גּ‬ [ɡ] [dʒ] [ɡ] [ɡ] ‫ج‬

[ɡ] [ɡ~ɡ̊] [ɡ]

‫ג‬ [ɡ~ɣ] [ɣ] [ɣ] [ɣ] ‫غ‬

‫דּ‬ [d̪] [d̪] [d̪] [d̪] ‫د‬

[d] [d~d̥] [d̪]

‫ד‬ [d̪~ð] [ð] [ð] [ð] ‫ذ‬

‫ה‬
[h~ʔ,
[h, -] [h, -] [h, -] [h, -] [h, -] [h] ‫ه‬
-]

‫ו‬ [v] [v~v̥] [v] [w] [w] [w] [w] ‫و‬

‫וּ‬ [u] [uː, iː] [uː] [əw] ? ? ? ‫ـُﻮ‬

‫וֹ‬
[əʊ, ɔj, ɛj,
[o̞] [o] [œ] ? ? ? ‫ـَﻮ‬
ɐʊ]

‫ז‬ [z] [z~z̥] [z] [z] [z] [z] [z] ‫ز‬

‫ח‬ [x~χ] [x] [ħ] [ħ] [ħ] [ħ] [ħ, χ] ‫ح‬

 ‫ط‬
‫ט‬
[t] [t] [t ̪] [t̴̪] (1) [t̴̪] [t ̪ˤ] (2) [t ̪ʼ] (3)

‫י‬ [j] [j] [j] [j] [j] [j] [j] ‫ي‬

‫ִי‬ [i] [i] [i] [i] ? ? ? ‫ِـﻲ‬

‫כּ‬ [k] [k] [k] [k] [k] [k] ‫ك‬

[k]

‫כך‬ [x~χ] [x] [x] [x] [x] [x] ‫خ‬

‫ל‬ [l] [l~ɫ] [l] [l] [l] [l] [l] ‫ل‬

‫מ‬
[m] [m] [m] [m] [m] [m] [m] ‫م‬
‫ם‬

‫נן‬ [n] [n] [n̪] [n̪] [n̪] [n̪] [n̪] ‫ن‬

‫*ض \ س‬

*possibly
rooted from
‫ס‬ [s] [s] [s] [s] [s] [s] [s]
Ancient
Egyptian ḏ or
dj

‫ע‬ [ʕ, - ] [-] [ʕ, ŋ, - ] [ʕ] [ʕ] [ʕ] [ʕ, ʁ] ‫ع‬

‫פּ‬ [p] [p] [p] [p] [p] [p] ‫پ‬

[p]

‫פף‬ [f] [f] [f] [f] [f] [ɸ] ‫ف‬

 [t͡s] [t͡s] [t͡s] ‫ص‬
‫צץ‬
[s̴] (1) [s̴] [sˤ] (2) [sʼ, ɬʼ,
θʼ] (3)

‫ק‬ [k] [k] [k] [ɡ], [ɢ], [q] [q] [q] [kʼ] (3) ‫ق‬

‫ר‬ [ɣ~ʁ] [ɹ]~[ʀ] [r]~[ɾ] [r]~[ɾ] [ʀ] [r] [r] ‫ر‬

‫שׁ‬ [ʃ] [ʃ] [ʃ] [ʃ] [ʃ] [ʃ] [ʃ] ‫ش‬

‫שׂ‬ [s] [s] [s] [s] [s] [s] [ɬ] ‫س‬

‫תּ‬ [t] [t ̪] [t ̪] [t ̪] ‫ت‬

[t] [t] [t ̪]

‫ת‬ [s] [θ] [θ] [θ] ‫ث‬

1. velarized or pharyngealized
2. pharyngealized
3. sometimes said to be ejective but
more likely glottalized.

Vowels …

Matres lectionis …
‫ א‬alef, ‫ ע‬ayin, ‫ ו‬waw/vav and ‫ י‬yod are
letters that can sometimes indicate a
vowel instead of a consonant (which
would be, respectively, /ʔ/, /ʔ/, /v/ and /j/).
When they do, ‫ ו‬and ‫ י‬are considered to
constitute part of the vowel designation in
combination with a niqqud symbol – a
vowel diacritic (whether or not the diacritic
is marked), whereas ‫ א‬and ‫ ע‬are
considered to be mute, their role being
purely indicative of the non-marked vowel.
 Consonant
Name indicated Vowel Name of Indicated
Letter
of letter when letter designation vowel designation Vowel
consonantal

‫א‬ alef /ʔ/ — — ê, ệ, ậ, â, ô

‫ע‬ ayin /ʔ/ or /ʕ/ — — ê, ệ, ậ, â, ô

‫וֹ‬ ḥolám malé ô

‫ו‬ waw/vav /w/ or /v/

‫וּ‬ shurúq û

‫ִי‬ ḥiríq malé î

‫י‬ yud /j/

‫ֵי‬ tseré malé ê, ệ

Vowel points …

Niqqud is the system of dots that help

determine vowels and consonants. In
Hebrew, all forms of niqqud are often
omitted in writing, except for children's
books, prayer books, poetry, foreign words,
and words which would be ambiguous to
pronounce. Israeli Hebrew has five vowel
phonemes, /i e a o u/, but many more
written symbols for them:
 Israeli Hebrew
Written
Name Symbol English
Position IPA Transliteration
example

vowel written
Hiriq below [i] i week
consonant

[e̞], ([e̞j]
vowel written eh (precise pronunciation); ei (imprecise
with bed,
Tsere below due to modern pronunciation, even if
succeeding main
consonant with succeeding yod – see Note 2)
yod)

vowel written
Segol below [e̞] e men
consonant

vowel written
Patach below [ä] a father
consonant

vowel written
father,
Kamatz below [ä], (or [o̞]) ah, (or oh)
more
consonant

vowel written
Holam
above
Haser
consonant
[o̞] o home
isolated
Holam
Male ‫וֹ‬ vowel written
on its own

isolated
Shuruk ‫וּ‬ vowel written
on its own
[u] u moon
vowel written
Kubutz below
consonant
Note 1: The circle represents whatever
Hebrew letter is used.
Note 2: The pronunciation of tsere and
sometimes segol – with or without the
letter yod – is sometimes ei in Modern
Hebrew. This is not correct in the
normative pronunciation and not
consistent in the spoken language.[13]
Note 3: The dagesh, mappiq, and shuruk
have different functions, even though they
look the same.
Note 4: The letter ‫( ו‬waw/vav) is used
since it can only be represented by that
letter.

Meteg E…
By adding a vertical line (called Meteg)
underneath the letter and to the left of the
vowel point, the vowel is made long. The
meteg is only used in Biblical Hebrew, not
Modern Hebrew.

Sh'va E…

By adding two vertical dots (called Sh'va)

underneath the letter, the vowel is made
very short. When sh'va is placed on the
first letter of the word, mostly it is "è" (but
in some instances, it makes the first letter
silent without a vowel (vowel-less): e.g. ְ‫ו‬
wè to "w")
 Israeli Hebrew
Name Symbol English
IPA Transliteration
example

deuce (the "e" not aspirated or pronounced as if it is

[e̞]
apostrophe, e, almost silent) - when placed on the first letter of the
Shva or
or silent word but in the medial or final position, it makes the
∅
letter (consonant or vowel) silent

Reduced
[e̞] e men
Segol

Reduced
[ä] a father
Patach

Reduced
[o̞] o more
Kamatz

Comparison table E…
Vowel comparison table [14]
Vowel length
English
(phonetically not manifested in Israeli Hebrew) IPA Transliteration
example
Long Short Very Short

ָ ַ ֲ [ä] a far

ֵ ֶ ֱ [e̞] e men

‫וֹ‬ [o̞] o more

‫וּ‬ ֻ [u] u soon

‫ִי‬ ִ [i] i ski

Note I: By adding two vertical dots (sh'va) ְ

the vowel is made very short.

Note II: The short o and long a have the same niqqud.

The short o is usually promoted to a long o

Note III:
in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation

The short u is usually promoted to a long u

Note IV:
in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation

Gershayim …
The symbol ‫ ״‬is called a gershayim and is
a punctuation mark used in the Hebrew
language to denote acronyms. It is written
before the last letter in the acronym, e.g.
‫ר״ת‬. Gershayim is also the name of a
note of cantillation in the reading of the
Torah, printed above the accented letter,
e.g. ‫ ֞א‬.

Stylistic variants
The following table displays typographic
and chirographic variants of each letter.
For the five letters that have a different
final form used at the end of words, the
final forms are displayed beneath the
regular form.

The block (square, or "print" type) and

cursive ("handwritten" type) are the only
variants in widespread contemporary use.
Rashi is also used, for historical reasons,
in a handful of standard texts.
 Variants
Letter Early
name Contemporary Ancestral
modern
(Unicode)
Block Block Paleo-
serif sans- Cursive Rashi Phoenician Hebrew Aramaic
serif

Alef ‫א‬ ‫א‬

Bet ‫ב‬ ‫ב‬
Gimel ‫ג‬ ‫ג‬
Dalet ‫ד‬ ‫ד‬
He ‫ה‬ ‫ה‬
Vav
(Unicode)[15] ‫ו‬ ‫ו‬
/ Waw

Zayin ‫ז‬ ‫ז‬

Chet ‫ח‬ ‫ח‬
Tet ‫ט‬ ‫ט‬
Yod ‫י‬ ‫י‬
Kaf ‫כ‬ ‫כ‬
Final Kaf ‫ך‬ ‫ך‬
 ‫ל‬ ‫ל‬
Lamed

Mem ‫מ‬ ‫מ‬

Final Mem ‫ם‬ ‫ם‬
Nun ‫נ‬ ‫נ‬
Final Nun ‫ן‬ ‫ן‬
Samekh ‫ס‬ ‫ס‬
Ayin ‫ע‬ ‫ע‬
Pe ‫פ‬ ‫פ‬
Final Pe ‫ף‬ ‫ף‬
Tsadi ‫צ‬ ‫צ‬
,
Final Tsadi ‫ץ‬ ‫ץ‬
Qof ‫ק‬ ‫ק‬
Resh ‫ר‬ ‫ר‬
Shin ‫ש‬ ‫ש‬
Tav
 ‫ת‬ ‫ת‬

Yiddish symbols …

Symbol Explanation

‫ װ ױ‬These are intended for Yiddish. They are not used in Hebrew, aside from in loan
‫ ײ ַײ‬words .
[d]

The rafe (‫ )רפה‬diacritic is no longer regularly used in Hebrew. In Masoretic Texts and
some other older texts, lenited consonants and sometimes matres lectionis are
‫ֿב‬ indicated by a small line on top of the letter. Its use has been largely discontinued in
modern printed texts. It is still used to mark fricative consonants in the YIVO
orthography of Yiddish.

Numeric values of letters

Following the adoption of Greek
Hellenistic alphabetic numeration practice,
Hebrew letters started being used to
denote numbers in the late 2nd century
BC,[16] and performed this arithmetic
function for about a thousand years.
Nowadays alphanumeric notation is used
only in specific contexts, e.g. denoting
dates in the Hebrew calendar, denoting
grades of school in Israel, other listings
(e.g. ‫ שלב ב׳‬,‫" – שלב א׳‬phase a, phase b"),
commonly in Kabbalah (Jewish
mysticism) in a practice known as
gematria, and often in religious contexts.

The lower clock on the Jewish Town Hall building in

Prague, with Hebrew numerals in counterclockwise
order.
letter numeric value letter numeric value letter numeric value

‫א‬ 1 ‫י‬ 10 ‫ק‬ 100

‫ב‬ 2 ‫כ‬ 20 ‫ר‬ 200

‫ג‬ 3 ‫ל‬ 30 ‫ש‬ 300

‫ד‬ 4 ‫מ‬ 40 ‫ת‬ 400

‫ה‬ 5 ‫נ‬ 50

‫ו‬ 6 ‫ס‬ 60

‫ז‬ 7 ‫ע‬ 70

‫ח‬ 8 ‫פ‬ 80

‫ט‬ 9 ‫צ‬ 90

The numbers 500, 600, 700, 800 and 900

are commonly represented by the
juxtapositions ‫ת״ק‬, ‫ת״ר‬, ‫ת״ש‬, ‫ת״ת‬, and
‫ תת״ק‬respectively. Adding a geresh ("‫ )"׳‬to
a letter multiplies its value by one
thousand, for example, the year 5778 is
portrayed as ‫ה׳תשע״ח‬, where ‫ה׳‬
represents 5000, and ‫ תשע״ח‬represents
778.
Transliterations and
transcriptions
The following table lists transliterations
and transcriptions of Hebrew letters used
in Modern Hebrew.

Clarifications:

For some letters, the Academy of the

Hebrew Language offers a precise
transliteration that differs from the
regular standard it has set. When
omitted, no such precise alternative
exists and the regular standard applies.
The IPA phonemic transcription is
specified whenever it uses a different
 symbol from the one used for the
regular standard Israeli transliteration.
The IPA phonetic transcription is
specified whenever it differs from IPA
phonemic transcription.

Note: SBL's transliteration system,

recommended in its Handbook of Style,[17]
differs slightly from the 2006 precise
transliteration system of the Academy of
the Hebrew Language; for "‫ "צ‬SBL uses "ṣ"
(≠ AHL "ẓ"), and for ‫ בג״ד כפ״ת‬with no
dagesh, SBL uses the same symbols as
for with dagesh (i.e. "b", "g", "d", "k", "f", "t").
 CLICK "SHOW" TO VIEW EXTENDED TABLE INCLUDING EXAMPLES.

Standard standard
Israeli Israeli IPA
Hebrew letter example Translation example example
transliteration transliteration tr
– regular[18] – precise[18]

‫א‬
consonantal, ‫ִאם‬ if none[A1] im
in
initial word
positions

‫א‬
consonantal, ‫ָשׁאַל‬ asked ' sha'ál ʾ shaʾál /ʔ
in
non initial
word
positions

‫א‬ ‫ִראשׁוֹן‬ first none[A2] rishón

silent

‫בּ‬ ‫ֵבּן‬ son b ben

‫ב‬ ‫טוֹב‬ good v tov

‫גּ‬ g
‫ַגּג‬ roof g gag gaḡ
‫ג‬ ḡ

‫ג׳‬ ‫ג׳וּק‬ roach ǧ[B1][12] ǧuk /d͡

‫דּ‬ d
‫דּוּד‬ boiler d dud duḏ
‫ד‬ ḏ

‫ה‬ ‫ֵהד‬ echo h hed

consonantal
‫פֹּה‬ none[A3]
‫ה‬ here po
silent

‫ו‬ ‫וָ ו‬ hook v vav w waw

consonantal

‫וּ‬ ‫הוּא‬ he u hu

‫וֹ‬ ‫לוֹ‬ to him o lo

‫ז‬ ‫זֶ ה‬ this z ze

‫ז׳‬ ‫׳רגוֹן‬
ְ ָ‫ז‬ jargon ž[B2][12] žargón /ʒ

/x

‫ח‬ ‫ַחם‬ hot ẖ [C1] ẖam ḥ ḥam dia

[ħ]

‫ט‬ ‫ָקט‬ tiny t kat ṭ kaṭ

‫י‬ ‫יָ ם‬ sea y yam /j/

consonantal

‫י‬
‫ִבּי‬ in me i bi
part of hirik
male
(/i/ vowel)

‫י‬
part of tsere ‫ֵמ ָידע‬ information e medá é médá /e
male
(/e/ vowel or
/ei/ diphthong)
[11]‫ ךּ‬,‫כּ‬ ‫כֹּה‬ so k ko

branch-
‫ ך‬,‫כ‬ ‫ְס ָכ‬
roofing
kh [C2] skhakh ḵ sḵaḵ /x

‫ל‬ ‫ִלי‬ to me l li

‫ ם‬,‫מ‬ ‫מוּם‬ defect m mum

 great-
‫ ן‬,‫נ‬ ‫נִ ין‬
grandson
n nin

‫ס‬ ‫סוֹף‬ end s sof

‫ע‬ Purim-
‫ַע ְד איָ ַדע‬ none[A4] adloyáda ʿ ʿadloyádaʿ
in initial or parade
final
word positions dia
/ʕ

/ʔ
‫ע‬ ‫מוֹעיל‬
ִ useful ' mo'íl ʿ moʿíl dia
in medial
word positions /ʕ

‫פּ‬
[D] ‫ִטיפּ‬ tip p tip

‫ ף‬,‫פ‬ ‫ִפ ְס ֵפס‬ missed f fisfés

‫ ץ‬,‫צ‬ ‫ִציץ‬ bud ts tsits ẓ ẓiẓ /t͡s

‫ ץ׳‬,‫צ׳‬ ‫ריצ׳רץ׳‬ zip č[B3][12] ríčrač /t͡ʃ

‫ק‬ ‫קוֹל‬ sound k kol q qol

‫ר‬ ‫ִעיר‬ city r ir

‫שׁ‬ ‫ָשׁם‬ there sh sham š šam /ʃ/

‫שׂ‬ ‫ָשׂם‬ put s sam ś śam

‫תּוּת‬
‫תּ‬ strawberry t tut
t
tuṯ

ṯ
‫ת‬
 Standard standard
Israeli Israeli IPA phonemic IPA phonetic
Hebrew letter
transliteration transliteration transcription transcription
[18] [18]
– regular – precise

‫א‬
consonantal, in none[A1] [ʔ]
initial word
positions

‫א‬
consonantal, in ' ʾ /ʔ/
non initial word
positions

‫א‬ none[A2]
silent

‫בּ‬ b

‫ב‬ v

‫גּ‬ g
g
‫ג‬ ḡ

‫ג׳‬ ǧ[B1][12] /d͡ʒ/

‫דּ‬ d
d
‫ד‬ ḏ

‫ה‬ h
consonantal

‫ה‬ none[A3]
silent

‫ו‬ v w
consonantal

‫וּ‬ u

‫וֹ‬ o [o̞] or [ɔ̝]

‫ז‬ z

‫ז׳‬ ž[B2][12] /ʒ/

/x/ or /χ/ [χ]

‫ח‬ ẖ[C1] ḥ dialectical

[ħ]

‫ט‬ t ṭ

‫י‬ y /j/
consonantal

‫י‬ i
part of hirik male
(/i/ vowel)

‫י‬
part of tsere male e é /e/ or /ej/ [e̞] or [e̞j]/
(/e/ vowel or
/ei/ diphthong)
[11]‫ ךּ‬,‫כּ‬ k

‫ ך‬,‫כ‬ kh[C2] ḵ /x/ or /χ/ [χ]

‫ל‬ l

‫ ם‬,‫מ‬ m

‫ ן‬,‫נ‬ n

‫ס‬ s
 none[A4]
‫ע‬ ʿ only in initial
word position
in initial or final
word positions [ʔ]

dialectical
/ʕ/

/ʔ/
‫ע‬ ' ʿ dialectical
in medial
word positions /ʕ/

‫פּ‬
[D] p

‫ ף‬,‫פ‬ f

‫ ץ‬,‫צ‬ ts ẓ /t͡s/

‫ ץ׳‬,‫צ׳‬ č[B3][12] /t͡ʃ/

‫ק‬ k q

[ʀ] or [ʁ]

‫ר‬ r dialectical
[r] or [ɾ]

‫שׁ‬ sh š /ʃ/

‫שׂ‬ s ś

‫תּ‬ t
t
‫ת‬ ṯ

Notes
A1^ 2^ 3^ 4^ In transliterations of modern
Israeli Hebrew, initial and final ‫( ע‬in regular
transliteration), silent or initial ‫א‬, and silent
‫ ה‬are not transliterated. To the eye of
readers orientating themselves on Latin
(or similar) alphabets, these letters might
seem to be transliterated as vowel letters;
however, these are in fact transliterations
of the vowel diacritics – niqqud (or are
representations of the spoken vowels).
E.g., in ‫"( ִאם‬if", [ʔim]), ‫"( ֵאם‬mother", [ʔe̞m])
and ‫"( אֹם‬nut", [ʔo̞m]), the letter ‫ א‬always
represents the same consonant: [ʔ]
(glottal stop), whereas the vowels /i/, /e/
and /o/ respectively represent the spoken
vowel, whether it is orthographically
denoted by diacritics or not. Since the
Academy of the Hebrew Language
ascertains that ‫ א‬in initial position is not
transliterated, the symbol for the glottal
stop  ʾ  is omitted from the transliteration,
and only the subsequent vowels are
transliterated (whether or not their
corresponding vowel diacritics appeared
in the text being transliterated), resulting in
"im", "em" and "om", respectively.

B1^ 2^ 3^ The diacritic geresh – "‫ – "׳‬is used

with some other letters as well (,‫ ט׳‬,‫ ח׳‬,‫ד׳‬
‫ ת׳‬,‫ ר׳‬,‫)ע׳‬, but only to transliterate from
other languages to Hebrew – never to spell
Hebrew words; therefore they were not
included in this table (correctly translating
a Hebrew text with these letters would
require using the spelling in the language
from which the transliteration to Hebrew
was originally made). The non-standard
"‫ "ו׳‬and "‫[ "וו‬e1] are sometimes used to
represent /w/, which like /d͡ʒ/, /ʒ/ and /t͡ʃ/
appears in Hebrew slang and loanwords.

C1^ 2^ The Sound /χ/ (as "ch" in loch) is

often transcribed "ch", inconsistently with
the guidelines specified by the Academy of
the Hebrew Language: ‫ חם‬/χam/ →
"cham"; ‫ סכך‬/sχaχ/ → "schach".
D^ Although the Bible does include a single
occurrence of a final pe with a dagesh
(Book of Proverbs 30, 6: "‫תּוֹס ְףּ‬-‫אַל‬
ְ
.‫יח ְבּ וְ נִ ְכזָ ְב ָתּ‬
ַ ‫יוֹכ‬-‫ן‬
ִ ‫ ֶפּ‬:‫דּ ָב ָריו‬-‫ל‬
ְ ‫)" ַע‬, in
modern Hebrew /p/ is always represented
by pe in its regular, not final, form "‫"פ‬, even
when in final word position, which occurs
with loanwords (e.g. ‫ שׁוֹפּ‬/ʃop/ "shop"),
foreign names (e.g. ‫יליפּ‬
ִ ‫ ִפ‬/ˈfilip/ "Philip")
and some slang (e.g. ‫ ָח ַרפּ‬/χaˈrap/ "slept
deeply").

Religious use
The letters of the Hebrew alphabet have
played varied roles in Jewish religious
literature over the centuries, primarily in
mystical texts. Some sources in classical
rabbinical literature seem to acknowledge
the historical provenance of the currently
used Hebrew alphabet and deal with them
as a mundane subject (the Jerusalem
Talmud, for example, records that "the
Israelites took for themselves square
calligraphy", and that the letters "came
with the Israelites from Ashur
[Assyria]");[19] others attribute mystical
significance to the letters, connecting
them with the process of creation or the
redemption. In mystical conceptions, the
alphabet is considered eternal, pre-
existent to the Earth, and the letters
themselves are seen as having holiness
and power, sometimes to such an extent
that several stories from the Talmud
illustrate the idea that they cannot be
destroyed.[20]

The idea of the letters' creative power

finds its greatest vehicle in the Sefer
Yezirah, or Book of Creation, a mystical text
of uncertain origin which describes a story
of creation highly divergent from that in
the Book of Genesis, largely through
exposition on the powers of the letters of
the alphabet. The supposed creative
powers of the letters are also referenced in
the Talmud and Zohar.[21][22]
The four-pronged Shin

Another book, the 13th-century Kabbalistic

text Sefer HaTemunah, holds that a single
letter of unknown pronunciation, held by
some to be the four-pronged shin on one
side of the teffilin box, is missing from the
current alphabet. The world's flaws, the
book teaches, are related to the absence
of this letter, the eventual revelation of
which will repair the universe.[23] Another
example of messianic significance
attached to the letters is the teaching of
Rabbi Eliezer that the five letters of the
alphabet with final forms hold the "secret
of redemption".[23]

In addition, the letters occasionally feature

in aggadic portions of non-mystical
rabbinic literature. In such aggada the
letters are often given anthropomorphic
qualities and depicted as speaking to God.
Commonly their shapes are used in
parables to illustrate points of ethics or
theology. An example from the Babylonian
Talmud (a parable intended to discourage
speculation about the universe before
creation):
 Why does the story of
creation begin with
bet?... In the same
manner that the letter
bet is closed on all
sides and only open in
front, similarly you are
not permitted to inquire
into what is before or
what was behind, but
only from the actual
time of Creation.

Babylonian Talmud,
Tractate Hagigah, 77c

Extensive instructions about the proper

methods of forming the letters are found
in Mishnat Soferim, within Mishna Berura
of Yisrael Meir Kagan.

Mathematical use
See aleph number and beth number and
gimel function.

In set theory, , pronounced aleph-

naught or aleph-zero, is used to mark the
cardinal number of an infinite countable
set, such as , the set of all integers. More
generally, the (aleph) notation marks
the ordered sequence of all distinct infinite
cardinal numbers.
Less frequently used, the (beth)
notation is used for the iterated power
sets of . The 2nd element is the
cardinality of the continuum. Very
occasionally, gimel is used in cardinal
notation.

Unicode and HTML

An example of a Hebrew keyboard.

The Unicode Hebrew block extends from

U+0590 to U+05FF and from U+FB1D to
U+FB4F. It includes letters, ligatures,
combining diacritical marks (Niqqud and
cantillation marks) and punctuation.[7] The
Numeric Character References is included
for HTML. These can be used in many
markup languages, and they are often
used in Wiki to create the Hebrew glyphs
compatible with the majority of web
browsers.

Standard Hebrew keyboards have a 101-

key layout. Like the standard QWERTY
layout, the Hebrew layout was derived
from the order of letters on Hebrew
typewriters.

See also
 Hebrew braille
Hebrew diacritics
Cursive Hebrew
Hebrew punctuation
Hebrew spelling
Help:Hebrew
Inverted nun
Koren Type
Ktiv hasar niqqud ("spelling lacking
niqqud")
Significance of numbers of Judaism

Notes
a^ "Alef-bet" is commonly written in Israeli
Hebrew without the maqaf (‫מקף‬, "[Hebrew]
hyphen"), ‫אלפבית עברי‬, as opposed to with
the hyphen, ‫אלף־בית עברי‬.

b^ The Arabic letters generally (as six of the

primary letters can have only two variants)
have four forms, according to their place in
the word. The same goes with the
Mandaic ones, except for three of the 22
letters, which have only one form.

c^ In forms of Hebrew older than Modern

Hebrew, ‫ בי״ת‬,‫ כ״ף‬and ‫ פ״א‬can only be
read b, k and p, respectively, at the
beginning of a word, while they will have
the sole value of v, kh and f in a sofit (final)
position, with few exceptions.[11] In medial
positions, both pronunciations are
possible. In Modern Hebrew this
restriction is not absolute, e.g. ‫ ִפיזִ ַיקאי‬/fizi
ˈkaj/ and never /piziˈkaj/ (= "physicist"),
‫ ְסנוֹבּ‬/snob/ and never /snov/ (= "snob"). A
dagesh may be inserted to unambiguously
denote the plosive variant: ‫ = בּ‬/b/, ‫ = כּ‬/k/,
‫= פּ‬/p/; similarly (though today very rare in
Hebrew and common only in Yiddish) a
rafé placed above the letter
unambiguously denotes the fricative
variant: ‫ = ֿב‬/v/, ‫ = ֿכ‬/χ/ and ‫ = ֿפ‬/f/. In
Modern Hebrew orthography, the sound [p]
at the end of a word is denoted by the
regular form "‫"פ‬, as opposed to the final
form "‫"ף‬, which always denotes [f] (see
table of transliterations and transcriptions,
comment[D]).

d^ However, ‫( וו‬two separate vavs), used in

Ktiv male, is to be distinguished from the
Yiddish ligature ‫( װ‬also two vavs but
together as one character).

e1^ e2^ e3^ e4^ e5^ The Academy of the

Hebrew Language states that both [v] and
[w] be indistinguishably represented in
Hebrew using the letter Vav.[24] Sometimes
the Vav is indeed doubled, however not to
denote [w] as opposed to [v] but rather,
when spelling without niqqud, to denote
the phoneme /v/ at a non-initial and non-
final position in the word, whereas a single
Vav at a non-initial and non-final position
in the word in spelling without niqqud
denotes one of the phonemes /u/ or /o/.
To pronounce foreign words and
loanwords containing the sound [w],
Hebrew readers must therefore rely on
former knowledge and context.

References
1. "Hebrew alphabet ." Encyclopedia
Britannica. "Square Hebrew became
established in the 2nd and 1st
 centuries bce and developed into the
modern Hebrew alphabet over the next
1,500 years."
2. https://www.worldcat.org/oclc/63062
039
3. Babylonian Talmud (Sanhedrin 21b–
22a); Jerusalem Talmud (Megillah
10a). Cf. Mishnah (Megillah 1:8): "The
Books [of Scripture] differ from
phylacteries and Mezuzahs only in that
the Books may be written in any
language, while phylacteries and
Mezuzahs may be written in the
Assyrian writing only." See: The
 Mishnah (ed. Herbert Danby), Oxford
University Press: London 1977, p. 202.
4. Saénz-Badillos, Angel (1993). A
History of the Hebrew Language.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press. p. 16.
5. Saénz-Badillos, Angel (1993). A
History of the Hebrew Language.
Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press. pp. 61–62.
. A History of the Hebrew Language.
Cambridge, England: Cambridge
University Press. 1993. ISBN 978-0-
521-55634-7.
 7. Chart of Hebrew glyphs at
unicode.org
. Unicode names of Hebrew characters
at fileformat.info .
9. Kaplan, Aryeh. Sefer Yetzirah: The
Book of Creation. pp. 8, 22.
10. "The Hebrew Alphabet (Aleph-Bet)" .
www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved
2020-10-04.
11. "‫ "ךּ‬is rare but exists, e.g. last word in
Deuteronomy 7 1 (‫דברים פרק ז׳ פסוק‬
‫ )א׳‬in the word " ָ‫ – " ִמ ֶמּךּ‬see ‫תנ״ך‬
‫ דברים פרק ז׳‬,‫ מנוקד‬. There is a single
occurrence of "‫"ףּ‬, see this
comment[D].
12. Transliteration guidelines preceding
2006-update Archived 2011-11-16 at
the Wayback Machine, p. 3 Academy
of the Hebrew Language
13. Laufer, Asher (2008). Chapters in
Phonetics and Phonetic Transcription.
Jerusalem: Magnes. pp. 207–211.
ISBN 978-965-493-401-5.
14. Hebrew lessons for Christians
15. https://www.unicode.org/charts/PDF/
U0590.pdf
1 . Sirat, Colette (1976), Ecriture et
civilisations, Paris: Editions du CNRS.
17. Resources for New Testament
Exegesis – Transliteration Standards
 of The SBL Handbook of Style
1 . Transliteration guidelines Archived
2014-07-03 at the Wayback Machine
by the Academy of the Hebrew
Language, November 2006
19. Jerusalem Talmud, Tractate Sanhedrin
21b
20. Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Pesach
87b, Avodah Zarah 18a.
21. Babylonian Talmud, Tractate Berachot
55c
22. Zohar 1:3; 2:152
23. The Book of Letters. Woodstock,
Vermont: Jewish Lights Publishing,
Woodstock. 1990
24. "Transliteration Rules" (PDF). Archived
from the original (PDF) on 2014-07-
03. issued by the Academy of the
Hebrew Language.

Bibliography
 Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §5 ff.
Hoffman, Joel M. 2004. In the Beginning:
A Short History of the Hebrew Language.
New York: New York University Press.
Saenz-Badillos, Angel. 1993. A History of
the Hebrew Language. Cambridge,
England: Cambridge University Press.
Steinberg, David. History of the Hebrew
Language.
 Mathers table

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media

related to Hebrew alphabet.

General …

How to draw letters

Official Unicode standards document for
Hebrew
Unicode collation charts —including
Hebrew letters, sorted by shape

Keyboards …
 LiteType.com – Virtual & Interactive
Hebrew Keyboard
Mikledet.com – For typing Hebrew with
an English keyboard (Hebrew
keyboard|Hebrew layout)
Prize Find: Oldest Hebrew Inscription
Biblical Archaeology Review

Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Hebrew_alphabet&oldid=1006112598"

Last edited 3 days ago by 47.187.213.131

Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless

otherwise noted.
Hiriq
 Ḥiriq

ִ
Hebrew: i
IPA
Yiddish: ɪ

Transliteration i

Hebrew: ski
English approximation
Yiddish: skip

Ḥiriq Example

‫נִ קּוּד‬
The word niqqud in Hebrew. The
first vowel (the dot underneath the
letter) is a ḥiriq itself.

Ḥiriq male Example

‫ִתּינוֹק‬
The word "baby" in Hebrew with
niqqud. Notice the additional Yud
⟨‫⟩י‬.

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol ·

Patach · Kamatz · Holam · Dagesh ·
Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe ·
Sin/Shin Dot
Hiriq (Hebrew: ‫ ִח ִיריק‬ḥiriq  IPA: [χiˈʁik]) is a
Hebrew niqqud vowel sign represented by
a single dot ⟨ ִ ⟩ underneath the letter. In
Modern Hebrew, it indicates the phoneme
/i/ which is similar to the "ee" sound in the
English word deep and is transliterated
with "i". In Yiddish, it indicates the
phoneme /ɪ/ which is the same as the "i"
sound in the English word skip and is
transliterated with "i".

Spelling
When writing with niqqud, the letter yud ⟨‫⟩י‬
is often written after the letter that carries
the Hiriq sign. This is called ḥiriq male
(Hebrew: ‫מ ֵלא‬ ‫יק‬
ָ ‫ ִח ִיר‬IPA: [χiˈʁik maˈle]),
meaning "full" (or "plene") hiriq. In writing
without niqqud, the letter yud is added
more often as a mater lectionis, than in
writing with niqqud, The main exception is
the i vowel in a syllable that ends with
shva naḥ. For example the words ‫ִס ְד ָרה‬
(series) and ‫( ִס ְדּ ָרה‬she organized) are
pronounced identically in modern Hebrew,
but in spelling without niqqud ‫ ִס ְד ָרה‬is
written ‫ סדרה‬because there is a shva naḥ
on the letter ‫ד‬, and ‫ ִס ְדּ ָרה‬is written ‫סידרה‬.

In Yiddish orthography the ḥiriq is placed

under the yud ⟨‫⟩יִ‬.
Pronunciation
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different Hiriqs in reconstructed historical
forms and dialects using the International
Phonetic Alphabet. The pronunciation in
IPA is above and the transliteration is
below.

The letter Bet (‫ )ב‬used in this table is only

for demonstration. Any letter can be used.

Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

‫ִב‬ Hiriq [i] [i] [i] [i] [i, iː] ? ?

Ḥiriq male

‫ִבי‬ (Also called, Ḥiriq [i] [iː] [iː] [iː] [iː] ? ?

Yud)
Vowel length comparison
These vowels lengths are not manifested
in Modern Hebrew. In addition, the short i
is usually promoted to a long i in Israeli
writing for the sake of disambiguation.

Vowel comparison table

Vowel Length English

IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very Short approximation

‫ִי‬ ִ n/a [i] i ski

Yiddish orthography style

Vowel English
IPA Transliteration
No length distinction approximation

‫יִ‬ [ɪ] i skip

Note: In Yiddish orthography only, the

glyph, yud-ḥiriq (‫)יִ‬, pronounced /i/, can be
optionally used, rather than typing yud then
ḥiriq (‫)יִ‬. In Hebrew spelling this would be
pronounced /ji/.  /i/ is written ḥiriq then
yud (‫)ִי‬.

Computer encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ִ U+05B4 HIRIQ

See also
Niqqud
Unicode and HTML for the Hebrew
alphabet

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Holam
 Holam

‫מ‬
ֹ
IPA o or o̞

Transliteration o

English example shore

Similar sound Qamatz qaṭan, ḥataf qamatz

Ḥolam Example

‫נ ַֹער‬
The word noʿar (youth) in Hebrew. The first
vowel (the dot above the letter) is the ḥolam.

Ḥolam male Example

‫חוֹלם‬
ָ
The word ḥolam in Hebrew. The letter vav ⟨‫⟩ו‬
with the dot above it is the Ḥolam male itself.

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol · Patach · Kamatz ·

Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz ·
Rafe · Sin/Shin Dot

Holam (modern Hebrew: ‫חוֹלם‬

ָ , IPA: [χo
ˈlam], formerly ‫ח ֶֹלם‬, ḥōlem) is a Hebrew
niqqud vowel sign represented by a dot
above the upper left corner of the
consonant letter. For example, here the
holam appears after the letter mem ⟨‫⟩מ‬:

‫מ‬
ֹ . In modern Hebrew, it indicates the mid
back rounded vowel, [o̞], and is
transliterated as an o.

The mater lectionis letter which is usually

employed with holam is vav, although in a
few words, the letters alef or he are used
instead of vav. When it is used with a
mater lectionis, the holam is called holam
male (‫חוֹלם ָמ ֵלא‬
ָ , IPA: [χoˈlam maˈle], "full
holam"), and without it the holam is called
holam haser (‫חוֹלם ָח ֵסר‬
ָ , IPA: [χoˈlam χa
ˈser], "deficient holam").

Appearance
If a holam is used without a following

mater lectionis (vav, alef or he), as in ‫פֹּה‬

(/po/, "here"), it is written as a dot above at
the upper-left corner of the letter after
which it is pronounced. Letter-spacing is
not supposed to be affected by it, although
some buggy computer fonts may add an
unneeded space before the next letter.
In the word ‫דֹּאר‬, the Biblical Hebrew spelling of the
name Dor, the alef is a mater lectionis, and in
traditional typography the holam is written above the

alef's right arm. In the word ‫( דֹּאַר‬/ˈdo.aʁ/, "mail"), the

alef is a consonant (a glottal stop), under which
appears the vowel pataḥ, so the ḥolam is written
above the previous letter's upper left corner. Not all
fonts actually implement these placement rules,
however.

If vav is used as a mater lectionis, the

holam appears above the vav. If the mater

lectionis is alef, as in ‫א‬ (/lo/, "no"), it is

supposed to appear above the alef's right
hand, although this is not implemented in
all computer fonts, and does not always
appear even in professionally typeset
modern books. This means a holam with
alef may, in fact, appear in the same place
as a regular holam haser. If the alef itself is
not a mater lectionis, but a consonant, the
holam appears in its regular place above
the upper-left corner of the previous letter,

as in ‫( תֹּאַר‬/ˈto.aʁ/, "epithet").

If a holam haser is written after vav, as in

‫( ִל ְגו ַֺע‬/liɡˈvo.a/, "to agonize"), it may

appear above the vav, or slightly further to
the left; this varies between different fonts.
In some fonts, a holam merges with the
shin dot (which appears on the upper-right
corner of its letter seat), in words such as

‫( ח ֶֹשׁ‬ḥóšeḵ, [ˈχoʃeχ], 'darkness') or with

the sin dot, as in ‫( שׂ ַֹבע‬/ˈsova/,
'satiation'). (These dots may or may not
appear merged on your screen, as that
depends on your device's Hebrew font.)

Usage
Holam male is, in general, the most
common way to write the /o/ sound in
modern spelling with niqqud. If a word has
Holam male in spelling with niqqud, the
mater lectionis letter vav is without any
exception retained in spelling without
niqqud, both according to the spelling
rules of the Academy of the Hebrew
Language and in common practice.

The use of holam haser is restricted to

certain word patterns, although many
common words appear in them. In most
cases the Academy's spelling rules
mandate that the vav will be written even
when the spelling with niqqud does not
have it. The normative exceptions from
this rule are listed below. The Academy's
standard is not followed perfectly by all
speakers, and common deviations from it
are also noted below.
In Biblical Hebrew the above rules are not
followed consistently, and sometimes the
vav is omitted or added.[1]

For further complications involving Kamatz

katan and Hataf kamatz, see the article
Kamatz.

Holam haser which is written as vav

in text without niqqud
…

For details on the transcription of

Hebrew, see Help:IPA/Hebrew and
Hebrew phonology
In words, in which the penultimate
syllable has the vowel /o/ and is
stressed (sometimes called segolate):

‫'( ק ֶֹטר‬diameter') /ˈkoteʁ/

‫'( ז ַֹהר‬radiance', Zohar), /ˈzohaʁ/
‫'( נ ַֹגהּ‬brightness', Nogah), /noˈɡa/
‫'( דֹּאַר‬mail'), /ˈdo.aʁ/ or /ˈdoʔaʁ/.
Some people tend to spell some of
these words without the vav, e.g. ‫דאר‬

instead of ‫דואר‬, although the Academy

mandates ‫דואר‬. The tendency is

especially strong when the words can be
used as personal names.
When Kubutz is changed to holam
before guttural letters in the passive
binyan Pual due to tashlum dagesh (a
vowel-change due to the inability of
guttural letters to carry a dagesh):

‫'( ְמפֹאָר‬fancy'), /məfoˈʔaʁ/

‫'( פּ ַֹרשׁ‬was explained'), /poˈʁaʃ/.
Without niqqud: ‫מפואר‬, ‫פורש‬.
In words which have the pattern
/CaCoC/ in the singular and become
/CəCuCCim/ with Kubutz in the plural,
especially names of colors:

‫'( ָכּתֹם‬orange'), /kaˈtom/, pl.

‫ ְכּ ֻת ִמּים‬/kətumˈmim/
 ‫'( ָעגֹל‬round'), /ʕaˈɡol/, pl. ‫ ֲע ֻג ִלּים‬/
ʕaɡulˈlim/.
When the last letter of the root is
guttural, holam haser is preserved due to
tashlum dagesh:

‫'( ָשׁחֹר‬black'), /ʃaˈχoʁ/, pl.

‫ ְשׁח ִֹרים‬/ʃəχoˈʁim/.
Without niqqud: ‫כתום‬, ‫כתומים‬, ‫עגול‬,
‫עגולים‬, ‫שחור‬, ‫שחורים‬.
A similar pattern, in which the last letter
of the root is not doubled in declension,
has holam male in the base form, which
is preserved in declension:
 sg. ‫'( ָגּדוֹל‬big'), /ɡaˈdol/, pl.

‫דוֹלים‬
ִ ‫ ְגּ‬/ɡədoˈlim/.
In three words, a holam male is changed
to a shuruk in declension:

‫'( ָמגוֹר‬place of living'), /maˈɡoʁ/,

pl. ‫גוּרים‬
ִ ‫ ְמ‬/məɡuˈʁim/[2]

‫'( ָמנוֹס‬escape'), /maˈnos/, pl.

‫נוּסים‬
ִ ‫ ְמ‬/mənuˈsim/;[3]

‫'( ָמתוֹק‬sweet'), /maˈtok/, pl.

‫תוּקים‬
ִ ‫ ְמ‬/mətuˈkim/.[4]
Similar to the above is the pattern
/CəCaCCoC/, with reduplication of the
second and third letters of the root:

‫'( ְפּ ַת ְלתֹּל‬crooked'), /pətalˈtol/, pl.

‫ ְפּ ַת ְל ֻתּ ִלּים‬/pətaltulˈlim/. Without
niqqud: ‫פתלתול‬, ‫פתלתולים‬.
In the future, infinitive and imperative
forms of most verbs in binyan Qal:

‫'( ֶא ְסגֹּר‬I shall close'), /ʔesˈɡoʁ/,

‫'( ִל ְסגֹּר‬to close'), /lisˈɡoʁ/, ‫ְסגֹר‬
('close!'), /səɡoʁ/. Without niqqud:
‫אסגור‬, ‫לסגור‬, ‫סגור‬.
In words, whose roots' second and third
letter are the same, in which case in
declension the holam changes to Kubutz
after which there will be a dagesh:
 ‫ כֹּל‬all, /kol/, decl. ‫ ֻכּלּהּ‬/kulˈlah/ ('all
of her'), root ‫[כ־ל־ל‬5]

‫'( רֹב‬most'), /rov/, decl. ‫ ֻרבּוֹ‬/rub

ˈbo/ ('most of him'), root ‫ר־ב־ב‬

‫'( תֹּף‬drum'), /tof/, pl. ‫ ֻתּ ִפּים‬/tup

ˈpim/, root ‫ת־פ־פ‬

‫'( ָמעֹז‬stronghold'), /maˈʕoz/, pl.

‫ ָמ ֻעזִּ ים‬/maʕuzˈzim/, root ‫ע־ז־ז‬
The standard spelling without niqqud for
all of them except ‫ ָכּל־‬in construct state
is with vav: ‫כול‬, ‫כולה‬, ‫רוב‬, ‫רובו‬, ‫תוף‬, ‫תופים‬,
‫מעוז‬, ‫מעוזים‬. Despite this, some people
occasionally omit the vav in some of
those words and spell ‫רב‬, ‫ תף‬etc.
Several common words are spelled with
a holam haser in the Bible, but the
Academy mandates that they be spelled
with holam male in modern Hebrew,
among them:

‫כּוֹח‬/
ַ ‫'( כּ ַֹח‬force'), /ˈkoaχ/
‫מוֹח‬/
ַ ‫'( מ ַֹח‬brain'), /ˈmoaχ/
‫יַ ֲהלוֹם‬/‫'( יַ ֲה ם‬a precious stone',
in modern Hebrew 'diamond'), /jaha
ˈlom/

‫מאוֹד‬/‫ֹד‬
ְ ‫'( ְמא‬very'), /məʔod/
 ‫פּ ְתאוֹם‬/‫ֹם‬
ִ ‫'( ִפּ ְתא‬suddenly'), /pit
ˈʔom/
Some people still spell them without
vav, but the standard spelling is with
vav.[6]
The participle of most verbs in binyan
Qal is often written with holam haser in
the Bible, but always with holam male in
modern Hebrew.
For example, in the Bible appear

both ‫ חֹזֶ ה‬and ‫'( חוֹזֶ ה‬seer'), /χo

ˈze/, but in modern Hebrew only

‫חוֹזֶ ה‬.
Holam with other matres lectionis …
The most common occasion for not
writing the /o/ sound as a vav in text
without niqqud is when in text with
niqqud the mater lectionis is Alef (‫ )א‬or
He (‫ )ה‬instead of vav. In the Bible some
words are irregularly and inconsistently
spelled with ‫ ה‬as a mater lectionis:

‫ זֹה‬alongside ‫זוֹ‬, e.g. ‫ֵבּיתֹה‬

alongside ‫ ֵבּיתוֹ‬, etc.
but the number of these irregularities
was brought to minimum in modern
Hebrew.
In the future forms of several verbs
whose roots' first letter is Alef:
‫ֹאכל‬
ַ ‫'( תּ‬you shall eat'), /toˈχal/,
root ‫א־כ־ל‬, without niqqud ‫תאכל‬.

The prefix of the first person

singular is itself Alef and in spelling
with niqqud only one Alef is written:

‫'( א ַֹמר‬I shall say'), /ʔoˈmaʁ/, root

‫א־מ־ר‬, and in spelling without
niqqud a vav is added: ‫אומר‬. This
always happens in the roots ‫א־ב־ד‬
('perish'), ‫'( א־ב־י‬wish'),[7] ‫א־כ־ל‬
('eat'), ‫'( א־מ־ר‬say'), ‫'( אפי‬bake') and
less consistently in the roots ‫א־ה־ב‬
('love'), ‫'( א־ח־ז‬hold'), ‫א־ס־ף‬
('collect'), ‫'( א־ת־י‬come').[7] In the
 root ‫ א־מ־ר‬a holam male with vav is
used in the infinitive in Mishnaic
and modern Hebrew:

‫לוֹמר‬
ַ /loˈmaʁ/.[8]
In the infinitive form of a small number
of verbs whose roots' last letter is Alef:

‫'( ִבּ ְמ את‬upon becoming full'), /bim

ˈlot/, root ‫מ־ל־א‬.[9]
In the following words the mater
lectionis is always Alef (‫)א‬:

‫'( זֹאת‬this' fem.), /zot/

‫'( א‬no'), /lo/[10]
 ‫'( מֹאזְ נַ יִם‬scales'), /mozˈnajim/,
without niqqud ‫מאזניים‬

‫'( נֹאד‬wineskin'), /nod/[11]

‫'( צֹאן‬sheep' or 'goats'), /t͡son/

‫'( רֹאשׁ‬head'), /ʁoʃ/

‫'( ְשׂמֹאל‬left'), /səmol/[12]
In the following words the mater
lectionis is always He (‫)ה‬:

‫'( כֹּה‬such'), /ko/

‫'( פֹּה‬here'), /po/
‫'( ֵאיפֹה‬where?'), /eˈfo/[13]
 In the absolute infinitive form of verbs
which end in He: ‫( ָהיֹה‬/haˈjo/ 'be'). This
form is common in the Bible, but in
modern Hebrew it is not productive and
it is preserved only in fossilized sayings.
For example, a common opening for
fairy tales, ‫'( ָהיֹה ָהיָ ה‬there once was'),
/haˈjo haˈja/ is written ‫ היה היה‬without
niqqud.

Holam without vav in personal

names
…

Some examples of usage of holam

without vav in personal names:
The names Pharaoh (‫ ַפּ ְרעֹה‬, /paʁˈʕo/),
('Moshe') (‫[)מ ֶֹשׁה‬14] and Shlomo
(‫[) ְשׁ מֹה‬15] are never written with vav.
Shilo (‫ ) ִשׁי ה‬is sometimes written with
vav in the Bible, but always with He in
modern Hebrew. The adjectives ‫ ַפּ ְרעוֹנִ י‬,
‫ ִשׁילוֹנִ י‬are written with vav and with a
nun in the suffix.

The name Aharon (‫אַהרֹן‬

ֲ ) is spelled with
holam haser in the Bible. In modern
Hebrew both ‫ אהרן‬and ‫ אהרון‬are used.

The name Noah (‫ )נ ַֹח‬is spelled with

holam haser in the Bible, but it is
sometimes written with the vav in the
Mishna[16] and in modern Hebrew.
Several other names of places and
people are spelled with holam and Alef
in the Bible include Yoshiyahu (‫ֹאשׁיָּ הוּ‬
ִ ‫י‬,
Josiah), Dor (‫דֹּאר‬, in modern Hebrew
‫ )דּוֹר‬and No Amon (‫נֹא אָמוֹן‬, the Hebrew
name of Thebes).

The word ‫'( כּ ֵֹהן‬priest'), /koˈhen/ is

spelled with holam haser in the Bible. It
is a common Jewish last name, Cohen.
The Academy mandates holam male for
the noun ‫כּוֹהן‬
ֵ , but allows the omission
of vav for spelling the personal name.[17]
Some personal names, such as Ohad
(‫)א ַֹהד‬, Zohar (‫ )ז ַֹהר‬and Nogah (‫)נ ַֹגהּ‬, are
sometimes spelled without vav in
modern writing without niqqud, although
this varies from person to person.

God's name Adonai (‫ ) ֲאדֹנָ י‬is written with

holam haser to distinguish it from the
word "Lord" (‫ )אָדוֹן‬used for humans.[18]
When the Tetragrammaton is written
with niqqud, it follows that of Adonai, so
it is written with holam haser, too. For
religious reasons writing Adonai and the
Tetragrammaton is avoided in modern
religious texts except in direct quotes
from the Bible. They rarely appear in
 secular modern Hebrew texts and their
spelling there is inconsistent.

The name Elohim (‫ ) ֱא ִהים‬is written

with holam haser in the Bible, although
its singular form Eloah (‫לוֹהּ‬
ַ ‫ ) ֱא‬is usually
written with holam male. In modern
Hebrew Elohim is a common word for
"God" and it is usually spelled with the
vav, which is also the Academy's
recommendation.

Pronunciation
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different holams in reconstructed
historical forms and dialects using the
International Phonetic Alphabet. The
transcription in IPA is above and the
transliteration is below.

The letters pe ⟨‫ ⟩פ‬and tsade ⟨‫ ⟩צ‬are used in

this table only for demonstration. Any
letter can be used.
 Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

‫פ‬
ֹ [oɪ ~ øɪ ~ eɪ ~ əʊ ~ [ɶ ~ ɤ ~
Holam [o̞] [o̞] [o] [oː] [oː]
ɐʊ ~ ɑʊ ~ oʊ] œ]
‫פוֹ‬
‫פֹה‬
Holam [oɪ ~ øɪ ~ eɪ ~ əʊ ~ [ɶ ~ ɤ ~
[o̞] [o̞] [o] [oː] [oː]
male ɐʊ ~ ɑʊ ~ oʊ] œ]
‫צֹא‬

Vowel length comparison

These vowel lengths are not manifested in
modern Hebrew. In addition, the short o is
usually promoted to a long o in Israeli
writing for the sake of disambiguation. As
well, the short o (qamatz qaṭan) and long a
(qamatz) have the same niqqud. As a
result, a qamatz qaṭan is usually promoted
to Holam male in Israeli writing for the
sake of disambiguation.

Vowel Length English

IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very Short example

‫וֹ‬ ָ n/a [o̞] o cone

Computer encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ֹ U+05B9 HEBREW POINT HOLAM

ֺ U+05BA HEBREW POINT HOLAM HASER FOR VAV

‫וֹ‬ U+FB4B HEBREW LETTER VAV WITH HOLAM

In computers there are three ways to

distinguish the vowel ḥolam male and the
consonant-vowel combination vav + ḥolam
ḥaser. For example, in the pair ‫( ַמצּוֹת‬/ma
ˈt͡sot/, the plural of ‫ ַמ ָצּה‬, matza) and ‫ִמ ְצוֹת‬
(/miˈt͡svot/, the plural of ‫ ִמ ְצוָ ה‬mitzva):[19]

1. By using the zero-width non-joiner

after the vav and before the holam:
‫ִמ ְצ ֹות‬
2. By using the Unicode character
U+05BA HEBREW POINT HOLAM
HASER FOR VAV: ‫ ִמ ְצוֺת‬.
3. By the precomposed character,[20]
U+FB4B (HTML Entity (decimal)
וֹ) ‫ִמ ְצוֹת‬

See also
Niqqud
 Zero-width non-joiner
Combining Grapheme Joiner

References
1. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §1.3; Gesenius' Hebrew
Grammar, §8l
2. Rarely used in the singular in Modern
Hebrew.
3. Rarely used in the plural in Modern
Hebrew.
4. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §1.3.
5. This word becomes ‫ ָכּל־‬in construct
state, which is very common, so as
another exception it is written without
vav in spelling without niqqud:
‫'( כל־האנשים‬all the people'), but ‫היא‬
‫'( יודעת הכול‬she knows all').
. The full list appears at Academy
Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.3.
7. Rare in modern Hebrew.
. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §68; the
Even-Shoshan Dictionary for the
modern forms.
9. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §3.5.
10. This word is written ‫ לוֹא‬several times
in the Bible, but such spelling never
occurs in modern Hebrew. With the
particle ‫ ֲה־‬and only when it is used as
a synonym of ‫'( ִהנֵּ ה‬here') it may be
written both as ‫ הלוא‬and as ‫הלא‬
(Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §2.4.4), but this usage is rare
in modern Hebrew.
11. The word ‫ נוֹד‬is pronounced identically
and means "wandering". It appears in
the Bible and is rare in modern
Hebrew. The Even-Shoshan dictionary
also notes that it is an incorrect

spelling for ‫נֹאד‬.

12. This word is actually spelled as ‫שמאול‬

several times in the Bible, but never in
modern Hebrew. However, the
intentionally wrong spelling ‫ סמול‬is
often used as a disparaging term for
the political left and is documented in
Uri Orbach's lexicon of Religious
Zionist slang.
13. The Even-Shoshan Dictionary also
registers the modern Hebrew word

‫'( ֵאיפ ֶֹשׁהוּ‬somewhere'), /efoʃehu/,

which is based on ‫ ֵאיפֹה‬and ‫־שׁהוּ‬
ֶ ,
the ending of the indefinite pronouns
‫משהו‬, ‫כלשהו‬, ('some'). The Academy
has not decided on a standard spelling
of this word.

14. The related participle ‫מוֹשׁה‬

ֶ ('pulling
out of water') is written with vav in
modern Hebrew. Modern diminutive
forms of Moshe, such as Moshiko
(‫ )מושיקו‬are written with vav.
15. A common modern diminutive version
of this name is regularly spelled ‫שלומי‬
(Shlomi).
1 . For example, in Avot 5:2 in the
Kaufmann manuscript.
17. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §1.3 fn. 55.
1 . According to The Brown–Driver–
Briggs Hebrew Lexicon.
19. This is the Biblical spelling in Jeremiah
35:18 (actually ‫) ִמ ְצו ָֺתיו‬. The standard
modern Hebrew spelling, with niqqud,
is with ḥolam male: ‫ ִמ ְצווֹת‬.
20. Also known as a presentation form in
Unicode.
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Kamatz

Qamatz

ָ
IPA [a] or [ä]

Transliteration a

English approximation spa

Same sound pataḥ

Example

‫ָדּג‬
The word for fish in Hebrew, dag.
The only vowel (the two
perpendicular lines) is a qamatz.

Other Niqqud

Shwa · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol ·

Pataḥ · Kamatz · Holam · Dagesh ·
Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe ·
Sin/Shin Dot
Kamatz or qamatz (Modern Hebrew: ‫ ָק ַמץ‬,
IPA: [kaˈmats]; alternatively ‫ ָק ֶמץ‬qāmeṣ) is
a Hebrew niqqud (vowel) sign represented
by two perpendicular lines (looking like an
uppercase T) ⟨ ָ ⟩ underneath a letter. In
modern Hebrew (Sephardi/Israeli), it
usually indicates the phoneme /a/ which is
the "a" sound in the word spa and is
transliterated as a . In these cases, its
sound is identical to the sound of pataḥ in
modern Hebrew. In a minority of cases it
indicates the phoneme /o/, equal to the
sound of ḥolam.

Qamatz Qaṭan, Qamatz

Gadol, Ḥataf Qamatz

Qamatz Qaṭan vs. Qamatz Gadol …

Biblical Hebrew Tiberian phoneme Tiberian vowel Babylonian phoneme Modern Hebrew

/a/ [a] Patach Patach

[a]
/a:/ Kamatz Gadol
[ɔ] Kamatz
/o/ Kamatz Katan
[o]
/o:/ [o] Holam Holam

The Hebrew of the late centuries BCE and

early centuries of the Common Era had a
system with five phonemic long vowels /aː
eː iː oː uː/ and five short vowels /a e i o u/.

In the later dialects of the 1st millennium

CE, phonemic vowel length disappeared,
and instead was automatically determined
by the context, with vowels pronounced
long in open syllables and short in closed
ones. However, the previous vowel
phonemes merged in various ways that
differed from dialect to dialect:

In Tiberian Hebrew, which underlies the

written system of vowels, short /a/
became [a] (indicated by pataḥ); long
/oː/ became [o] (indicated by ḥolam);
while /aː/ and /o/ both merged into an
in-between sound [ɔ] (similar to the
vowel in English "caught" without the
cot-caught merger), which was indicated
by qamatz.
In the Babylonian vocalization, however,
short and long variants simply merged,
 with /a/ and /aː/ becoming [a], while /o/
and /oː/ became [o]; and this system
underlies the pronunciation of Modern
Hebrew.

The result is that in Modern Hebrew, the

vowel written with qamatz might be
pronounced as either [a] or [o], depending
on historical origin. It is often said that the
two sounds can be distinguished by
context:

The qamatz sound of [o], known as

Qamatz Qaṭan (Hebrew: ‫ ָק ַמץ ָק ָטן‬, IPA: [ka
ˈmats kaˈtan], "small qamatz") occurs in
a "closed syllable", i.e. one which ends in
a consonant marked with a shwa nakh
 (zero vowel) or with a dagesh ḥazaq
(which indicates that the consonant was
pronounced geminated, i.e. doubled);
The qamatz sound of [a], known as
Qamatz Gadol (Hebrew: ‫[ ָק ַמץ ָגּדוֹל‬ka
ˈmats ɡaˈdol], "big qamatz") occurs in an
"open syllable", i.e. any other
circumstance: one which ends in a
consonant followed by a normal vowel,
a consonant at the end of a word and
with no vowel marking, or a consonant
marked with a shwa na (originally
pronounced [ə]).

Unfortunately, the two varieties of shwa

are written identically, and pronounced
identically in Modern Hebrew; as a result,
there is no reliable way to distinguish the
two varieties of qamatz when followed by
a vowel marked with a shwa. (In some
cases, Biblical texts are marked with a
metheg or other cantillation mark that
helps to indicate which pronunciation is
intended, but this usage is not consistent,
and in any case such marks are absent in
non-Biblical texts.)

An example of the qamatz qatan is the

Modern Hebrew word ‫[( ָתּ ְכנִ ית‬toχˈnit],
"program").
According to the standard Hebrew spelling
rules as published by the Academy of the
Hebrew Language, words which have a
qamatz qatan in their base form must be
written without a vav, hence the standard
vowel-less spelling of ‫ ָתּ ְכנִ ית‬is ‫תכנית‬. In
practice, however, Modern Hebrew words
containing a qamatz qatan do add a vav ⟨‫⟩ו‬
to indicate the [o] pronunciation; hence the
"nonstandard" spelling ‫ תוכנית‬is common
in newspapers and is even used in several
dictionaries, for example Rav Milim.
Words, which in their base form have a
ḥolam that changes to qamatz qaṭan in
declension, retain the vav in vowel-less
spelling: the noun ‫ˈ[( ח ֶֹפשׁ‬χofeʃ],
"freedom") is spelled ‫ חופש‬in vowel-less
texts; the adjective ‫[( ָח ְפ ִשׁי‬χofˈʃi], "free") is
spelled ‫ חופשי‬in vowel-less text, despite
the use of qamatz qatan, both according
to the standard spelling and in common
practice.

Some books print the qamatz qaṭan

differently, although it is not consistent.
For example, in siddur Rinat Yisrael the
vertical line of qamatz qatan is longer. In a
book of Psalms used by some Breslov
hassidim the qamatz qatan is bolder. In
the popular niqqud textbook Niqqud
halakha le-maase by Nisan Netser, the
qamatz qatan is printed as an encircled
qamatz for didactic purposes.

Unicode defines the code point U+05C7 ‫ׇ‬

HEBREW POINT QAMATS QATAN, although its
usage is not required.

Ḥaṭaf Qamatz …

Ḥaṭaf Qamatz (Hebrew: ‫ ֲח ַטף ָק ַמץ‬, IPA: [χa

ˈtaf kaˈmats]) is a "reduced qamatz". Like
qamatz qatan, it is pronounced [o], but the
rationale for its usage is different: it
replaces the shva on letters which require
a shva according to the grammar, but
where the traditional pronunciation is [o].
This mostly happens with gutturals, for
example in ‫[( ֳא ָרנִ ים‬oʁaˈnim], "pines", the
plural form of ‫א ֶֹרן‬, [ˈoʁen]), but
occasionally also on other letters, for
example ‫[( ֳשׁ ָר ִשׁים‬ʃoʁaˈʃim], "roots", the
plural of ‫ˈ[ שׁ ֶֹרשׁ‬ʃoʁeʃ]) and ‫[( ִצ ֳפּ ִרים‬tsipo
ˈʁim], "birds", the plural of ‫[( ִצפּוֹר‬tsiˈpoʁ]).

Pronunciation and
transliteration
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different qamatzes in reconstructed
historical forms and dialects using the
International Phonetic Alphabet. The
transcription in IPA is above and the
transliteration is below.

The letters bet ⟨‫ ⟩ב‬and heth ⟨‫ ⟩ח‬used in

this table are only for demonstration. Any
letter can be used.

Pronunciation

Symbol Name English Reconstructed

Modern Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

[ä] [ɔ~u] [ä] [ɔ] [ɔː] ? ?

‫ָב‬
Qamatz Big
Gadol Qamatz a o,u a o ā ? ?

,‫ָבה‬ Qamatz Full

[ä] [ɔ~u] [ä] [ɔ] [ɔː] ? ?

‫ָבא‬
Male Qamatz
a o,u a o â ? ?

[o̞] [ɔ] [o̞] [ɔ] [ɔ] ? ?

‫ָב‬
Qamatz Small
Qatan Qamatz o o o o o ? ?

Reduced [o̞] [ɔ] [o̞] [ɔ] [ɔ]̆ ? ?

‫ֳח‬
Hataf
Qamatz Qamatz o o o o ŏ ? ?
Vowel length comparison
These vowel lengths are not manifested in
Modern Hebrew. The short o (qamatz
qaṭan) and long a (qamatz) have the same
niqqud. Because of this, the short o
(Qamatz Qaṭan) is usually promoted to a
long o (holam male) in Israeli writing,
written as a vav ⟨‫⟩ו‬, for the sake of
disambiguation.

By adding two vertical dots (shva) the

vowel is made very short.
 Vowel comparison table

Vowel length English

IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very Short approximation

ָ ַ ֲ [a] a spa

qamatz Pataḥ Reduced pataḥ

‫וֹ‬ ָ ֳ [o] o core

Ḥolam Qamatz qaṭan Reduced qamatz

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ָ U+05B8 QAMATS

ֳ U+05B3 HATAF QAMATS

‫ׇ‬ U+05C7 QAMATS QATAN

Note: the glyph for QAMATS QATAN may

appear empty or incorrect if one applies a
font that cannot handle the glyph
necessary to represent Unicode character
U+05C7. Usually this Unicode character
isn't used and is substituted with the
similar looking QAMATS (U+05B8).

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Kubutz and Shuruk
 Kubutz and Shuruk

ֻ‫וּ‬
,

IPA u

Transliteration u

English example moon

Same appearance as Shuruk Dagesh, Mappiq

Kubutz Example

‫ֻקבּוּץ‬
The word Kubutz in Hebrew. The first vowel
(the three diagonal dots) is the Kubutz itself.

Shuruk Example

‫שׁוּרוּק‬
The word Shuruk in Hebrew. Both letters Vav
with a dot in the middle are examples of
Shuruk.

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol · Patach · Kamatz ·

Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz ·
Rafe · Sin/Shin Dot
Kubutz (modern Hebrew: ‫; ֻקבּוּץ‬ IPA: [ku
ˈbuts], formerly ‫ ִקבּוּץ‬, qibbûṣ) and Shuruk
(Hebrew: ‫שׁוּרוּק‬, IPA: [ʃuˈɾuk]) are two
Hebrew niqqud vowel signs that represent
the sound [u]. Kubutz is a short u and
Shuruk is long u.[1] In an alternative,
Ashkenazi naming, the Kubutz (three
diagonal dots) is called "Shuruk" and
Shuruk is called "Melopum" (‫)מלאפום‬.

Appearance
The Kubutz sign is represented by three
diagonal dots "" underneath a letter.
The Shuruk is the letter Vav with a dot in
the middle and to the left of it. The dot is
identical to the grammatically different
signs Dagesh and Mappiq, but in a fully
vocalized text it is practically impossible to
confuse them: Shuruk itself is a vowel
sign, so if the letter before the Vav doesn't
have its own vowel sign, then the Vav with
the dot is a Shuruk and otherwise it is a
Vav with a Dagesh or a Mappiq.
Furthermore, the Mappiq only appears at
the end of the word and only in the letter
He (‫ )ה‬in modern Hebrew and in the Bible
it sometimes appears in Aleph (‫ )א‬and
only in some Bible manuscripts it appears
in the letter Vav, for example in the word ‫ֵגּוּ‬
('torso') [ɡev].[2] Compare for example Vav
with Dagesh in ‫[ ְמ ֻגוָּ ן‬məɡuvˈvan] 'varied'
(without niqqud: ‫ )מגוון‬as opposed to
Shuruk in ‫[ ִמגּוּן‬miɡˈɡun] 'protection'
(without niqqud: ‫ ;)מיגון‬see also
orthographic variants of Waw.

Name
In older grammar books the Kubbutz is
called Qibbûṣ Pum etc. (‫)קבּוּץ פּוּם‬,
ִ
compression or contraction of the mouth.
This was shortened to Qibbûṣ (also
transliterated as Kibbutz etc.) but later all
the names of vowel signs were changed to
include their own sound in their first
syllable.[3] This way Kibutz changed to
Kubutz, and this is the common name
today, although the name "Kibutz" is still
occasionally used, for example by the
Academy of the Hebrew Language.[4]

Shuruk was earlier called Shureq (‫)שׁוּרק‬,

ֶ
but this name is rarely used today.

Usage

Shuruk in modern texts …

For details on the sounds of Hebrew, see

Help:IPA/Hebrew and Hebrew phonology
The Shuruk is used to mark [u] at the last
syllable of the word and in open syllables
in the middle of the word:

‫'( ָשׁ ְמרוּ‬they guarded') [ʃaˈməʁu]

‫'( ָחתוּל‬cat') [χaˈtul]
‫שׁוּבה‬
ָ ‫'( ְתּ‬answer', Tshuva) [təʃuˈva]

Regardless of syllable type, Shuruk is

always written in foreign words and names
if they weren't adapted to Hebrew word
structure (mishkal):

‫יטה‬
ָ ‫יב ְר ִס‬
ֶ ִ‫'( אוּנ‬university') [universita]
‫בּוּרג‬
ְ ‫'( ַה ְמ‬Hamburg') [hambuʁɡ]
‫אוּק ָר ִאינָ ה‬
ְ ('Ukraine') [ukʁaʔina] (closed
syllable)
Differently from all other niqqud signs, a
Shuruk can stand on its own in the
beginning of the word and not after a
consonant when it is the conjunction ‫ו־‬
and. Hebrew one-letter words are written
together with the next word and their
pronunciation may change according to
the first letters of that word. The basic
vocalization of this conjunction is Shva na
(‫[ וְ ־‬və]), but before the labial consonants
Bet (‫)ב‬, Waw (‫)ו‬, Mem (‫ )מ‬and Pe (‫)פ‬, and
before any letter with Shva (except Yodh) it
becomes a Shuruk (‫[ וּ־‬u]). This is the
consistent vocalization in the Bible[5] and
in normative modern Hebrew, but in
spoken modern Hebrew it is not
consistently productive and the
conjunction may simply remain ‫ וְ ־‬in these
cases. It is not reflected in writing without
niqqud. Examples:

‫וּמ ְכ ָתּב‬
ִ ('and a letter') [umiχˈtav]
‫'( וּוֶ ֶרד‬and a rose') [uˈveʁed]
‫וּס ָפ ִרים‬
ְ ('and books') [usəfaˈʁim]

Kubutz in modern texts …

Kubutz is used only in native Hebrew

words and in words with foreign roots that
were adapted to Hebrew word structure
(mishkal), for example ‫'( ְמ ֻפ ְר ָמט‬formatted
(disk)') [məfuʁˈmat] (without niqqud
‫)מפורמט‬. It is written in closed syllables
which do not appear at the end of the
word. A closed syllable is one which ends
in a consonant with Shva nakh (zero
vowel) or in a consonant with Dagesh
khazak (essentially two identical
consonants, the first of which has Shva
nakh).

Kubutz in base forms of nouns …

Common noun patterns in which Kubutz

appears in the base form are:[6]

/CuCCaC/ where the middle CC is a

double consonant (with Dagesh): ‫ֻס ָלּם‬
('scale') [sulˈlam], ‫'( ֻא ָכּף‬saddle') [ʔukˈkaf].
Without niqqud: ‫סולם‬, ‫אוכף‬.
/CuCCa/: ‫'( ֻח ְל ָדּה‬rat') [χulˈda], without
niqqud: ‫חולדה‬. To this pattern belong
also the words whose roots' second and
third letter are the same and merge into
one consonant with Dagesh: ‫'( ֻס ָכּה‬hut',
Sukka) [sukˈka], root ‫ס־כ־כ‬, without
niqqud: ‫סוכה‬.
/CəCuCCa/ where the last CC is a
double consonant (with Dagesh): ‫נְ ֻק ָדּה‬
('point') [nəqudˈda]. The Dagesh is not
realized in modern Hebrew, but if the
letter with the Dagesh is Bet (‫)ב‬, Kaph
(‫ )כ‬or Pe (‫)פ‬, then it is pronounced as a
stop consonant: ‫'( ְכּ ֻת ָבּה‬Ketubba',
'prenuptial agreement') [kətubˈba], ‫ֲחנֻ ָכּה‬
 ('housewarming', Hanukka) [ħanukˈka].[7]
Without niqqud: ‫נקודה‬, ‫חנוכה‬.
/CuCCan/: ‫'( ֻשׁ ְל ָחן‬desk') [ʃulˈχan], without
niqqud: ‫שולחן‬.
/CuCCoCet/ with Dagesh in the middle
letter of the root: ‫'( ֻכּתֹּנֶ ת‬coat', 'garment')
[kutˈtonet]; with a four letter root: ‫ֻגּ ְלגּ ֶֹלת‬
('skull') [ɡulˈɡolet]. Without niqqud:
‫ גולגולת‬,‫כותונת‬.
/CuCCeCet/: ‫'( ֻכּ ֶסּ ֶמת‬spelt', 'buckwheat')
[kusˈsemet], ‫'( ֻק ַבּ ַעת‬goblet') [qub
ˈbaʕat].[8] Without niqqud: ‫ קובעת‬,‫כוסמת‬.
Kubutz in declined forms of nouns …

Common noun patterns in which Kubutz

appears in the declined form are:
Declined forms of words, whose roots'
second and third letter are the same,
and which have a Holam haser in the last
syllable of their base form: ‫'( ֻדּ ִבּים‬bears')
[dubˈbim], the plural of ‫[ דֹּב‬dov], root
‫'( ֻכּ ָלּם ;ד־ב־ב‬all of them') [kulˈlam], a
declined form of ‫[ כֹּל‬kol], root ‫כ־ל־ל‬. All
these words are written with Vav in texts
without niqqud: ‫דובים‬, ‫דוב‬, ‫כולם‬, ‫כול‬.[9]
Declined forms of words which have the
pattern /CaCoC/ in the singular and
become /CəCuCCim/ in the plural: ‫ָכּתֹם‬
('orange', [kaˈtom]), pl. ‫[( ְכּ ֻת ִמּים‬kətum
ˈmim]), ‫'( ָעגֹל‬round', [ʕaˈɡol]), pl. ‫ֲע ֻג ִלּים‬
([ʕaɡulˈlim]).[7] Without niqqud: ‫כתום‬,
‫כתומים‬, ‫עגול‬, ‫עגולים‬. Exception: ‫ָמתוֹק‬
('sweet', [maˈtok]), pl. ‫תוּקים‬
ִ ‫[( ְמ‬mə
ˈtukim]), with Holam gadol and Shuruk
and without Dagesh.[4]
Some words, in the base form of which
the penultimate syllable has [o] and is
stressed (sometimes called seggolate),
may be written with Kubutz or with
Kamatz katan when declined. For
example, base form: ‫( ַמ ְשׂכּ ֶֹרת‬wage, [mas
ˈkoʁet]); declined: ‫[ ַמ ְשׂ ָכּ ְר ָתּהּ‬maskoʁˈtah]
or ‫[ ַמ ְשׂ ֻכּ ְר ָתּהּ‬maskuʁˈtah], both being
normative spellings and pronunciations
of her wage.[4] Without niqqud, in any
case: ‫משכורת‬, ‫משכורתה‬.
The plural form of words which end in ‫־וּת‬
was in the past written with a Kubutz in
texts with niqqud: sg. ‫'( ָחנוּת‬shop'), [ħaˈnut],
pl. ‫[ ֲחנֻ יּוֹת‬ħanujˈjot]. In March 2009 the
Academy decided to simplify the niqqud of
such words by eliminating the Dagesh in
the letter yodh and changing the Kubutz to
Shuruk: ‫ ֲחנוּיוֹת‬.[10] This doesn't change the
pronunciation, since in modern Hebrew the
dagesh is not realized anyway. The
spelling without niqqud is also unchanged:
‫חנויות‬.

Kubutz in verbs …
Kubutz is common in verbs in the passive
binyanim Pual and Huf'al and in some
conjugated forms of verbs whose roots'
second and third letters are the same.

Pual E…

Verbs and participles in the passive binyan

Pual usually have a Kubutz in the first
letter of the root: ‫'( ֻכּנַּ ס‬was gathered') [kun
ˈnas], ‫מק ָבּל‬
ֻ ('acceptable') [məqubˈbal],
without niqqud: ‫כונס‬, ‫מקובל‬.

If the second letter of the root is one of the

guttural consonants Aleph (‫)א‬, He (‫)ה‬, Ayin
(‫ )ע‬and Resh (‫ )ר‬- but not Heth (‫ )ח‬-, the
Kubutz changes to holam haser in a
process called tashlum dagesh (‫תשלום‬
‫)דגש‬: ‫'( יְ תֹאַר‬will be described') [yətoˈʔaʁ],
‫'( ְמד ָֹרג‬graded') [mədoˈʁaɡ]; without niqqud:
‫יתואר‬, ‫מדורג‬.

Huf'al E…

Kubutz is used in the prefixes of verbs and

participles in the passive binyan Huf'al:
‫'( ֻה ְר ַדּם‬was put to sleep') [huʁˈdam], ‫ֻמ ְס ָדּר‬
('organized') [musˈdaʁ]. It is also correct to
write words in this binyan with Kamatz
katan in the prefix: ‫ ָה ְר ַדּם‬, ‫[( ָמ ְס ָדּר‬hoʁˈdam],
[mosˈdaʁ]).[11] Without niqqud, in any case:
‫הורדם‬, ‫מוסדר‬.
The Kubutz is used only if the prefix is a
closed vowel, which is the majority of
cases. With some root patterns, however, it
becomes an open vowel, in which case a
Shuruk is written:

Roots whose first letter is Yodh (‫)י‬: ‫הוּטב‬

ַ
('become better') [huˈtav], root ‫;י־ט־ב‬
‫הוּרד‬
ַ ('brought down') [huˈrad], root ‫י־ר־ד‬.
Roots whose middle letter is Waw (‫ )ו‬or
Yodh (‫)י‬: ‫הוּקם‬
ַ ('erected') [huˈqam], root
‫הוּבן ;קום‬
ַ ('understood') [huˈvan], root ‫בין‬.
Roots whose second and third letter are
the same: ‫הוּגן‬
ַ ('protected') [huˈɡan], root
‫גננ‬.
In many roots whose first letter is Nun (‫)נ‬
and in six roots whose first two letters are
Yodh (‫ )י‬and Tsade (‫)צ‬, this letter is
assimilated with the second letter of the
root, which in turn takes a complementary
Dagesh. This makes the syllable of the
prefix closed, so accordingly the prefix
takes Kubutz: ‫'( ֻה ַסּע‬driven') [husˈsaʕ], root
‫'( ֻה ַצּג ;נסע‬presented') [hut͡sˈt͡saɡ], root ‫יצג‬.
Without niqqud: ‫הוסע‬, ‫הוצג‬.

Double roots E…

Kubutz appears in some conjugated forms

of verbs with roots whose second and
third letter are the same (also called
double stems and ‫)ע"ע‬. Most of them are
rarely used.

Examples with verb ‫'( ָס ַבב‬turn') [saˈvav] in

the future tense of binyan Qal:

‫[ ֲא ֻס ֵבּ‬asubˈbeχ] (1 sg. with possessive

suffix)
‫[ ְתּ ֻס ֶבּינָ ה‬təsubˈbena] (3 pl. f.)

In older texts …

In the Bible Shuruk and Kubutz are not

always used according to the above
consistent rules and sometimes quite
arbitrarily.[12] For example, in Jeremiah
2:19 appear the words: ‫תּוֹכ ֻח‬
ִ ‫בוֹתיִ‬
ַ ‫וּמ ֻשׁ‬
ְ
('and your backslidings shall reprove you',
[uməʃuvoˈtajiχ toχiˈħuχ]). Kubutz is used in
both of them, even though in the first word
the syllable is not closed and the Vav is
even a part of this word's root, and in the
second word the [u] sound is in the last
syllable. Contrariwise, a Shuruk is used in
closed syllables where a Kubutz would be
expected, for example in Genesis 2:25 -
‫רוּמּים‬
ִ ‫'( ֲע‬naked', [ʕarumˈmim], the plural of
‫ערֹם‬,ָ [ʕaˈrom]), instead of the more regular
‫( ֲע ֻר ִמּים‬in modern Hebrew without niqqud:
‫)ערומים‬.

The word ‫( נְ ֻאם‬speech, [nəum]) is written

with Kubutz in the Bible. It was previously
frequently used to mark the signature on
documents (e.g. ‫ נאם יוסף לוי‬- 'so says
Yosef Levi'), but this usage is rare in
modern Hebrew, where this word usually
means "(a delivered) speech" and is
regularly spelled with Shuruk - ‫נְ אוּם‬. The
name ‫הוֹשׁ ַע‬
ֻ ְ‫'( י‬Joshua', [jəhoˈʃuaʕ]) is
spelled with Kubutz in the Bible, but
usually ‫הוֹשׁוּע‬
ַ ְ‫ י‬in modern Hebrew.

In the first decades of the revival of the

Hebrew language it was common in
spelling without niqqud not to write the
Vav in words which were written with
Kubutz. For example, in the printed works
of Eliezer Ben-Yehuda the word ‫ מרבה‬may
mean ‫'( ְמ ֻר ֶבּה‬multiplied', [məʁubˈbe]) and
‫'( ַמ ְר ֶבּה‬multiplying', [maʁˈbe]).[13] This
practice disappeared in the middle of
twentieth century and now ‫ ְמ ֻר ֶבּה‬is written
‫ מרובה‬and ‫ ַמ ְר ֶבּה‬is written ‫מרבה‬.

Pronunciation
In Biblical Hebrew both signs may have
indicated the same sound and when the
Bible manuscripts were vocalized Kubutz
was simply used where the letter Vav was
not written,[14] although other possibilities
were proposed by researchers, most
commonly that the vowels had different
length (quantity), Kubutz being shorter,[15]
or that the signs indicated different
sounds (quality), Kubutz being more
rounded,[16] although this is a matter of
debate. It is also possible that Biblical
Hebrew had several varieties of [u] sounds,
which were not consistently represented in
writing.[17]

Shuruk is usually a reflection of

reconstructed Proto-Semitic long /uː/ (ū)
sound, although most likely in the Bible
Kubutz stands for it when the letter Vav is
not written. Kubutz is one of the
reflections of the short Proto-Semitic short
/u/ (ŭ) sound. Kamatz Katan is a variant of
Kubutz in the Bible, as they are found in
complementary distribution in closely
related morphological patterns.[17]

In modern Hebrew, both signs indicate the

phoneme /u/, a close back rounded vowel.
Its closest equivalent in English is the "oo"
sound in moon, but the modern Hebrew
pronunciation is shorter. It is transliterated
as a "u".

In modern Hebrew writing without niqqud

the /u/ sound is always written as Waw, in
which case it is considered a mater
lectionis.

The following table contains the

pronunciation of the Kubutz and Shuruk in
reconstructed historical forms and
dialects using the International Phonetic
Alphabet.

Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

ֻ Kubutz [u] ? [u] ? [u, uː] ? ?

‫וּ‬ Shuruk [u] [uː, iː] [u] [əw] [uː] ? ?

Vowel length comparison

These vowels lengths are not manifested
in modern Hebrew. In addition, the short u
is usually promoted to a long u in Israeli
writing for the sake of disambiguation
 Vowel Length English
IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very Short example

‫וּ‬ ֻ n/a [u] u tube

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ֻ U+05BB QUBUTS

ּ U+05BC DAGESH, MAPIQ, OR SHURUQ

See also
Niqqud

References
1. ‫דקדוקי אביע"ה‬, a classic work on
pronunciation; a summary can be
found in the preface in the common
Sefardic E"M Siddur Avodath Hashem
2. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §8m
footnote. In modern Hebrew letter this
word is written ‫ ֵגּו‬.
3. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §8d
4. Academy Decisions: Grammar, §1.3.
5. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §26a,
§104e
. Based on the list of noun patterns
(mishkalim) in the Even-Shoshan
Dictionary.
7. [ə] changes to [a] on a guttural letter.
. Segol changes to Patach on a guttural
letter.
 9. As an exception, ‫ כול‬is written without
Vav when it is in construct state,
compare: ‫'( כל־האנשים‬all the people'),
but ‫'( היא יודעת הכול‬she knows all'). In
any case, this is in regard to [o]; for [u],
there are no exceptions.
10. Summary of meeting 308, March 16,
2009 Archived February 12, 2008, at
the Wayback Machine; ‫שתי החלטות‬
‫ אקדם – ידיעון‬,‫ דורון יעקב‬.‫בדקדוק‬
‫ שבט‬,40 ‫ גיליון‬,‫האקדמיה ללשון העברית‬
‫תש"ע‬
11. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §53b
12. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §8l.
 13. There are several other possible
readings, but this is enough for the
example.
14. Preliminary Remark to Gesenius'
Hebrew Grammar, §8
15. Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §9n
1 . Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §9o
17. Chaim Rabin, 'Short Vowels in Tiberian
Hebrew', in Ḥiqre Lašon 1999
(originally published 1961). (in
Hebrew).

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Patach

Pataḥ

IPA [a] or [ä]

Transliteration a

English approximation far

Same sound qamatz

Example

‫ַגּם‬
The word for also in Hebrew, gam.
The first vowel (the horizontal line)
is a pataḥ.

Other Niqqud

Shwa · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol ·

Pataḥ · Kamatz · Holam · Dagesh ·
Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe ·
Sin/Shin Dot
Pataḥ (Hebrew: ‫ ַפּ ַתח‬pataḥ, IPA: [paˈtaħ],
Biblical Hebrew: paṯaḥ) is a Hebrew niqqud
vowel sign represented by a horizontal line
⟨ ‫ ַא‬ ⟩ underneath a letter. In modern
Hebrew, it indicates the phoneme /a/
which is close to the "a" sound in the
English word far and is transliterated as an
a.

In Modern Hebrew, a pataḥ makes the

same sound as a qamatz, as does the
ḥaṭaf pataḥ (Hebrew: ‫ ֲח ַטף ַפּ ַתח‬IPA: [ħaˈtaf
paˈtaħ], "reduced pataḥ"). The reduced (or
ḥaṭaf) niqqud exist for pataḥ, qamatz, and
segol which contain a shva next to it.
Pronunciation
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different pataḥs in reconstructed historical
forms and dialects using the International
Phonetic Alphabet. The pronunciation in
IPA is above and the transliteration is
below.

The letters Bet ⟨‫ ⟩ב‬and Het ⟨‫ ⟩ח‬used in this

table are only for demonstration. Any letter
can be used.
 Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

‫ַב‬ Pataḥ [ä] [ä] [ä] [a] [a, aː] ? ?

‫ ַבה‬, Pataḥ
[ä] [ä] [ä] [a] [aː] ? ?
male
‫ַבא‬

‫ֲח‬
Ḥaṭaf
[ä] [ä] [ä] [a] [a] ? ?
pataḥ

A pataḥ on a letter ‫ח‬, ‫ע‬, or ‫( הּ‬that is, ‫ה‬

with a dot (mappiq) in it) at the end of a
word is sounded before the letter, and not
after. Thus, ‫( נ ַֹח‬Noah; properly
transliterated as Noaḥ) is pronounced
/no.aχ/ in Modern Hebrew and /no.aħ/ or
/no.ʔaħ/ in Biblical Hebrew. This only
occurs at the ends of words, only with
pataḥ and only with these three letters.
This is sometimes called a pataḥ gnuva, or
"stolen" pataḥ (more formally, "furtive
pataḥ"), since the sound "steals" an
imaginary epenthetic consonant to make
the extra syllable.

In addition, a letter with a pataḥ or qamatz

with a succeeding, articulated yud ⟨‫⟩י‬
makes the diphthong /ai ̯/, similar to the
diphthong in the English words fine and
why.

Vowel length comparison

By adding two vertical dots (shva) the
vowel is made very short. However, these
vowels lengths are not manifested in
Modern Hebrew.

Vowel comparison table

Vowel Length English

IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very short approximation

ָ ַ ֲ [a] a spa

Qamatz Pataḥ Reduced pataḥ

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ַ U+05B7 PATAH

ֲ U+05B2 HATAF PATAH

See also
Niqqud
Qamatz
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Segol

Segol

ֶ
IPA ɛ

Transliteration e

English example bed

Same sound tzere

Example

‫ֶשׁל‬
The word for of in Hebrew, shel.
The triangular array of three dots
under the word form the segol.

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol ·

Patach · Kamatz · Holam ·
Dagesh · Mappiq · Kubutz and
Shuruk · Rafe · Sin/Shin Dot
Segol (modern Hebrew: ‫ ֶסגּוֹל‬, IPA: [seˈɡol];
formerly ‫ ְסגוֹל‬, səḡôl) is a Hebrew niqqud
vowel sign that is represented by three
dots forming an upside down equilateral
triangle " ". As such, it resembles an
upside down therefore sign (a because
sign) underneath a letter. In modern
Hebrew, it indicates the phoneme /e/
which is similar to "e" in the English word
sound in sell and is transliterated as an e.

In Modern Hebrew, segol does the Hataf

Segol (Hebrew: ‫ ֲח ַטף ֶסגּוֹל‬  IPA: [ħaˈtaf se
ˈɡol], "Reduced Segol"). The reduced (or
ħataf) niqqud exist for segol, patah, and
kamatz which contain a shva next to it.
Pronunciation
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different segols in reconstructed historical
forms and dialects using the International
Phonetic Alphabet. The transcription in IPA
is above and the transliteration is below.

The letters Bet "‫ "ב‬and Het "‫ "ח‬used in this

table are only for demonstration. Any letter
can be used.
 Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Modern Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

‫ֶב‬ Segol [e̞] [e̞] [e̞] [a] [ɛ, ɛː] ? ?

,‫ ֶבה‬,‫ֶבי‬ Segol
[e̞] [e̞] [e̞] [a] [ɛː] ? ?

‫ֶבא‬
Male

‫ֱח‬
Hataf
[e̞] [e̞] [e̞] [a] [ɛ]̆ ? ?
Segol

In addition, a letter with a segol or tzere

with a succeeding yod often makes the "ei"
(also spelled "ey") sound such as in they or
tape.

Vowel length comparison

By adding two vertical dots (shva), the
vowel can be made very short. However,
the vowels lengths are not manifested in
Modern Hebrew.

Vowel comparison table

Vowel length English

IPA Transliteration
Long Short Very Short example

ֵ ֶ ֱ [e̞] e temp

Tzere Segol Reduced Segol

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ֶ U+05B6 SEGOL

ֱ U+05B1 HATEF SEGOL

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Shva

Shva

Modern Hebrew: /e/ ([e̞]), Ø

IPA
Biblical Hebrew: /ɛ/̆ – /ɐ/̆ – /ɔ/̆ – /ĭ/

Transliteration e, ' (apostrophe), nothing

English example men, menorah

Example

The word shva in Hebrew. The first vowel (marked

with red) is itself a shva .

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol · Patach · Kamatz ·

Holam · Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk · Kubutz · Rafe ·
Sin/Shin Dot
 This article contains IPA phonetic
symbols. Without proper rendering
support, you may see question marks,
boxes, or other symbols instead of
Unicode characters. For an introductory
guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.

Shva or, in Biblical Hebrew, shĕwa

(Hebrew: ‫ ) ְשׁוָ א‬is a Hebrew niqqud vowel
sign written as two vertical dots ( ְ )
beneath a letter. It indicates either the
phoneme /ə/ (shva na', mobile shva) or the
complete absence of a vowel (Ø) (shva
nach, resting shva).
It is transliterated as "e", "ĕ", "ə", "'"
(apostrophe), or nothing. Note that usage
of "ə" for shva is questionable:
transliterating Modern Hebrew shva nach
with "ə" is misleading, since it is never
actually pronounced [ə] – the vowel [ə]
does not exist in Modern Hebrew.
Moreover, the vowel [ə] is probably not
characteristic of earlier pronunciations
such as Tiberian vocalization.

A shva sign in combination with the vowel

diacritics patáẖ, segól and kamáts katán
produces a "ẖatáf": a diacritic for a "tnuʿá
ẖatufá" (a "fleeting" or "furtive" vowel).
Pronunciation in Modern
Hebrew
In Modern Hebrew, shva is either
pronounced /e/ or is mute (Ø), regardless
of its traditional classification as shva
nacḥ (‫ ) ְשׁוָ א נָ ח‬or shva na (‫) ְשׁוָ א נָ ע‬, see
following table for examples. The Israeli
standard for its transliteration[1] is /e/ only
for a pronounced shva na (i.e., one which
is pronounced /e/) and no representation
in transliteration if the shva is mute.

In Modern Hebrew, a shva is pronounced

/e/ under the following conditions:[2]
 Condition for /e/ Exam
Examples
pronunciation of shva
in Israeli Hebrew In Hebrew IPA translation In H

1. When under the

first of two letters, ‫ָשׁ ְכחוּ‬ /ʃaχeˈħu/ they forgot ‫ָמ ְכרוּ‬
both representing the
same consonant or
consonants with
identical place and ‫ָשׁ ַד ְד ְתּ‬ /ʃaˈdadet/ you (f.) robbed ‫ָשׁ ַל ְל ְתּ‬
manner of
articulation:

2. When under the

first letter of a word, if ‫נְ ָמ ִלים‬ /nemaˈlim/ ants ‫ְגּ ָמ ִלים‬
this letter is a
sonorant in modern
pronunciation, i.e. ‫י‬
(/j/), ‫( ל‬/l/), ‫( מ‬/m/), ‫ְמנִ יָּ ה נ‬ /meniˈja/ counting ‫ְבּנִ יָּ ה‬
(/n/) or ‫( ר‬/r/)[*]:

3. When under the

first letter of a word, if ‫תאָרים‬
ִ
the second letter is a
‫אָרים‬
ִ ‫ְתּ‬ /teaˈrim/ titles
glottal consonant, i.e.
‫( א‬/ʔ/), ‫( ה‬/h/) or ‫( ע‬/ ‫תּמ ִרים‬
ָ
ʕ/ or /ʔ/):

4. When under the

‫יחהּ‬
ָ ‫ְבּ ֵר‬ /berejˈχa/ in her scent ‫יכה‬
ָ ‫ְבּ ֵר‬
first letter of a word, if
this letter represents
one of the prefix- ‫ישׁה‬
ָ ‫ְבּ ִח‬ /beχiˈʃa/ in sensing ‫ישׁה‬
ָ ‫בּח‬
ִ
morphemes
1. ‫( ב‬/be/) =
amongst others
and (they)
"in", ‫רוֹדים‬
ִ ְ‫ו‬ /veroˈdim/ ‫רוּדים‬
ִ
tyrannize
2. ‫( ו‬/ve/) = "and",
 3. ‫( כ‬/ke/) = ‫ְכּ ָרזָ ה‬ /keraˈza/ as a thin person ‫ְכּ ָרזָ ה‬
amongst others
"as" or
"approximately", ‫ְל ָפּ ִריז‬ /lepaˈriz/ to Paris
4. ‫( ל‬/le/) =
amongst others
"to", dative
marker and verb you (m. p.) will
prefix in ‫ְתּ ַבלּוּ‬ /tevaˈlu/ have a good ‫ְתּ ַבלּוּל‬
infinitive, time

5. ‫( ת‬/te/) as future
tense verb prefix:

5. (In non standard ‫ִמ ְצּ ָע ִדים‬ /mitseaˈdim/ from steps ‫צּמ ִדים‬
ָ
language usage) if ‫ְצ ָע ִדים‬
one of the
‫ִמ ְרוָ ִחים‬ /mirevaˈχim/ from blanks ‫ְרוָ ִחים‬
morphemes
mentioned above (‫ב‬ standard: ‫– ֵמ ְרוָ ִחים‬/merevaˈχim/

/be/, ‫ ו‬/ve/, ‫ כ‬/ke/, ‫ל‬ Lions and tigers

‫ ַל ֲא ָריוֹת וְ ְלנְ ֵמ ִרים יֵ שׁ ַפּ ְרוָ ה‬/learaˈjot velenemerim…/
/le/ or ‫ ת‬/te/) or one have fur
of the morphemes ‫מ‬
standard: ‫ וְ ִלנְ ֵמ ִרים‬/…velinmeˈrim…/
/mi/ ("from") or ‫ ש‬/ʃe/
And as children
("that") is added as a
‫וְ ְכּיְ ָל ִדים ִשׂ ַח ְקנוּ ַבּחוּץ‬ /vekejelaˈdim…/ we played
prefix to a word,
outside
which without this
prefix begins with a
letter marked with a
shva pronounced /e/
under the above
standard: ‫יל ִדים‬
ָ ‫ – וְ ִכ‬/veχilaˈdim…/
conditions, this shva
will retain its /e/-
pronunciation also
with the prefix:

6. (Usually – see ‫ִא ְשׁ ְפּזוּ‬ /iʃpeˈzu/ they hospitalized ‫ר ַדּ ַעת‬

#Counterexamples[**])
when under a medial
letter, before whose
pronunciation a
consonant was
pronounced:

Counterexamples …

^ One exception to rule 2 seems to be ‫ְמ ַלאי‬

/mlaj/ 'inventory'; the absence of a vowel
after the ‫( מ‬/m/) might be attributable to
the high sonority of the subsequent liquid
‫( ל‬/l/), however compare with ‫( ְמ ִלית‬/me
ˈlit/, not /*mlit/) 'filling' (in cuisine).
According to the New User-Friendly
Hebrew-English Dictionary (Arie Comey,
Naomi Tsur; Achiasaf, 2006), the word
‫'( ְמ ַלאי‬stock') is pronounced with an /e/:
[me'lai].
^ Exceptions to rule 6 include ‫ְפּ ַסנְ ְתּ ָרן‬
(/psantˈran/, not */psanteˈran/ – 'pianist'),
‫( אַנְ ְגּ ִלית‬/aŋˈɡlit/, not */aŋɡeˈlit/ – 'English'),
‫[נַ ְשׁ ְפּ ִריץ‬3] (/naʃˈprit͡s/, not */naʃpeˈrit͡s/ –
'we will sprinkle'), several inflections of
quinqueliteral roots – e.g.: ‫[ ִסנְ ְכּ ֵרן‬4] (/sin
ˈkren/, not */sinkeˈren/ – "he
synchronized"); ‫[ ִחנְ ְט ֵרשׁ‬5] (/χinˈtreʃ/, not */
χinteˈreʃ/ – 'he did stupid things');
‫[ ִה ְת ְפ ַל ְר ֵטט‬6] (/hitflarˈtet/, not */hitfelartet/
– 'he had a flirt') – as well as other, more
recent loanwords, e.g. ‫( ַמנְ ְט ַרה‬/ˈmantra/,
not */mantera/ – 'mantra').

In earlier forms of Hebrew, shva na and

nach were phonologically and phonetically
distinguishable, but the two variants
resulting from Modern Hebrew phonology
no longer conform to the traditional
classification, e.g. while the (first) shva
nach in the phrase ‫'( ִס ְפ ֵרי תורה‬books of
the Law') is correctly pronounced in
Modern Hebrew /sifrei torah/ with the "‫"פ‬
(or /f/ sound) being mute, the shva na in
‫'( זְ ַמן‬time') in Modern Hebrew is often
pronounced as a mute Shva (/zman/). In
religious contexts, however, scrupulous
readers of the prayers and scriptures do
still differentiate properly between Shva
Nach and Shva Na (e.g. zĕman).

Traditional classification
In traditional Hebrew grammar, shvas are
in most cases classified as either "shva
na" (Heb. ‫ )שווא נע‬or as "shva naḥ" (Heb.
‫ ;)שווא נח‬in a few cases as "shva meraḥef"
(Heb. ‫)שווא מרחף‬, and when discussing
Tiberian pronunciation (ca. from the 8th
until the 15th century) some shvas are
classified as "shva ga'ya" (Heb. ‫)שווא געיה‬.

A shva is categorized according to several

attributes of its grammatical context. The
three categories of shva relevant to
standard grammar of Modern Hebrew are
"shva na", "shva naḥ" and "shva meraḥef";
the following table summarizes four
distinguishing attributes which determine
these categories:

Does the shva supersede a vowel or no

vowel in the word's non inflected form?
Is the preceding letter pointed with a
"short" or a "long" niqqud-variant?
Is the following letter, when ‫בג״ד כפ״ת‬,
pointed with a dagesh qal or not?
Is the letter which is pointed with shva
assigned to the preceding or to the
following syllable?

To help illustrate the first criterion

(existence or non-existence of a vowel in
the word's non inflected form), the
"location" of the shva, i.e., the place within
the word where the lack of vowel is
indicated by it, is marked within the
phonemic transcription with an orange
linguistic zero: Ø; if existing, the
corresponding vowel in the basic (non
inflected) form of the example is also
marked in orange.

standard supersedes
type of shva example non inflected form of example
syllabification in non
inflected
form:

na ‫ ֵע ְרבוֹנוֹת‬/erØvoˈnot/ (deposits) ‫ ֵע ָרבוֹן‬/eraˈvon/ (deposit) ‫—רבוֹ—נוֹת‬

ְ ‫ֵע‬ vowel

naḥ ‫ ֶע ְלבּוֹנוֹת‬/elØboˈnot/ (insults) ‫ ֶע ְלבּוֹן‬/elØˈbon/ (insult) ‫ֶע ְל—בּוֹ—נוֹת‬ no vowel

meraḥef ‫יֶ ֶא ְרכוּ‬ /je.erØˈχu/ (they will last) ‫ יֶ ֱא ַר‬/je.eˈraχ/ (it will last) ‫—א ְר—כוּ‬

ֶ ֶ‫י‬ vowel

Shva Na …

In most cases, traditional Hebrew

grammar considers shva na, or the mobile
shva, to be an entity that supersedes a
vowel that exists in the basic form of a
word but not after this word underwent
inflection or declension. Additionally, any
shva marked under an initial letter is
classified shva na.

Merely identifying a given shva as being a

"shva na" offers no indication as to its
pronunciation in Modern Hebrew; it is
however relevant to the application of
standard niqqud, e.g.: a ‫ בג״ד כפ״ת‬letter
following a letter marked with a shva na
may not be marked with a dagesh qal
(Modern Hebrew phonology sometimes
disagrees with this linguistic prescription,
as in ‫' – זִ ְפּזְ פּוּ‬they zapped" – in which the
second pe is pointed with a dagesh qal
although preceded by a shva na), or: the
vowel preceding a letter marked with a
shva na must be represented by the "long"
niqqud-variant for that vowel: qamats and
not pataḥ, tsere and not segol etc.[↑].
Furthermore, in standard syllabification,
the letter under which a shva na is marked
is grouped with the following syllable.

The Academy of the Hebrew Language's

transliteration guidelines[1] specify that
shva na should be transliterated only if
pronounced in Modern Hebrew, in which
case "e" be used for general purposes and
"ĕ" for precise transliteration. Generally,
shva na is sometimes transliterated "ə".
Concerning Modern Hebrew pronunciation,
however, this symbol is misleading, since it
is commonly used in linguistics to denote
the vowel Schwa, which does not exist in
Modern Hebrew.

A shva na can be identified as such by

means of the following criteria:

1. when marked under the first letter of

a word, as in ‫ ְמ ַר ֵחף‬, ‫ ְל ָפנָ י‬, and ‫ ְשׁ ַמע‬,
2. when marked under the first of two
identical letters,
3. when it's the second of two shvas
marked under two consecutive letters
(except when marked under the last
letter of a word), as in ‫( ַר ְע ְמ ֵסס‬Exo.
12:37) and ‫וישׁ ְמעו‬
ְ (Gen. 3:8),
4. when the letter before the one under
which it is marked is marked with a
"long" niqqud-variant,[↑], such as the
long vowel of either yod or ḥiríq, as in
‫יד‬
ֿ ְ ‫( יְ ִ ֽח‬Gen. 22:2) (yeḥīdhəkha), or the
long vowel of waw or ḥolam, as in the
words ‫הוֹל ִֿכים‬
ְ , ‫יוֹד ִעים‬
ֿ ְ and ‫מוֹכ ִרים‬
ְֿ
(hōləkhīm, yōdəʻīm and mōkhərīm) and
‫( שׁ ְֹפ ִטים וְ שׁ ְֹט ִרים‬Deut. 16:18), "shōfəṭīm
wa-shōṭərīm."
 5. when marked under a letter with a
dagesh ḥazaq (historically an
indicator of gemination), as ‫יכם‬
ֶ ֵ‫ִמ ְפּנ‬
(Lev. 18:24) and ‫( ִמ ְקּ ָ ֿדשׁ‬Exo. 15:17).[7]:31

For a more detailed account, see Tiberian

vocalization § Vowel diacritics

Shva Naḥ …

Traditional Hebrew grammar defines shva

naḥ, or shva quiescens, as indicating the
absence of a vowel. In Modern Hebrew,
some shvas classified as shva naḥ are
nonetheless pronounced /e/ (e.g. the shva
under the second dalet in the word ‫– ָשׁ ַד ְד ְתּ‬
/ʃaˈdadet/ – "you (f.) robbed"; see table
above).

In all but a small number of cases, a shva

not conforming to the criteria listed above
is classified shva naḥ. This offers no
conclusive indication as to its
pronunciation in Modern Hebrew; it is
however relevant to the application of
standard niqqud, e.g.: a ‫ בג״ד כפ״ת‬letter
following a letter marked with a shva nacḥ
must be marked with a dagesh qal
(Modern Hebrew phonology sometimes
disagrees with this linguistic prescription,
as in ‫" – ְל ַפ ְס ֵפס‬to miss" – in which the
second pe lacks a dagesh qal although
preceded by a shva naḥ), or: the vowel
preceding a letter marked with a shva naḥ
must be represented by the "short" niqqud-
variant for that vowel: pataḥ and not
qamats, segol and not tsere etc.[↑].
Furthermore, in standard syllabification,
the letter under which a shva naḥ is
marked is grouped with the preceding
syllable.

The Academy of the Hebrew Language's

transliteration guidelines[1] specify that
shva naḥ should not be represented in
transliteration.

Shva Meraḥef …
"Shva meraḥef" is the grammatical
designation of a shva which does not
comply with all criteria characterizing a
shva na (specifically, one marked under a
letter following a letter marked with a
"short", not a "long", niqqud-variant[↑]), but
which does, like a shva na, supersede a
vowel (or a shva na) that exists in the
basic form of a word but not after this
word underwent inflection or declension.

The classification of a shva as "shva

meraḥef" is relevant to the application of
standard niqqud, e.g.: a ‫ בג״ד כפ״ת‬letter
following a letter marked with a shva
meraḥef should not be marked with a
dagesh qal, although the vowel preceding
this letter could be represented by the
"short" niqqud-variant for that vowel.[↑]
This reflects sometimes, but not always,
pronunciation in Modern Hebrew, e.g. ‫ַמ ְל ֵכי‬
("kings of") is commonly pronounced in
accordance with the standard form, /mal
ˈχej/ (with no dagesh qal in the letter kaf),
whereas ‫"( ַכּ ְל ֵבי‬dogs of"), whose standard
pronunciation is /kalˈvej/, is commonly
pronounced /kalˈbej/ (as if there were a
dagesh qal in the letter bet). In standard
syllabification, the letter under which a
shva meraḥef is marked is grouped with
the preceding syllable.
Shva Ga'ya …

The word /vənā'šūḇā/ in Ekhah (Lamentations) 5:21.

The ga'ja in the word (marked in red) renders the shva
stressed. In the Spanish and Portuguese Sephardic
tradition, the pronunciation is ['vanā'šūḇā].

"Shva Ga'ya" designates a shva marked

under a letter that is also marked with the
cantillation mark "ga'ya" (‫ ַגּ ְעיָ ה‬lit.
"bleating" or "bellowing"),[7]:22–23 or
"meteg", e.g. the shva under the letter bet
in the word ‫"( ְבּהוֹנוֹת‬toes") would normally
be classified a shva na and be
transliterated "e": "behonót" (or according
to the precise standard,[1] "ĕ": "bĕhonót"),
however, if marked with the ga'ya
cantillation mark, , this shva is
classified as shva ga'ya, and the
transliteration believed to reflect its
historical pronunciation would be bohonót.
This "strict application" is found in
Yemenite Hebrew.

T'nua hatufa
Within niqqud, vowel diacritics are sorted
into three groups: "big", "small" and
"fleeting" or "furtive" ("T'nuot g'dolot" –
"‫"גדולות‬, "T'nuot k'tanot" – "‫ "קטנות‬and
"T'nuot chatufot" "‫)"חטופות‬, sometimes
also referred to as "long", "short" and "very
short" or "ultrashort". This grouping might
have correlated to different vowel lengths
in earlier forms of Hebrew (see Tiberian
vocalization → Vowels; spoken Israeli
Hebrew however does not distinguish
between different vowel lengths, thus this
orthographic differentiation is not
manifest in speech).

The vowel diacritics classified as

"chatufot" ("fleeting") all share the
common feature of being a digraph of a
"small vowel" diacritic (Patach, Segol or
Kamatz Katan) plus a shva sign. Similarly,
their names are derived from the
respective "small vowel" diacritic's name
plus the adjunct "chataf": "chataf patach",
"chataf segol" and "chataf kamatz".

As with a shva na, standard (prescribed)

syllabification determines that letters
pointed with a "fleeting vowel" diacritic be
considered part of the subsequent
syllable, even if in modern Hebrew
pronunciation this diacritic represents a
full-fledged syllable, thus e.g. the
phonologically trisyllabic word "‫"ה ֱע ִמיד‬
ֶ ("he
placed upright"), pronounced /he.eˈmid/,
should standardly be syllabified into only
two syllables, "‫—ע ִמיד‬
ֱ ‫"ה‬
ֶ ("he'emid").

Israeli Hebrew
Name Symbol English
IPA Transliteration
approximate

Reduced Segol
[e̞] e men
("ẖatáf segól")

Reduced Patach
[ä] a cup
("ẖatáf patáẖ")

Reduced Kamatz
[o̞] o clock
("ẖatáf kamáts")

Reduced Hiriq
("ẖatáf ẖiríq") – not in current use, appears rarely[8] [i] i it
in the Aleppo Codex[9]

Comparison table …
 Vowel comparison table

Vowel Length
(phonetically not manifested in IPA English
Transliteration Notes
Israeli Hebrew) approximate
Long Short Very Short phonemic phonetic

see open

‫ָס‬ ‫ַס‬ ‫ֲס‬

central
/a/ [ä] a spa
unrounded
vowel

see mid front

‫ֵס‬ ‫ֶס‬ ‫ֱס‬ /e/ [e̞] e temp unrounded
vowel

‫ָס‬ ‫ֳס‬
see mid back
‫סוֹ‬ /o/ [o̞] o cone
rounded vowel

‫סוּ‬ ‫ֻס‬ /u/ [u] u doom

n/a

‫ִסי‬ ‫ִס‬ /i/ [i] i ski

Note I: ְ
By adding two vertical dots (shva) the vowel is made very short.

Note II: The short o and long a have the same niqqud.

The short o is usually promoted to a long o in Israeli writing for the sake of
Note III:
disambiguation

The short u is usually promoted to a long u in Israeli writing for the sake of
Note IV:
disambiguation

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ְ U+05B0 HEBREW POINT SHEVA

ֱ U+05B1 HEBREW POINT HATAF SEGOL

ֲ U+05B2 HEBREW POINT HATAF PATAH

ֳ U+05B3 HEBREW POINT HATAF QAMATS

As of 2016, a separate Unicode symbol for

the sheva na has been proposed but not
implemented.[10]

See also
Niqqud
Schwa
Tiberian vocalization
Arabic diacritic sukūn
Notes
↑^ Long and short niqqud-variants
represent identical spoken vowels in
Modern Hebrew; the orthographic
distinction is, however, still observed in
standard spelling.

Bibliography
 Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §10

References
1. Transliteration guidelines from 2006
(p. 4)
2. "Characterization and Evaluation of
Speech-Reading Support Systems for
 Hard-of-Hearing Students in the Class"
by Becky Schocken; Faculty of
Management, Tel-Aviv University,
Department of Management and
Economics, The Open University of
Israel
3. "Archived copy" . Archived from the
original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved
2015-03-25.
4. "Archived copy" . Archived from the
original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved
2015-03-25.
5. "Archived copy" . Archived from the
original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved
2015-03-25.
 . "Archived copy" . Archived from the
original on 2011-07-21. Retrieved
2015-03-25.
7. Maḥberet Kitrei Ha-Torah (ed. Yoav
Pinhas Halevi), chapter 5, Benei Barak
1990 (Hebrew)
. I Kings 17:11 "‫ ;"לקחי־נא‬Psalms 14:1
"‫"התעיבו‬,"‫ ;"השחיתו‬Psalms 53:2
"‫ "והתעיבו‬,"‫"השחיתו‬
9. hagigim.com
10. http://scriptsource.org/cms/scripts/pa
ge.php?
item_id=entry_detail&uid=qek84cbq5
u
Retrieved from
"https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?
title=Shva&oldid=1004860340"

Last edited 9 days ago by Crash48

Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0 unless

otherwise noted.
Tzere

Tzere

ֵ
IPA e

Transliteration e

English example bed

Same sound segol

Example

‫ֵתּל‬
The word for mound in Hebrew, tel.
The two dots is a Tzere.

Other Niqqud

Shva · Hiriq · Tzere · Segol ·

Patach · Kamatz · Holam ·
Dagesh · Mappiq · Shuruk ·
Kubutz · Rafe · Sin/Shin Dot
Tzere (also spelled Tsere, Tzeirei, Zere,
Zeire, Ṣērê; modern Hebrew: ‫ ֵצ ֵירי‬, IPA: [tse
ˈʁe], sometimes also written ‫;צירה‬
formerly ‫ ֵצ ֵרי‬, ṣērê) is a Hebrew niqqud
vowel sign represented by two
horizontally-aligned dots "◌"
ֵ underneath a
letter. In modern Hebrew, tzere is
pronounced the same as and indicates the
phoneme /e/ which is the same as the "e"
sound in sell and is transliterated as an "e".
There was a distinction in Tiberian Hebrew
between segol and Tzere.

Usage
Tzere is usually written in these cases:
In final stressed closed syllables: ‫ַמ ְח ֵשׁב‬
([maħˈʃev], computer), ‫[( ִס ֵפּר‬sipˈpeʁ], he
told; without niqqud ‫)סיפר‬. Also in final
syllables closed by guttural letters with
an added furtive patach: ‫[( ַמ ְט ֵבּ ַע‬mat
ˈbeaʕ], coin), ‫שוֹכ ַח‬
ֵ ([ʃoˈχeaħ], forgetting).
Notable exceptions to this rule are:
The personal suffixes ‫־תם‬
ֶ ([tem], 2
pl. m.), ‫־תן‬
ֶ ([ten], 2 pl. f.), ‫־כם‬
ֶ ([χem],
2 pl. m.), ‫־כן‬
ֶ ([χen], 2 pl. f.), ‫־הם‬
ֶ
([hem], 3 pl. m.), ‫־הן‬
ֶ ([hen], 3 pl. f.)
are written with segol. (But the
words ‫[( ֵהם‬hem], they m.), ‫[( ֵהן‬hen],
they f.) are written with Tzere.)
The words ‫[( ֱא ֶמת‬eˈmet], truth), ‫ַבּ ְרזֶ ל‬
([baʁˈzel], iron), ‫[( ַגּ ְרזֶ ן‬ɡaʁˈzen], axe),
 ‫[( ַכּ ְר ֶמל‬kaʁˈmel], Carmel,
gardenland), ‫[( ֲע ָר ֶפל‬ʕaʁaˈfel], fog)
are written with segol.
The word ‫[( ֵבּן‬ben], son, boy) is
written with tzere in the absolute
state, but with segol in the
construct state: ‫בּן־‬.
ֶ In the Bible this
rule also applies to other words
which end in tzere, when they are
written with maqaf.[1]
In non-final, unstressed open syllables:
‫[( ֵענָ ב‬ʕeˈnav], grape), ‫[( ֵתּ ָבה‬teˈva], chest,
ark; without niqqud ‫)תיבה‬.
In the first (stressed) syllable of about
70 segolate words, among them ‫ֵח ֶלק‬
([ˈħeleq], part), ‫ˈ[( ֵס ֶפר‬sefeʁ], book), ‫ֵע ֶדן‬
([ˈʕeden], Eden).[2] In other – much more
numerous – segolate words the first [e]
sound is a segol.
In final open syllables, when the mater
lectionis is yod (‫ )י‬or aleph (‫)א‬: ‫ְבּנֵ י־‬
([bəne], sons of), ‫מוֹצא‬
ֵ ([moˈtse], finding).
When the mater lectionis is he (‫)ה‬, the
vowel sign is usually segol, but tzere is
written in the imperative and absolute
infinitive forms of the verb, in nouns in
construct state, and in the base form of
several other nouns (see below for
details).
In declension tzere sometimes changes to
other vowels or to shva. The full rules for
these changes were formulated the
Academy of the Hebrew Language.[3]

In modern Hebrew there are words which

are homophones and homographs in
spelling without niqqud, but are written
differently with niqqud, the difference
being segol and tzere. For example, ‫ֶע ֶרב‬
evening and ‫ ֵע ֶרב‬weft are both pronounced
[ˈʕeʁev] and written ‫ ערב‬without niqqud
(these words also have different
etymology).

Writing tzere with and

without matres lectionis
Tzere can be written with and without
matres lectionis. The most prominent
mater lectionis for tzere is Yod (‫)י‬, and in
some cases it is used with the letters
aleph (‫ )א‬and he (‫)ה‬.

Standard spelling rules mandate only one

way to spell every word with or without the
Yod after tzere. Although in standard
modern pronunciation the sound of tzere
with or without the Yod is the same, it may
change the word's meaning in a written
text (see below).
Standard usage without Yod …

Tzere can be written by itself without

mater lectionis, in which case it is called
tzere ḥaser ("lacking tzere"), for example in
the word ‫[( זֵ ר‬zeɾ], wreath). In this case, in
text without niqqud the vowel [e] is usually
not written at all: ‫זר‬. This word can be also
vocalized as ‫[( זָ ר‬zaɾ], stranger) and the
reader has to guess the right
pronunciation according to the context.
According to the standardized Hebrew
spelling the letter Yod is sometimes
written in texts without niqqud, when there
is a grammatical reason for it; for example,
the verb ‫[( ֵתּ ָע ֵדר‬teʕaˈdeɾ], she will be
absent) is written without Yod in texts with
niqqud, but the Yod is written in a text
without niqqud: ‫תיעדר‬.

Standard usage with Yod …

Tzere with Yod is called "full tzere". When a

full tzere is written in text with niqqud, the
letter Yod must be written in text without
niqqud. The main cases for writing the
tzere with Yod are these:

Tzere is written with Yod to indicate the

plural number of declined words, for
example ‫מוּצ ֵרנוּ‬
ָ means our product and
‫מוּצ ֵרינוּ‬
ָ means our products; the
standard pronunciation is the same:
[mutsaˈɾenu].
Tzere is written with Yod in words in
which the Yod is a part of the root:
Nouns, for example ‫יצה‬
ָ ‫[( ֵבּ‬beˈtsa],
egg), root ‫יתים ;ב־י־צ‬
ִ ֵ‫[( ז‬zeˈtim],
olives, the plural of ‫)זַ יִת‬, root ‫ז־י־ת‬,
‫[( ֵמ ָידע‬meˈdaʕ], information), root
‫י־ד־ע‬. Tzere is also traditionally
written with Yod in several other
words, the roots of which are rarely
used productively to form other
words, among them ‫יפס‬
ָ ‫[( ְפּ ֵס‬pəse
ˈfas], mosaic), ‫יסם‬
ָ ‫[( ֵק‬qeˈsam], sliver)
and the word "tzere" itself – ‫ֵצ ֵירי‬
([tseˈɾe]).[3]
Verbs, in which the last letter of the
root is he (‫)ל״ה‬, which is by
convention treated as
interchangeable with Yod,[4] for
example ‫[( נִ ְבנֵ ית‬nivˈnet], being built
f.), root ‫( ב־נ־ה‬or ‫)ב־נ־י‬. In Arabic
the corresponding verbs are written
with ʾalif maqṣūra, which represents
a similar interchange of the letters
yāʾ (‫ )ي‬and ʾalif (‫)ا‬.
Some verbs in which the first letter
of the root is Yod (‫)פ״י‬,[5] for
example ‫יטיב‬
ִ ‫[( ֵה‬heˈtiv], he did well),
root ‫י־ט־ב‬.
 In standard spelling without niqqud Yod
is written to represent the [e] sound in
words formed in the pattern heCCeC
(‫)ה ְק ֵטל‬,
ֶ in which the first and the second
consonants of the root merge, even
though the vowel there is not tzere, but
seggol, for example ‫[( ֶה ֵשּׂג‬hesˈseɡ],
achievement; root ‫נ־שׂ־ג‬, without niqqud
‫)הישג‬.

Nonstandard usage of Yod to

represent tzere
…

In texts with full niqqud – mostly poetry,

religious and children books – tzere is
usually written in accordance with the
rules mandated by the Academy. The
Academy defined some cases in which a
Yod is added to texts without niqqud to
signify an [e] sound, but in common usage
Yod is often written or not written contrary
to the standard.

Some notable common deviations from

the standard in which a Yod is added
include:

Some words are often written with Yod

in texts without niqqud, even though the
Yod is not a part of the root and is not
written in a text with niqqud. For
example: ‫[( ֵמ ַמד‬meˈmad], dimension),
‫[( ֵמ ַרב‬meˈɾav], Merab, most), ‫[( ֵשׂ ָער‬se
ˈʕaɾ], hair) are often written ‫מימד‬, ‫מירב‬
and ‫שיער‬, even though the standard
spelling without niqqud is ‫ממד‬, ‫מרב‬,
‫שער‬. This goes further as the Yod is
retained in declined forms of the word,
which aren't written with tzere at all, but
with shva; for example, the word ‫ְשׂ ָערוֹת‬
([seʕaˈɾot], hairs) is frequently written
‫שיערות‬, although the vowel of the ‫ ש‬is
shva (the standard spelling is ‫)שערות‬.
Words in the pattern CəCeCa (‫)ק ֵט ָלה‬
ְ are
often written with a Yod, even though it
is not the standard. Examples include
‫[( ְבּ ֵר ָכה‬bəɾeˈχa], pool), ‫[( ְגּנֵ ָבה‬ɡəneˈva],
theft), ‫[( ְשׂ ֵר ָפה‬səɾeˈfa], burning), which
are often written ‫בריכה‬, ‫גניבה‬, ‫שריפה‬
instead of the standard ‫ברכה‬, ‫גנבה‬,
‫שרפה‬.
Yod is often added in texts without
niqqud to represent tzere in the future
tense of verbs in which Yod is the first
letter of the root, for example ‫[( יֵ ֵשׁב‬ye
ˈʃev], he will sit) is often written ‫יישב‬,
although the standard spelling is ‫ישב‬.
This spelling may also be vocalized ‫יָ ַשׁב‬
([yaˈʃav], he sat), but adding a Yod
doesn't solve the ambiguity – ‫ יישב‬may
be vocalized ‫[( יְ יַ ֵשׁב‬yeˈyaʃev], he will
settle) and ‫יִשׁב‬
ֵ ([yiˈʃev], he settled).
Because of the many potential
ambiguities, the Academy suggests
adding vocalization in such cases.
Several other (non-comprehensive)
examples:
The standard spelling of the plural
form of the word ‫[( ְפּ ִרי‬pəɾi], fruit) is
‫[( ֵפּרוֹת‬peɾot]) with niqqud and ‫פרות‬
without niqqud, but it is often
written ‫ פרות( פירות‬may also mean
‫[ ָפּרוֹת‬paˈɾot] cows).
The words ‫[( ֵאזוֹר‬eˈzoɾ], zone), ‫ֵה ֶפ‬
([ˈhefeχ], contrary; also ‫) ֶה ֶפ‬, ‫ֵתּ ֶכף‬
([ˈteχef], immediately; also ‫)תּ ֶכף‬
ֶ are
sometimes spelled ‫איזור‬, ‫היפך‬, ‫תיכף‬,
although the standard spelling
without niqqud is ‫אזור‬, ‫הפך‬, ‫תכף‬. (In
the Even-Shoshan dictionary ‫תיכף‬
 refers to ‫;תּ ֶכף‬
ֶ in the Rav-Millim
dictionary it is the main entry.)

Some notable common deviations from

the standard in which a Yod is not written
include:

According to the modern spelling rules,

the Academy mandates writing a Yod in
some cases in which the vowel [i]
changes to [e] for grammatical reasons.
(Not writing the Yod is correct according
to the old ktiv haser spelling.) For
example:
In the future, imperative and
infinitive forms of verbs in binyan
nif'al, the vowel of the prefix is
usually [i], which in standard
spelling without niqqud is written
with a Yod: ‫[( ְל ִהזָּ ֵהר‬ləhizzaˈheɾ], to
be cautious), standard spelling
without niqqud: ‫להיזהר‬. This vowel
changes to [e] before the guttural
letters ‫א‬, ‫ה‬, ‫ח‬, ‫ע‬, ‫ר‬: ‫[( ְל ֵה ָר ֵדם‬ləheɾa
ˈdem], to fall asleep), standard
spelling without niqqud: ‫להירדם‬.
Sometimes, however, verbs with
both [i] and [e] are written without a
Yod in texts without niqqud: ‫להזהר‬,
‫להרדם‬.
In nouns of the pattern CiCCuC,
such as ‫[( ִספּוּק‬sipˈpuq], satisfaction,
without niqqud ‫ )סיפוק‬the vowel [i]
 also changes to [e] before guttural
letters: ‫[( ֵפּרוּשׁ‬peˈɾuʃ], commentary),
‫[( ֵתּאוּר‬teˈʔuɾ], description), without
niqqud: ‫פירוש‬, ‫תיאור‬, but sometimes
‫פרוש‬, ‫תאור‬.
The Yod is sometimes omitted from
words, the last letter of whose root is ‫ה‬.
This is a mistake, because in these
verbs the Yod is written in texts with
niqqud. For example: ‫יתי‬
ִ ‫הוֹד‬
ֵ ([hoˈdeti], I
thanked, root ‫)י־ד־ה‬, ‫[( נֶ ֱהנֵ ינוּ‬neheˈnenu],
we enjoyed, root ‫ )ה־נ־ה‬are sometimes
incorrectly spelled ‫הודתי‬, ‫נהננו‬.

Tzere with aleph and he …

The letter aleph (‫ )א‬is the mater lectionis
after tzere in the middle or the end of the
word when it is a part of the root: ‫מוֹצא‬
ֵ
([moˈtse], finding m.), ‫מוֹצאת‬
ֵ ([moˈtset],
finding f.).

The letter he (‫ )ה‬is very rarely used as a

mater lectionis for [e] in the middle of the
word. The notable example for this is the
word ‫הפיָּ ה‬
ִ ‫[( יְ ֵפ‬jəfefiˈja], pretty), in which the
two last letters of the root (‫ )י־פ־ה‬are
reduplicated. It can also be spelled
‫( יפה־פיה‬fem.; so in the Bible, Jeremiah
46:20 ) or ‫יפיפיה‬.
The letter he (‫ )ה‬is often used as a mater
lectionis for the vowel [e] in the end of the
word, but the niqqud is usually segol. It is
tzere in these cases:

In the construct state of nouns: absolute

state ‫[( ָשׂ ֶדה‬saˈde], field), but construct
state ‫[( ְשׂ ֵדה־‬səde]).
In the imperative and absolute infinitive
forms of the verb: future form ‫יְ ַג ֶלּה‬
([jəɡalˈle], he will discover), but ‫[( ַגּ ֵלּה‬ɡal
ˈle], discover!); future form ‫[( ַתּ ְר ֶבּה‬taɾˈbe],
she shall increase, make many), absolute
infinitive ‫[( ַה ְר ֵבּה‬haɾˈbe], many).
In some words, among them ‫[( ַאיֵּ ה‬ajˈje],
where?), ‫אַריֵ ה‬
ְ ([aɾˈje], lion), ‫[( ִהנֵּ ה‬hinˈne],
 here!), ‫[( יָ ְשׁ ֵפה‬jaʃəˈfe], jasper; also ‫)יָ ְשׁ ֶפה‬,
‫־ע ְשׂ ֵרה‬
ֶ ([ʕesˈre], -teen f.).[6]

Pronunciation
The following table contains the
pronunciation and transliteration of the
different tzeres in reconstructed historical
forms and dialects using the International
Phonetic Alphabet. The pronunciation in
IPA is above and the transliteration is
below.

The letters Bet "‫ "ב‬used in this table are

only for demonstration. Any letter can be
used.
 Pronunciation

Symbol Name Reconstructed

Israeli Ashkenazi Sephardi Yemenite Tiberian
Mishnaic Biblical

‫ֵב‬ Tzere [e̞] [ej] [e̞] [e̞] [eː] ? ?

,‫ ֵבה‬,‫ֵבי‬ Tzere
[e̞] [ej] [e̞] [e̞] [eː] ? ?
‫ֵבא‬ Male

In Modern Hebrew tzere – with or without

a following yod – may be pronounced as
[ej] and transliterated as "ei or "ey". Such
pronunciation and transliteration of tzere
are not correct in the normative
pronunciation and not consistent in the
spoken language.[7]

Unicode encoding
Glyph Unicode Name

ֵ U+05B5 HEBREW POINT TSERE

See also
Niqqud
Segol

References
1. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §1.4 ‫ב‬.
2. A full list appears in Academy
Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.4
‫כ‬.
3. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd
edition, §1.4.
4.  Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §75.
5.  Gesenius' Hebrew Grammar, §70.
 . A grammatical supplement to the
Even-Shoshan Dictionary (2003
edition), §15.
7. Laufer, Asher (2008). Chapters in
Phonetics and Phonetic Transcription.
Jerusalem: Magnes. pp. 207–211.
ISBN 9789654934015.

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