Basic Pronunciation Question
Clwinbery at aol.com
Clwinbery at aol.com
Mon Jul 22 15:57:19 EDT 2002
In a message dated 7/22/02 9:07:08 AM, ewestwig at palisade.com writes:
>Hi there,
>
>I have an extremely elementary pronunciation question that has been
>bothering me for a while. I've been reluctant to ask the question here,
>mainly because: 1) it shows how after a year and a half of studying Greek,
>I still can't even say the simplest words to my satisfaction, 2) I've noticed
>pronunciation questions to this group tend to cause a flurry of debate
>well beyond the original post.
>These reservations aside, here's my question. All the sources I've looked
>at (in books, and on the web) pronounce the word BIBLION like this: BIBLION
--> "bib LEE on"
>
>Now these same sources invariably say the sound of iota should be either
>short or long: short iota --> "i" like the i in pit.
>long iota --> "ee" like the i in machine.
It is obvious that the one who applied accents to this text did not consider
the iota here to be loong but short, hence it had to have an acute.
>Also these same source all say if the accent is on a long penultimate
>syllable, it must always be a circumflex if the ultima is short.
>So... Since the last syllable of BIBLION is short (the vowel is omicron)
>and the iota is pronounced with a long "ee" sound, I would have expected a
>circumflex accent on the iota. Instead, of course, there is an acute accent
>on the iota. But I would have expected this to be pronounced --> "bib
>LI on".
It is obvious that the iota was considered short by those who punctuated the
word in this text.
There is sometimes "irregularities" (if that's the right word) in the "rules"
of accent. Hence, the genitive of PISTIS is accented PI/STEWS instead of
PISTE/WS. Now the EW Is not a diphthong so the latter is what is expected. I
suspect that the EW came to be considered as one sound but not according to
the rules.
Carlton Winbery
Louisiana College
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