 How to pronounce trilobite names - Wie spricht man Trilobitennamen aus? |
Jens 
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| How to pronounce trilobite names - Wie spricht man Trilobitennamen aus? |
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Hi all,
I stumbled in the fossil-forum about a topic about the right pronunciation of scientific names.
http://www.thefossilforum.com/index.php/...__1#entry303812
This topic is not explicit about how to pronounce a trilobite right, but some of the used examples are trilobites and so I think its a good idea to collect some informations for "How to speak right".
The difficulties of the right pronunciation are broad, because not many people are able to speak latin or greek well. And many scientific names include also elements of many different languages.
Maybe in Europe we have some advantages, because we are used to use different languages and some had also latin in school. but not me;-)
I think Löwe is more educated in the use of latin and greek. And may be we should look for some samples to explain how to speak somewhat right.
Its real fun to hear how other Scientists speak a genus like Calymene.
I heard it recently how Richard Fortey spoke that word - Kali-mini
The germans speak it in a different way like - Kali-mé-ne - with the first e accented and the last e (not as a i) short.
Another example was a story in Morocco, we heard there the first time how the spiny trilobite Psychopyge was spoken in french.
It was like Psycho-püüsche (sorry this is the german pronunciation and may be not understandable for the normal anglo-american speaker;-)
Okay, we speak Psycho in a different way than in "American Psycho", its same in french and german, spoken the first part in two syllables "Psü-cho (the greek y is spoken as the german ü, which is unknown in english or may be similar to the y in abbys and the "ch" is spoken not as a hard "c", its more longer, like in "ch"ain, but a little different cho) and the "pyge" are also two syllables "pü" and "ge".
But the french pronunciation was different because they speak the "ge" very soft and not hard as it should be spoken.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Germanic_umlaut
Probably Psychopyge ist not a good example, because of its greek orign, but anyway, basics in greek and latin are necessary to pronounce right;-)
psych -> http://wordinfo.info/unit/2730
pyge -> pygidium (lat.) -> derived from the ancient greek "Àῡ³¯´¹¿½" = rump (Steiß) or uropygium (for birds)
German and latin are in some respect more similar in pronunciation than the french, a language with roman roots. Its a joke of history, the german fights back the romans in their history (e.g. battle in the Teutoburg forest) but our language sound more after latin than the french or also english. England is also a country which was occupied by roman troops for some centuries;-)
And Its funny, that there a lots of linguistic limits in the english language, making a correct pronunciation difficult or not possible. Because "umlauts" or vowel mutuation as ä, ö, ü, which are also with a similar sounds (bu other spelling) part of the latin and greek. They were reduced into nothing during the evolution of the english language, but they are necessary to speak the names right;-)
I found for the moment only german explanations for speaking latin and I have to note, that there are different way to speak something...
http://de.wikibooks.org/wiki/Latein/_Sch...es_Lateinischen
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lateinische_Aussprache
edit: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Latin_spell...d_pronunciation here in english;-)
Hope we can add some more examples, for instance.
Ceratarges.
Here we use the C as a Ze, like in ammonites the ceras, also with a stressed s spoken.
greetings,
Jens
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22.02.2012 11:35 |
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Tapir
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Corect latin pronounciation of Ceratarges is
"Kerátarges" with a hard "K" like the first letter in german "Käse" or in english "cake", if I remember right...
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22.02.2012 13:54 |
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Jens
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22.02.2012 14:09 |
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Jens
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Mmh,
I think the more accepted usage is ceras with z rather than k.
Calamites, Calymene this are examples for the C spoken as K
Ctenocephalus - Kteno - zefa-lus
Ceras, Cerathophthalmus, Cerithium, Triceratops - are examples for using c with z.
I'm not sure if scientists are always right and there are different schools of pronunciation but only one right spelling;-)
For me, the usage of the Church latin appears more reasonable and the usage of PleurO-Keras sounds not really convincing to me.
@Tapir: I wonder how you know that you pronounce right and that I'm wrong.
By the way, it was not my attention to be funny about other pronunciations, I want to discuss that matter and present the difficulties. Anyway.
greetings,
Jens
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22.02.2012 15:36 |
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Xiphogonium
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Well, Gentlemen, the language problem .... 
First of all, both English and German belong to the same language tribe, i. e. the Indogermanic Languages. For me, personally, it is pretty easy to anticipate how a native speaker of English will pronounce such names, as English follows certain pronunciation patterns - a characteristic shared by almost every other language.
It is normal behaviour to pronounce names in a "common fashion", so to speak, in reference to one's own language and regardless of their origin(s).
So while we say Psychopyge in German, it is obvious for a Briton or American to pronounce it "Saikopigii" (The phonetic transcription used here is not the official one, I did this on purpose!)
So unless you (meaning anyone) have studied Latin and Greek including the phonetics you will pronounce names they way you think them most likely to be pronounced correctly, right? 
At the end of the day, the important thing is that when in conversation with friends from abroad we know what trilobite we are talking about. 
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22.02.2012 15:49 |
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Jens
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than my dear friend, I will correct you in any case you use a Z for a c, that will be fun. Because I never heard you speaking, in that way you describe here as the right one;-)
And may be you are right and i'm wrong.
Okay, I try it Kephalopda, Kerithium, ZigzagiKeras;-)
regards,
Jens
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22.02.2012 15:53 |
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Jens
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Hi,
I think after that short controversy we can see, how difficult it can be to speak scientific names right and one name must not sound the same in a other language, but this was originally the attempt by using latin or latinized words in the scientific language, always with the problem that the own mother tongue gave us limits or let us think, that we do it in a right way.
The languages live also a dead language as the latin, several different slangs exist and after my experience we use in Germany more the way of the Church latin when speaking latin words.
The classical variant might be the right, but its the same than car driving, you will never drive in the same way you learned it at the driving school;-)
greetings,
Jens
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22.02.2012 16:07 |
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Jens
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22.02.2012 16:48 |
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Jens
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And here are some rules for english pronunciation of biological latin, which should also include the paleontological names.
http://capewest.ca/pron.html
After reading, my version of C = z seems not so bad
Caesar - spoken as Seesar
also interesting for german speakers, a list of latin and greek words used in the biologic systematic.
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liste_latei...chen_Systematik
and also a hint that Johannes might be right when saying Keras than Zeras
ceros greek: keras Horn e.g. Narwal, Monodon monoceros
greetings,
Jens
Add: Interessantes PDF zur Systematik
http://www.landesmuseum.at/pdf_frei_remo...5_0017-0032.pdf
E. GEISER: Die biologische Systematik vor und nach Linné oder warum Carl von Linné kein Systematiker, sondern ein Informatiker war.1
A b s t r a c t : Biological Systematics before and after Linnaeus or why Carolus Linnaeus was a Computer Scientist rather than a Systematicist. Modern biological systematics started with the "Systema Naturae" series by Carolus Linnaeus, about 250 years ago. His methods were so successful because he used concepts which are research items of computer science, nowadays.
1. Hierarchical order by a tree (a structure studied by graph theory) for all species of organisms. Clear criteria for classification and quick retrieval.
2. A concise identifier for each species (concept of the Primary Key). This leads to multiple joins of the species information in different contexts.
3. Binary nomenclature contains more information by using the combination of genus name and species name and also reduces the complexity to square root amounts. With two words for each species you need by far fewer words as identifiers for all species.
The Systema Naturae by Linnaeus caused an immense innovation in biological sciences. The clear and handy critera for his methods of description and classification of new species accelerated the inventory-establishing process for the species of Europe and the many species newly discovered by the great expeditions starting then. The growing knowledge about species diversity and their classification by a tree structure resulted in the discovery of evolutionary theory, after all. Even nowadays, while biological systematics is synonymous to phylogenetic systematics or cladistics, the concepts of Linnaeus, based on computer sciences, are excellent approved methods.
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22.02.2012 16:58 |
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Löwe4
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Ist ja interessant, dass die Diskussion in Englisch geführt wird. Nicht dass ich diese Sprache verstehe oder ständig brauche, aber das in einem deutschen Forum. Vielleicht sollten bei dem Thema doch lieber gleich lateinisch korrespondieren. Haec propositas facilitat communicationem universale.
Als alter Lateiner und Grieche kenne ich die Diskussion von meiner Ausbildung. Was man sicher sagen kann: es gibt kein Richtig oder Falsch, alles ist Konvention
Wenn ich nur schon die Ausprache von deutschen Wörtern durch Schweizer oder Deutschen (ich verzichte auf geschlechtsneutrale Formulierungen) denke (inklusive Helvetismen), gibt es schon spürbare Unterschiede. Es geht nun nicht darum, den Orginalsound hinzukriegen, sondern zu erreichen, dass man sich versteht. Das fängt ja schon bei Forennamen an. Richard Fortey wird wohl "Trailobaitei" sagen, da habe ich schon Mühe zu verstehen, was er meint. Das die Vokale im Englischen so unterschiedlich ausgesprochen werden, ist für das Verständnis bei uns fast noch ausschlaggebender. Eine saichopaigi zu haben ist schon, aber welcher deutsche Triii-lobiten-Sammler weiss schon auf Anhieb, was damit gemeint ist. In Amerika gibt es verschiedene Aussprachsweisen. Es ist schon ein gewisser Chauvinismus vorhanden, d.h. jeder nimmt an, dass seine Aussprache wohl richtig ist. Auch wenn Regeln bestehen heisst das nicht, dass diese richtig sind. Die Duden-Diskussion auf die Aussprache zu erweitern würde zu einem aussichtslosen Glaubenskrieg ausarten.
Also, versuche so zu sprechen, dass Dich Dein Gegenüber versteht. Basta. 
Löwe
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22.02.2012 18:37 |
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Jens
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Danke Löwe,
schöne Ausführung, ich antworte mal auf deutsch,-) Habe englisch genutzt, weil wir doch ne Menge Mitleser aus Übersee, aber auch Belgien und den Niederlanden haben, die recht glücklich sind, wenn wir nicht zu viel auf deutsch quasseln;-)
Meine Anmerkung Glücklicherweise war Linné ein Europäer und die Wurzeln der Wissenschaftssprache liegen in Europa, also sollten wir auch die Deutungshoheit haben.
Aber du hast sicher recht, es bilden sich überall unterschiedliche Aussprachen ein und desselben Wortes heraus und wie für uns die englische oder französische Aussprache eines Namens "strange" klingt, so wird es auch für andere sein, wenn sie uns sprechen hören;-)
Wie du schon gesagt hast, Anspruch und Ziel ist das gegenseitige verstehen. Notfalls mit Skizzen;-)
lg,
Jens
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22.02.2012 18:50 |
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Fred
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Well, Jens' first post refers to a thread at the fossil forum, where member 'oilshale' says it all. Latin pronounciation has some variants, and whatever consensus exists concerning pronounciation, in the field people develop their own slang, usually being the variant of latin that suits them best, combined with a thick fat accent.
Ceratarges would be pronounced by most Belgians as "Sératargès" (harder g), Moroccan French goeds towards "Sératàrgis' (softer g).
In the end we understand one another.
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22.02.2012 18:52 |
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Jens
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Hi Fred,
the german use of Ceratarges is the same like in Belgian, with exact the same accentuation (accent aigu et accent grave);-)
but how is it with the examples which are used in the fossilforum,
Asaphus kowalewskii -> the one with the long eyes.
by the way Kowalewski is a russian family name
or Asaphus punctatus ;-)
lg,
Jens
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22.02.2012 19:48 |
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Löwe4
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Extincta animal trilobita res forum Trilobita laetificat omnes. Lingua franca Britannica adhibet radices Graeca animalibus elocuta incertum.
Leo
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22.02.2012 20:56 |
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Jens
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22.02.2012 21:58 |
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