# short and long vowels



## Shakeek

Guten morning,

Yesh lee a sefer about Hebrew in Arabic. This book says that the "moves" in Hebrew are like in Arabic, short and long.

e.g. 

ha-patakh ַ is a short _a. _
ha-qamats ָ is a long _aa_ (double patakh).

However, even though I don't hear Hebrew that much I don't think I really hear the distinction being made between short and long vowels.

1. Do you recognize the short and long vowels as two separate things?
2. Is there a distinction in modern pronunciation?
3. If not, why?

Todot rabot,


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## Mjolnir

I'm no expert, but in modern pronunciation there isn't a distinction between the two, I don't know why. Maybe it's because you only see 'patakh' and 'qamats' in children's books nowadays and people don't pay much attention to it.

When I hear a "long move", it's for emphasis. For example: Kama? = How much?; Kaama? = How much?!?


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## Shakeek

Thank you Mjolnir. 

So like the removed "off-topic part" in my post said, the distinction has disappeared because people don't pronounce right anymore?

I mean when this guy hundred of years ago put the following tnu"ot on צָבָא , he wanted to say that the pronunciation was saavaa, but now that the pronunciation rules have changed, it became tsavaa (by shortening the vowel and changing the Semitic צ to German z too). Is this correct?

For poor people like myself who need to depend on the moves sometimes, do the qamats _always_ sound like a patakh? (barring the qamats khatuf of course "the o")

Is this related to the fact that the stress usually falls on the end of the word? I mean are the vowels in the first syllables always short and the ones in the last syllables long?

Shukran raabiyan,


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## Mjolnir

> the distinction has disappeared because people don't pronounce right anymore?


Yes, I believe so.

About the צ and German z, I don't know what a German z sounds like, but צבא still sounds like צבא with a צ, not zava.



> do the qamats _always_ sound like a patakh?


Pretty much.



> Is this related to the fact that the stress usually falls on the end of the word?


It might be, I'm not sure though.

In modern Hebrew there isn't much of a distinction (if any) between qamats and patakh. I don't know if the stress changes it because I'm not sure about the correct punctuation, but I think that the stress makes the vowel longer regardless of its punctuation.


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## Shakeek

Thanks.

So according to that, there is not anymore long vowels in Hebrew except for the stress or accent at the end of most words?

I wonder if the strong dagesh (the point) is also not pronounced anymore? is it pronounced like an Arabic dagesh _mm_ or like an English stress (which is much lighter)?

About the צ, which is off topic, I am pretty sure that Eastern Jews used to pronounce it like a Semitic צ (like in Arabic ص) less than hundred years ago. The German z sounds like how צ is pronounced today (this has probably come from Yiddish).


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## Mjolnir

You're correct, long vowels are only heard (*heard*, not necessarily written long vowels) at the end of words or when there's a stress.

The dagesh is only pronounced if it relates to פ, כ, etc. where you can actually hear the difference (פ - f or p).


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## scriptum

Mjolnir said:


> You're correct, long vowels are only heard (*heard*, not necessarily written long vowels) at the end of words or when there's a stress.


Hello everybody,
linguistically speaking, there is no such thing as long or short vowels in modern Hebrew. Of course everybody is free to drawl his vowels as much as he wants, or to reduce them to (almost) nothing; but nobody can change the meaning of a word by replacing a "long" vowel with a "short" one. Yes, long and short vowels are heard - in the same sense in which coughs and sneezes are heard. Their length is heard but irrelevant.


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## Mjolnir

I agree with you on that, but sometimes a stress can appear as a long vowel.

Rabi with the stress on the first syllable means just a rabbi, while Rabi with the stress on the last syllable means 'my rabbi'.

This may not be connected to long/short vowels, but the meaning of a word can change with different pronunciation.

I'll repeat myself and say again that I agree that there's no difference between long and short vowels in modern Hebrew, but the stress can appear as though it's a long vowel and thus change the meaning.


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## Shakeek

So Hebrew has become more like English.

Many thanks,


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## Flaminius

May be —just maybe— a guttural consonant, when placed at the end of a syllable, is not pronounced in Modern Hebrew but elongates the vowel immediately before?

Examples of compensatory elongation are:
ידע - /jad*a*/
קורא - /kor*e*/

I find the bolded vowels to be longer than the unmarked vowels.  It may be accounted for by the accent but I am wondering if those *a* and *e* are also longer than the same in ידה and כורה.


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## CarmineCuor

i cannot really understand why did they create such a script that they don't wanna use it properly: D


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## bazq

CarmineCuor said:


> i cannot really understand why did they create such a script that they don't wanna use it properly: D



Earlier forms of Hebrew did possess a long-short vowel distinction.
By the time the vocalization system was created (~700AD) the classical vowel system had changed significantlly, and kamats and patakh, as well as other vowel "pairs", were different vowels (not the same vowel only one short and one long). We can trace the origin of the vowels, say a kamats which started as a long [a], but it was not realized as a long [a] anymore.
The vocalization system was never revised since it was regarded as sacred. Modern Hebrew follows the Sephardic vowel system which looks identical to the old vocalization in writing, out of religious/ideological reasons, but sounds very different. The script remained the same, but the realization has not. It's not a question of "using it properly". Would you say the French are not using French properly because they write letters they do not pronounce while speaking?
The writing system is always more conservative than the oral language.


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## MuttQuad

Mjolnir said:


> Yes, I believe so.
> 
> About the צ and German z, I don't know what a German z sounds like, but צבא still sounds like צבא with a צ, not zava.
> 
> Pretty much.
> 
> It might be, I'm not sure though.
> 
> In modern Hebrew there isn't much of a distinction (if any) between qamats and patakh. I don't know if the stress changes it because I'm not sure about the correct punctuation, but I think that the stress makes the vowel longer regardless of its punctuation.



A German "z" sounds just like tsade, as in "Schweiz" (Switzerland) and צבא


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## CarmineCuor

bazq said:


> Earlier forms of Hebrew did possess a long-short vowel distinction.
> By the time the vocalization system was created (~700AD) the classical vowel system had changed significantlly, and kamats and patakh, as well as other vowel "pairs", were different vowels (not the same vowel only one short and one long). We can trace the origin of the vowels, say a kamats which started as a long [a], but it was not realized as a long [a] anymore.
> The vocalization system was never revised since it was regarded as sacred. Modern Hebrew follows the Sephardic vowel system which looks identical to the old vocalization in writing, out of religious/ideological reasons, but sounds very different. The script remained the same, but the realization has not. It's not a question of "using it properly". Would you say the French are not using French properly because they write letters they do not pronounce while speaking?
> The writing system is always more conservative than the oral language.


yes i would, why write them thenDD also in arabic, you cannot read most of the text because you onlly see consonants and long vowels, it's fine for natives but for non native speakers not so much


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## Drink

CarmineCuor said:


> i cannot really understand why did they create such a script that they don't wanna use it properly: D



Who's "they"? The Hebrew script was not "created", it _evolved_, much like the language itself.



CarmineCuor said:


> yes i would, why write them thenDD also in arabic, you cannot read most of the text because you onlly see consonants and long vowels, it's fine for natives but for non native speakers not so much



Scripts are optimized for the natives, not for foreigners. Foreigners have about as much of a right to complain about other languages' scripts as your neighbor has to complain about the arrangement of furniture in your house.


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## CarmineCuor

Drink said:


> Who's "they"? The Hebrew script was not "created", it _evolved_, much like the language itself.
> 
> 
> 
> Scripts are optimized for the natives, not for foreigners. Foreigners have about as much of a right to complain about other languages' scripts as your neighbor has to complain about the arrangement of furniture in your house.


that's true, although it was not a complaint; ) I like arabic and hebrew ;D


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## hadronic

Hebrew is said to have "new" long vowels, created from the dropping of gutturals or glides. 
צר tsar, narrow
צער tsá'ar > tsáar > tsa:r, sorrow 
זה ze, this
זהה ze:, identical


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