μαιε�?ω

Prolagus commented on the word μαιε�?ω

"I cause to be born".

July 5, 2008

vanishedone commented on the word μαιε�?ω

Quite a vowel cluster.

July 6, 2008

mollusque commented on the word μαιε�?ω

Strange, Prolagus. It's panvocalic in English transliteration (maieuo), but not in Greek, since it lacks eta and omicron.

July 6, 2008

Prolagus commented on the word μαιε�?ω

Right, mollusque. I realized while typing it. Interesting conflict.

This raises a question: How to define a panvocalic? Italian, for example, is graphically a pentavocalic language, but linguistically a heptavocalic one since pèsca (peach) and pésca (fishing) have different pronunciations, and the same happens with pòsta (mail) VS pósta (placed).

July 6, 2008

bilby commented on the word μαιε�?ω

Do you detect any difference in the vocal quality of the a in cinema and ultrà? I know, they are both foreign words but there is also no doubt that they are acceptable in standard Italian these days.

There's also the odd case of da and dà where the accent goes to grammar rather than pronunciation.

July 7, 2008

Prolagus commented on the word μαιε�?ω

In Italian we have just one "a", so it's the same one - except for the stress, of course. Cinema is a contraction of cinematografo (images in motion) so it can be considered Italian (as far as I know).

The spelling of da’ ("Give!") is due to the need to distinguish between the preposition (da = "from") and the verb, if I remember well, just as what happens for di ("of") and di’ ("Say!").

Edit: I forgot to mention that da’ and di’ originate from Latin dac and dic.

July 7, 2008

mollusque commented on the word μαιε�?ω

If the words are written without the diacritics, are they ambiguous? There are lots of homographs in English, but context usually sorts them out. And should I be using diacritics in my listings from Italian?

July 7, 2008