Scientific Name Pronunciations

[HoppeHunting]

Hi all,

 

How do you all go about pronouncing the scientific names of species that you find? So far, I've just gone with what sounds right and tweaked it based off what I hear others say. Most genus and species names are derived from Greek and Latin I believe, so looking at pronunciations in those languages may help. But is there any outside resource that you all use, or do you just say it how you see it? I'd hate to disrespect a shark by butchering his name!

[Miocene_Mason]

Maybe this thread could be helpful, I don’t think the sharks will mind.

[Tidgy's Dad]

I think this is very difficult. Apart from the Latin, some are ancient Greek or modern place and peoples names, look at the number of Chinese names for taxa now. Our phonetics don't even cover some of the sounds made. I've even heard well known names like Diplodocus pronounced with emphasis on different syllables. Spelling it correctly is most important, I guess.  

[Brett Breakin' Rocks]

  Indeed .. I muddle through it all the time.  I try to find lectures on the sharks I'm interested in on Youtube. That helps .... 'hopefully' the researchers/scientists rattling off the names know how to pronounce them. 

 

  Where is John Cleese when you need him ?

 

2 hours ago, HoppeFossilHunting said:

Hi all,

 

How do you all go about pronouncing the scientific names of species that you find? So far, I've just gone with what sounds right and tweaked it based off what I hear others say. Most genus and species names are derived from Greek and Latin I believe, so looking at pronunciations in those languages may help. But is there any outside resource that you all use, or do you just say it how you see it? I'd hate to disrespect a shark by butchering his name!

 

 

[Ludwigia]

I agree with Tidgy's Dad that spelling is the most important thing. Being at home in two languages shows me that English and German paleontologists often put the emphasis on different syllables, so which is correct? I sometimes wonder what comes out of the mouths of Russians and Chinese. Of course, it's probably best to be able to pronounce a name correctly in your native language, so I'd suggest hanging out with experienced collectors and experts while keeping your mouth shut.

[LordTrilobite]

Yes, spelling is the most important part.

 

In the natural history museum in Leiden where we prepped Triceratops fossils in a lab where visitors could see it and ask questions, a common question was how to pronounce Triceratops. And they're get different answers depending on who they asked. About half the team put the emphasis "RA" in Trice-RA-tops. And the other half pronounced it as Tri-CERA-tops.

 

 

And there's names like Coelacanth, Coelodonta, Coelophysis and Opistocoelocaudia. The pronunciation tends to vary wildly. I myself am guilty of being inconsistent with these names.

[Ludwigia]

In Germany they say Treeceratops.

[Miocene_Mason]

7 hours ago, Ludwigia said:

In Germany they say Treeceratops.

We talking this or are we talking this?

[ynot]

[oldtimer]

I am one who learned early in my education how to pronounce the scientific names.  I have a Master's Degree in Horticulture and learned well over 4000 scientific plant names

throughout the years.  My first instructor sat on the plant naming board and so he was a stickler for the correct pronunciation.  Kind of drilled it into my head. It was interesting how later in other classes the instructors struggled with names. Learning the correct pronunciation also aided in the correct spelling. One hint is that a lot of the multiple vowels a sounded in the pronunciation.  I too have noticed that with scientific names even professionals have a difficult time.

[HoppeHunting]

15 hours ago, oldtimer said:

I am one who learned early in my education how to pronounce the scientific names.

Awesome! Would you mind if I sent you a couple PM’s with a few shark names that I’ve found particularly difficult to pronounce?

[oldtimer]

9 hours ago, HoppeFossilHunting said:

Awesome! Would you mind if I sent you a couple PM’s with a few shark names that I’ve found particularly difficult to pronounce?

Sure.  I would give it a shot however I probably could not pronounce it well in print/text.

[Cam28]

Every shark lecture I've seen, the Carchar.. sharks i.e. Carcharodon, Carcharocles, etc. is pronounced "Car-car", i.e. Carcharocles is "Car-car-o-kleez". Why the "H" is silent I have no idear

[Miocene_Mason]

4 hours ago, Cam28 said:

Why the "H" is silent I have no idear

When you think about it, “H” is almost always silent. I’m no linguist, but maybe Latin/Greek (whichever it comes from) doesn’t have a “ch” sound, rather the ch in the root carchar (means knife like I believe) was originally K followed by a breathy “h” (hard to to in text) to emphasize the second syllable. Or they just decided it would be that way and I’m conjuring up nonsense, which may be more likely.

[Kane]

9 minutes ago, WhodamanHD said:

When you think about it, “H” is almost always silent. I’m no linguist, but maybe Latin/Greek (whichever it comes from) doesn’t have a “ch” sound, rather the ch in the root carchar (means knife like I believe) was originally K followed by a breathy “h” (hard to to in text) to emphasize the second syllable. Or they just decided it would be that way and I’m conjuring up nonsense, which may be more likely.

You're actually pretty close, history-wise! Most of the Latinate / Romance languages lost their hard 'h' over time with the vulgarization of Latin, whereas the Ingvaeonic root languages (Germanic, and to some hybridized extent, English) retain a harder 'h.' A good example would be our "hospital" where the 'h' is audible, whereas in French, hôpital, the 'h' is silent. In English, various phonemes are present to give 'h' a bit more punch, such as "shout." In the Romance languages, the 'h' serves a different role, such as in the Italian phoneme of 'gh' ("alghe"), but many of which are borrow words. 

[caldigger]

Waa caint chuall juz speek Amuricane?

[aplomado]

If you want to pronounce dinosaur names, this website has recording of them; very useful:

 

https://www.usborne.com/quicklinks/eng/catalogue/catalogue.aspx?cat=1&loc=uk&area=H&subcat=HP&id=6500

[ynot]

6 hours ago, caldigger said:

Waa caint chuall juz speek Amuricane?

Thems wern't bread fer it.

[HoppeHunting]

2 hours ago, aplomado said:

If you want to pronounce dinosaur names, this website has recording of them; very useful:

 

https://www.usborne.com/quicklinks/eng/catalogue/catalogue.aspx?cat=1&loc=uk&area=H&subcat=HP&id=6500

Thanks! If only there was a shark one as well...

[Malone]

On 2/24/2018 at 6:28 PM, oldtimer said:

I am one who learned early in my education how to pronounce the scientific names.  I have a Master's Degree in Horticulture and learned well over 4000 scientific plant names

throughout the years.  My first instructor sat on the plant naming board and so he was a stickler for the correct pronunciation.  Kind of drilled it into my head. It was interesting how later in other classes the instructors struggled with names. Learning the correct pronunciation also aided in the correct spelling. One hint is that a lot of the multiple vowels a sounded in the pronunciation.  I too have noticed that with scientific names even professionals have a difficult time.

I know this is off topic but I was wondering why there is so little information publicly available on pollia condensata chemistry,as it produces they shiniest object known. I could imagine that being a characteristic of the forbidden fruit. I could only find a couple papers on the color structure.

Edited February 28, 2018 by Malone
Typo

[doushantuo]

check your mailbox,Malone