Definitions Related to Hebrew Letters
Source: www.MyHebrewBible.Com/Hebrew
niqqud
dotting or pointing is a diacritical system of signs (נִקּוּד means point in Hebrew) to represent vowels (i.e. Vowel Points).
The most common system was created by the Masoretes of Tiberias in the second half of the first millennium AD in the Land of Israel.
holam
holam (חוֹלָם) is vowel sign represented by a dot above the upper left corner of the consonant letter that makes an ō sound like boat
mappiq
mappiqא (מפיק which means "causing to go out" in Hebrew) is a vowel point which takes the form of a dot in the middle of a letter
(usually the heyה, and rarely the alephא).
An identical point with a different phonetic function (marking different consonants) is called a dagesh.
dagesh
dagesh (דָּגֵשׁ) means emphasis (plural dagashim) and is a vowel point which takes the form of a dot in the middle of a letter and has the effect of modifying the sound in one of two ways.
An identical mark called mappiq, has a different phonetic function, and can be applied to different consonants;
the same mark is also employed in the vowel shurukּ.
The two functions of dagesh are distinguished as either kal (light) or hazak (strong).
dagesh kal may be placed inside the consonants בbet, גgimel,
דdalet, כkaf, פpe and תtav.
This is made into an acronmy called BeGadKeFat
In modern Hebrew three of these letters can have their sounds change dependent on the presence of a dagesh or not.
The three are the bet, caf and pey, and without the dagesh their respective sounds are soften to the vet, chaf and fey.
No Dagesh
vet
ב
chaf
כ
fey
פ
With Dagesh
bet
בּ
caf
כּ
pey
פּ
dagesh hazak (דגש חזק) may be placed in almost any letter, this indicated a doubling of that consonant in the pronunciation of pre-modern Hebrew.
The following letters, the gutturals, almost never have a dagesh.
A few instances of resh with dagesh are masoretically recorded in the Hebrew Bible, as well as a few cases of aleph with a dagesh, such as in Lev 23:17.
gutturals
The Hebrew gutturals are אaleph, הhey, חchet,
עayin, רresh.
Kubutz and Shuruk
both of these letters represent the u sound like boot. Kubutz has three dots underneath like here (using a bet)... בֻshuruk always uses the letter vav with a dot in the middle and to the left of it like... וּ.
The dot is identical to the grammatically different signs unicode #1468 (dagesh and mapiq),
Shuruk itself is a vowel sign, so if the letter before the vav doesn't have its own vowel sign then the vav with the dot is a Shuruk and otherwise it is a vav with a Dagesh or a Mappiq.
Furthermore, the Mappiq only appears at the end of the word and only in the letter He (ה) {exception with the Aleph}
Ktiv hasar niqqud
are the rules for writing Hebrew without vowel pointers (niqqud), often replacing them with matres lectionis.
כתיב חסר ניקוד literally means "spelling lacking niqqud", colloquially known as ktiv maleכתיב מלא
To avoid confusion, the Hebrew consonants vavו and sometimes the heyה or yood are doubled in the middle of words.
holam haser
is written as vavו in text without niqqud (vowel points).
matres lectionis
Hebrew used to only contain consonant letters which can be confusion because it can be read differently so some of the consonant letters were used for the indication of long vowels.
The long vowel used is vavו and sometimes the heyה or yoodי are used.
This thing came to be known as matres lectionis (Latin mothers of reading).
Shva
Here is a link for this.
Shva Nach (the resting, or silent shva)
Resources
Learning the letters
Learning the vowels
Learning the Hebrew syllables
Paleo Hebrew Alephbet
Here is a link for this.
Qere Ketiv
The most important of the Masoretic notes are those that detail the Qereקְרֵי (what is read) and Ketivכְּתִיב (what is written)
that are located in the Masorah parva in the outside margins of BHS. Given that the Masoretes would not alter the sacred consonantal text,
the Kethiv-Qerenotes were a way of "correcting" or commenting on the text for any number of reasons
(grammatical, theological, aesthetic, etc.) deemed important by the copyist.
[22]Source .
For a more detailed page see Qere Ketiv.
See List