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Here's the British Council's explanation: Here are three reasons why English has so many silent letters: Old English was 90% phonemic (words sound the same as they look). But from the beginning of the 15th century, we began to borrow words from other languages. Because grammar and usage rules are different in other languages, adopted words did not follow the rules of English pronunciation.
- Here's the British Council's explanation: Here are three reasons why English has so many silent letters: Old English was 90% phonemic (words sound the same as they look).
- But from the beginning of the 15th century, we began to borrow words from other languages.
- Because grammar and usage rules are different in other languages, adopted words did not follow the rules of English pronunciation.
- The English language 'borrowed' the Latin alphabet, and so we have only got 26 letters to represent around 41 different significant sounds.
- This means that we must attempt to use combinations of letters to represent sounds.
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Here's the British Council's explanation:
Here are three reasons why English has so many silent letters:
Old English was 90% phonemic (words sound the same as they look). But from the beginning of the 15th century, we began to borrow words from other languages. Because grammar and usage rules are different in other languages, adopted words did not follow t
Here are three reasons why English has so many silent letters:
Old English was 90% phonemic (words sound the same as they look). But from the beginning of the 15th century, we began to borrow words from other languages. Because grammar and usage rules are different in other languages, adopted words did not follow t
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