Rough breathings in compound words

Erik Westwig ewestwig at palisade.com
Tue Sep 3 15:50:16 EDT 2002


Let me revisit this one more time.

I think I picked an unfortunate choice of example, since the tau --> theta
transformation in hORAW --> KAQORAW complicates things.  Instead, how about
the word hOSIOS and its negative using the alpha-privative prefix, ANOSIOS.
If the former is pronounced "Haw see os", do you pronounce the latter "an
HAW see os" or "an AW see os".  I realize there probably is not a definitive
answer to this question, but I am curious how most of you would say this
word.

Thanks,
Erik

-----Original Message-----
From: Carl W. Conrad [mailto:cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, August 28, 2002 1:37 PM
To: Erik Westwig
Cc: Biblical Greek
Subject: Re: [b-greek] Rough breathings in compound words


At 12:37 PM -0400 8/28/02, Erik Westwig wrote:
>Hi there,
>
>When a compound word is formed, does/should one pronounce the rough
>breathing of the original word?  For example, the word hORAW has the
>compound KAQORAW.  When I try to pronounce this, I reflexively say
>"kath-hor-AH-oh" instead of "kath-or-AH-oh."  Just curious if this is
normal
>practice for others on the list, or not.

There are at least two distinct issues here: (1) present-day pronunciation,
about which I have no advice (there are three or four different schemes
from which you can take your choice); (2) in theory the Theta was an
aspirated Tau, so; that when the rough breathing preceding omicron in hORAW
compounded with the elided KAT, the SOUND "T-h" was SPELLED with a Theta
(Q). In theory (at least) the Theta did not originally have the fricative
sound of "th" in either "the" or "thin" but was rather like the combination
of "t" and "h" in "hothouse.
                                                                --
-- 

Carl W. Conrad
Department of Classics, Washington University (Emeritus)
Most months:: 1647 Grindstaff Road/Burnsville, NC 28714/(828) 675-4243
cwconrad at artsci.wustl.edu OR cwconrad at ioa.com
WWW: http://www.artsci.wustl.edu/~cwconrad/



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