Heth

This article is about the Semitic letter. For other uses, seeHeth (disambiguation).

← Zayin Heth Teth →
Phoenician	𐤇‎
Hebrew	ח‎
Aramaic	𐡇‎
Syriac	ܚ‎
Arabic	ح‎
Phonemic representation	χ,x,ħ
Position in Alpha bet	8
Numerical value	8
Alphabetic derivatives of the Phoenician
Greek	Η,Ͱ
Latin	H
Cyrillic	И

Heth,sometimes writtenChetorḤet,is the eighthletterof theSemitic abjads,includingPhoenicianḥēt𐤇,Hebrewḥētח,Aramaicḥēṯ𐡇,Syriacḥēṯܚ, andArabicḥāʾح.

Heth originally represented a voiceless fricative, eitherpharyngeal/ħ/,orvelar/x/.In Arabic, two corresponding letters were created for both phonemic sounds: unmodifiedḥāʾحrepresents/ħ/,whileḫāʾخrepresents/x/.

The Phoenician letter gave rise to theGreeketaΗ,Etruscan,LatinH,andCyrillicИ.While H is a consonant in the Latin Alpha bet, the Greek and Cyrillic equivalents representvowelsounds, though the letter was originally a consonant in Greek and this usage later evolved into therough breathingcharacter.The Phoenician letter also gave rise to the archaic Greek letterheta,as well as a variant of Cyrillic letterI,short I.

Origins

The shape of the letter Ḥet ultimately goes back either to theEgyptian hieroglyphfor 'courtyard' (ḥwt):

(compare Hebrew חָצֵרḥatserof identical meaning, whichbegins withḤet).
or to the one for 'thread, wick' representing a wick of twisted flax: (ḥ)

(compare Hebrew חוּטḥutof identical meaning, whichbegins withḤet).

Possibly namedḥasirin theProto-Sinaitic script.

The correspondingSouth Arabian lettersareḥ andḫ, corresponding to theGe'ez lettersḤawṭሐ andḪarmኀ.

This letter is usually transcribed asḥ,h with a dot underneath. In some romanization systems, a (capital) Ch is also used. The latter method has the advantage of being easy to type on a computer.

Arabic ḥāʾ

See also:خ

The letter is namedحَاءْḥāʾand is the sixth letter of the Alpha bet. Its shape varies depending on its position in the word, and its initial and medial form resembles a bird's beak:

Position in word	Isolated	Final	Medial	Initial
Glyph form: (Help)	ح‎	ـح‎	ـحـ‎	حـ‎

This form is used to denote three letters, the other two beingخḫāʾandجǧīm.

Pronunciation

In Arabic,ḥāʾis similar to theEnglish[h],but it is much "raspier",IPA:[ħ]~[ʜ].(Pharyngeal H)

In Persian, it is[h],like⟨ه⟩and the Englishh.

Hebrew chet

Orthographicvariants
Various print fonts			Cursive Hebrew	Rashi script
Serif	Sans-serif	Monospaced
ח	ח	ח

Hebrew spelling:חֵית‎

Pronunciation

InModern Israeli Hebrew(andAshkenazi Hebrew,although not under strict pronunciation), the letter Ḥet (חֵית‎) usually has the sound value of avoiceless uvular fricative(/χ/), as the historical phonemes of the lettersḤetח (/ħ/) andKhafכ (/x/) merged, both becoming the voiceless uvular fricative (/χ/). In more rare Ashkenazi phonologies, it is pronounced as avoiceless pharyngeal fricative(/ħ/).

The (/ħ/) pronunciation is still common amongIsraeli ArabsandMizrahi Jews(particularly among the older generation and popularMizrahi singers,especiallyYemenites), in accordance with oriental Jewish traditions (see, e.g.,Mizrahi HebrewandYemenite Hebrew).

The ability to pronounce the Arabic letterḥāʾ(ح) correctly as avoiceless pharyngeal fricative/ħ/is often used as ashibbolethto distinguishArabic-speakers from non-Arabic-speakers; in particular, pronunciation of the letter as/x/is seen as a hallmark ofAshkenaziandGreek Jews.

Ḥetis one of the few Hebrew consonants that can take a vowel at the end of a word. This occurs whenpatach gnuvacomes under the Ḥet at the end of the word. The combination is then pronounced/-aħ/rather than/-ħa/.For example:פָּתוּחַ(/ˌpaˈtuaħ/), andתַּפּוּחַ(/ˌtaˈpuaħ/).

Variations

Ḥet, along withAleph,Ayin,Resh,andHe,cannot receive adagesh.As pharyngeal fricatives are difficult for most English speakers to pronounce, loanwords are usually Anglicized to have/h/.Thuschallah(חלה), pronounced by native Hebrew speakers as/χala/or/ħala/is pronounced/halə/by most English speakers, who cannot often perceive the difference between[h]and[ħ].

Significance

Ingematria,Ḥet represents the number eight.

Inchat rooms,online forums,andsocial networkingthe letter Ḥet repeated (חחחחחחחחחח) denotes laughter, just as in English, in the saying 'Haha'.

Character encodings

Character information

Preview	ח		ح		ܚ		ࠇ
Unicode name	HEBREW LETTER HET		ARABIC LETTER HAH		SYRIAC LETTER HETH		SAMARITAN LETTER IT
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	1495	U+05D7	1581	U+062D	1818	U+071A	2055	U+0807
UTF-8	215 151	D7 97	216 173	D8 AD	220 154	DC 9A	224 160 135	E0 A0 87
Numeric character reference	ח	ח	ح	ح	ܚ	ܚ	ࠇ	ࠇ

Character information

Preview	𐎈		𐡇		𐤇
Unicode name	UGARITIC LETTER HOTA		IMPERIAL ARAMAIC LETTER HETH		PHOENICIAN LETTER HET
Encodings	decimal	hex	dec	hex	dec	hex
Unicode	66440	U+10388	67655	U+10847	67847	U+10907
UTF-8	240 144 142 136	F0 90 8E 88	240 144 161 135	F0 90 A1 87	240 144 164 135	F0 90 A4 87
UTF-16	55296 57224	D800 DF88	55298 56391	D802 DC47	55298 56583	D802 DD07
Numeric character reference	𐎈	𐎈	𐡇	𐡇	𐤇	𐤇

See also

• Ħ, ħ:H with stroke