Subj : Strange a bit
To   : Gleb Hlebov
From : Ardith Hinton
Date : Sun Oct 06 2024 22:06:14

Hi, Gleb!  Recently you wrote in a message to Ardith Hinton:

AH>  I guess if I'd never seen your name written down &/or you
AH>  asked me to approximate it phonetically I might spell it
AH>  "A leg ZAN der".

GH>  There's only a slight difference. I believe this is because
GH>  "Alexander" is a Greek originated name

           Quite possibly.  The earliest occurrence of this name I know of, i.e. "Alexander the Great", dates back about 2400 years.


GH>  which came into English via French,

           As a proper noun, maybe.  OTOH it is also used as a botanical name... which my OXFORD CANADIAN DICTIONARY tells me comes from medieval Latin.

           IMHO the history of the English language tends to reflect who invaded the Island of Great Britain at what time & the ancient Romans did it long before "William the Conqueror" did.  We'll adopt a good word from anywhere.  :-)


GH>  and the French tend to pronounce "x" consonants mostly as
GH>  [gz].

           As we do in this case.  I've seen it spelled "Alexandre" In French...


GH>  Russian inherited it directly from Greek so we pronounce it
GH>  the Greek way as [ks].

           ... and I've also seen it spelled "Aleksandr" by Russian Fidonetters. While I can understand that, there are details which continue to puzzle me.

           I think what Alexander most needs to know is that when we shorten his name to "Alex" in English we use the /ks/ as he would.  But meanwhile Dallas & I had a wonderful time researching the topic, for which we thank you... [chuckle].




--- timEd/386 1.10.y2k+
 * Origin: Wits' End, Vancouver CANADA (1:153/716)

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