Re: pronunciation of chrysographes
- To: i*@Rt66.com
- Subject: Re: pronunciation of chrysographes
- From: t*@Lanl.GOV (Tom Tadfor Little)
- Date: Mon, 6 May 1996 12:03:36 -0600
Doc Dave Silverberg writes
:Tom: I don't mean to seem argumentative BUT according to "Pronunciation of
:Iris Names", page 509, "Garden Irises," the pronunciation is given as
:(cry-so-GRAH-feez). I would tend to find this more acceptable since the word
:means "gold writing" (referring to the gold colored blaze on the falls) the
:emphasis should be placed on the "writing."
Both pronunciations are certainly in circulation. The rules of stress in
Latin make the stress fall on the antepenult (the "so" in this case) whenever
the penult ("gra" here) is short, which it is in this case. It doesn't
matter whether the word is a compound or not, it is stressed as though
it were a single word. I agree that it is a pretty natural idea (at least
for English speakers) to pronounce compounds as you would pronounce each part
separately. But that's not the practice in Latin, and most botanists
respect the Latin rules for placement of stress in their pronunciations.
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Tom Tadfor Little tlittle@lanl.gov -or- telp@Rt66.com
technical writer/editor Los Alamos National Laboratory
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Telperion Productions http://www.rt66.com/~telp/
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