Coptic Month Pronunciation

[copticuser20]

Why do you pronounce the Coptic Months according to the Arabic versions of the words and not the actual Coptic words?

[imikhail]

Why do you pronounce the Coptic Months according to the Arabic versions of the words and not the actual Coptic words?

Can you please give example(s)?

[ophadece]

Another flawed perception that I hoped wouldn't come from Copticuser20. The Coptic months were pronounced first, then transcribed in Arabic letters, and a long time later after corrupting the language with what's called Greco-Bohairic were written in English, and since many of our Coptic language loving youth can only read English and not Arabic they can't see beyond Greco-Bohairic.
Oujai

[Remnkemi]

Ophadece,

I know you are not a fan of Greco-Bohairic, but before you accuse GB of everything wrong in the Coptic language, please review your comments.

The names of the Coptic months, as we currently have them, are Arabic transliteration of OB, not GB. Actually it is a mix of OB and GB (which is more proof that there is no one version or dialect of OB).

For example, ;wout in GB would be "Tho oot" (2 syllables). In OB (the popular dialect), it would be "tood". Also, look at mecory. In GB, it would be "Mesoree". In OB, it would be "masora" which became "misra". Misra is closer to masora then mesoree. And the best example is varmo;i. In GB, it is "pharmothi" (pronounced far moo thi). In OB, it would be "barmota". The Arabic "baramoda" is closer to "barmota" then "pharmothi."

So the current Arabic transliteration, and by default the English transliterations, are based more closely to OB than GB.

Copticuser, to answer your question go to this website. The English transliteration is based on the Arabic pronunciation of the Coptic months.

[imikhail]

Ophadece,

I know you are not a fan of Greco-Bohairic, but before you accuse GB of everything wrong in the Coptic language, please review your comments.

The names of the Coptic months, as we currently have them, are Arabic transliteration of OB, not GB. Actually it is a mix of OB and GB (which is more proof that there is no one version or dialect of OB).

For example, ;wout in GB would be "Tho oot" (2 syllables). In OB (the popular dialect), it would be "tood". Also, look at mecory. In GB, it would be "Mesoree". In OB, it would be "masora" which became "misra". Misra is closer to masora then mesoree. And the best example is varmo;i. In GB, it is "pharmothi" (pronounced far moo thi). In OB, it would be "barmota". The Arabic "baramoda" is closer to "barmota" then "pharmothi."

So the current Arabic transliteration, and by default the English transliterations, are based more closely to OB than GB.

Copticuser, to answer your question go to this website. The English transliteration is based on the Arabic pronunciation of the Coptic months.

Dear Reminkimi,

I do not want this to turn into a long debate, or a short one for that matter.

The only thing I want to caution you on is that you based your conclusion on a modern way of writing the Coptic months (as in the link you provided). However, this way is not the only way to write the Coptic months, and in my opinion, is a modern way.

In addition, the Arabic way of saying the Coptic months is the way they were said in Upper Egypt and that way persisted till today.

Now, if you try to apply the Greco Bohairic way in reading the the Coptic letters as they are written in Saididc, you will get a different way of pronunciation. However, if you apply the Old Bohairic, the authentic, way of reading the letters, you will get the exact pronunciation (the way they are said nowadays in Egypt).

Thanks and God Bless.

[ophadece]

Well done imikhail...
Dear Remenkimi and Copticuser20,
As imikhail elaborately pointed out, the names are Sa'idic. Therefore Baramoda rather than Barmoti, and Mesra not "Masora". Please also note the vowels in authentic Coptic are treated way differently than the flawed Greco-Bohairic teachings, and in many cases, specifically speaking about the letters "o" and "w" are not pronounced as is claimed. Examples are:
mwit - /meet/ as in "Meet Ghamr" (name of a town in upper Egypt), in Sa'idic pronunciation.
ouwrp - /wareb/ as in Bohairic dialect (please note the insertion of a vowel close to the ə in English (as in table, ample, etc)
Ba,oc - /wakhes/ or /wakhos/ in Bohairic.
Oujai qen `P[C

[ophadece]

And of course /tot/, /thot/ or /toot/ because it is pronounced this way; just like that. No artificialness about t being pronounced /d/ ALL THE WAY.
And also people from upper Egypt had the upper hand in transmitting their pronunciation to us (and I argue other dialects) because they were primarily concerned with agriculture, and Nile fluctuations throughout the year.
Oujai qen `P[C

[dzheremi]

ouwrp - /wareb/ as in Bohairic dialect (please note the insertion of a vowel close to the ə in English (as in table, ample, etc)

Where is the schwa in ouwrp - /wareb/, just out of curiosity?

[ophadece]

Dear dzheremi,
There are many instances where there is the schwa inserted between two consonants. I am not sure if that answers the question, because as I pointed out earlier, it is inserted as a sound, not as a spelling of a written letter, if that makes it clear.
Oujai qen `P[C

[Remnkemi]

Dear Reminkimi,

I do not want this to turn into a long debate, or a short one for that matter.

Neither do I.

The only thing I want to caution you on is that you based your conclusion on a modern way of writing the Coptic months (as in the link you provided). However, this way is not the only way to write the Coptic months, and in my opinion, is a modern way.

So you're saying that the "modern" way to spell these Coptic names is wrong? I checked Mouawad and Crum's dictionaries. The Bohairic names of the months are exactly like the website.

In addition, the Arabic way of saying the Coptic months is the way they were said in Upper Egypt and that way persisted till today.

You'll have to be a little more specific. Are you saying that Upper Egyptians pronounce Old Bohairic differently than the OB Fr Shenouda and the Cairenes pronounce it? Are you saying that GB is different in upper Egypt and Cairo?

Now, if you try to apply the Greco Bohairic way in reading the the Coptic letters as they are written in Saididc, you will get a different way of pronunciation. However, if you apply the Old Bohairic, the authentic, way of reading the letters, you will get the exact pronunciation (the way they are said nowadays in Egypt).

So you want to apply Old Bohairic pronunciation norms to Sahidic Coptic? Sahidic pronunciation is different than OB and GB. It's closer to GB than OB. If the Sahidic names are different than the Bohairic (and they are), we can't apply OB rules to Sahidic names if we are to maintain that Sahidic and Bohairic are distinct dialects.

Additionally, even if you applied OB to Sahidic names, it doesn't always give you the same Arabic transliteration. For example, :wout is Bohairic. The Sahidic version is toot. If you apply OB rules, you get "dood" not "toot". But GB and Sahidic both pronounce it "toot". On the other hand, varmou;i in Sahidic is parmoute. In Sahidic, it would be pronounced "parmoute". In proper OB, varmou;i is pronounced "barmouta" and parmoute is pronounced "barmouda". Then the most unusual name is "baramhat". The Bohairic is Vamenw;. In GB, it is pronounced "Phamenoot". There is more than one Sahidic version. The standard Sahidic version is par=mhotp, which is pronounced "paremhotp" in Sahidic. In GB, it is pronounced the same. In OB, it would be "baramhodb". Crum tells us that some Sahidic manuscripts have paremhotp, paremhot, parymhat, pamnhat, and vamenhatp. None of them would be pronounced "baramhat". It is clear that OB proponents seem to apply Bohairic rules to Sahidic inconsistently. (And dare I say "OB rules corrupts Sahidic"?)

The only conclusion we agree about is that the Arabic transliteration is an OB pronunciation of Sahidic words. We can't blame GB for this.

[ophadece]

Dear Remenkimi,
In your reply to imikhail, you show me that you clearly haven't read my post yet. When (or if) you do, would you mind explaining to me what you meant by Greco-Bohairic being closer to Sa'idic than old Bohairic (the way you like it, or authentic Bohairic as I maintain)? I am puzzled.
Oujai qen `P[C

[imikhail]

You'll have to be a little more specific. Are you saying that Upper Egyptians pronounce Old Bohairic differently than the OB Fr Shenouda and the Cairenes pronounce it? Are you saying that GB is different in upper Egypt and Cairo?

No that is not what I am saying and I apologize for not being clear.

The way the the Coptic months are written in Saiidic are different than the way they are written in Bohairic.

I will post images later to clarify this point.

If we follow the Old Bohairic pronunciation in reading the way the Saiidic months are written, then they match exactly the way the months are pronounced today in Egypt.

Does this make sense?

[imikhail]

Here are the links for two different resources:

http://postimage.org/image/2mic8zmec/

http://books.google.com/books?id=ZuYqAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA363&dq=coptic+months&hl=en&ei=gcuATtfbAdC_tgfwwLzKCQ&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=5&ved=0CEcQ6AEwBA#v=onepage&q=coptic%20months&f=false

[imikhail]

It is clear that the if we read the the Coptic months the way they are written in Saiidic using OB, they would match exactly the way they are pronounced today.


You will also notice differences in the way they are written in Bohairic versus how they are written in the link http://copticchurch.net/easter.html.

Thanks.

[Remnkemi]

In many posts before, I was told in OB "e" is always "a", "t" is always "d", "Ti" is always "di". This is only a sample of OB rules mentioned on these forums by you or imikhail. If this isn't so, please let us know.

If these rules are found in OB, then Sahidic names that are pronounced with OB rules, like parymhat, would have to be pronounced "baramhad", not "baramhat". Baramhat is the Arabic transliteration, not "baramhad".

In Sahidic pronunciation, see Plumey's Grammar, the letter p is always pronounced /p/ not /b/, the letter t is always pronounced /t/ not /d/.  Therefore, parymhat, which is a Sahidic word, would be pronounced in Sahidic as /paremhat/. Even though it is not a Bohairic word, GB would pronounce it the same way /paremhat/.

Does that clarify things?