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"voice" in seven languages

Meaningvoice

Spanish

voz

/boθ/

fem.inherited

plural: voces

French

voix

/vwa/

fem.inherited

plural: voix

Italian

voce

/ˈvotʃe/

fem.inherited

Portuguese

voz

/vɔs/

fem.inherited

Romanian

voce

/ˈvotʃe/

fem.borrowed · Italian voce

The older native word is glas, from Slavic.

Catalan

veu

/bɛw/

fem.inherited

Catalan turned the Latin -C- of VŌCEM into a -u glide, as in creu 'cross' from CRUCEM.

English

voice

/vɔɪs/

from Latin/French · Old French vois

English → ItalianvoicevoceCognateSame source — inherited, learned or borrowed. You can recognize it.What English and Italian share

The Latin ancestor

VŌCEM (nom. VŌX)‘voice, sound, word’

All six sisters descend from it, unless marked otherwise below.

The story

The c of VŌCEM softened three ways: Spanish θ, French s (now silent, though the x remembers it), Italian tʃ. A vowel is a 'voiced' sound, from the same word.

English relatives: vocal, vocabulary, vowel, advocate

Sound laws at work

C before E and IB and V merge in SpanishFinal vowels

Learn it

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In a sentence

  • esTiene una voz preciosa.
  • frElle a une très belle voix.
  • itHa una voce bellissima.
  • ptEla tem uma voz linda.
  • roAre o voce frumoasă.
  • caTé una veu preciosa.
  • enShe has a beautiful voice.

More in The body

All The body words