[Ger-Poland-Volhynia] Words Pronounciations was: Name Translations by Reiner

[Reiner Kerp]

Hello fellow searchers,
dear Tricia!

It is very difficult for me to explain in English, that the pronounciation 
of two words, either written in Polish and German, is identical. I can 
hardly keep up with the English used here (escpecially the abbriviations), 
as I only learned English at school. I have never learned Polish, but as 
time went by - only got a very little experience with this language while 
doing genealogy. It was strange!!!!

Comparing Amalia with Emilie was not a good idea.

When a German says Amalia it will sound the same as when a Pole says 
Em>e<lie. As this differs in the second e from Em>i<lie (according to the 
pronounciation of my wifes grandaunt name "Milscha") it has to be mentioned. 
In Germany Emil is only used for males and Amalia is only used for females. 
When you see a woman having the first name Emilie, you can be shure that she 
has a polish background.

When a German says Jakob it will sound exactly the same as when a Pole says 
Jakub.
When a German says Krantz it will sound exactly the same as when a Pole says 
Krenc.
When a German says Kolberg it will sound exactly the same as when a Pole 
says Kulbarc.
When a German says Schur it will sound exactly the same as when a Pole says 
Schlar.
When a German says Plugh it will sound exactly the same as when a Pole says 
Bloch.

This all is a matter of pronounciation - not translation.

> This is of  particular interest to me as our dau. is expecting our first
> grandchild in 3 months. The kids had just picked out EMILIA as the
> first name for their child. You can imagine my surprise when I saw the
> example given.

As I cannot transmit phonetical characters, I try to help myself with 
examples.

The a´s in Amalie is pronounced like the a in "f>a<re" away.
The m has no difference between German and English.
How the i in Amalie is pronounced is very difficult for me to explain. Maybe 
it floats a bit like the y in "young".
The e in Amalie is pronounced like the E in ">E<dward".

There were very many more problems with the kind of speaking of our German 
ancestors and understanding them by the Poles. Doing the "cluster-search" 
that Otto recommended, makes some of them visible. A big basis (Data-Base) 
is the best you can build on.

Best whishes,

Reiner