Holam Explained

Holam -
IPApronounced as /link/ or pronounced as /link/
Transliterationo
English exampleshore
Similar soundQamatz qaṭan, ḥataf qamatz
Example -style="line-height:2.5em;" - The word (youth) in Hebrew. The first vowel (over Nun, the dot above) is the .
Example -style="line-height:2.5em;" - The word in Hebrew. The letter vav with the dot above it is the itself.
Other Niqqud
Holam or cholam (modern Hebrew: {{Script/Hebrew|חוֹלָם, pronounced as /he/, formerly, ) is a Hebrew niqqud vowel sign represented by a dot above the upper left corner of the consonant letter. For example, here the holam appears after the letter mem ‎: . In modern Hebrew, it indicates the mid back rounded vowel, pronounced as /link/, and is transliterated as an o.

The mater lectionis letter which is usually employed with holam is vav, although in a few words, the letters or are used instead of . When it is used with a mater lectionis, the holam is called holam male (pronounced as /he/, "full holam"), and without it the holam is called holam haser (pronounced as /he/, "deficient holam").

Appearance

If a holam is used without a following mater lectionis (vav, alef or he), as in (pronounced as //po//, "here"), it is written as a dot above at the upper-left corner of the letter after which it is pronounced. Letter-spacing is not supposed to be affected by it, although some buggy computer fonts may add an unneeded space before the next letter.

If vav is used as a mater lectionis, the holam appears above the vav. If the mater lectionis is alef, as in (pronounced as //lo//, "no"), it is supposed to appear above the 's right hand, although this is not implemented in all computer fonts, and does not always appear even in professionally typeset modern books. This means a holam with may, in fact, appear in the same place as a regular holam haser. If the alef itself is not a mater lectionis, but a consonant, the holam appears in its regular place above the upper-left corner of the previous letter, as in (pronounced as //ˈto.aʁ//, "epithet").

If a holam haser is written after , as in (pronounced as //liɡˈvo.a//, "to agonize"), it may appear above the , or slightly farther to the left; this varies between different fonts. In some fonts, a holam merges with the shin dot (which appears on the upper-right corner of its letter seat), in words such as (ḥṓšeḵ, pronounced as /[ˈχoʃeχ]/, 'darkness') or with the sin dot, as in (pronounced as //ˈsova//, 'satiation'). (These dots may or may not appear merged on your screen, as that depends on your device's Hebrew font.)

Usage

Holam male is, in general, the most common way to write the pronounced as //o// sound in modern spelling with niqqud. If a word has Holam male in spelling with niqqud, the mater lectionis letter is without any exception retained in spelling without niqqud, both according to the spelling rules of the Academy of the Hebrew Language and in common practice.

The use of holam haser is restricted to certain word patterns, although many common words appear in them. In most cases the Academy's spelling rules mandate that the will be written even when the spelling with niqqud does not have it. The normative exceptions from this rule are listed below. The Academy's standard is not followed perfectly by all speakers, and common deviations from it are also noted below.

In Biblical Hebrew the above rules are not followed consistently, and sometimes the is omitted or added.[1]

For further complications involving Kamatz katan and Hataf kamatz, see the article Kamatz.

Holam haser which is written as in text without niqqud

Some people tend to spell some of these words without the , e.g. Hebrew: rtl=yes|דאר instead of Hebrew: rtl=yes|דואר, although the Academy mandates Hebrew: rtl=yes|דואר. The tendency is especially strong when the words can be used as personal names.

Without niqqud: Hebrew: rtl=yes|כתום, Hebrew: rtl=yes|כתומים, Hebrew: rtl=yes|עגול, Hebrew: rtl=yes|עגולים, Hebrew: rtl=yes|שחור, Hebrew: rtl=yes|שחורים.

The standard spelling without niqqud for all of them except Hebrew: rtl=yes|כָּל־ in construct state is with : Hebrew: rtl=yes|כול, Hebrew: rtl=yes|כולה, Hebrew: rtl=yes|רוב, Hebrew: rtl=yes|רובו, Hebrew: rtl=yes|תוף, Hebrew: rtl=yes|תופים, Hebrew: rtl=yes|מעוז, Hebrew: rtl=yes|מעוזים. Despite this, some people occasionally omit the in some of those words and spell Hebrew: rtl=yes|רב, Hebrew: rtl=yes|תף etc.

Some people still spell them without , but the standard spelling is with .[6]

Holam with other matres lectionis

but the number of these irregularities was brought to minimum in modern Hebrew.

Holam without vav in personal names

Some examples of usage of holam without in personal names:

Pronunciation

The following table contains the pronunciation and transliteration of the different holams in reconstructed historical forms and dialects using the International Phonetic Alphabet.

The letters Pe and Tsade are used in this table only for demonstration. Any letter can be used.

Symbol NamePronunciation
IsraeliAshkenaziSephardiYemeniteTiberianReconstructed
Biblical

Holampronounced as /[o̞]/ pronounced as /[oɪ ~ øɪ ~ eɪ ~ əʊ ~ ɐʊ ~ ɑʊ ~ oʊ]/ pronounced as /[o̞]/ pronounced as /[ɶ ~ ɤ ~ œ]/ pronounced as /[o]/ pronounced as /[o]/[aw] > [o'''ː''']

Holam malepronounced as /[o̞]/ pronounced as /[oɪ ~ øɪ ~ eɪ ~ əʊ ~ ɐʊ ~ ɑʊ ~ oʊ]/ pronounced as /[o̞]/ pronounced as /[ɶ ~ ɤ ~ œ]/ pronounced as /[o]/ pronounced as /[o]/pronounced as /[oː]/

Vowel length comparison

These vowel lengths are not manifested in modern Hebrew. In addition, the short o is usually promoted to a long o in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation. As well, the short o and long a have the same niqqud. As a result, a is usually promoted to Holam male in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation.

Computer encoding

GlyphUnicodeName
U+05B9HEBREW POINT HOLAM
U+05BAHEBREW POINT HOLAM HASER FOR VAV
U+FB4BHEBREW LETTER VAV WITH HOLAM
In computers there are three ways to distinguish the vowel and the consonant-vowel combination + . For example, in the pair (pronounced as //maˈt͡sot//, the plural of, ) and (pronounced as //miˈt͡svot//, the plural of ):[19]
  1. By using the zero-width non-joiner after the and before the holam:
  2. By using the Unicode character U+05BA HEBREW POINT HOLAM HASER FOR VAV: .
  3. By the precomposed character,[20] U+FB4B (HTML Entity (decimal) וֹ):

See also

Notes and References

  1. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.3; 1.
  2. Rarely used in the singular in Modern Hebrew.
  3. Rarely used in the plural in Modern Hebrew.
  4. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.3.
  5. This word becomes Hebrew: rtl=yes|כָּל־ in construct state, which is very common, so as another exception it is written without in spelling without niqqud: Hebrew: rtl=yes|כל־האנשים ('all the people'), but Hebrew: rtl=yes|היא יודעת הכול ('she knows all').
  6. The full list appears at Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.3.
  7. Rare in modern Hebrew.
  8. 1.
    the Even-Shoshan Dictionary for the modern forms.
  9. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §3.5.
  10. This word is written Hebrew: rtl=yes|לוֹא several times in the Bible, but such spelling never occurs in modern Hebrew. With the particle Hebrew: rtl=yes|הֲ־ and only when it is used as a synonym of Hebrew: rtl=yes|הִנֵּה ('here') it may be written both as Hebrew: rtl=yes|הלוא and as Hebrew: rtl=yes|הלא (Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §2.4.4), but this usage is rare in modern Hebrew.
  11. The word Hebrew: rtl=yes|נוֹד is pronounced identically and means "wandering". It appears in the Bible and is rare in modern Hebrew. The Even-Shoshan dictionary also notes that it is an incorrect spelling for Hebrew: rtl=yes|נֹאד.
  12. This word is actually spelled as Hebrew: rtl=yes|שמאול several times in the Bible, but never in modern Hebrew. However, the intentionally wrong spelling Hebrew: rtl=yes|סמול is often used as a disparaging term for the political left and is documented in Uri Orbach's lexicon of Religious Zionist slang.
  13. The Even-Shoshan Dictionary also registers the modern Hebrew word Hebrew: rtl=yes|אֵיפֹשֶׁהוּ ('somewhere'), pronounced as //efoʃehu//, which is based on Hebrew: rtl=yes|אֵיפֹה and Hebrew: rtl=yes|־שֶׁהוּ, the ending of the indefinite pronouns Hebrew: rtl=yes|משהו, Hebrew: rtl=yes|כלשהו, ('some'). The Academy has not decided on a standard spelling of this word.
  14. The related participle Hebrew: rtl=yes|מוֹשֶׁה ('pulling out of water') is written with in modern Hebrew. Modern diminutive forms of Moshe, such as Moshiko (Hebrew: rtl=yes|מושיקו) are written with .
  15. A common modern diminutive version of this name is regularly spelled Hebrew: rtl=yes|שלומי (Shlomi).
  16. For example, in Avot 5:2 in the Kaufmann manuscript.
  17. Academy Decisions: Grammar, 2nd edition, §1.3 fn. 55.
  18. According to The Brown–Driver–Briggs Hebrew Lexicon.
  19. This is the Biblical spelling in Jeremiah 35:18 (actually). The standard modern Hebrew spelling, with niqqud, is with : .
  20. Also known as a presentation form in Unicode.