Word.ws English Dictionary

silent h

silent h noun: a letter ⟨h⟩ that is written but not pronounced.

Noun

silent h (plural silent h's)

  1. A letter ⟨h⟩ that is written but not pronounced.
    • The vihuela (silent h) is a small, guitar-like instrument strummed as much for its percussive as its melodic sound.1989 August 26, Richard Vasquez, “Women Are Spicing Up the World of Mariachi Music”, in Los Angeles Times, Los Angeles, Calif.: Los Angeles Times Communications, →ISSN, →OCLC, archived from the...
    • Examples include the silent h in ghost (to match Dutch gheest, which later became geest), aghast, ghastly and gherkin.2019, Carson Stewart, History of the English Language, page 178

Forms of silent h

pluralsilent h's

Questions about silent h

What does silent h mean?
Silent h means a letter ⟨h⟩ that is written but not pronounced.
What part of speech is silent h?
Silent h is a noun.
What is the plural of silent h?
The plural of silent h is silent h's.

Words near silent h in the dictionary

  1. silent forest syndrome
  2. silent fox
  3. silent fox gesture
  4. Silent Generation
  5. Silent Grove
  6. silent h
  7. silent h's
  8. silent key
  9. silent keys
  10. silent killer
  11. silent killers

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: silent h (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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