The Six Spellings of “Long E”

Some of you have had the opportunity to attend, but we wanted our members to have a sneak peak at what they have to offer.

The above quotation is from a club announcement.

The words “sneak peak” certainly seem as if they ought to match, but the word “peak” is a misspelling in this context.

The word meaning “a surreptitious look” is spelled peek.
A peak is “a projecting point.”

As I pointed out in English Spelling is Not Total Chaos, English has more phonograms (sound symbols) than it needs.

This multiplicity of spellings applies especially to the vowel sounds.

“Long E” is the vowel sound represented by the e in me.

This “long e” sound can also be represented by five other phonograms:

ee
Achilles was wounded in his heel.
The “double e” spelling ee always represents the “long e” sound: see, kneel, feel, tee (golf term).

ea
Physician, heal thyself.
“Long e” is the most common sound represented by ea: read, zeal, appeal, deal, meal, real. (The spelling ea can also represent two other vowel sounds.)

ei
That man is filled with conceit.
This ei spelling for “long e” occurs in words in which the ei follows the letter c: ceiling, conceit, perceive, receipt, receive. (There’s a rule that often helps: “i before e except after c…”)

ie
Let’s plant oats in that field.
“Long e” is spelled ie in several common words: believe, belief, brief, chief, field, niece, priest, siege, achieve, piece.

ey
Follett wrote The Key to Rebecca.
The ey spelling for “long e” is not common in one-syllable words. Key is the only one I can think of. The phonogram ey to represent “long e” does appear at the end of two-syllable words like valley, alley, and galley. (The spelling ey more often represents the “long a” sound, as in they.)

It’s too bad that we have so many ways to spell the “long e” sound, but it’s probably too late to do anything about it–other than learn the variants.

Even Richard Mulcaster (1531-1611), an early advocate of English spelling reform, had to concede that

No set of rules can cover all points; some things must be left to observation and daily practice.*

*Baugh, A History of the English Language p. 255)

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Maeve on September 18, 2007 | Filed Under Spelling

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8 Responses to “The Six Spellings of “Long E””

Sous Rature on September 19th, 2007 12:20 am

Don’t forget “i” as in “pique” and “unique”.
Maeve on September 19th, 2007 12:40 pm

Right you are, Sous Rature.

The letter i represents the long E sound in several French borrowings ending in -que (don’t forget boutique and oblique), and in at least two that end in -che (quiche, niche).

My own preference would be to teach them as oddities when teaching the words.

Ah, the pitfalls of trying to formulate rules for English spelling!
Maeve on September 20th, 2007 1:25 pm

Durn, I just thought of another one: Queen Latifah!

And then there’s pita bread.

Sigh. Guess I’ll just have to add the letter i to my list of letters that can represent long E.
Alan on September 21st, 2007 4:17 pm

First of all: thank you for this great website!
How about “adobe”, “Capote”, “Nike”, “Penelope”, “Hermione” and so on? I actually landed on your site while trying to find the rule regarding these words with a final long E. The rule, if any, seems to be related to imported foreign words, especially Greek. Any idea?
Maeve on September 21st, 2007 5:58 pm

Alan,
Yours is an interesting question, one that I have not addressed on this site (except peripherally in Caesar Sat on the Dais.

You’re right in concluding that the pronounced final e has to do with a word’s being a foreign borrowing.

Of your five examples, three are from the Greek, as is the “Zoe” example in the article I mention.

Adobe, however, is from Spanish (which borrowed it from Arabic). Capote can be one of two words, one of which is pronounced with the final /E/ and the other not.

The surname Capote is Italian in origin; the final e is pronounced.

The word for a hooded coat, capote, comes from French; the final e is silent.
Chris on February 15th, 2008 12:51 am

I am trying to teach my 7 year old son, who wants to know who made up all this stuff anyway, when to use all of these different spellings of the long e sound.

Are there any rules or tricks for remembering other than the “i before e except after c”. How do I teach him to use ie instead of ee or ea?

Any help would be gratefully appreciated. Any good website recommendations?

Thanks
Maeve on February 15th, 2008 5:42 pm

Chris,
The best way is not to try to teach them all at once, especially not with a 7 year old.
First they master the long e sound in words that follow the rules “long e at the end of a syllable: me, he, we and then the rule about silent final e “E makes the E say /e/ (long e). This takes time.
The ee spelling is a piece of cake: “E double E always says E (long e sound).

Leave the ie, ei words until later. Much later.

You might find my English site helpful: http://www.AmericanEnglishDoctor.com