consonant

UK/ˈkɒn.sə.nənt/US/ˈkɑn.sə.nənt/

nounB1+Rare in speech; mostly a word you read · #12,821 of 15,258mostly written

Other forms: consonants

A consonant is any letter of the alphabet that is not a vowel. B, c, d, and the rest of them.

The real definition is about sound rather than spelling, since a consonant is made by blocking the airflow somewhere, with lips, teeth or tongue, while a vowel lets it through. English has twenty-one consonant letters and rather more consonant sounds. There is a separate and formal adjective meaning in agreement, so a decision consonant with policy is consistent with it.

Definitions of consonant

1nounconsonantA speech sound made by obstructing the airflow, or the letter representing it.B1+
“The word begins and ends with the same consonant.”

Where it comes from

A consonant sounds with something else. Latin cōnsonāns means sounding together, because a consonant needs a vowel beside it to be heard, and the Latin was itself a calque of the Greek term.

Ancient Greek
σύμφωνον
Latin
cōnsonāns — sounding with
Old French
consonant
Middle English
consonant
English, today
consonant

Built from

con- · Latin — with
sonāns · Latin — sounding
sonāre · Latin — to sound

From Middle English consonant or consonaunt, from Old French consonant, from Latin cōnsonāns (“sounding with”), from the prefix con- (“with”) + the present participle sonāns (“sounding”), from sonāre (“to sound”). The Latin is a calque of Ancient Greek σύμφωνον.

Etymology from Wiktionary, CC BY-SA

Practised in A Man Called Ove

First appears in chapter 29 of A Man Called Ove.

Practise this word

consonant in the wild

The terms also contrast them with a syllabary, in which a single symbol denotes the combination of a consonant and a vowel.
Abugida
Most consonants are pulmonic, using air pressure from the lungs to generate a sound.
Consonant
A velar trill or tap is not possible according to the International Phonetics Association: see the shaded boxes on the table of pulmonic consonants.
Velar consonant
In some languages, dentals are distinguished from other groups, such as alveolar consonants, in which the tongue contacts the gum ridge.
Dental consonant
Dental consonants share acoustic similarity and in the Latin script are generally written with consistent symbols (e.g. t, d, n).
Dental consonant

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From Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 4.0. These sentences were written by other people about their own subjects; they are here to show the word at work, not as anybody’s opinion.

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