Patach

Pataḥ (Hebrew: פַּתַח pataḥ, Biblical: paṯaḥ ) is a Hebrew niqqud vowel sign represented by a horizontal line ⟨ ַ ⟩ underneath a letter. In modern Hebrew, it indicates the phoneme /a/ which is close to the "a" sound in the English word far and is transliterated as an a.