A 08:13 2002-01-23 -0500, John Cowan a écrit :
>Middle French spelling is very unphonemic. This is the so-called
>"aspirated h", which still blocks liaison even though it is
>quite silent now.
[Alain] Not only quite, but absolutely mute, one must not be so shy. We
use the word "aspirated" to distinguish them from all other "mute" h's just
because the h has an effect on pronunciation, but the h itself is never
pronounced in French.
Example of "aspirated" h (they are exceptional anyway) in French : « des
héros » (which means « [some, many] heroes »)... pronounced « day 'ayro »
(which distinguishes the words from « des zéros » (« dayzayro »), which
means « [some, many] zeroes ».
Alain LaBonté
Québec
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