medieval-religion: Scholarly discussions of medieval religion and culture
At 7:41 AM +0100 5/11/05, Bill East wrote:
>Comgall (d. 603) Comgall was a native of Ulster.
>
>Somebody yesterday asked me the correct pronunciation of Comgall.
>Short answer is, I don't know, but I usually find that with Irish
>words you don't pronounce the consonants (and very few of the
>vowels) unless absolutely necessary. 'Coal'? Irish speakers to the
>rescue, please.
FWIW, I consulted my friendly neighborhood Gaelic-names expert, who says this:
At 1:15 AM -0700 5/13/05, Sharon L. Krossa wrote:
>Well, in 7th century Irish <Comgall> was pronounced very roughly
>"KOV-ghall", if you pronounce the guide as if it were standard
>English (with emphasis on the capitalized syllable)... with the
>exception of "gh", which is a sound not normally found in English;
>it is the voiced version of the <ch> in Scottish <loch> and German
><achtung!> and <Bach> -- so a kind of hard "g" sound that you force
>air through. Some English speakers have this sound in their
>pronunciation of <ugh!> or <ughghgh!> (specifically, the people who
>don't pronounce <ugh> the same way they would pronounce <ug>). But
>for those who can't quite manage this sound, a regular hard English
>"g" sound will suffice.
>
>Modernly the Irish name is spelled <Comhghall> and is pronounced
>very roughly "COW-all" in Irish Gaelic.
(Sharon can be found online at http://www.medievalscotland.org )
--
____________________________________________________________
O Chris Laning <[log in to unmask]> - Davis, California
+ http://paternoster-row.org - http://paternosters.blogspot.com
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