New-York tribune., 1900-04-15
HISPRONCNCIiTIONS

Professor w. w. Skeat, in The London Globe.
In an article in The Globe" December IL, 1899.
with this title, various misprOnunciations
dwelt upon. but it seems to he assumed that
they cannot be explained.
The misuse of the initial aspirate is nothing
new. As shown in my principles of English
EtymoIOgy," Series |, page $50, it is found in
the Lincolnshire Romance of Havelok, in the
thirteenth century. l have since shown that the
MS. was written cut by Norman scribe The
phenomenon is, of course due to the collision
OF two habits, that of the Norman, who pro-
nounCed the N in very few words but usually
dropped it, and that Of the Saxon. whose habit
was to pronounce it strongly While the Nor
man was striving To learn English in which he
ultimately succeeded, and the Saxon adopt
ing large number of words into the English
tongue, many attempts to initiate the pronunCi-
alton of unfamiliar words were made on both
sides with more zeal than success, and the
fusion has lasted 10 the present day. The Shrnp-
shire man alone succeeded in establishing }
false uniformity by the simple process Of never
pronouncing an N at ALL so that, at any rate,
he never inserts ore in the wrong place. The
misuse of III is by no means confined to Lon
don; 1t is common Cto say no more) in many
parts of East Anglia.
The loss of final r" after vowel has moth
ing to do with want of education Ii is the
habit of all classes in the South of England:
being. in fact, dialectal. in the speech of many
mot alb educated Southerners the words
though some ditferentiate them by declaring;
that they pronounce the ''r' in morn meaning
thereby that they introduce in the place of the
''r' faint indHtcrminate vowel like the "a"
III China" But this is only VocaliC sound
and not true trilled p The Introduction
of ''r' in the phrase Marian Ann is simply be
cause Maria ends with Il vowel and Ann
begins with one; hence there is confusion with
such phrases there he is the ha bit being
that the r. in there" is only trlled before a
word beginning with vowel, whereas in the
phrase he is there the final ere" is either
Vocalic or diphth0ngal. if the speaker is a South
erner. Northerner would perhaps give il the
trill.
In the case of clerk there is no real use Of
"a" for "e'; rather. the combna ton ..er'' he
comes ar as Is common in old French that
it is of Norman origin This rule is carried out
in common spec n much further than in polite
talk; hence we hear of ''Varmn. 'sarpent" or
"Sarpint varsity for ''univerSity'' and So on
The appearance OF "a for e in The word
Thames is of different origin altogether being
the result of the pedantry of the EenaiSSl nee
period. The ola English spelling was 'Tcmese -
now reduced to 'Tem'se." which is quite right
But the pedants discovered that the Latin spell
ing had once been "Thamesis. 50 they wrote
Than instead o! the English TEN
In short, all the phenomena have been fire.
quently explained in books that treat of English
phonetics. but are still caviare the general.
have little doubt that this statement will eagerly
be assaed, but it is not worth while defendn.
what is sufficiently known to the initiated. There
is no subject regarding which those who have
never studied it are so irrepreSSibly eager to
prove that they have not done as the study
of English pronunciation. AS a fact. the study
of phonetiCs aboUnds with difficulties. many of
which an unpra"tised cannot discern at all