Eau is atrigraph which occurs in some languages that use theLatin script, such asFrench andEnglish.
InModern French,⟨eau⟩ is pronounced/o/[1] and often appears at the end of a word. Generally,⟨eau⟩ alternates with⟨e⟩ in another form of a word, for example, the feminine ofchameau (camel) ischamelle. There are three main ways of spelling/o/:⟨o⟩,⟨au⟩, and⟨eau⟩, out of which⟨eau⟩ is by far the rarest.[2]
InOld French,⟨eau⟩ represented atriphthong, probably pronounced[e̯aɯ̯] (or[ə̯aɯ̯]). This triphthong originated from the Proto-Frenchdiphthong[ɛɯ̯], which had formed from the sequence of⟨e⟩ and⟨l⟩, whereL had vocalized. In the 12th and 13th centuries, both⟨iau⟩ and⟨eau⟩ were used ([i̯aɯ̯] was probably a variant pronunciation), but⟨eau⟩ soon became the standard spelling.[3] Eau is also a word in French.
InEnglish,⟨eau⟩ only exists in words borrowed from French, and so is pronounced similarly in almost all cases (like inplateau,bureau). Exceptions includebeauty and words derived from it, where it is pronounced/juː/,bureaucrat where it is pronounced/ə/,bureaucracy where it is pronounced/ɒ/,[4] and (in some contexts) the proper namesBeaulieu andBeauchamp (as/juː/ and/iː/, respectively).[5]
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