’Onest error

Published on 17/10/2012 00:00

Your front page headline, “An Historic Day” (16 October), is a classically unique example of a visual oxymoron – and not just because one of the two men pictured had studied at Oxford.

No, the word “an” preceding certain words starting with the letter “h” does not work in Scotland, despite this rule being foisted on us by misguided teaching staff at school.

The English have congenital trouble pronouncing their “haitches”, dropping them when their oral cavities can’t cope. This should not determine rules for the rest of us.

In the South, the leading utterance in the word, “historic”, is the sound, “i”. This rule takes over when a noun or qualifying adjective starts, or strangely here does not start, with a vowel. So in actual fact it should read: “an ’istoric day”.

How selfishly centralised some rules are. But also how “correctly” taken on board they can be.

Douglas Hogg

Gordon

Berwickshire