Holam


Holam or cholam is a Hebrew niqqud vowel sign represented by a dot above the upper left corner of the consonant letter. For example, here the holam appears after the letter mem ‎: . In modern Hebrew, it indicates the mid back rounded vowel,, and is transliterated as an o.
The mater lectionis letter which is usually employed with holam is vav, although in a few words, the letters ' or ' are used instead of . When it is used with a mater lectionis, the holam is called holam male, and without it the holam is called holam haser.

Appearance

If a holam is used without a following mater lectionis, as in , it is written as a dot above at the upper-left corner of the letter after which it is pronounced. Letter-spacing is not supposed to be affected by it, although some buggy computer fonts may add an unneeded space before the next letter.
File:Dor-Doar.svg|150px|thumb|left|In the word, the Biblical Hebrew spelling of the name Dor, the alef is a mater lectionis, and in traditional typography the holam is written above the 's right arm. In the word , the ' is a consonant, under which appears the vowel ', so the ' is written above the previous letter's upper left corner. Not all fonts actually implement these placement rules, however.
If vav is used as a mater lectionis, the holam appears above the vav. If the mater lectionis is alef, as in , it is supposed to appear above the 's right hand, although this is not implemented in all computer fonts, and does not always appear even in professionally typeset modern books. This means a holam with ' may, in fact, appear in the same place as a regular holam haser. If the alef itself is not a mater lectionis, but a consonant, the holam appears in its regular place above the upper-left corner of the previous letter, as in .
If a holam haser is written after ', as in , it may appear above the ', or slightly farther to the left; this varies between different fonts. In some fonts, a holam merges with the shin dot, in words such as or with the sin dot, as in .

Usage

Holam male is, in general, the most common way to write the sound in modern spelling with niqqud. If a word has Holam male in spelling with niqqud, the mater lectionis letter ' is without any exception retained in spelling without niqqud, both according to the spelling rules of the Academy of the Hebrew Language and in common practice.
The use of holam haser is restricted to certain word patterns, although many common words appear in them. In most cases the Academy's spelling rules mandate that the ' will be written even when the spelling with niqqud does not have it. The normative exceptions from this rule are listed below. The Academy's standard is not followed perfectly by all speakers, and common deviations from it are also noted below.
In Biblical Hebrew the above rules are not followed consistently, and sometimes the is omitted or added.
For further complications involving Kamatz katan and Hataf kamatz, see the article Kamatz.

Holam haser which is written as '''' in text without niqqud

  • In words in which the penultimate syllable has the vowel and is stressed :
  • * rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes, or.
  • When Kubutz is changed to holam before guttural letters in the passive binyan Pual due to tashlum dagesh :
  • * rtl=yes,. Without niqqud: rtl=yes.
  • * rtl=yes,. Without niqqud: rtl=yes.
  • In words which have the pattern /CaCoC/ in the singular and become /CəCuCCim/ with Kubutz in the plural, especially names of colors:
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes.
  • When the last letter of the root is guttural, holam haser is preserved due to tashlum dagesh:
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes.
  • : Without niqqud: rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes.
  • A similar pattern, in which the last letter of the root is not doubled in declension, has holam male in the base form, which is preserved in declension:
  • * sg. rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes.
  • In three words, a holam male is changed to a shuruk in declension:
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes ;
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes.
  • Similar to the above is the pattern /CəCaCCoC/, with reduplication of the second and third letters of the root:
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes. Without niqqud: rtl=yes, rtl=yes.
  • In the future, infinitive and imperative forms of most verbs in binyan Qal:
  • * rtl=yes,, rtl=yes,, rtl=yes,. Without niqqud: rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes.
  • In words, whose roots' second and third letter are the same, in which case in declension the holam changes to Kubutz after which there will be a dagesh:
  • * rtl=yes all,, decl. rtl=yes , root rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,, decl. rtl=yes , root rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes, root rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,, pl. rtl=yes, root rtl=yes
  • Several common words are spelled with a holam haser in the Bible, but the Academy mandates that they be spelled with holam male in modern Hebrew, among them:
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • : Some people still spell them without ', but the standard spelling is with '.
  • The participle of most verbs in binyan Qal is often written with holam haser in the Bible, but always with holam male in modern Hebrew.
  • * For example, in the Bible appear both rtl=yes and rtl=yes,, but in modern Hebrew only rtl=yes.

    Holam with other matres lectionis

  • The most common occasion for not writing the sound as a ' in text without niqqud is when in text with niqqud the mater lectionis is Alef or He instead of '. In the Bible some words are irregularly and inconsistently spelled with ה as a mater lectionis:
  • * rtl=yes alongside rtl=yes, e.g. rtl=yes alongside rtl=yes, etc.
  • : but the number of these irregularities was brought to minimum in modern Hebrew.
  • In the future forms of several verbs whose roots' first letter is Alef:
  • * rtl=yes,, root rtl=yes, without niqqud rtl=yes.
  • * The prefix of the first person singular is itself Alef and in spelling with niqqud only one Alef is written: rtl=yes,, root rtl=yes, and in spelling without niqqud a ' is added: rtl=yes. This always happens in the roots rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes and less consistently in the roots rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes, rtl=yes. In the root rtl=yes a holam male with ' is used in the infinitive in Mishnaic and modern Hebrew:
  • * rtl=yes.
  • In the infinitive form of a small number of verbs whose roots' last letter is Alef: rtl=yes,, root rtl=yes.
  • In the following words the mater lectionis is always Alef :
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,, without niqqud rtl=yes
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • In the following words the mater lectionis is always He :
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • * rtl=yes,
  • In the absolute infinitive form of verbs which end in He: rtl=yes. This form is common in the Bible, but in modern Hebrew it is not productive and it is preserved only in fossilized sayings. For example, a common opening for fairy tales, rtl=yes, is written rtl=yes without niqqud.

    Holam without vav in personal names

Some examples of usage of holam without ' in personal names:
  • The names Pharaoh, Moshe and Shlomo are never written with '. Shilo is sometimes written with ' in the Bible, but always with He in modern Hebrew. The adjectives rtl=yes, rtl=yes are written with ' and with a nun in the suffix.
  • The name Aharon is spelled with holam haser in the Bible. In modern Hebrew both rtl=yes and rtl=yes are used.
  • The name Noah is spelled with holam haser in the Bible, but it is sometimes written with the ' in the Mishna and in modern Hebrew.
  • Several other names of places and people are spelled with holam and Alef in the Bible include Yoshiyahu, Dor and No Amon.
  • The word rtl=yes, is spelled with holam haser in the Bible. It is a common Jewish last name, Cohen. The Academy mandates holam male for the noun rtl=yes, but allows the omission of ' for spelling the personal name.
  • Some personal names, such as Ohad, Zohar and Nogah, are sometimes spelled without ' in modern writing without niqqud, although this varies from person to person.
  • God's name Adonai is written with holam haser to distinguish it from the word "Lord" used for humans. When the Tetragrammaton is written with niqqud, it follows that of Adonai, so it is written with holam haser, too. For religious reasons writing Adonai and the Tetragrammaton is avoided in modern religious texts except in direct quotes from the Bible. They rarely appear in secular modern Hebrew texts and their spelling there is inconsistent.
  • The name Elohim is written with holam haser in the Bible, although its singular form Eloah is usually written with holam male. In modern Hebrew Elohim is a common word for "God" and it is usually spelled with the ', which is also the Academy's recommendation.

    Pronunciation

The following table contains the pronunciation and transliteration of the different holams in reconstructed historical forms and dialects using the International Phonetic Alphabet.
The letters Pe and Tsade are used in this table only for demonstration. Any letter can be used.

Vowel length comparison

These vowel lengths are not manifested in modern Hebrew. In addition, the short o is usually promoted to a long o in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation. As well, the short o and long a have the same niqqud. As a result, a is usually promoted to Holam male in Israeli writing for the sake of disambiguation.