![]() “ Tohte” was the origin of the modern English “taut,” a homonym of “taught,” meaning something stretched or pulled tight, as in a “taut rope.” It is unrelated to the verb “taught,” which comes from Old English tahte, the past tense of taecan, which meant to demonstrate, instruct, persuade, or train ( source). If it makes you feel any better, though, there was once an adjective “ tohte” in Middle English, and one of the variant spellings was “tought” ( source). “Tought” is either a misspelling of “taught” or a typo for words like “thought,” “though,” or “tough.” You’ll notice that Ngram Viewer provides no comparison between “taught” and “tought.” The words “taught” and “tought” sound the same and even seem related in spelling to other English words like “thought” and “though.” But there is no such word as “tought” in today’s modern English. Sounds confusing? It can be at first, but not after we look at some examples. Collectively, we refer to these as homonyms. We also spell some words the same, but they have different meanings (homographs), while other words look the same, but we pronounce them differently. Grammarians call these words homophones, from the Greek words “ homos” (the same) and “ phono” (sound). We will learn more about the common phenomenon where English words can sound the same, have different spelling, and have very different meanings. Several vowel combinations can make the same sound in English, which is the case with “taught” and “tought.”Īlso, there are at least two other identical-sounding words in English but with very different spelling than “taught.” ![]() We have seen in a related article, “ Weird or Wierd: Which Is Correct?,” that it is quite common for writers to misspell some words in English by mixing up vowels. We picked up some odd spelling irregularities along the way. Modern English has developed from 5th-century Old English or Anglo-Saxon to the Middle English of the 11th-century Norman conquests - think Geoffrey Chaucer and The Canterbury Tales - via the language of Shakespeare and Milton. ![]() We’ll also look at using the irregular verb form “taught” as the past tense and past participle of “teach.” This article will examine the homonyms of “taught” and why such a spelling error might occur. ![]() Taught is correct both as t he past tense and past participle form of the verb “teach.” However, “taught” does have some homophones - words we pronounce the same way - in “taut” and “tort.” There is no such word as “tought” in common usage today. For example, is it “taught” or “tought,” and what is the past tense of “teach”? Both spoken and written English has undergone continuous change over centuries - no more so than in its spelling. ![]()
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