1097: Assimilation (s.s.w.2) Dec 10, 2017

It might not seem that assimilation—when one sound becomes similar to or completely elides with one that is adjacent to it—would have too much to do with syllables, but there are similarities. Rules for assimilation, in some language, are based upon sonority hierarchy, such as in Finnish in which a less sonorous phoneme can elide with a more sonorous one it precedes. For instance, [tn] could become [n]. Plenty of other languages use assimilation, including the English 'sandwich' which can be pronounced idyllically as [ˈsændˌwɪt͡ʃ], but may more likely appear as /ˈsænˌwɪt͡ʃ/ or /ˈsæmˌwɪt͡ʃ/ (with only [n] or alternatively [m]). In languages like Finnish however, because it follows the same patterns as the sonority hierarchy, this would change how many syllables are in a given word. Nevertheless, English has historically had assimilation (which is called diachronic assimilation) that changed the quality and number of syllables in words that are now consistently a certain amount of syllables. For instance, the '-ea-' used in orthography now often represents the way that people used to speak, such as in 'sea' which would not have rhymes with 'see' and would have had two syllables.