Re: CHAT: Lost (was: Azurian.)

JV = John Vertical
E = Eugene

JV>  "lost" is one of the few exceptions to the rule of <o> being /o/
JV> before /st/,

E>This is interesting; I'd never thought about that before. So on the
E>one hand we have lost, cost, dost (archaic of course),

I've usually heard <dost> pronounced homophonously with "dust" rather
than rhyming with "lost".  But I haven't been hanging around in the
Middle Ages much, so take that with a grain of salt.

Based purely on phonics I would expect <ost> to have a short vowel (be
it [a], [O], [Q], or whatever).

A quick scan through /usr/dict/words, leaving out compounds with
-frost, -most. -post and so on, finds 14 -ost words, exactly split 7-7
between short and long O:

Short O:
accost
cost
frost
lost
Pentecost
provost
teleost

Long O:
almost
compost
ghost
host
impost
most
post

The words accost, Pentecost, and almost might be pronounced by analogy
with -cost and -most, but aren't really compounds of them.  Compost
and impost are etymologically related to post but, again, not
compounds.


--
Mark J. Reed <markjreed@...>

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