The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-08-08
CURIOUS ENGLISH NAMES.
Queer PronunciatiOns of Words Thar
Are oddly Spelled.
From the Chicago Times-Herald

Are Oddly Spelled.
From the Chicago Times Herald.
Chumley and Cholmondeley. Marsh
banks and Majoribanks and few SINH
lar exhibitions of freakishness in the pro
nunciation of English proper names have
gone far to convince everyone that there
are no rules by which it can be told in
advance how an effort of this kind is
going to sound, however well known its
spelling may be. But the real enormites
of the English system or lack of It can
only become apparent to the careful stu
dent of such matters-and the more care
full the student the greater the enormi-
ties He will, it is true succeed in bring
ing out rule or two for the guidance Of
those who come after him, but the rules
will be few and the names many. SO that
his work is of little value at best. 1t can
be safely said, however, that an English
mans name is his to muss up quite
as much as his home is his castle, and
the results of the one are as incongruous
as the castleship of the other. There
are three names from the French, to take
an example quite at random, which came
into English at nearly the same time and
have much the same sort of meaning.
These are Beauchamp, a pleasant field;
Beauclerc, a good writer, and Beaufn,
we'll ended, all of them, it will be noted,
having the same word for their first sy-
liable. Will it be believed that they are
pronounced as if spelled beecham, with
a long ''e;' boclar, with a long o." and
bff1n, with a short "i?" What, then, is the
law governing the word beau" in compo.
sition? There isn't any.
But there are few laws, as has been
cot 10, ia .rr9+h fhar
sylables, itself being the last, is always
called stun" Thus Blackstone and
Blackstone are spelled ndiferenuy buX-
ton and blaXton, while Gladstone is called
gladstun, of course. "Ou" at the begin
ming of a name is "oo'' long as In Ouse
Ouless, Outram, Ousely and some Others
cough" has the uniform sound Of ''ui
in monosyllables, as in Clough Hougl
and Tough. instead Of being distributed al
over the alphabet. as in common nouns
In the terminal "cester" the two letters
&C" and ''e' are not sounded, and they
generally succeed in drawing others down
with them: Worcester and Leicester are
well known, Bicester (bister), Cirencesl
(siseter), and some others not so muc1 81,
&C" is generally hard before ''e' ana !
also, as in Elgin, elliott, Gill; Clifford am
some others. but short in Nigel, LaHH
name, and in Gillett, as coming iron.
Giles, another Latin name. Termm"
'ohun" is "oon," as in Bohun and Mohu''
Hope" is up" with a short u, as ~
Courthope. Stanhope (cortup, stanupl' ari
many more. Ham" is "um," the Vow
sound being the obscurest possible. nj
does the IN" in this soften the e. Il may
happen TO follow, therefore Gotham
got'm. Hotham is hutm, Bentham PEN -
and so on. "Ys" as an ending might o.r
ter have the "y' out, for Oldys Is o.
Sandys. sands; Pepys, peps, peeps or plssi
"a" is long i'm Aram and Avon, ana "
also long in the first syllables Of bai--'
Bagehot (baje-uD. and Bathurst w.
the 9TH" is sounded as In the word iH'
"Er" is generally pronounced ar ~
Berkeley, Derby, Herts, HEREFORD, ~
went and many more. This is one ts
English rule In such matters, as mag "A
seen in Bartram and Bertram. beIu.,
and Barnard, and in the common hots
merchant" and CLERK" from W.
come the not unusual family name, ...
Marchant and Clark. Short 20
quently the short "a" Of to-day ~ n
Cromwell, Boleyn and others ana Ian
just here or hereabOuts that rule al
How can law for final *" Doe etU.'ui
from data which include Moyncux mon ,
nooks). Meux (muse), Vaux CvaNhsL. ,'y
GeX de jay) and a few others ','r,
miscellaneous? What OF Crichton l,.-r,
and CREIGHTON (crayt'n)2 When emu
rs In two syllables as well as spo. ,v1
why should Cheves and Lewes pt ~. iy
syllahles also? How can you, or a1s ,Ig
account for Ascough (ask-you). n.,oss
(bu-ikl. and Lcveson Cu-s'n). t'..s..
knows that the poet Cowpcr ana th' n.
ist Cooper pronounced their FANNY '..r..
alike. but why did they spell th,h 'i .r
entity? IL all ends up IN the wise a. ~
cient saw that a fool can ask q4'
but
There r. see OF English names N ,~
mon use which are derived from ". M
pcllations OF saints. and these .lon
far corruptlons may extend.
Tuley On from g. Olnve. Sidney 100
Denis. Simbarb from g. Barrie =
sIrHivcr. 81 Paul. Simple, semp ...st
pole. e. Loe saliow. st. Cnir ,f.,~
s.nkicr. st. Lcgcr Ehllngcr, hi
sliiaryi ST. Amand. snnlem1n
&c. lie, Eenley. Sonils. 81 h'N
Table. Sc Orytho. syfh. sifhe. ih
u1nrH tfffs THESE fha raHHff ~.
pared for almost anything n Ehs'-D