Assibilation
In linguistics, assibilation is a sound change resulting in a sibilant consonant. It is a form of spirantization, as well as commonly the final phase of palatalization.
Romance languages
The word "assibilation" itself contains an example of the phenomenon, being pronounced /əsɪbɪleɪʃən/. The classical Latin tio was pronounced /tio/ (for example, assibilatio was pronounced /asːibilatio/ and attentio /atːentio/). However, in Vulgar Latin it assibilated to /tsio/, and this can still be seen in Italian: attenzione. In French, lenition gave /sjə/, which in English then palatalized to the /ʃə/.
High German consonant shift
In the High German consonant shift, voiceless stops /p, t, k/ spirantized to /f, s, x/ at the end of a syllable. The shift of /t/ to /s/ (as in English water, German Wasser) is assibilation.
Greek
Proto-Indo-European *t and *dʰ (Greek th) before *y shifted to Proto-Greek /s/.
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