Re: Spelling pronunciations (was: rhotic miscellany)

[WAISTCOAT aka VEST]
On Sunday, November 7, 2004, at 12:56 , Paul Bennett wrote:

> On Sat, 06 Nov 2004 19:04:12 +0000, Ray Brown <ray.brown@...>
> wrote:
>
>> My dictionary says of the pronunciation /'wEskIt/
>
> Really with an /E/?
Yes, definitely - I've checked the dictionary. Besides JRRT spelling
hardly leaves any doubt:

Gaffer Gamgee (Sam's father) says "What's become of his weskit [sic]?
I don't hold with wearing ironmongery, whether it wears well or no."

Also, it is the dialect pronunciation I knew as a youngster. There is a
tendency in rural dialects of southern england for RP [ej] to become just
[E]. Occasionally it gets into the standard language, for example:
again /@'gejn/ or /@'gEn/ (so also with _against_)
ate /ejt/ or /Et/

Of course there's the well known _ain't_ /Ent/ (which I was certainly
familiar with) that JRRT puns with _Ent_ in LotR.

> I'd've said /'wes:k1t/ (with an ambisyllabic /s/ --
I've no doubt that there are other dialect variants. But the point I was
making is that IME the most common pronunciation now in the UK is
'waist-coat' /'wejstk@wt/.

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On Sunday, November 7, 2004, at 05:57 , John Cowan wrote:

> Ray Brown scripsit:
[snip]

>> Not the side of the Pond, it ain't. They are still often worn -
>> especially
>> if colorful   :)
>
> Hmm, there seems to be a semantic issue here.  MWC10 (www.m-w.com),
> which is an American dictionary, defines "waistcoat" as "1. An ornamental
> garment worn under a doublet.  2. *chiefly British* A vest."  Vests are
> certainly not obsolete.
We've given up wearing doublets long ago   :)

I've been talking all the time about 'British waistcoats', which you
LeftPondians quaintly call 'vests'. The were once (and hopefully still are)
  called 'weskits'. Over here, as I guess you know, 'vest' always means
what you call an 'undervest'
=================================================
[TORTOISE]

On Sunday, November 7, 2004, at 05:57 , John Cowan wrote:

> Ray Brown scripsit:
[snip]
>> It wasn't the first syllable I was commenting on. I imagine all dialects
>> (and ideolects) of English pronounce the syllable with or withour
>> 'rhoticity' according its normal practice. It's the second syllable I was
>> commenting on. When I was a youngster AFAIK practically everyone
>> pronounce
>> it [@s], as they did also with 'porpoise'. But now I too often hear both
>> these words pronounced as tho they rhymed with 'toys' - ach!!
>
> I've also heard a Frenchified [-wAz] in British English.
Ach!!!! How pretentious & ignorant can a person get?!

The French for _tortoise_ is in fact _tortue_ <-- late Latin _tortu:ca_

If the word have stayed as borrowed, we would still be using the French
spelling (tho not pronunciation). I think the second syllable got changed
through the influence of _porpoise_.

_porpoise_ is from Old French _porpeis_ or _porpois_ (and |oi| was *not*
pronounced [wa] then!) for earlier *porcpeis <-- Latin _porcu(m) + pisce(m)
, i.e. "hog-fish"   :)

> But my point
> was that in North America the traditional [-@s] pronuncation prevails.
Glad to know it. I hope the pretentious [-Ojz] does not cross the Atlantic,
  still less the ignorant pseudo-French [-wAz]!

Ray
===============================================
http://home.freeuk.com/ray.brown
ray.brown@freeuk.com
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Anything is possible in the fabulous Celtic twilight,
which is not so much a twilight of the gods
as of the reason."      [JRRT, "English and Welsh" ]

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