Those studying Dutch often grapple with the challenging guttural ‘g’ sound (/ɣ/), a frequent feature in the language, found twice in Vincent van Gogh’s surname. This distinct sound (a voiced velar fricative) once existed in English also, as evidenced by the silent -gh- in certain words. Old English utilized a separate letter, the ‘yogh,’ (written ȝ) to represent this sound. An adapted version of this symbol (/ʒ/) is now used only in phonetic script, to refer to a different sound: the zh- phoneme (voiced palatal fricative) found in English in loan words from French and Italian, such as ‘beige’ and ‘gigolo.’

As the yogh sound fell out of the English language, the original long /i:/ vowel in words such as ‘night’ and ‘fight’ came to be transformed into the modern /ai/ diphthong. These words thus came to rhyme with ‘white’ and ‘bite,’ rather than ‘neat’ and ‘feet.’ Likewise, ‘write,’ ‘right,’ and ‘rite’ became homophones.

The -gh- remains, however, in the spelling of certain words, a ghostly reminder of their history. Poets who use rhyme often still avoid rhyming ‘light’ with ‘-ite’ ending words, opting for more harmonious pairings like ‘night,’ ‘bright,’ or ‘fight.’