TENUIS CONSONANT

A 'tenuis consonant' is a stop or affricate which is ''unvoiced, unaspirated,'' and ''unglottalized.'' That is, it is a consonant "plain" phonation like and has a voice onset time close to zero. The term ''tenuis'' comes from Ancient Greek grammar, which differentiated three series of consonants, voiced ''β δ γ,'' aspirate ''φ θ χ,'' and tenuis ''π τ κ,'' which have close parallels in other Indo-European languages.