Re: [tied] Re: -ow

Brian M. Scott wrote:

>
>>So the greek beta wasn't 'definitely v'. /B/ is a good
>>enough approximation to /w/ for someone who wants to
>>design an alfabet for a written language.
>
>
> As I recall, beta had already ceased to be pronounced [b]
> several centuries before the Cyrillic alphabet was devised.
> Moreover, Ptolemy writes <Ouirokonion>, not <Birokonion>,
> for Roman <Viroconium> (Wroxeter, Salop.).

That's because he was transcribing the Roman pronunciation, which
pronounced 'v' as 'w'. For that matter, the distinction between the
letters "V" and "U" is a later innovation - so the Roman name was
<VIROCONIVM> or (to better suggest the sounds to our eyes) <uiroconium>.

Stephen
--
A clever man commits no minor blunders (Goethe)