This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For the distinction between [ ], / / and ⟨⟩, see IPA § Brackets and transcription delimiters.
In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonorous. The word lenition itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin lēnis 'weak'). Lenition can happen both synchronically (within a language at a particular point in time) and diachronically (as a language changes over time). Lenition can involve such changes as voicing a voiceless consonant, causing a consonant to relax occlusion, to lose its place of articulation (a phenomenon called debuccalization, which turns a consonant into a glottal consonant like [h] or [ʔ]), or even causing a consonant to disappear entirely.
An example of synchronic lenition is found in most varieties of American English, in the form of tapping: the /t/ of a word like wait[weɪt] is pronounced as the more sonorous [ɾ] in the related form waiting[ˈweɪɾɪŋ]. Some varieties of Spanish show debuccalization of /s/ to [h] at the end of a syllable, so that a word like estamos "we are" is pronounced [ehˈtamoh]. An example of diachronic lenition can be found in the Romance languages, where the /t/ of Latin patrem ("father", accusative) has become /d/ in Italian and Spanish padre (the latter weakened synchronically /d/ → [ð̞]), while in Catalan pare, French père and Portuguese pai historical /t/ has disappeared completely.
In some languages, lenition has been grammaticalized into a consonant mutation, which means it is no longer triggered by its phonological environment but is now governed by its syntactic or morphological environment. For example, in Welsh, the word cath "cat" begins with the sound /k/, but after the definite article y, the /k/ changes to [ɡ]: "the cat" in Welsh is y gath. This was historically due to intervocalic lenition, but in the plural, lenition does not happen, so "the cats" is y cathod, not *y gathod. The change of /k/ to [ɡ] in y gath is thus caused by the syntax of the phrase, not by the modern phonological position of the consonant /k/.
The opposite of lenition, fortition, a sound change that makes a consonant "stronger", is less common, but Breton and Cornish have "hard mutation" forms which represent fortition.
delimiters. In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonorous. The word lenition itself means "softening" or...
consonant mutations: lenition (Irish: séimhiú [ˈʃeːvʲuː]) and eclipsis (urú [ˈʊɾˠuː]) (the alternative names, aspiration for lenition and nasalisation for...
contexts falling intonation in most types of sentences, including questions lenition and extreme sandhi phenomena Due to the geographic concentration of Gaelic...
(lenition marking the genitive case of a masculine noun) Seán "John" – a Sheáin! "John!" (lenition as part of the vocative case, the vocative lenition...
Gaulish. Examples include sandhi phenomena (liaison, resyllabification, lenition), the loss of unstressed syllables and the vowel system (such as raising...
series of consonants in Romance languages. Stop consonants shifted by lenition in Vulgar Latin in some areas. The voiced labial consonants /b/ and /w/...
Aramaic of Hatra, Hatran Aramaic or Ashurian designates a Middle Aramaic dialect, that was used in the region of Hatra and Assur in northeastern parts...
the word used by modern phoneticians, and linguists prefer to speak of lenition here. Historically, the Celtic initial mutations originated from progressive...
and syllabic consonants. Affrication of /t/ as [ts] word-initially and lenition to [θ̠] intervocalically and word-finally. The latter type of allophony...
however ⟨h⟩ placed after a consonant is known as a "séimhiú" and indicates lenition of that consonant; ⟨h⟩ began to replace the original form of a séimhiú...
imperfect, preterite, and conditional, a consonant-initial stem undergoes lenition (and dialectally is preceded by do), while a vowel-initial stem is prefixed...
(rather than preNATO). In languages such as Scottish Gaelic and Irish, where lenition (initial consonant mutation) is commonplace, acronyms must also be modified...
Common to most Eastern Iranian languages is a particularly widespread lenition of the voiced stops *b, *d, *g. Between vowels, these have been lenited...
when not prefixed to a word initial vowel or after a consonant to show lenition, primarily occurs word initially in loanwords, e.g. hata "hat". ⟨k⟩ is...
The overdot was used to indicate lenition of ⟨ḟ, ṡ⟩, while the following ⟨h⟩ was used for ⟨ch, ph, th⟩. The lenition of other letters was not generally...
This article contains phonetic transcriptions in the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA. For...
syllable's initial consonant was intervocalic and as a result suffered lenition, becoming a voiced fricative. The minor syllables were eventually lost...
infinite verb etten (to eat) is pronounced [ˈɛtn̩]. Tweants applies extensive lenition in its spoken form. All strong plosives may be pronounced as their weak...
Iníon Mhic "son's daughter"). In both cases the following name undergoes lenition, except for when Nic is followed by ⟨c⟩ or ⟨g⟩. Thus the daughter of Seán...
of the changes that are typical of Western Romance languages, including lenition of intervocalic consonants (thus Latin vīta > Spanish vida). The diphthongization...
The history of the Romanian language started in Roman provinces north of the Jireček Line in Classical antiquity. There are three main hypotheses around...
both pronounced /la/. In Gaelic type, a dot over a consonant indicates lenition of the consonant in question. In other writing systems, diacritics may...
between languages are often the product of regular sound change (i.e. lenition of /b/ into /v/ or Ø). The table below has words in the modern languages...
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