It’s “Corp” (hard p) because it’s an abbreviation of “corporation”. It’s not a shortening or variant of the word “corps” (eg. Marine corps, press corps”) which is pronounced with a silent p (that word comes from an old French word).

The word corps, for example, is singular in both form and meaning. It comes from the French le corps. The s on the end is from the original Latin spelling corpus, which is also singular. The s does not signify plural and never has.

Why don’t you pronounce the p and s in Corps, such as the Marine Corps? One reason is that the resulting pronunciation would identical to that of “corpse”. The image of dead bodies is not one that sits well with how the populace at large likes to think of the various military units whose job is to protect them.

Corps sentence example

1. Our corps was stationed on a hillside.
2. In 1902 the special corps in Eritrea numbered about 4700 of all ranks, including nearly 4000 natives.
3. army corps ; its court of appeal is in Paris.
4. He commanded the corps in the battles of Alma and Inkerman.

Corp is an abbreviation for “corporation” and “corporal.” Corp, corps, and corpse all trace back to the Latin word corpus, meaning “body.” The origin of core is obscure.

Corps refers to a group, such as the Marine Corps. Its spelling does not change in the singular or plural, but it is pronounced /KOR/ when singular and /KORZ/ when plural. Core can be a noun, verb, or adjective, but usually refers to the center or most important part of something.

Pronunciation is often as distinctly different between English and the American dialect as word choice is. However sword is pronounced ‘sohrd’ the world over. Examples of words beginning ‘sw’ where the ‘w’ is pronounced: ‘swashbuckling’, ‘swat’, ‘swallow’, ‘swan’, ‘swerve’, ‘swell’, ‘swim’, ‘swoosh’, and ‘swung’.

The W in two and sword is silent because of that reason (i.e. [t, s] [w] [back vowel]). Just a theory: As sword is a thing of knights and noblemen. The silent w may be due to Norman-French pronunciation habits and this pronunciation was generally accepted.

Similar to ‘wr’, the word ‘sword’ has its origins in Old High German (swert – related to ‘sweran’ meaning to hurt) in which the ‘w’ was pronounced. Again, from a teaching perspective, given this is just a single word, it is useful to just have student pronounce the ‘w’ when they are learning the spelling (s-word).

A possible explanation for the prevalence of this mistake is that pronouncing the w makes the words sound more English to non-native ears. It also seems to distinguish otherwise identically pronounced words such as write and right or wrap and rap. However, it is still not right.

Etymonline.com has “answer” as – Old English andswaru “a response, a reply to a question,” from and- “against” (from PIE root *ant- “front, forehead,” with derivatives meaning “in front of, before”) + -swaru “affirmation,” from swerian “to swear” (see swear), suggesting an original sense of “sworn statement rebutting a …

First off, thank you, everyone, for saying why the word’s spelling has a “w” in it – it used to be pronounced, then got dropped, et cetera. That’s only half the answer, though: there’s also the question of why the letter is silent.

It’s more an abbreviation. Remember Greenwich is originally in London (the one in New York came later), and Londoners are well known for using abbreviations and shortening words. The Baker Street and Waterloo line being shorted to Bakerloo for example.

It is not conclusively known why this occurred. However, some researchers believe it was due to the influence of Latin and French during this period, as these languages did not include the ‘kn’ cluster. This resulted in the ‘k’ being mispronounced or not pronounced and gradually eliminated.

“Debt” used to be spelled “dette”. The word comes from the Latin debitum, with a “b”, so it made sense to them to add a “b” to the spelling of a word where no “b” was pronounced.

The ‘p’, usually a popping sound made at the front of the mouth, is silenced when it precedes an ‘s’. Most of these words with silent ‘p’s are to do with the mind or the medicine of the mind: Psychology, psychiatry, psyche, psychological, psychotic or pseudo.

The word psalm, which is pronounced with a silent p, comes from the Greek word psalmos, “song sung to a harp,” and its root, psallein, “play a stringed instrument.” While they’re not often backed by a harp these days, psalms are frequently sung with musical accompaniment in churches and temples.

In other words, demotic characters didn’t just symbolize concepts; they spelled out how words were pronounced. (As you may have guessed, in Greek the P in Ptolemy isn’t silent.)