Scourge of War Boards

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(I had to look up two of these. The French ones are easier!)

Pretty good. I missed off Featherstonhaugh.

I thought that Desaix pronounced his name with the "x" pronounced like in English: "ecks"?

X's are always silent in French

Deh-say

Pretty good. I missed off Featherstonhaugh.

Had to look that one up, but it seems to be...wait for it...Fanshaw. Ironic in a way, because my mother's maiden name was Featherstone. In Ireland we pronounce it like it looks, but in England it's "Featherstun".

Some English pronunciations are just daft. I remember two MPs from the House of Commons: Norman St-John Stevas which was pronounced Sinjin Stevas, and Tam Dalywell which was pronounced Tam Dee-ell.

There's a town in Cornwall called Mousehole which is pronounced Mouzel.

I swear I'm not making this up.

I thought that Desaix pronounced his name with the "x" pronounced like in English: "ecks"?

I've never heard Desaix's name pronounced, but in my experience "x" at the end of a word in French is always silent, but Aix by itself is an exception, I think. Perhaps because without sounding the "x" it sounds like "et", or "est", or "ai".

The reason why I am surprised is because I was traveling by railway in France and I met a frenchman from Strasbourg who worked for the Chevrolet auto company.

I had plans to visit the Marengo battlefield and mentioned this. I thought to ask him how the name "Desaix" is pronounced in French and he was quite sure that it was "Dez-ecks". He had no special insight into how to pronounce the name. He simply saw it spelled on paper pronounced it.

So, I am puzzled now!

Are we sure that it is "Dez-ay"?

We need to figure this out because General Desaix is one of France's great military heroes.

Thanks.

PS Thanks for this great guide.

Remember Strasbourg has the historical Germanic attributes of that region of France and indeed the language at grass-roots level is a German dialect (same as spoken in the Black Forest just across the Rhine.)

Quite possible that someone from that area might have his own slant on French pronunciation.

Geoff Laver
Late of Her Britannic Majesty's 57th Regiment of Foot

Good point.

I was mislead by man from Strasbourg speaking very BAD French !

B)

http://www.forvo.com/word/desaix/

There's a town in Cornwall called Mousehole which is pronounced Mouzel.

That makes complete sense since you can see how "Mouse-Hole" gets 'crunched' and bent by the Cornish accent into "mow-zel", its the same word just slang-ified.

Many of the more curious British names are that way via French (aka Norman) pronunciation or Anglo-Saxon. I think its what makes English such a fascinating language.

BTW according to Debrett's Featherstonhaugh is pronounced how it looks "fether-ston-how"

Other fun British names are

Menzies
Dalzell
De'Ath
Farquhar
Farquharson
Eyre
Garioch
Geoghegan
Home
Melhuish
Dysart

and so on

I have no idea how to pronounce many of those listed English names!

:laugh: