Eau is a trigraph of the

Latin script The Latin script, also known as Roman script, is an alphabetic writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae, in southern Italy ...

French

Modern French French ( or ) is a Romance language of the Indo-European family. It descended from the Vulgar Latin of the Roman Empire, as did all Romance languages. French evolved from Gallo-Romance, the Latin spoken in Gaul, and more specifically in No ...

, is pronounced and may or may not be the same

phoneme In phonology and linguistics, a phoneme () is a unit of sound that can distinguish one word from another in a particular language. For example, in most dialects of English, with the notable exception of the West Midlands and the north-west o ...

as the one attached to the letter o. It is used as an ending for several words, like ''berceau'' ( cradle) or ''manteau'' (

coat A coat typically is an outer garment for the upper body as worn by either gender for warmth or fashion. Coats typically have long sleeves and are open down the front and closing by means of buttons, zippers, hook-and-loop fasteners, toggles, a ...

), usually being the remnant of a suffix (''bercer'' meaning to cradle; ''mante'' meaning mantle). This is also a word by itself: ''eau'' means

water Water (chemical formula ) is an inorganic, transparent, tasteless, odorless, and nearly colorless chemical substance, which is the main constituent of Earth's hydrosphere and the fluids of all known living organisms (in which it acts as a ...

English

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

, only exists in words imported from French, and so is pronounced likewise in almost all cases. Exceptions include ''beauty'' and words derived from it, where it is pronounced , ''bureaucrat'' where it is pronounced , ''

bureaucracy The term bureaucracy () refers to a body of non-elected governing officials as well as to an administrative policy-making group. Historically, a bureaucracy was a government administration managed by departments staffed with non-elected offi ...

'' where it is pronounced , and (in some contexts) the proper names Beaulieu and Beauchamp. Latin-script trigraphs {{Latin-script-stub