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Added 9 October 2026

vowel

/ˈvaʊ.əl/ noun

In Latin: vōcālis Wiktionary

noun Definition from WordNet 3.1, Princeton University. Pronunciation from Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org. More about vowel at Wordnik → Where our words come from →

A speech sound made with the vocal tract open.
A letter of the alphabet standing for a spoken vowel.

Origin

From Middle English vowel, from Old French vouel, a variant of voyeul (whence French voyelle), from Latin vōcālis (“voiced”), itself a semantic loan of Koine Greek φωνῆεν (phōnêen). Doublet of vocal and vocalis.

From Wiktionary, via Kaikki.org (CC BY-SA)

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