Re: USAGE: maneuver was THEORY: lexical shift [was Re: Time machine]

[I don't remember if I sent a message like this earlier.  It's so inconvenient
to post to conlang that half the time I look over a message and decide it's
not really worth posting it anyway.]

From: "Tristan McLeay" <kesuari@...>
> Yes, I know, that was the point of my post.  I was wondering if the loss
> of the <o> from <manoeuvre> suggested that the /j/ had already been lost
> from /nju/; I say /m@n}:v@/ too, but /nj}:tri:n8u/, /nj}:tr@l/, /dZ}:s/.
No, the American thing is that original <ae>, <oe> digraphs[1] get respelled
as
<e>.  Encyclopedia, estrogen.  (With rare exceptions: coelacanth.)

Nothing to do with the loss of /j/, which still is in some American words with
<neu> (e.g. <aneurysm>.)

> The triagraph <oeu> doesn't suggest any sound at all, it's used in oh so
> many words (can anyone think of another?) that it's okay.
Well, there's <oeuvre>, but that probably doesn't count because it's the root
of <manoeuvre>.



    *Muke!
[1] Except from classical <aë> (aero-) and <oë> (poet), which weren't the same
sound as <e> at the proper time
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