Patach
Hebrew point patah (U+05B7), Niqqud vowel sign
Patach, pathah, or pathaḥ (Israeli Hebrew: פַּתַּח, /pataχ/; Classical Hebrew: פַּתָח, paṯāḥ) is a Hebrew niqqud vowel sign represented by a horizontal lineunderneath a letter. In modern Hebrew, it indicates the phoneme /a/ which is close to the [a] sound in the English word far and is transliterated as an a.
In Modern Hebrew, a patach makes the same sound as a qamatz, as does the hataf patach (Hebrew: חֲטַף פַּתַּח, romanized: hăṭap̄ pattaḥ, lit. 'reduced patach'). The reduced (or hataf) niqqud exist for patach, qamatz, and segol which contain a shva next to it.
In Yiddish orthography, a patach (called pasekh in Yiddish) has two uses. The combination of pasekh with the letter alef, אַ, is used to represent the vowel [a]; the combination of pasekh with a digraph consisting of two yods, ײַ, is used to represent the diphthong [aj].
Etymology
The patach name comes from the verb פָּתַח (pāṯáḥ) 'to open', because the vowel's pronunciation, the [a] sound, requires the mouth to be opened wide.
Pronunciation
The following table contains the pronunciation and transliteration of the different forms of patach in reconstructed historical forms and dialects using the International Phonetic Alphabet.
The letters Beth ⟨ב⟩ and Heth ⟨ח⟩ used in this table are only for demonstration, any letter can be used.
A patach on a letter ח, ע, or הּ (that is, ה with a mappiq in it) at the end of a word is sounded before the letter, and not after.
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