Synalepha

A synalepha or synaloepha /ˌsɪnəˈliːfə/[1] is the merging of two syllables into one, especially when it causes two words to be pronounced as one.

The original meaning in Ancient Greek is more general than modern usage and includes coalescence of vowels within a word. Similarly, synalepha most often refers to elision (as in English contraction), but it can also refer to coalescence by other metaplasms: synizesis, synaeresis or crasis.[2]

Examples

Spanish, Portuguese and Italian use synalepha; this is important when counting syllables in poetry. For instance in this hendecasyllable (11-syllable line) by Garcilaso de la Vega:

Los cabellos que al oro oscurecían.

The hair that endarkened the gold.

The words que and al form one syllable when counting them because of the synalepha. The same thing happens with -ro and os-, so that the line has eleven syllables (syllable boundaries shown by a dot):

Los·ca·be·llos·queal·o·roos·cu·re·cí·an.

gollark: Make suicide punishable with the death penalty!

gollark: Technically, it's paid-for-by-other-people university.

gollark: The vonnegut thing, that is.

gollark: I wouldn't support it unless you did actually have to wait a while to make sure you really do actually want to die.

gollark: Yes. Free university education for inmates but nobody else.

Notes

Greek συναλοιφή (or συναλιφή), from συναλείφω: συν- "together" and ἀλείφω "I anoint", "smear". Alternation between οι, ει, and ι in verb root is ablaut.
W. Sidney Allen, Vox Graeca, chart of "Types of vowel-junction", p. 98.

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[1] Greek συναλοιφή (or συναλιφή), from συναλείφω: συν- "together" and ἀλείφω "I anoint", "smear". Alternation between οι, ει, and ι in verb root is ablaut.

[2] W. Sidney Allen, Vox Graeca, chart of "Types of vowel-junction", p. 98.

Synalepha

Examples

See also

Notes