dieresis

Or di·aer·e·sis

[dahy-er-uh-sis]

noun

plural

diereses 

1. Linguistics, Phonetics.,  the separation of two adjacent vowels, dividing one syllable into two.

2. Phonetics, Orthography.,  a diacritic (¨) placed over the second of two adjacent vowels to indicate separate pronunciation, as in one spelling of the older forms naïve and coöperate: no longer widely used in English.

3. Prosody.,  the division made in a line or verse by coincidence of the end of a foot and the end of a word.

dieresis

/ daɪˈɛrɪsɪs, ˌdaɪəˈrɛtɪk /

noun

1. a variant spelling of diaeresis

Other Word Forms

• dieretic adjective

Word History and Origins

Origin of dieresis¹

1605–15; < Latin diaeresis < Greek diaíresis literally, distinction, division, equivalent to diaire-, stem of diaireîn to divide ( di- di- ³ + haireîn to take) + -sis -sis