Re: Questions and Impressions of Basque

--- Andreas Johansson <andjo@...> wrote:

> _Gitler_ and _Xitler_* in WWII stuff.
My wife (Ukrainian) says 'Gitler', and 'Gyugo', for
Hugo (Victor) (and 'Gavr' for the French port of Le
Havre). True, I sometimes told her that she pronounces
"havarit'" rather than "govorit'" when we speak
Russian, but it seems that she is not really aware of
it, she *thinks* she pronounces it the Russian way.
And I *think* this is not quite true.

> Judging from my atlas, Ukrainian has something spelt
> transliterated as 'h' where
> Russian has 'g' - Chernihiv for Chernigov, and so
> on. The little voices in my
> head say this is probably relevant.
It's really a mistery to, how such different sounds as
'i' and 'o' can be used alternatively in similar words
between Russian and Ukrainian. Kiev airport, Borispol,
is Borispil in Ukrainian. If, as I believe, '-pol'
comes from Greek 'polis' (city), than I wonder why the
Ukrainian changed that 'o' into 'i'. Or maybe it comes
from Russian 'polje' (field, ground) ? (but, same
remark).

> * I'm not sure about how the Russians pronounce the
> 'i', but I'm hoping for near
> cardinal, to maximize the similarity of the initial
> syllable to Swedish _skit_
> [xi:t] "shit (n)"!
>
To me, Russian, German, Spanish, Italian and French
'i' are all the same, usually. I'm not sure for
Swedish, but I think it's the same too.


=====
Philippe Caquant

"High thoughts must have high language." (Aristophanes, Frogs)


		
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