Xenography

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Xenography ( gr. Ξένος xénos "foreign" and γραφία graphía ( -graphie ) "spelling": foreign spelling ) is the name given to the habit of adopting foreign words in their original spelling, but pronouncing them in one's own language or in another language. Examples of this are the pronunciation of the word Colgate , which is articulated in German in contrast to the German-speaking neighboring countries, and the pronunciation of the name Schloss Belvedere in Austria and Germany (especially Berlin / Brandenburg) without an ending "e", due to the influence of the French Language.

Another example is the German pronunciation of the Latin abbreviation of Ampersand et ( & ) as and.

Such spellings are even more common in English than in German. This is how Latin abbreviations are read in English:

eg (Latin: exempli gratia: "for example") reads "for instance"
ie (Latin: id est: "that is") reads "that is"

Examples in other languages ​​can be found in the pronunciation of Chinese characters in Japanese (see Kun reading and On reading ). History shows that Sumerian words had a different pronunciation in Akkadian (see Sumerogram ).

See also

Web links

Wiktionary: Xenography  - explanations of meanings, word origins, synonyms, translations

supporting documents

  1. ^ Definition according to Maurice Pope: The riddle of the old writings. Hieroglyphs, cuneiform, Linear B. Pawlak, Herrsching 1990, ISBN 3-88199-676-1 , p. 113.
  2. local Italian or traditional Austrian pronunciation due to French influence - see: Austrian Dictionary. 42nd edition. Österreichischer Bundesverlag, Vienna 2012, ISBN 3-215-04828-0 , p. 106.