An Introduction to French Pronunciation

8 The Syllable
8.1 Introduction
The Syllable 41
8.1.1 The way in which French words – or, more precisely,
French utterances (see 8.3) – are divided into syllables may
seem a purely theoretical question. However, as we shall see,
it has a number of important practical applications relating
to such matters as stress (9.4), the distinctions between /e/
and /ε/ (10.6), between /ø/ and /œ/ (10.7) and between /o/ and
/b/ (10.8), and vowel length (chapter 12). It is therefore important
to grasp the principles of French syllabification.
8.1.2 Throughout this section it must always be borne in
mind that we are dealing with pronunciation, not spelling.
Note in particular that:
(i) There is no final consonant in words such as lit /li/,
doux /du/, grand /gre/.
(ii) There is only one consonant in between the vowels of
words such as donner /dbne/, (nous) battons /batf/.
(iii) Digraphs such as ch /ʃ/, ph /f/, th /t/, gn // represent
single consonants, as in cacher /kaʃe/, éléphant /elefe/,
télépathie /telepati/, agneau /ao/.
(iv) A single written consonant, x, represents a succession
of two pronounced consonants in words such as vexer
/vεkse/, examen /εgzamh/.