Vowel

How to spell vowel

5 letters · 2 syllables

How to pronounce vowel

Say the part in capitals loudest.

What does vowel mean?

1. nounA speech sound made with an open vocal tract, or a letter such as a, e, i, o, or u that represents it.

Vowel in a sentence

• The word "queue" has more than one vowel in a row.

• Every English syllable needs at least one vowel sound.

Where does vowel come from?

Language of origin: Latin

This word traces back to the Latin vocalis, short for vocalis littera, meaning literally a 'vocal letter', that is a letter sounded with the voice. Vocalis was built on vox, the Latin word for 'voice', the same root that gives us 'vocal', 'voice', and 'vociferous'. English took it through Old French, where the form had softened to vouel or voiel, and it settled into Middle English in the 1300s. The idea behind the name is that a vowel is produced with an open, freely sounding breath, unlike a consonant, which interrupts or shapes that flow. The spelling trap lies in the ending: although it sounds like the soft '-le' of words such as 'towel' relatives, it is actually written '-el', a reminder of its French noun ending.

How the word is built

• vow- (from Latin vocalis: of the voice)
• -el (noun suffix via Old French)