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Hebrew
Pronunciation
- Homophone: ט
Letter
ת • (t)
Usage notes
- The letter ת represents the phoneme /t/. In Modern Israeli Hebrew, this phoneme is pronounced [t] (like the <t> in English tap).
- In the Masoretic Text, the letter ת takes a dagesh (תּ) not only when geminated, but also at the start of a word or after a consonant. In Ashkenazi Hebrew, it is pronounced [t] when it has a dagesh, and [s] (like the <s> in English see) in other cases. In Yemenite Hebrew, it is pronounced [t] when it has a dagesh, and [θ] (like the <th> in English thick) in other cases; it is commonly believed that the same was true in Classical Hebrew.
- In Modern Israeli Hebrew, the sound /θ/ (like the <th> in English path), which occurs in various foreign phrases and proper nouns, is commonly written ת׳ (th).
- Nouns ending in ת tend to be feminine, and many adjectives and participles form their feminine singular forms by appending ת to the masculine singular form (plus vowel changes). This is a reflex of Proto-Afro-Asiatic.
- In many cases ת alternates with silent ה in different forms of a verb or noun; for example, feminine nouns whose singular indefinite forms end in ה tend to have singular construct forms ending in ת. (In many cases, this results from an original etymological /t/ having been lost in certain word-final contexts.)
- For information about ת as a sort of prefix in various future-tense (prefix conjugation) forms, see Appendix:Hebrew verbs.
- For information about ת as a sort of suffix in second-person singular past-tense (suffix conjugation) forms, see Appendix:Hebrew verbs.
Yiddish
Letter
ת • (sof)
- the twenty-sixth and final letter of the Yiddish alefbet (never found at the beginning of a word)
Related terms
- תּ (tof)
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