What is the pronunciation of "an heart"?

[sitifan]

Book of Ezekiel 36:26 (KJV):

“A new heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you: and I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you an heart of flesh.”

What is the pronunciation of "an heart"?

 

[5jj]

We pronounce it as though it were written a heart these days.

 

[emsr2d2]

At one time, words starting with "h" were preceded by "an" because the "h" was silent, making the word sound as if it started with a vowel sound. I don't know how long that continued with "heart" but my grandfather (born in 1921) always said "an hotel" (pronounced "an otel").

 

[Edward B]

At one time, words starting with "h" were preceded by "an" because the "h" was silent, making the word sound as if it started with a vowel sound. I don't know how long that continued with "heart" but my grandfather (born in 1921) always said "an hotel" (pronounced "an otel").

Pretty much, and it's still true in some dialects today.
The Yorkshire accent still drops the H so "an art" would be valid.
Is got n art o gold
He has a heart of gold

 

[sitifan]

Is got n art o gold

What does the quoted sentence mean?

 

[Edward B]

What does the quoted sentence mean?

Is got n art o gold
He has a heart of gold

They are the same, but the first is how it would sound in Yorkshire

 

[emsr2d2]

@sitifan It might be clearer for you to read it as "He's got a heart of gold".

 

[PeterCW]

At one time, words starting with "h" were preceded by "an" because the "h" was silent, making the word sound as if it started with a vowel sound. I don't know how long that continued with "heart" but my grandfather (born in 1921) always said "an hotel" (pronounced "an otel").

I am a generation younger and was taught to treat the "h" as silent as it was a French word.

 

[emsr2d2]

I am a generation younger and was taught to treat the "h" as silent as it was a French word.

I was taught that it was a French word but that we no longer treat it as such, we pronounce the "h" and therefore precede it with "a".

 

[Edward B]

I might well be wrong, but please don't shout at me if I am.
I think it has Germanic roots, but the great vowel shift and other bits of history has changed its pronunciation.
If I'm correct (see the first sentence) it was pronounded "hirt" as in dirt a few hundred years ago.
Toss in the GVS, and "an hirt" (Say it like you are acting in Pirates of the Carrabinian) might well have been valid.

 

[PeterCW]

In spoken English I will shift between "a" and "an" before an aitch depending on the word, the social setting and how rapidly I am speaking.

 

[SoothingDave]

I had a conversation on Twitter last week because someone was criticizing a tweet calling something "an historic day."

I said that I say "an historic," because of how it's just easier to say when the emphasis is on "STOR." The "h" disappears when I say this.

I would say "a history book." There an "h" sound when the first syllable is emphasized.

 

[jutfrank]

I think there's a chance that by the time the KJV of the Bible was printed, the article 'an' before 'heart' was still being used orthographically (in the written word) even though the phenomenon of h-dropping in speech had largely faded from use. In other words, I think it's possible that the people who actually wrote the Bible, and those churchmen who would have been reading it in church, would have pronounced it as /ha:t/ instead of /a:t/, despite the 'an'.

This kind of fossilisation isn't uncommon when it comes to articles, and I think it might explain why some speakers in the 19th and early 20th centuries pronounced both the 'n' in 'an' and the 'h' of the following word in a phrase such as I'm an historian.

 

[jutfrank]

Here's someone pronouncing both the 'n' and the 'h' sounds:

 

[sitifan]

There an "h" sound when the first syllable is emphasized.

There is an "h" sound ...