pronounced as /notice/
In linguistics, lenition is a sound change that alters consonants, making them more sonorous. The word lenition itself means "softening" or "weakening" (from Latin 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 pronounced as /link/ or pronounced as /link/), 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 pronounced as /link/ of a word like wait pronounced as /[weɪt]/ is pronounced as the more sonorous pronounced as /link/ in the related form waiting pronounced as /[ˈweɪɾɪŋ]/. Some varieties of Spanish show debuccalization of pronounced as /link/ to pronounced as /link/ at the end of a syllable, so that a word like Spanish; Castilian: estamos "we are" is pronounced pronounced as /[ehˈtamoh]/. An example of diachronic lenition can be found in the Romance languages, where the pronounced as /link/ of Latin Latin: patrem ("father", accusative) has become pronounced as /link/ in Italian and Spanish Multiple languages: padre (the latter weakened synchronically pronounced as /link/ → pronounced as /link/), while in Catalan Catalan; Valencian: pare, French French: père and Portuguese Portuguese: pai historical pronounced as /link/ 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 Welsh: cath "cat" begins with the sound pronounced as /link/, but after the definite article Welsh: y, the pronounced as /link/ changes to pronounced as /link/: "the cat" in Welsh is Welsh: y gath. This was historically due to intervocalic lenition, but in the plural, lenition does not happen, so "the cats" is Welsh: y cathod, not *Welsh: y gathod. The change of pronounced as /link/ to pronounced as /link/ in Welsh: y gath is thus caused by the syntax of the phrase, not by the modern phonological position of the consonant pronounced as /link/.
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.
Lenition involves changes in manner of articulation, sometimes accompanied by small changes in place of articulation. There are two main lenition pathways: opening and sonorization. In both cases, a stronger sound becomes a weaker one. Lenition can be seen as a movement on the sonority hierarchy from less sonorous to more sonorous, or on a strength hierarchy from stronger to weaker.
In examples below, a greater-than sign indicates that one sound changes to another. The notation pronounced as /[t]/ > pronounced as /[ts]/ means that pronounced as /[t]/ changes to pronounced as /[ts]/.
The sound change of palatalization sometimes involves lenition.
Lenition includes the loss of a feature, such as deglottalization, in which glottalization or ejective articulation is lost: pronounced as /[kʼ]/ or pronounced as /[kˀ]/ > pronounced as /[k]/.
The tables below show common sound changes involved in lenition. In some cases, lenition may skip one of the sound changes. The change voiceless stop > fricative is more common than the series of changes voiceless stop > affricate > fricative.
In the opening type of lenition, the articulation becomes more open with each step. Opening lenition involves several sound changes: shortening of double consonants, affrication of stops, spirantization or assibilation of stops or affricates, debuccalization, and finally elision.
| geminated stop | → | stop | → | affricate | → | fricative | → | placeless approximant | → | no sound |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| original sound | → | degemination | → | affrication | → | spirantization (deaffrication) | → | debuccalization | → | elision |
| pronounced as /[pp] or [ppʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[p] or [pʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[pɸ]/ | → | pronounced as /[ɸ]/ | → | pronounced as /[h]/ | → | (zero) |
| → | pronounced as /[pf]/ | → | pronounced as /[f]/ | → | ||||||
| pronounced as /[tt] or [ttʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[t] or [tʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[tθ]/ | → | pronounced as /[θ]/ | → | |||
| → | pronounced as /[ts]/ | → | pronounced as /[s]/ | → | ||||||
| pronounced as /[kk] or [kkʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[k] or [kʰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[kx]/ | → | pronounced as /[x]/ | → |
The sonorization type involves voicing. Sonorizing lenition involves several sound changes: voicing, approximation, and vocalization.
Sonorizing lenition occurs especially often intervocalically (between vowels). In this position, lenition can be seen as a type of assimilation of the consonant to the surrounding vowels, in which features of the consonant that are not present in the surrounding vowels (e.g. obstruction, voicelessness) are gradually eliminated.
| stop | → | voiced stop | → | continuant (fricative, trill, etc.) | → | approximant | → | no sound | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| original sound | → | voicing (sonorization) | → | spirantization, trilling | → | approximation | → | elision | ||||
| pronounced as /[p]/ | → | pronounced as /[b]/ | → | pronounced as /[β]/ | → | pronounced as /[β̞]/ | → | (zero) | ||||
| → | pronounced as /[v]/ | → | pronounced as /[ʋ]/ | → | ||||||||
| → | pronounced as /[w]/ | → | ||||||||||
| pronounced as /[t]/ | → | pronounced as /[d]/ | → | pronounced as /[ð]/ | → | pronounced as /[ð̞]/ | → | |||||
| → | pronounced as /[z]/ | → | pronounced as /[ɹ]/ | → | ||||||||
| → | pronounced as /[r]/ | → | ||||||||||
| pronounced as /[k]/ | → | pronounced as /[ɡ]/ | → | pronounced as /[ɣ]/ | → | pronounced as /[ɰ]/ | → | |||||
| → | pronounced as /[j], [w]/ | → | ||||||||||
Some of the sounds generated by lenition are often subsequently "normalized" into related but cross-linguistically more common sounds. An example would be the changes pronounced as /[b]/ → pronounced as /[β]/ → pronounced as /[v]/ and pronounced as /[d]/ → pronounced as /[ð]/ → pronounced as /[z]/. Such normalizations correspond to diagonal movements down and to the right in the above table. In other cases, sounds are lenited and normalized at the same time; examples would be direct changes pronounced as /[b]/ → pronounced as /[v]/ or pronounced as /[d]/ → pronounced as /[z]/.
L-vocalization is a subtype of the sonorization type of lenition. It has two possible results: a velar approximant or back vowel, or a palatal approximant or front vowel. In French, l-vocalization of the sequence pronounced as //al// resulted in the diphthong pronounced as //au//, which was monophthongized, yielding the monophthong pronounced as //o// in Modern French.
| lateral approximant | → | semivowel | → | vowel |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| pronounced as /[l]/ | → | pronounced as /[w]/ pronounced as /[ɰ]/ | → | pronounced as /[u]/ pronounced as /[o]/ |
| → | pronounced as /[j]/ | → | pronounced as /[i]/ |
Sometimes a particular example of lenition mixes the opening and sonorization pathways. For example, pronounced as /[kʰ]/ may spirantize or open to pronounced as /[x]/, then voice or sonorize to pronounced as /[ɣ]/.
Lenition can be seen in Canadian and American English, where pronounced as //t// and pronounced as //d// soften to a tap pronounced as /[ɾ]/ (flapping) when not in initial position and followed by an unstressed vowel. For example, both rate and raid plus the suffix -er are pronounced pronounced as /[ˈɹeɪ̯ɾɚ]/. In many British English dialects, a different lenition that affects only pronounced as /[t]/ takes place: pronounced as /[t]/ > pronounced as /[ʔ]/ (see T-glottalization). The Italian of Central and Southern Italy has a number of lenitions, the most widespread of which is the deaffrication of pronounced as //t͡ʃ// to pronounced as /[ʃ]/ between vowels: post-pausal Italian: cena pronounced as /[ˈt͡ʃeːna]/ 'dinner' but post-vocalic Italian: la cena pronounced as /[laˈʃeːna]/ 'the dinner'; the name Italian: Luciano, although structurally pronounced as //luˈt͡ʃano//, is normally pronounced pronounced as /[luˈʃaːno]/. In Tuscany, pronounced as //d͡ʒ// likewise is realized pronounced as /[ʒ]/ between vowels, and in typical speech of Central Tuscany, the voiceless stops pronounced as //p t k// in the same position are pronounced respectively pronounced as /[ɸ θ x/h]/, as in pronounced as //la kasa// → pronounced as /[laˈhaːsa]/ 'the house', pronounced as //buko// → pronounced as /[ˈbuːho]/ 'hole'.
Diachronic lenition is found, for example, in the change from Latin into Spanish, in which the intervocalic voiceless stops pronounced as /[p t k]/ first changed into their voiced counterparts pronounced as /[b d ɡ]/, and later into the approximants or fricatives pronounced as /[β̞ ð̞ ɣ̞]/: Latin: vita > Spanish; Castilian: vida, Latin: lupa > Spanish; Castilian: loba, Latin: caeca > Spanish; Castilian: ciega, Latin: apotheca > Spanish; Castilian: bodega. One stage in these changes goes beyond phonetic to have become a phonological restructuring, e.g. pronounced as //lupa// > pronounced as //loba// (compare pronounced as //lupa// in Italian, with no change in the phonological status of pronounced as //p//). The subsequent further weakening of the series to phonetic pronounced as /[β̞ ð̞ ɣ̞]/, as in pronounced as /[loβ̞a]/ is diachronic in the sense that the developments took place over time and displaced pronounced as /[b, d, g]/ as the normal pronunciations between vowels. It is also synchronic in an analysis of pronounced as /[β̞ ð̞ ɣ̞]/ as allophonic realizations of pronounced as //b, d, g//: illustrating with pronounced as //b//, pronounced as //bino// 'wine' is pronounced pronounced as /[bino]/ after pause, but with pronounced as /[β̞]/ intervocalically, as in pronounced as /[de β̞ino]/ 'of wine'; likewise, pronounced as //loba// → pronounced as /[loβ̞a]/.
A similar development occurred in the Celtic languages, where non-geminate intervocalic consonants were converted into their corresponding weaker counterparts through lenition (usually stops into fricatives but also laterals and trills into weaker laterals and taps), and voiceless stops became voiced. For example, Indo-European intervocalic * in * "people" resulted in Proto-Celtic, Primitive Irish *tōθā, Old Irish pronounced as //t̪ʰuaθ// and ultimately debuccalisation in most Irish and some Scottish dialects to pronounced as //t̪ʰuəh//, shift in Central Southern Irish to pronounced as //t̪ʰuəx//, and complete deletion in some Modern Irish and most Modern Scots Gaelic dialects, thus pronounced as //t̪ʰuə//.[1]
An example of historical lenition in the Germanic languages is evidenced by Latin-English cognates such as Latin: pater, Latin: tenuis, Latin: cornu vs. father, thin, horn. The Latin words preserved the original stops, which became fricatives in old Germanic by Grimm's law. A few centuries later, the High German consonant shift led to a second series of lenitions in Old High German, chiefly of post-vocalic stops, as evidenced in the English-German cognates ripe, water, make vs. German: reif, German: Wasser, German: machen.
Although actually a much more profound change encompassing syllable restructuring, simplification of geminate consonants as in the passage from Latin to Spanish such as cuppa > pronounced as //ˈkopa// 'cup' is often viewed as a type of lenition (compare geminate-preserving Italian pronounced as //ˈkɔppa//).
All varieties of Sardinian, with the sole exception of Nuorese, offer an example of sandhi in which the rule of intervocalic lenition applying to the voiced series /b d g/ extends across word boundaries. Since it is a fully active synchronic rule, lenition is not normally indicated in the standard orthographies.[2]
| pronounced as //b// | → pronounced as /[β]/: Sardinian: baca pronounced as /[ˈbaka]/ "cow" → Sardinian: sa baca pronounced as /[sa ˈβaka]/ "the cow" |
| pronounced as //d// | → pronounced as /[ð]/: Sardinian: domu pronounced as /[ˈdɔmu]/ "house" → Sardinian: sa domu pronounced as /[sa ˈðɔmu]/ "the house" |
| pronounced as //ɡ// | → pronounced as /[ɣ]/: Sardinian: gupu pronounced as /[ˈɡupu]/ "ladle" → Sardinian: su gupu pronounced as /[su ˈɣupu]/ "the ladle" |
In the Celtic languages, the phenomenon of intervocalic lenition historically extended across word boundaries. This explains the rise of grammaticalised initial consonant mutations in modern Celtic languages through the loss of endings. A Scottish Gaelic example would be the lack of lenition in Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: am fear pronounced as //əm fɛr// ("the man") and lenition in Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: a’ bhean pronounced as //ə vɛn// ("the woman"). The following examples show the development of a phrase consisting of a definite article plus a masculine noun (taking the ending Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: -os) compared with a feminine noun taking the ending Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: -a. The historic development of lenition in those two cases can be reconstructed as follows:
Proto-Celtic Celtic languages: *(s)indo'''s w'''iros IPA: pronounced as /[wiɾos]/ → Old Irish Irish, Old (to 900);: ind fer pronounced as /[fʲeɾ]/ → Middle Irish Irish, Middle (900-1200);: in fer pronounced as /[fʲeɾ]/ → Classical Gaelic an fear pronounced as /[fʲeɾ]/ → Modern Gaelic Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: am fear pronounced as /[fɛɾ]/
Proto-Celtic Celtic languages: *(s)ind'''ā be'''nā IPA: pronounced as /[vʲenaː]/ → Old Irish Irish, Old (to 900);: ind ben pronounced as /[vʲen]/ → Middle Irish Irish, Middle (900-1200);: in ben pronounced as /[vʲen]/ → Classical Gaelic an bhean pronounced as /[vʲen]/ → Modern Gaelic Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: a' bhean pronounced as /[vɛn]/
Synchronic lenition in Scottish Gaelic affects almost all consonants (except pronounced as //l̪ˠ//, which has lost its lenited counterpart in most areas).[3] Changes such as pronounced as //n̪ˠ// to pronounced as //n// involve the loss of secondary articulation; in addition, pronounced as //rˠ// → pronounced as //ɾ// involves the reduction of a trill to a tap. The spirantization of Gaelic nasal pronounced as //m// to pronounced as //v// is unusual among forms of lenition, but it is triggered by the same environment as more prototypical lenition. (It may also leave a residue of nasalization in adjacent vowels.)[4] The orthography shows that by inserting an Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: h (except after Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: l n r).
Spirantization | |||
| pronounced as //p// | → pronounced as //v// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: bog pronounced as //pok// "soft" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé bhog pronounced as //kleː vok// "very soft" | |
| pronounced as //pj// | → pronounced as //vj// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: beò pronounced as //pjɔː// 'alive' → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé bheò pronounced as //kleː vjɔː// 'very alive' | |
| pronounced as //kʰ// | → pronounced as //x// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: cas pronounced as //kʰas̪// "steep" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé chas pronounced as //kleː xas̪// "very steep" | |
| pronounced as //kʰʲ// | → pronounced as //ç// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: ciùin pronounced as //kʰʲuːɲ// "quiet" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé chiùin pronounced as //kleː çuːɲ// "very quiet" | |
| pronounced as //t̪// | → pronounced as //ɣ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: dubh pronounced as //t̪uh// "black" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé dhubh pronounced as //kleː ɣuh// "very black" | |
| pronounced as //tʲ// | → pronounced as //ʝ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: deiseil pronounced as //tʲeʃal// "ready" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé dheiseil pronounced as //kleː ʝeʃal// "very ready" | |
| pronounced as //k// | → pronounced as //ɣ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: garbh pronounced as //kaɾav// "rough" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé gharbh pronounced as //kleː ɣaɾav// "very rough" | |
| pronounced as //kʲ// | → pronounced as //ʝ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: geur pronounced as //kʲiaɾ// "sharp" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé gheur pronounced as //kleː ʝiaɾ// "very sharp" | |
| pronounced as //m// | → pronounced as //v// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: maol pronounced as //mɯːl̪ˠ// "bald" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé mhaol pronounced as //kleː vɯːl̪ˠ// "very bald" | |
| pronounced as //mj// | → pronounced as //vj// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: meallta pronounced as //mjaul̪ˠt̪ə// "deceitful" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé mheallta pronounced as //kleː vjaul̪ˠt̪ə// "very deceitful" | |
| pronounced as //pʰ// | → pronounced as //f// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: pongail pronounced as //pʰɔŋɡal// "exact" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé phongail pronounced as //kleː fɔŋɡal// "very exact" | |
| pronounced as //pʰj// | → pronounced as //fj// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: peallagach pronounced as //pʰjal̪ˠakəx// "shaggy" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé pheallagach pronounced as //kleː fjal̪ˠakəx// "very shaggy" | |
Loss of secondary articulation | |||
| pronounced as //n̪ˠ// | → pronounced as //n// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: nàdarra pronounced as //n̪ˠaːt̪ərˠə// "natural" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé nàdarra pronounced as //kleː naːt̪ərˠə// "very natural" | |
| pronounced as //rˠ// | → pronounced as //ɾ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: rag pronounced as //rˠak// "stiff" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé rag pronounced as //kleː ɾak// "very stiff" | |
| pronounced as //l̪ˠ// | → pronounced as //lˠ// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: lag pronounced as //l̪ˠak// "weak" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé lag pronounced as //kleː lˠak// "very weak" (in Harris Gaelic only) | |
Debuccalization | |||
| pronounced as //s̪// | → pronounced as //h// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: sona pronounced as //s̪ɔnə// "happy" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé shona pronounced as //kleː hɔnə// "very happy" | |
| pronounced as //ʃ// | → pronounced as //h// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: seasmhach pronounced as //ʃes̪vəx// "constant" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé sheasmhach pronounced as //kleː hes̪vəx// "very constant" | |
| pronounced as //ʃ// | → pronounced as //hj// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: seòlta pronounced as //ʃɔːl̪ˠt̪ə// "sly" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé sheòlta pronounced as //kleː hjɔːl̪ˠt̪ə// "very sly" | |
| pronounced as //t̪ʰ// | → pronounced as //h// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: tana pronounced as //t̪ʰanə// "thin" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé thana pronounced as //kleː hanə// "very thin" | |
| pronounced as //tʰʲ// | → pronounced as //h// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: tinn pronounced as //tʲiːɲ// "ill" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé thinn pronounced as //kleː hiːɲ// "very ill" | |
| pronounced as //tʰʲ// | → pronounced as //hj// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: teann pronounced as //tʰʲaun̪ˠ// "tight" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé theann pronounced as //kleː hjaun̪ˠ// "very tight" | |
Elision | |||
| pronounced as //f// | → Ø | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: fann pronounced as //faun̪ˠ// "faint" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé fhann pronounced as //kleː aun̪ˠ// "very faint" | |
| pronounced as //fj// | → pronounced as //j// (before a back vowel) | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: feòrachail pronounced as //fjɔːɾəxal// "inquisitive" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé fheòrachail pronounced as //kleː jɔːɾəxal// "very inquisitive" | |
Reduction of place markedness | |||
| In the modern Goidelic languages, grammatical lenition also triggers the reduction of markedness in the place of articulation of coronal sonorants (Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: l, Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: r, and Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: n sounds). In Scottish Gaelic, pronounced as //n// and pronounced as //l// are the weak counterparts of palatal pronounced as //ɲ// and pronounced as //ʎ//. | |||
| pronounced as //ɲ// | → pronounced as //n// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: neulach pronounced as //ɲial̪ˠəx// "cloudy" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé neulach pronounced as //kleː nial̪ˠəx// "very cloudy" | |
| pronounced as //ʎ// | → pronounced as //l// | Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: leisg pronounced as //ʎeʃkʲ// "lazy" → Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: glé leisg pronounced as //kleː leʃkʲ// "very lazy" | |
Some languages which have lenition have in addition complex rules affecting situations where lenition might be expected to occur but does not, often those involving homorganic consonants. This is colloquially known as 'blocked lenition', or more technically as 'homorganic inhibition' or 'homorganic blocking'. In Scottish Gaelic, for example, there are three homorganic groups:[5]
In a position where lenition is expected due to the grammatical environment, lenition tends to be blocked if there are two adjacent homorganic consonants across the word boundary. For example:[5]
In modern Scottish Gaelic this rule is only productive in the case of dentals but not the other two groups for the vast majority of speakers. It also does not affect all environments any more. For example, while Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: aon still invokes the rules of blocked lenition, a noun followed by an adjective generally no longer does so. Hence:[5]
There is a significant number of frozen forms involving the other two groups (labials and velars) and environments as well, especially in surnames and place names:[5]
Though rare, in some instances the rules of blocked lenition can be invoked by lost historical consonants, for example, in the case of the past-tense copula Gaelic; Scottish Gaelic: bu, which in Common Celtic had a final -t. In terms of blocked lenition, it continues to behave as a dental-final particle invoking blocked lenition rules:[5]
In Brythonic languages, only fossilized vestiges of lenition blocking occur, for example in Welsh Welsh: no'''s d'''a 'good night' lenition is blocked[6] (Welsh: nos as a feminine noun normally causes lenition of a following modifier, for example Welsh: Gwener 'Friday' yields Welsh: nos Wener 'Friday night'). Within Celtic, blocked lenition phenomena also occur in Irish (for example Irish: ao'''n d'''oras 'one door', Irish: an chéa'''d d'''uine 'the first person') and Manx (for example Manx: u'''n d'''orrys 'one door', Manx: yn chie'''d d'''ooinney 'the first man') however.
Outside Celtic, in Spanish orthographic b d g are retained as pronounced as /[b, d, ɡ]/ following nasals rather than their normal lenited forms pronounced as /[β, ð, ɣ]/.
See also: Welsh morphology and Irish initial mutations. In the modern Celtic languages, lenition of the "fricating" type is usually denoted by adding an h to the lenited letter. In Welsh, for example, Welsh: c, Welsh: p, and Welsh: t change into Welsh: ch, Welsh: ph, Welsh: th as a result of the so-called "aspirate mutation" (Welsh: carreg, "stone" → Welsh: ei charreg "her stone"). An exception is Manx orthography, which tends to be more phonetic, but in some cases, etymological principles are applied. In the Gaelic script, fricating lenition (usually called simply lenition) is indicated by a dot above the affected consonant, and in the Roman script, the convention is to suffix the letter Manx: h to the consonant, to signify that it is lenited. Thus, Manx: a ṁáṫair is equivalent to Manx: a mháthair. In Middle Irish manuscripts, lenition of Irish, Middle (900-1200);: s and Irish, Middle (900-1200);: f was indicated by the dot above, and lenition of Irish, Middle (900-1200);: p, Irish, Middle (900-1200);: t, and Irish, Middle (900-1200);: c was indicated by the postposed Irish, Middle (900-1200);: h; lenition of other letters was not indicated consistently in the orthography.
Voicing lenition is represented by a simple letter switch in the Brythonic languages, for instance Welsh: carreg, "stone" → Welsh: y garreg, "the stone" in Welsh. In Irish orthography, it is shown by writing the "weak" consonant alongside the (silent) "strong" one: Irish: peann, "pen" → Irish: ár bpeann "our pen", Irish: ceann, "head" → Irish: ár gceann "our head" (sonorization is traditionally called "eclipsis" in Irish grammar).
Although nasalization as a feature also occurs in most Scottish Gaelic dialects, it is not shown in the orthography on the whole, as it is synchronic (the result of certain types of nasals affecting a following sound), rather than the diachronic Irish type sonorization (after historic nasals). For example Irish: taigh pronounced as /[t̪ʰɤj]/ "house" → Irish: an taigh pronounced as /[ən̪ˠˈd̪ʱɤj]/ "the house".[3] [7]
See main article: Consonant gradation. The phenomenon of consonant gradation in Finnic languages is also a form of lenition.
An example with geminate consonants comes from Finnish, where geminates become simple consonants while retaining voicing or voicelessness (e.g. Finnish: katto → Finnish: katon, Finnish: dubbaan → Finnish: dubata). It is also possible for entire consonant clusters to undergo lenition, as in Votic, where voiceless clusters become voiced, e.g. Votic: itke- "to cry" → Votic: idgön.
If a language has no obstruents other than voiceless stops, other sounds are encountered, as in Finnish, where the lenited grade is represented by chronemes, approximants, taps or even trills. For example, Finnish used to have a complete set of spirantization reflexes for pronounced as //p t k//, though these have been lost in favour of similar-sounding phonemes. In the Southern Ostrobothnian, Tavastian and southwestern[8] dialects of Finnish, pronounced as //ð// mostly changed into pronounced as //r//, thus the dialects have a synchronic lenition of an alveolar stop into an alveolar trill pronounced as //t/ → /r//. Furthermore, the same phoneme pronounced as //t// undergoes assibilation pronounced as //t// → pronounced as //s// before the vowel pronounced as //i//, e.g. root Finnish: vete- "water" → Finnish: vesi and Finnish: vere-. Here, Finnish: vete- is the stem, Finnish: vesi is its nominative, and Finnish: vere- is the same stem under consonant gradation.
See main article: Fortition. Fortition is the opposite of lenition: a consonant mutation in which a consonant changes from one considered weak to one considered strong. Fortition is less frequent than lenition in the languages of the world, but word-initial and word-final fortition is fairly frequent.
Italian, for example, presents numerous regular examples of word-initial fortition both historically (Lat. Latin: Januarius with initial pronounced as //j// > Italian: gennaio, with pronounced as /[dʒ]/) and synchronically (e.g., pronounced as //ˈkaza// "house, home" → pronounced as /[ˈkaːza]/ but pronounced as //a ˈkaza// "at home" → pronounced as /[aˈkːaːza]/).
Catalan is among numerous Romance languages with diachronic word-final devoicing (Latin: frigidus > pronounced as /
Word-medially, pronounced as //lː// is subject to fortition in numerous Romance languages, ranging from pronounced as /[ɖː]/ or pronounced as /[dː]/ in many speech types on Italian soil to pronounced as /[dʒ]/ in some varieties of Spanish.