Why is the h in herb silent
Why Americans Drop the H in Herb | Distant Words
herbs herbs play a surprising but
critical role in the British American
pronunciation divide indeed one need
only scour the ruins of early 21st
century internet forums to realize that
neither side can agree on how to say the
likes of basil Oregon Oh how do you let
me know below
but peruse those forums long enough and
you'll come to find the same is also
true of the word herb itself you see
unlike me Americans are in fact prone to
dropping CH a policy that some in
Britain view as an all-out act of war
one they might well wage by adding an H
to the word age it's all confusing but
if the case were ever brought before the
International Criminal Court of
pronounciation America would have one
heck of a defense case indeed they'd
receive instant exoneration where they
to cite chapter four of Lynn Murphy's
book The Prodigal tongue the love-hate
relationship between American and
British English you see in the early
days of herbes English life the H was
not pronounced and for the very reason
that there was no H to pronounce later
influenced by this Latin spelling the
word evolved into what we know today but
crucially the English as in my people
continue to pronounce it with a silent H
and this makes sense because we did
precisely the same with other old French
words like Ernest and our in fact we
still do Shh don't tell anyone
moreover you only have to go back to the
19th century to find instances of the
British themselves saying herb without
an H actually you needn't even go that
far back am i right a grid from Harry
Potter however by the Victorian age and
early twentieth-century age dropping in
Britain had become a marker of low
social status those that drop them like
Eliza Doolittle in my fair lady were
cast aside as plebs while those at the
top Henry Higgins and the like believed
firmly that hurricanes hardly happen
this h vs. h less classified continues
if subconsciously in england to this
very day whereas no such distinction is
made in the united states to americans
this linguistic evolution was likely
lost in the pond and they simply
continued to pronounce it the way they'd
always pronounced it you could say in
fact as lynn murphy does that it's less
a case of americans dropping the h and
more a case of as brits adding one no
further questions your honor
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slash lost in the pond
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