Heteronym
"Bow" has two different pronunciations with two different meanings. Say BOH when it means a weapon, or a ribbon knot (noun), and BOW (rhymes with cow) when it means to bend forward at the waist (verb). Which one is correct depends entirely on the sentence.
noun
BOH
a weapon, or a ribbon knot
“She tied a bow in her hair.”
verb
BOW (rhymes with cow)
to bend forward at the waist
“The actors took a bow.”
Each button speaks the respelling, not the spelling — otherwise the speech engine would pick a single default pronunciation for both senses.
| Pronunciation | Part of speech | Meaning |
|---|---|---|
| BOH | noun | a weapon, or a ribbon knot |
| BOW (rhymes with cow) | verb | to bend forward at the waist |
"Bow" has two different pronunciations with two different meanings. Say BOH when it means a weapon, or a ribbon knot (noun), and BOW (rhymes with cow) when it means to bend forward at the waist (verb). Which one is correct depends entirely on the sentence.
Pronounced BOH, "bow" is a noun meaning a weapon, or a ribbon knot. For example: "She tied a bow in her hair."
Pronounced BOW (rhymes with cow), "bow" is a verb meaning to bend forward at the waist. For example: "The actors took a bow."
"Bow" is a heteronym: two distinct words that happen to be spelled the same way. English spelling did not standardise around pronunciation, so unrelated words sometimes converged on one spelling while keeping separate sounds.
See the full entry for “bow”, browse all 76 heteronyms and stress pairs, or learn how English stress works.