The mappiq ( ''mapík''; also ''mapiq'', ''mapik'', ''mappik'', lit. "causing to go out") is a

diacritic A diacritic (also diacritical mark, diacritical point, diacritical sign, or accent) is a glyph added to a letter or to a basic glyph. The term derives from the Ancient Greek (, "distinguishing"), from (, "to distinguish"). The word ''diacrit ...

used in the

Hebrew alphabet The Hebrew alphabet (, ), known variously by scholars as the Ktav Ashuri, Jewish script, square script and block script, is a unicase, unicameral abjad script used in the writing of the Hebrew language and other Jewish languages, most notably ...

. It is part of the Masoretes' system of niqqud (vowel points), and was added to

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

orthography An orthography is a set of convention (norm), conventions for writing a language, including norms of spelling, punctuation, Word#Word boundaries, word boundaries, capitalization, hyphenation, and Emphasis (typography), emphasis. Most national ...

at the same time. It takes the form of a dot in the middle of a letter (usually , '' he''). An identical point with a different phonetic function (marking different consonants) is called a dagesh. The ''mappiq'' is used to indicate that the corresponding letter is to be pronounced as a consonant, although in a position where the letter usually indicates a vowel. Typically, the mappiq is used in the middle of ('' he''), though it historically and biblically has been used with ( yodh), ( vav), and (

aleph Aleph (or alef or alif, transliterated ʾ) is the first Letter (alphabet), letter of the Semitic abjads, including Phoenician alphabet, Phoenician ''ʾālep'' 𐤀, Hebrew alphabet, Hebrew ''ʾālef'' , Aramaic alphabet, Aramaic ''ʾālap'' � ...

). Before the vowel points were invented, some consonants were used to indicate vowel sounds. These consonants are called '' matres lectionis'' ( New Latin: sg. ''māter lēctiōnis'' "mother of reading", pl. ''mātrēs lēctiōnis'' "mothers of reading",

calque In linguistics, a calque () or loan translation is a word or phrase borrowed from another language by literal word-for-word or root-for-root translation. When used as a verb, "to calque" means to borrow a word or phrase from another language ...

s of Hebrew: ''em kriá'' and ''imót kriá'' - with the same meaning). The letter ''he'' (transliterated ''H'') at the end of a word (Hebrew is written from right to left) can indicate the vowel sound ''a'' or ''e''. When it does, it is not acting as a consonant, and therefore in pure phonetic logic the Biblical name Zechariah (among others) should be spelled "Zekharya" without the final "h". However, silent final h being also a feature of English, it is usually retained in Hebrew transliterations to distinguish final ''he'' from final ''aleph''. The divine name Yah has a mappiq (a dot inside the last letter), so the last letter shall not be read as a vowel ''a'', but as the consonant ''H'' - and therefore Yah (and not Ya). The most common occurrence of ''mappiq'' is in the suffix "-ah", meaning "her". A ''he'' with ''mappiq'' is meant to be pronounced as a full consonant "h". In Mizrahi and Yemenite Hebrew it is pronounced more strongly than a normal ''he'', sometimes with a slight following '' shwa'' sound (this rule is also followed by Dutch Sephardim), and in Ashkenazi Hebrew, it is pronounced . In modern Hebrew, however, it is normally silent; although it is still pronounced in religious contexts by careful readers of the prayers and scriptures.

Rafe

In Masoretic manuscripts the opposite of a ''mappiq'' would be indicated by a '' rafe'', a small line on top of the letter. This is no longer found in Hebrew.

References

Niqqud {{Hebrew-lang-stub

Rafe

See also

References