Why "Xerox" is pronounced as "Zirox" ?
Jean Stax
Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
Thanks
Joona I Palaste
> Hi !
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
been carried over into English.
--
/-- Joona Palaste (pal...@cc.helsinki.fi) ---------------------------\
| Kingpriest of "The Flying Lemon Tree" G++ FR FW+ M- #108 D+ ADA N+++|
| http://www.helsinki.fi/~palaste W++ B OP+ |
\----------------------------------------- Finland rules! ------------/
"The large yellow ships hung in the sky in exactly the same way that bricks
don't."
- Douglas Adams
Spehro Pefhany
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
It is consistent with most of the other words beginning with "X" which
have Greek origin. There's another class that of "X.." words that have
Asian origins such as Xu (Vietnamese) and Xian (Chinese) in which the
'x' is pronounced more like an 's'.
Best regards,
--
Spehro Pefhany --"it's the network..." "The Journey is the reward"
sp...@interlog.com Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog Info for designers: http://www.speff.com
Matti Lamprhey
>
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
Is this a trick question? The word is pronounced "zearocks".
Matti
Donna Richoux
But would you pronounce "zea-rocks" and "zear-ocks" (or "zear-rocks")
the same? I don't think you pronounce "fee" and "fear" the same, even as
a nonrhotic Brit. The common American sound is more like your "fear"
than your "fee". Though I have heard a few Americans say "zee" in Xerox.
There is an old Edward Lear alphabet rhyme ("A was once an apple pie")
in which the value for X was Xerxes, old King Xerxes, I think. We always
said "Zurk-sees."
As is usual for big American corporations, you can find a little about
their history by going to CompanyName.com and looking for links called
"About Companyname" or "Corporate History". The Xerox site has three
paragraphs about the origin of the name at (long URL alert!):
http://www.xerox.com/go/xrx/template/019d.jsp?view=Factbook&id=Overview&
Xcntry=USA&Xlang=en_US&Xseg=corp
If there is any mystery remaining, and I doubt it, it is whether the
words for "dry" and "writing" in Greek would be pronounced more or less
the same as "xerography" is in English. Is Iannis with us?
--
Best -- Donna Richoux
An American living in the Netherlands
Tony Cooper
"Zer-ocks" to this ear. Of course, I've just been diagnosed
as being CINC. It may something to do with the
side-effects.
--
Tony Cooper aka: tony_co...@yahoo.com
Provider of Jots and Tittles
Matti Lamprhey
> Matti Lamprhey <matti-...@totally-official.com> wrote:
> > "Jean Stax" <jean...@hotmail.com> wrote...
> > >
> > > Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
> >
> > Is this a trick question? The word is pronounced "zearocks".
>
> But would you pronounce "zea-rocks" and "zear-ocks" (or "zear-rocks")
> the same? I don't think you pronounce "fee" and "fear" the same, even as
> a nonrhotic Brit. The common American sound is more like your "fear"
> than your "fee". Though I have heard a few Americans say "zee" in Xerox.
You're right that it would have been better to have written "zear-ocks",
although it may not help a non-native speaker, perhaps. It seems that the
common pronunciation is much the same on both sides of the pond.
Matti
John O'Flaherty
>
> Hi !
>
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
A photographic memory is 'xerox in ze head'.
--
john
John Varela
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
In Brazil Xerox is pronounced Sherosh.
--
John Varela
God has a special providence for fools, drunks, and
the United States of America -- Otto von Bismarck
Richard Fontana
>Matti Lamprhey wrote:
>>
>> "Jean Stax" <jean...@hotmail.com> wrote...
>> >
>> > Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
>>
>> Is this a trick question? The word is pronounced "zearocks".
>
>"Zer-ocks" to this ear. Of course, I've just been diagnosed
>as being CINC. It may something to do with the
>side-effects.
What do you mean by "zer"? I'm no longer an advocate of ASCII IPA but
"zer" is completely unclear. Does "zer" rhyme with "fur"?
I say "zeer-ox". "Zeer" rhymes with ear, beer, cheer, deer, fear, hear,
gear, jeer, leer, mere, near, pier, queer, rear, steer, sheer, tier, veer,
year. I think it's phonetically closer to the vowel of "zee" than to the
so-called "short i" sound, but it's more lax, less tense, than "zee",
and it's r-colored; it's not "Zee-rox".
Tony Cooper
>
> What do you mean by "zer"? I'm no longer an advocate of ASCII IPA but
> "zer" is completely unclear. Does "zer" rhyme with "fur"?
You are obsessed. Zer rhymes with hair. Also with air,
bear, care, dare, err (one version), fair, the gar in
garish.....
Rushtown
mplsray
"Joona I Palaste" <pal...@cc.helsinki.fi> wrote in message
news:a0schd$6l1$1...@oravannahka.helsinki.fi...
> Jean Stax <jean...@hotmail.com> scribbled the following:
> > Hi !
>
> > Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
>
> Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
> with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
> been carried over into English.
>
It appears from the following, however, that the ancient Greeks *could*
pronounce /ks/ at the beginning of a word (and used the letter ksi rather
than the letter chi):
From *The Century Dictionary,* under their entry for "X."
From
www.century-dictionary.com
[quote]
1. The twenty-fourth letter
and nineteenth consonant-
sign in the English alpha-
bet. In the Latin alphabet, from
which it comes to ours, it followed
next after _U_ or _V_ (which were then
only one letter : see _U_), and was
till a late date the last letter in
that alphabet, till _Y_ and _Z_ (see
those letters) were finally added
from the Greek to represent pe-
culiar Greek sounds. The sign _X_ was a Greek addition
to the Phenician alphabet ; it had in early Greek use a
divided value : in the eastern alphabets, that of _kh_ (besides
the signs for _ph_ and _th_) ; in the western, that of _ks_ (besides
the signs for _ps_ and _ts_ or _ds_). The former of the two came
afterward to be the universally accepted value in Greece
itself ; while the latter was carried over into Italy, and so
became Roman, and was passed on to us. Hence our _X_ has
in general the Latin value _ks ;_ but as initial (almost only in
words from the Greek, and there representing a different
Greek character, the _ksi_) we have reduced it to the z-sound,
as in _Xerxes, xanthous._ In many words also, especially
among those beginniug with _ex,_ it is made sonant, or pro-
nounced as _gz._ The accepted rule for this is that the _gz-_
sound is given after an unaccented before an accented
vowel, as in _exért, exílic_ (_egzert, egzilic_), over against _éxer-
cise, éxile_ (_eksercize, eks[i with a macron]l). But usage does not follow
the rule with exactness, and many cultivated speakers disre-
gard the distinction altogether, pronouncing everywhere
alike _ks_ (or _kz_). In any case, the sign _X_ is superfluous in
English, as it was in Latin and in Greek ; it denotes no
sound which is not fully provided for otherwise. In Old
English it was sometimes used for _sh,_ as in _xal_ = _shall._
[end quote]
--
Raymond S. Wise
Minneapolis, Minnesota USA
R H Draney
wrote:
>Jean Stax <jean...@hotmail.com> scribbled the following:
>
>> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
>
>Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
>with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
>been carried over into English.
We get around this in a number of different ways...I've heard the same
name "Xavier" pronounced /eg'zEI viR/, /'zEI viR/ and /hA'vir/ (an
approximation of the Spanish /'xA vi,Er/)...the initial consonant
cluster [ks] doesn't seem phonotactically possible in English, just as
other languages can't deal directly (and so add a leading vowel) with
the initial [sp], [st] and [sk] that are so common in English....r
N.Mitchum
----
> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
How else would you pronounce the name? Do you have your own
special pronunciation of the initial "X"?
(And, for the sake of consistency, shouldn't that be "Zirocks"?)
----NM
Richard Fontana
>Richard Fontana wrote:
>>
>> What do you mean by "zer"? I'm no longer an advocate of ASCII IPA but
>> "zer" is completely unclear. Does "zer" rhyme with "fur"?
>
>You are obsessed. Zer rhymes with hair. Also with air,
>bear, care, dare, err (one version), fair, the gar in
>garish.....
Then you should spell it "zair" or "zare". Even for the MIMIMs "zer" is
unclear, because it might imply /zR/ ("zur").
As I mentioned in an earlier posting, I use the "merry" vowel in
"err" (when I don't remember to rhyme it with "fur"). I use the
"marry" vowel in "garish", just like "parish".
You MIMIMs never cease to amaze me!
Tony Cooper
>
> Then you should spell it "zair" or "zare". Even for the MIMIMs "zer" is
> unclear, because it might imply /zR/ ("zur").
"Zair" seems to much like "Zay-ear".
>
> You MIMIMs never cease to amaze me!
I thought I was a CINC? Has it spread? Why is all this
money being spent on cancer research when we haven't even
come up with a cure for CINC? How many CINCs could be saved
on what Rudy G wants to spend on new baseball stadiums?
Steve MacGregor
> Would you pronouncd [sic] it Eksox"
No, I would not swap the initial consonant-pair with the following
vowel, and delete the next consonant. If I wanted to get fussy, I'd
pronounce the "X" as an X (or like "ks"): "KSER-oks", with the first
syllable rhyming with "their", "where", "fair", etc.
In practice, English-speaking people can't begin a word with the "ks"
sound combination, and pronounce it as a "z" instead. Just as we have
a hard time pronouncing words that begin with "ct", "pn", "tl", "mn",
and such, and make adjustments.
--
-- __Q Steve MacGregor
-- -`\<, Phoenix, Arizona, USA
-- (*)/ (*)
--------------- <http://www.steve-and-pattie.com>
R H Draney
MacGregor) wrote:
>rush...@aol.com (Rushtown) wrote in message news:<20020101145548...@mb-cs.aol.com>...
>
>> Would you pronouncd [sic] it Eksox"
>
>No, I would not swap the initial consonant-pair with the following
>vowel, and delete the next consonant. If I wanted to get fussy, I'd
>pronounce the "X" as an X (or like "ks"): "KSER-oks", with the first
>syllable rhyming with "their", "where", "fair", etc.
At one time, there was a radio station in Ciudad de Juarez, across the
Rio Grande from El Paso, with the call sign XEROK...the owners were
apparently on this side of the border, and programmed rock music on
it, calling the station "ecks-rock"...(the official station ID was in
Spanish: "echis, eh, ereh, oh, kah")...later they changed format to
country and western and took to calling themselves
"ecks-ee-are-oh-country"....r
--
["SOYLENT BROWN IS HAMSTERS!" --- sig trial period expires 02/29/99]
Richard Fontana
>Richard Fontana wrote:
>>
>> Then you should spell it "zair" or "zare". Even for the MIMIMs "zer" is
>> unclear, because it might imply /zR/ ("zur").
>
>"Zair" seems to much like "Zay-ear".
How do you say "Zaire"? For me it's /zaI 'ir/ where /aI/ is "I", "eye"
and /ir/ is "ear".
>> You MIMIMs never cease to amaze me!
>
>I thought I was a CINC?
I think you are. But you're also no doubt a MIMIM. I have a hunch that
you might be a PIP too. But your wife is probably a PINP. I can't
believe this sort of thing isn't a topic of marital discussion.
Pierre Jelenc
>
> Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
> with the "ks" sound.
Some people's... French has no trouble with initila "x". Nor does Swedish.
Pierre
--
Pierre Jelenc | H o m e O f f i c e R e c o r d s
| * The Dan Emery Mystery Band * Pawnshop *
T h e G i g o m e t e r | * The Cucumbers * RAW Kinder *
www.thegigometer.com | www.homeofficerecords.com
Tony Cooper
>
> How do you say "Zaire"? For me it's /zaI 'ir/ where /aI/ is "I", "eye"
> and /ir/ is "ear".
Richard, if I tell you that I say "Zaire" as "zay ear", then
you will ask me how I say "ear". If I tell you I say "ear"
as "eeee er", you will ask me how I say "er". If I tell you
I say "er" as "urr", you will ask me how I say "r". I can't
do this. I simply can't do this.
> >> You MIMIMs never cease to amaze me!
> >
> >I thought I was a CINC?
>
> I think you are. But you're also no doubt a MIMIM. I have a hunch that
> you might be a PIP too. But your wife is probably a PINP. I can't
> believe this sort of thing isn't a topic of marital discussion.
I wanna be a Guppy. In the meantime, I will go tell my wife
that there is no PINUP without "u". She will give me that
look.
Richard Fontana
>Richard Fontana wrote:
>>
>> How do you say "Zaire"? For me it's /zaI 'ir/ where /aI/ is "I", "eye"
>> and /ir/ is "ear".
>
>Richard, if I tell you that I say "Zaire" as "zay ear", then
>you will ask me how I say "ear". If I tell you I say "ear"
>as "eeee er", you will ask me how I say "er". If I tell you
>I say "er" as "urr", you will ask me how I say "r". I can't
>do this. I simply can't do this.
It was just a simple question. Zaire the country: I always seem to hear
this with the first syllable rhyming with "bye", "dye", "guy". Are you
saying you pronounce Zaire in this way, or do you instead rhyme the first
syllable of Zaire with "bay", "day", "gay"?
mplsray
"Pierre Jelenc" <rc...@panix.com> wrote in message
news:a0u1nu$j8u$1...@news.panix.com...
> Joona I Palaste <pal...@cc.helsinki.fi> writes:
> >
> > Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
> > with the "ks" sound.
>
> Some people's... French has no trouble with initila "x". Nor does Swedish.
>
I should have known that, but I guess one can go years without pronouncing
the words in question, and if I did pronounce them I no doubt figured they
were pronounced /z/ as in English. My edition of *The Oxford-Hachette French
Dictionary* gives the following French words beginning with "x"--I have
included the pronunciation given to the letter:
xénon /ks-/
xénophobe /gz-/
xénophobie /gz-/
Xénophon /gz-/
xérès /ks-/
xérophyte /ks-/
Xerxès /gz-/
xylographe /ks-/
xylographie /ks-/
xylographique /ks-/
xylophage /ks-/
xylophène /ks-/
xylophone /ks-/
xylographique /ks-/
Another source, the *TLF informatisé* gives a few more words, including the
name of the 14th letter of the Greek alphabet, "xi," also spelled "ksi,"
both pronounced /ksi/.
Now here's a surprise. That letter in English, spelled "xi," is pronounced
in the following ways (combining pronunciations from the AHD4 and Webster's
Collegiate): /zaI/, /saI/, /ksaI/, and /ksi/! So the editors of those
dictionaries are saying that English speakers *can* handle an initial /ks/.
Tony Cooper
Zay, as it rhymes with "Mandalay".
Steve Hayes
>Jean Stax <jean...@hotmail.com> scribbled the following:
>> Hi !
>
>> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
>
>Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
>with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
>been carried over into English.
Over the years the Greeks seem to have learnt to pronounce it, so perhaps in a
millennium or two English speakers will have managed to do so as well.
--
Steve Hayes from Tshwane, South Africa
http://www.geocities.com/Athens/7734/steve.htm
E-mail - see web page, or parse: shayes at dunelm full stop org full stop uk
mplsray
"Steve Hayes" <haye...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:3c329b0c....@news.saix.net...
> On 1 Jan 2002 13:11:09 GMT, Joona I Palaste <pal...@cc.helsinki.fi>
wrote:
>
> >Jean Stax <jean...@hotmail.com> scribbled the following:
> >> Hi !
> >
> >> Can somebody explain this phenomenon, please.
> >
> >Because people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
> >with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
> >been carried over into English.
>
> Over the years the Greeks seem to have learnt to pronounce it, so perhaps
in a
> millennium or two English speakers will have managed to do so as well.
>
As I mentioned in another post to this thread, the AHD4 and Merriam
Webster's Collegiate appear to believe that some English speakers *are* up
to it, since they both have the word "xi," meaning "the fourteenth letter of
the Greek alphabet" with pronunciation variants in which the "x" is
pronounced /ks/.
Robert Bannister
It rhymes with BrE 'tsar'; perhaps for you with 'bah': zah-ear.
--
Rob Bannister
Richard Fontana
Well, I'm closer than Coop. I'm just diphthongizing the "ah".
Steve Hayes
wrote:
It's an academic point anyway -- the country is no longer called Zaire.
j...@radidelmex.net
"chlorine" and "sodium hydroxide,". Xerox comes from xerography, but
the -ox ending, I guess, means nothing.
mplsray
<j...@radiDELMEx.net> wrote in message news:a11s5d$ark$3...@news1.Radix.Net...
I wouldn't say that it means nothing in the strictest sense. It is a
practice which once had the associations of (1)
a commercial product name and (2) modernity. Just as there are in the naming
of babies, there are fashions in product naming, and I would say that
although final "x" is not unknown in new product names, it carries no hint
of modernity, and I would not be at all surprised if the people who are
experts in product naming--it's a profession now, you know--have rejected
many a possibility for an "x"-final name for a new product because it
sounded too old-fashioned.
Steve Hayes
How do the Brits pronounce "tsar" then?
In the days that Zaire was still around, I pronounced it "Zah-eer".
Steve Hayes
<illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote:
>
>"Steve Hayes" <haye...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
>news:3c329b0c....@news.saix.net...
>> Over the years the Greeks seem to have learnt to pronounce it, so perhaps
>in a
>> millennium or two English speakers will have managed to do so as well.
>>
>
>
>As I mentioned in another post to this thread, the AHD4 and Merriam
>Webster's Collegiate appear to believe that some English speakers *are* up
>to it, since they both have the word "xi," meaning "the fourteenth letter of
>the Greek alphabet" with pronunciation variants in which the "x" is
>pronounced /ks/.
Some Russians appear to have given up hope that English speakers will learn to
pronounce X, and have taken to transliterating the name Xenia as Ksenia in
English.
R H Draney
wrote:
>Some Russians appear to have given up hope that English speakers will learn to
>pronounce X, and have taken to transliterating the name Xenia as Ksenia in
>English.
I've occasionally found myself wondering why the Russian given name
"Oksana" is spelled this way in the Roman alphabet, when "Oxana" would
work just as well...I suppose some early transliterator overlooked the
opportunity because of the wish to represent each letter separately by
its Roman equivalent (whether that be one English letter or more)....r
Reinhold (Rey) Aman
One of my Ukrainian friends in Lvov/Lviv used to transliterate her name
as "Oxana," but I talked her into using "Oksana" instead, for two
reasons: (1) because of the negative association of "Oxana" with "ox"
(stupid animal) and (2) the uncertainty of what sound(s) <x>
represents. Is it the Russian/Ukrainian "kh" as in _xuy_ ("Okhana"), or
what? Writing the name with <ks> is unambiguous.
--
Reinhold (Rey) Aman
mplsray
> On Wed, 2 Jan 2002 17:01:58 -0600, "mplsray"
> <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote:
>
> >
> >"Steve Hayes" <haye...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> >news:3c329b0c....@news.saix.net...
>
> >> Over the years the Greeks seem to have learnt to pronounce it, so
perhaps
> >in a
> >> millennium or two English speakers will have managed to do so as well.
> >>
> >
> >
> >As I mentioned in another post to this thread, the AHD4 and Merriam
> >Webster's Collegiate appear to believe that some English speakers *are*
up
> >to it, since they both have the word "xi," meaning "the fourteenth letter
of
> >the Greek alphabet" with pronunciation variants in which the "x" is
> >pronounced /ks/.
>
> Some Russians appear to have given up hope that English speakers will
learn to
> pronounce X, and have taken to transliterating the name Xenia as Ksenia in
> English.
>
I once learned the Russian alphabet--I can even write it in cursive!--and
"X" in Russian is not pronounced /ks/. It's pronounced like the "ch" in the
Scottish word "loch," represented in IPA as /x/ and in ASCII IPA as /x/ or
/C/ (why two versions!?)
I did a search on the Web and confirmed that the Russian name "Ksenia"
begins with the Russian equivalents for "K" and "s" which look like "Kc."
If the Russian word for "xenon" were to be written in capital letters, it
would look like this: KCEHOH.
See
http://environmentalchemistry.com/yogi/periodic/Xe.html#Names
Apurbva Chandra Senray
> I once learned the Russian alphabet--I can even write it in cursive!--and
> "X" in Russian is not pronounced /ks/. It's pronounced like the "ch" in the
> Scottish word "loch," represented in IPA as /x/ and in ASCII IPA as /x/ or
> /C/ (why two versions!?)
I think /C/ is the palatal fricative in German "ich" and /x/ is
the velar fricative in German "Bach" and Scottish "loch."
Robert Bannister
Wouldn't it be because the letter X in cyrillic is more like our H sound?
--
Rob Bannister
R H Draney
<rob...@it.net.au> wrote:
>R H Draney wrote:
>
>> I've occasionally found myself wondering why the Russian given name
>> "Oksana" is spelled this way in the Roman alphabet, when "Oxana" would
>> work just as well...I suppose some early transliterator overlooked the
>> opportunity because of the wish to represent each letter separately by
>> its Roman equivalent (whether that be one English letter or more)....r
>
>Wouldn't it be because the letter X in cyrillic is more like our H sound?
Then I'd expect them to convert the name to "Okcaha", and English
pronunciation be damned...I'm having trouble thinking of the
appearance of the letter in the target language as much of an
influence...besides the letters that don't look much like anything
Western, there are plenty of Cyrillic letters that resemble Roman
letters to which they *don't* correspond (B for V, H for N, P for R, C
for S, y for U, and as you mentioned, X for H--sort of)...that's six,
as many as the oft-recited list of letters that are the same in both
alphabets: A, E, K, M, O and T, and if you allow 3 for Z, you also
have to consider allowing bI for Y, W for SH, and even "backwards R
and N" for "Ya and I"....
I'd have to go to my reference shelf to check on the cursive
similarities, but the point is that anybody converting one language to
the other is used to picking proper names apart and doing simple
substitution...the point with "Oxana" is that people on both sides of
the former Iron Curtain tend to think of English as "one letter, one
sound", unlike Russian....
Didn't we do the "Exapno Mapcase" thing here last year?...r
Steve Hayes
<illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote:
Fair enough, but English does have an x, and Xenia is the normal English
written form of the name, not Ksenia. But English speakers might mispronounce
it, so it gets written Ksenia in English as well.
Iannis Kyris
in a
> millennium or two English speakers will have managed to do so as well.
Was there a time when the Greeks could *not* pronounce the initial 'xi'?
Aaron J Dinkin
> I once learned the Russian alphabet--I can even write it in cursive!--and
> "X" in Russian is not pronounced /ks/. It's pronounced like the "ch" in the
> Scottish word "loch," represented in IPA as /x/ and in ASCII IPA as /x/ or
> /C/ (why two versions!?)
ASCII IPA [x] is IPA [x]. ASCII IPA [C] corresponds to the IPA
c-with-cedilla. [C] is a palatal fricative, as in German "ich"; [x] is a
velar fricative, as in German "ach". Two different sounds. I don't know
which one is used in Russian, but I would guess [x].
-Aaron J. Dinkin
Dr. Whom
daniel gerard mcgrath
wrote:
>On Fri, 4 Jan 2002 00:03:29 -0600, "mplsray"
"Draw an ox, Xenia; gain Exxon award!"
- A. Ross Eckler
--------------------------------------------------
daniel g. mcgrath
an avid subscriber to _word ways: the journal of recreational linguistics_
(<URL:http://www.wordways.com/>) and 'alt.usage.english' newsgroup
i have AUTISM -- for more information, please see
<URL:http://www.alt-usage-english.org/McGrath.html>.
mplsray
"Iannis Kyris" <ikyris...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:a16vek$ompgd$1...@ID-93377.news.dfncis.de...
As good a place as any, it seems, to throw this in. It was while I was
researching the letter xi that I came across the following:
From
http://www.wikipedia.com/wiki/Greek_alphabet
[quote]
The letter san was used at variance with sigma, and by classical times the
latter won out, san disappearing from the alphabet.
[end quote]
So you could say that from that point on, Greek texts were written sans
sans.
john smith
>
> "Joona I Palaste" wrote
> > <...> people's tongues are too clumsy to pronounce words starting
> > with the "ks" sound. I think this started in ancient Greece and has
> > been carried over into English.
> >
>
> pronounce /ks/ at the beginning of a word <...>
The modern Greeks can too. They're doing it right now, even as we
keyboard.
\\P. Schultz
john smith
Yes. In the summer of 846 BC there was a dreadful outbreak of
trenchmouth in Attica, and the employment of that particular consonant
in word-initial position was suspended until autumn.
\\P. Schultz
Steve Hayes
wrote:
Someone seemed to think so, but I'm not sure how they know. I think it would
be very difficult to know how people pronounced things before the development
of sound recording devices.
Steve Hayes
wrote:
>>Fair enough, but English does have an x, and Xenia is the normal English
>>written form of the name, not Ksenia. But English speakers might mispronounce
>>it, so it gets written Ksenia in English as well.
>>
>>
>"Draw an ox, Xenia; gain Exxon award!"
How does Ekskson grab you?
Iannis Kyris
>
> I think it would be very difficult to know how people pronounced
> things before the development of sound recording devices.
All the same we *do* know that the letter 'xi' was adopted by the Athenians
in 403 BCE so that they could write down a certain sound. That sound was
spelt previously with two consonants ('chi' + 'sigma'). We do not know if
it actually sounded like /ks/ or like /xs/, but AFAIK there is no reason to
believe that those guys had any problem with their 'xi' in word-initial
position.
Best regards
Iannis Kyris
Athens, Attica, Hellas
ikyris...@yahoo.com.invalid
(de-Hellenise my address for email)
------------------------------------------------------------------
'There are no answers, only cross-references'
Iannis Kyris
news:3C37C220...@company.com...
>
> Yes. In the summer of 846 BC there was a dreadful outbreak of
> trenchmouth in Attica, and the employment of that particular consonant
> in word-initial position was suspended until autumn.
That was an *awful* summer! Please, don't remind me.
R H Draney
wrote:
>On Sat, 05 Jan 2002 20:31:15 GMT, dmcg...@yahoo.com (daniel gerard mcgrath)
>wrote:
>
>>"Draw an ox, Xenia; gain Exxon award!"
>
>How does Ekskson grab you?
By not crediting payments when they're received, so they can charge a
late fee....r
--
"Angry? Me?"
mplsray
> "Steve Hayes" <haye...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:3c37c1ea....@news.saix.net...
> >
> > I think it would be very difficult to know how people pronounced
> > things before the development of sound recording devices.
>
>
> All the same we *do* know that the letter 'xi' was adopted by the
Athenians
> in 403 BCE so that they could write down a certain sound. That sound was
> spelt previously with two consonants ('chi' + 'sigma'). We do not know if
> it actually sounded like /ks/ or like /xs/, but AFAIK there is no reason
to
> believe that those guys had any problem with their 'xi' in word-initial
> position.
>
Yes, there are methods of knowing how people pronounced things before the
development of sound recording devices. I sometimes wish that someone would
put up a Web page giving a concise summary of the methods which have been
used to determine such things--I've read bits and pieces here and there, but
it would be good to have it all in one place.
Comparing texts before and after a spelling reform, as you do, is one
method. Another method, available when texts of a language were written in
two different alphabets, is to compare the spelling of a word in one
alphabet with a word in another. One can also study what words are rhymed in
poetry (in those cultures which used rhymed poetry). Then there are old
instruction manuals written by people speaking language A for the
instruction of language B. Very important is the matter of regular sound
changes as described in Grimm's Law and other such rules, which allow us
even to reconstruct forms which were never written down, with a good
assurance that our reconstructions are quite close to the actual forms.
There are all sorts of clever methods. A tutorial on such things would be a
good introduction of the scientific method to those iignoramuses--such as a
teaching assistant I had in a biology class in college--who believe that it
is necessary to have a time machine to learn the truth about the past.
John Holmes
"mplsray" <illi...@NOSPAM.mninter.net.invalid> wrote in message
>
> Yes, there are methods of knowing how people pronounced things before
the
> development of sound recording devices. I sometimes wish that someone
would
> put up a Web page giving a concise summary of the methods which have
been
> used to determine such things--I've read bits and pieces here and
there, but
> it would be good to have it all in one place.
There was a very good spoof story that appeared some years ago, probably
for April Fools Day. It said that scientists had found a way to recover
snippets of background sounds, including conversation, from the fine
scratches left on the surface of ancient pottery as it had turned on the
potter's wheel -- sort of like a primitive wax cylinder recording.
Wouldn't that be fun if it worked?
--
Regards
John
daniel gerard mcgrath
Fontana) wrote:
>As I mentioned in an earlier posting, I use the "merry" vowel in
>"err" (when I don't remember to rhyme it with "fur"). [...]
So you _do_ try to rhyme "err" with "fur"? Can you explain the
history of your experience with the pronunciations of "err"? How does
PPS fit in?
Richard Fontana
>On Tue, 01 Jan 2002 22:15:00 GMT, rfon...@wesleyan.edu (Richard
>Fontana) wrote:
>
>>As I mentioned in an earlier posting, I use the "merry" vowel in
>>"err" (when I don't remember to rhyme it with "fur"). [...]
>
>So you _do_ try to rhyme "err" with "fur"?
When I have time to think about it, yes. It's not something I've been
doing for very long.
>Can you explain the
>history of your experience with the pronunciations of "err"? How does
>PPS fit in?
Well, PPS accepts both /Er/ and /R/. But it's understood that /Er/ is
more likely (whether it's "more natural" is a more controversial issue).
The interesting thing about /Er/ in PPS is that it's not a homophone of
"air". But in isolation it's really difficult to preserve the
non-airness, the merry-vowel-ness, of "err" since it's a
monosyllable. (There's no problem with "error", which of course has the
merry vowel and is nothing like "airer".)
See, "err" is not a word most people start *saying* until their speech
habits are pretty well formed. They might *hear* it first in "To err is
human". And that's so commonly pronounced in AmE with /Er/ (whether
you're MIMIM, MIMBMID or MINMINM) that using /R/ sounds really weird.
I am troubled by the fact that the /Er/ pronunciation of "err" originated
in what has to be called ignorance. Don't blame us; this was begun by
Pre-War American Speakers ("PWASes"). You know who you are, guys! And so
you see I have some tendency to try to make things right and go back to
/R/, as it were. But it's not easy. Then again, how often does anyone
say "err"?
Sometimes I really envy Rightpondians.
Mike Oliver
> See, "err" is not a word most people start *saying* until their speech
> habits are pretty well formed. They might *hear* it first in "To err is
> human". And that's so commonly pronounced in AmE with /Er/ (whether
> you're MIMIM, MIMBMID or MINMINM) that using /R/ sounds really weird.
You think? I absolutely think of the phrase as "to /R/ is human".
So much so that when I saw a headline about Michael Jordan's
return to basketball, entitled "To Air Is Human", I had
to think about it to figure out what they were getting at.