H

H, which in reference is spelled aitch (or sometimes haich by speakers of dialects—primarily Irish and Australian—which pronounce a h in the letter name), is the eighth letter of the latin alphabet.

A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, L, M, N, O, P, Q, R, S, T, U, V, W, X, Y, Z

The Semitic letter ח (Ħêt) probably represented the phoneme /X/ (pharyngeal voiceless fricative) (IPA [ħ]). The form of the letter probably stood for a fence. Early Greek H stood for /h/, but later on &Eta or &eta (Êta) stood for /E:/. In Modern Greek this phoneme fell together with /i/, similar to the English development where EA /E:/ and EE /e:/ came to be both pronounced /i:/ . In Etruscan and Latin, the sound value /h/ was maintained, but all Romance languages lost the sound - only Romanian borrowed the /h/ phoneme from its neighbouring Slavic languages and Castilian /x/ developed [h] allophones in some Spanish-speaking countries.

Hotel represents the letter H in the NATO phonetic alphabet.

H is also:

• The chemical symbol for hydrogen.
• A symbol for the SI derived unit for electric inductance, the henry
• A musical note in the German system.

See also: ĥ

Two-letter combinations starting with H:

• ha hb hc hd he hf hg hh hi hj hk hl hm hn ho hp hq hr hs ht hu hv hw hx hy hz