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General => The Common Room => The Lighter Side => Topic started by: ScouseBoy on Saturday 30 July 11 18:10 BST (UK)
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I am posting this because of a discussion on another thread.
Some Place Names are pronounced locally differently from how they look.
Would it be possible to list any of them? Perhaps the BBC has an index for the benefit of news readers.
I will start you off with one or two.
Worsley Mesnes is a district of Wigan. Second word pronounced Mains.
How many transcription errors are caused by these factors?
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Slaithwaite in West Yorkshire: pronounced Slough - it
Cati
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Here's another couple....
Heather in Leicestershire...pronounced Heether
Belvoir Castle...pronounced Beaver
Whitwick in Leicestershire...pronounced Wittick
Groby in Leicestershire...pronounced Grew-bee
RM :-)
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Another-
Trottiscliffe in Kent pronounced Tros-ley
:)
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Ratlinghope in Shropshire pronounced Ratchup.
Bury in Lancashire pronounced Burry locally but by " outsiders" Berry.
Rawtenstall Lancashire pronounced Rottenstall locally.
Viktoria.
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Still in that neck of the woods, Is Darwen pronounced as Darren by the locals?
Then Kirkby near Liverpool has a silent second k so Kirby.
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Just down the road we have Bosham pronounced - Boz um; but a bit further along in Hampshire there is Cosham pronounced Cosh hm.
Anna
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Norfolk ...
Happisburgh pronounced Haze-brrr
Mundesley .... Munslee
Wymondham ... Wind-em (wind as in breeze !)
Hunstanton ... Hunston
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Stourton Caundle in Dorset is pronounced Sturton Candle by the locals - or was when my dad was a child.
Linda
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Three near me in Northumberland..
Cambois pronounced Cammus
Ulgham pronounced Uffum
Cowpen pronounced Coopn
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Hautbois ... Suffolk = Hobbis
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How about some Ulster ones?
Portglenone = Port glen own (not Port glen one- BBC newsreaders please take note)
Maghera = Ma her a ... but Magherafelt = Ma her felt
Camus = Cams
Articlave = Art i cliff
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Greater Manchester area (all ones I've heard "alternatives" for on radio/TV)
Blackley = Blake lee
Wythenshawe = With en shore
Audenshaw = Or den shore
Altrincham = Ol tring ham
Broughton = Bror ton
(I know about the Bury one posted earlier, but can honestly say I've never heard Burry except on discussions about pronounciation - is it fading away?)
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Cogenhoe in Northamptonshire is pronounced Cook no. This is obviously a long standing pronunciation as it appears as the place of birth in 1851 etc, censuses spelt Cookno or Cooknow.
Also interesting are how the names of rivers are pronounced. For example the river Nene in Northamptonshire is pronounced to rhyme with men in Northampton but by the time it reaches Peterborough it rhymes with mean. This completely confuses the traffic news presenters on the BBC who seem to randomly use the wrong pronunciation.
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Cholmondley in Cheshire is pronounced Chumley
BumbleB
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Plaistow in the East End of London is pronounced Plah stoh
BumbleB
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Shipbourne, Kent - "Shibbun"
Boughton: Nr Canterbury, Kent - "Borton"
Nr. Ollerton, Notts - "Boo'en"
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Burgh in Cumbria is pronounced Bruff
and
Torpenhow is Trpena
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Haverhill, Suffolk - A ver ill
Magdelene College in Cambridge - maudlin
In Coventry:
Styvechale - Sty chill
Cherylesmore - charles more
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Must include my favourite Saltfleetby Lincs pronounced Sollerby
Barnoldswick Yorks (Now Lancs -SHAME) Barlick
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In Sussex we have Steyning pronounced Stenning but on TV I have heard it Stay-ning and many years ago when my brother and sister came down from Liverpool to stay she said she had enjoyed the visit to A-run-dle Took me quite a while to realise she meany Arun-del. ;D ;D
Jean
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I currently live in Tamworth in Staffordshire, which I am reliably informed is pronounced Tam'orth. Plus, I am also reliably informed, a "moggie" is a mouse :o
BumbleB
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In Suffolk there is Walberswick - pronounced Wobbleswick
In Norfolk Costessey - pronounced Cossey
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Staffordshire: Brewood is pronounced Brood
Yorkshire: Haworth is pronounced Howuth
Cati
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Harrietsham in Kent is pronounced Harsham
I once worked in London with a chap who'd moved from Manchester and told me he was looking for a flat in Willesden, which he pronounced as its written. I told him it was Wilsdun and he thought I was pulling his leg! People often say Holborn instead of Hoburn too.
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and also in Northumberland
Newsham pron Newsm
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"I take it you already know
Of tough and bough and cough and dough?
Others may stumble, but not you
On hiccough, thorough, slough, and through.
Well don't! And now you wish, perhaps,
To learn of less familiar traps.
Beware of heard, a dreadful word
That looks like beard but sounds like bird.
And dead: it's said like bed, not bead,
For goodness sake don't call it deed!
Watch out for meat and great and threat
(They rhyme with suite and straight and debt).
A moth is not a moth as in mother
Nor both as in bother, nor broth as in brother,
And here is not a match for there,
Nor dear and fear, for bear and pear.
And then there's dose and rose and lose--
Just look them up--and goose and choose
And cork and work and card and ward
And font and front and word and sword
And do and go, then thwart and cart,
Come, come! I've hardly made a start.
A dreadful Language? Why man alive!
I learned to talk it when I was five.
And yet to write it, the more I tried,
I hadn't learned it at fifty-five. "
Cati
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What do you call a bread roll?
Where I live its called a "batch"
This is VERY local to Coventry, Bedworth & Nuneaton.
I don't think anywhere else calls it a batch!
I remember the first time away from home and visiting a chip shop. I asked for a "chip batch please" and no one knew what I wanted! I was quite confused!!
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What do you call a bread roll?
Where I live its called a "batch"
This is VERY local to Coventry, Bedworth & Nuneaton.
I don't think anywhere else calls it a batch!
I remember the first time away from home and visiting a chip shop. I asked for a "chip batch please" and no one knew what I wanted! I was quite confused!!
Does't tha mean a chip butty?
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I knew "batch" as "barm cake" when I lived in Cheshire. Around Saddleworth area the same thing is a "bread cake".
BumbleB
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I was very confused when we lived in York and someone asked me to make some 'buns'. Here in Scenic East Northants, buns are made from sweet yeast dough with dried fruit in. In York, 'buns' are any small cakes. Then we visited OH's cousin in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, and I found that 'buns' are bread rolls! No wonder foreigners get confused!
Here we have Oundle which is often misheard as 'Arundel' if you pronounce it Ow as in brown but if you are a native of Northants, 'ou' is a sound difficult to write because it's like 'e' and 'a' and 'o' all rolled into one, followed by 'w', sort of 'eaowndle'
Then there is Chelveston which use to be pronounced 'Chelsun' locally, but with so many 'incomers', the middle syllable has taken root more firmly.
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near here in Cheshire we have Mow Cop, to be spoken as if you stubbed your toe not cut the grass, clayton bradley
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Luckily I am now fairly well travelled and know what to ask for in local chip shops! Chip buttie in Lancashire, chip Cob in Leicestershire, and so on. Although, I also have a very local accent which also confuses people! However, I haven't been everywhere so would still like to know what others call it.
Bedworth = Bed'uth
Coventry = Cov
Tamworth = Tam'uth
Atherstone= Atherston
Hinckley = Hink lea
Manea = Mainey
Southwark = Suthuck
I'm sure I'll think of more!
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Up the road from me in Sussex is Horsted Keynes - as in canes, not as in Milton Keynes.
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On BBC TV -
Pakistan - Pakistaaaaaaaaaan
Afghanistan ---------------Afghanistaaaaaaaaaaaaan
Estuary English gone mad!!!
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Hope I don`t offend anyone but a lot of southerners -- including Jeremy Paxman --say sickth instead of sixth, and fith instead of fifth.
Viktoria.
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Hope I don`t offend anyone but a lot of southerners -- including Jeremy Paxman --say sickth instead of sixth, and fith instead of fifth.
Viktoria.
And do they say Baath and not Bath?
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My daughter-in-law-to-be comes from 'oop thar' and my son is picking it up from her ... 'bath', instead of his normal 'barth', and of course, 'path' instead of 'parth' ...
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.............and Twelth instead of Twelfth, strenth instead of strength (my mother's pet hate), Viktoria
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Harrietsham in Kent is pronounced Harsham
Is it? I've lived 5 minutes down the road from it for 20 years, and I've never heard it pronounced as such ???
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Hope I don`t offend anyone but a lot of southerners -- including Jeremy Paxman --say sickth instead of sixth, and fith instead of fifth.
Viktoria.
And do they say Baath and not Bath?
Surely the correct pronunciation of a place name is the way the locals pronounce it. Bath is thus one place name which northerners pronounce incorrectly even if they need to call the place they wash by a different name.
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There needs to be some uniformity and good diction, otherwise when people stopped to ask for directions in a different region to where they normally lived, you would not be able to understand those directions.
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There needs to be some uniformity and good diction,
DOOWAAH ?
Sy
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From near where I grew up in Somerset:
Congresbury - pronounced Congs-bree by locals!!
Naish Hill - Nash Hill - that's the hill on the M5 where the caravans cause problems! ;D
Hatch Beauchamp - Hatch Beecham
And from where I then lived, Isle of Man, we have:
Ballaugh - pronounced Bal-laff
but Maughold - pronounced Mack-old?!
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Here's another couple....
Heather in Leicestershire...pronounced Heether
Belvoir Castle...pronounced Beaver
Whitwick in Leicestershire...pronounced Wittick
Groby in Leicestershire...pronounced Grew-bee
In the same neck of the woods, there's Zouch, just north of Loughborough, which is pronounced 'Zotch', unlike Ashby de la Zouch, where it's 'Zoosh'. And then there's Gotham on the bus route between Loughborough and Nottingham (can't remember whether it's in Leics or Notts), which is Goat-um, not like Gotham City. And you can always spot a local when they talk about Coalville, Leics -- they'll put the stress as CoalVILLE, whereas everyone else says COALville.
Then there's Loughborough itself, which always causes a headache when you're trying to say where you live to people who've never heard of it. Alongside the possibly apocryphal story of an Australian trying to buy a train ticket to 'Loogabarooga', I can personally vouch for the fact that an American asked me in all seriousness whether the town I lived in was really called 'Lowbrow'.
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Surely the correct pronunciation of a place name is the way the locals pronounce it. Bath is thus one place name which northerners pronounce incorrectly even if they need to call the place they wash by a different name.
In that case, we should all refer to Paree, Roma, Maskvá (with stress on second syllable) and so on, rather than Pariss, Rome and Moscow. And, with Moscow in particular, do we have to say 'This is Maskva', 'I live in Maskve', 'I'm travelling to Maskvu' and 'I'm from Maskvy'? If the only correct way to say it is like the locals do, then I guess we do. ;)
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Surely the correct pronunciation of a place name is the way the locals pronounce it. Bath is thus one place name which northerners pronounce incorrectly even if they need to call the place they wash by a different name.
In that case, we should all refer to Paree, Roma, Maskvá (with stress on second syllable) and so on, rather than Pariss, Rome and Moscow. And, with Moscow in particular, do we have to say 'This is Maskva', 'I live in Maskve', 'I'm travelling to Maskvu' and 'I'm from Maskvy'? If the only correct way to say it is like the locals do, then I guess we do. ;)
It would save a huge number of problems if that convention were to be adopted. However I was simply reacting to the continual assertion by northerners that the city of Bath should have its name pronounced their way even by southerners, as in the post by scouseboy to which I was objecting.
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In Somerset, or at least the part I grew up in ;D, its pronounced Bath with a short a.
Definitely not Baaath! or Barth!
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In Somerset, or at least the part I grew up in ;D, its pronounced Bath with a short a.
Definitely not Baaath! or Barth!
A short "a" yes but surely not pronounced the same way as the "a" in "at". My Somerset relatives just shorten the actual vowel without changing its pronunciation to the northern sound. Whereas those from Brizzle (sorry Bristol) seem to lose the "a" altogether and just have a string of consonants pronounced Bth.
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That's probably my problem, then!
Grew up in PortZ ;D Or Portishead to non-Bristolians!
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Surely the correct pronunciation of a place name is the way the locals pronounce it. Bath is thus one place name which northerners pronounce incorrectly even if they need to call the place they wash by a different name.
For information of the southerners THERE IS NO R IN BATH!!! There may sometimes be a P, but we northerners leave that to southerners!
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As a Scot I have got used to the English pronounciation of the word LOCH as LOCK.
It is understandable that they just can't produce the correct CH sound.
But I can't understand why they tend to miss the second R from LIBRARY and the first R from FEBRUARY.
Can anyone explain it?
Sy
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Then there's always the county town of Norfolk, which according to the locals is pronounced Narch.
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But I can't understand why they tend to miss the second R from LIBRARY and the first R from FEBRUARY.
Can anyone explain it?
Sy
Laziness which has morphed into usage I suggest.
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As a Scot I have got used to the English pronounciation of the word LOCH as LOCK.
It is understandable that they just can't produce the correct CH sound.
But I can't understand why they tend to miss the second R from LIBRARY and the first R from FEBRUARY.
Can anyone explain it?
Sy
It needs to be acknowledged that the residents of some Scottish towns and cities have excellent diction and excellent pronunciation. Inverness, some people say, has an excellent record on clarity and diction.
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A few districts on Merseyside:
Aigburth.......pronounced Egbuth
Gateacre........Gataka
Meols.......Melz
I love to hear the different accents around the UK....of course, some are easier on the ear than others. ;)
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Some southerners get Maghull wrong, have you noticed? They say it as two words Mag Hull. Instead of Ma gull.
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OOOer! I started something didn`t I?
I was drawing attention to the missing out of the x in sixth and the second f in fifth which I`ve only heard southerners do.
I agree that February nowadays has lost its second R and also Wednesday has become Wensdy, it used to be Wed-n-sday and I suppose before that Wed nes day.
Language is a living changing thing and the different accents add colour but some seem more pleasing than others don`t they. Rural accents seem more attractive.
Up here ---- people generally say book, cook, look etc with a long o sound and it is considered "posh" to say them with a short o but the long o is how it used to be hundreds of years ago so who is correct? Personally -as long as the grammar is correct I say " vive la difference".
To get back to the original topic--Holcombe is locally pronounced as Hokum. Viktoria.
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Some southerners get Maghull wrong, have you noticed? They say it as two words Mag Hull. Instead of Ma gull.
Not only southerners! Most people who don't live in the area mispronounce it until corrected. I live in Maghull, so I know!
:)
Linda
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Strange how folks south of the border have the greatest difficulty with the word "deteriorated".
Skoosh.
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Mousehole in Cornwall ...... Mouzle
Fowey same place ......... Foy
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Rahnd my nek of the woods Greenwich is sed as Gren-itch, Deptford as Det-fd and Lewisham as Loo-sham ;D
Ermy
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Kilconquhar = kinyucher.
Strathaven = straiven.
Milngavie = mulguy.
Greenock = greenock.
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I have been wondering how to pronounce Kilconquhar Shoosh,up till now I thought I had family from Kill-con-queue-haar ;D
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Ah'm still workin on Seoras! Skoosh.
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Leighlin Bridge in Co Carlow Ireland is pronounced Loughlin Bridge.
The village of Old Leighlin is also called Old Loughlin.
Sams Mam
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Near me in lancashire we have -
Oswaldtwistle or rather ozzultwisle. The BBC never get this one right.
Salmesbury is Sa(r)msbry (Northerners need the R - Southerners just say A ;D).
Blackburn, contrary to what outsiders may think, is not said both halves equally. It's not Black-burn it's Blackb'n.
Places with shaw in tend to be shuh like lanshuhbridge (laneshawbridge) and crawshuhbooth (crawshawbooth).
Colne is Cone to people in Blackburn and Accrington but people in Burnley and Colne actually say the L. Somehow. Too close to yorkshire there I think.
Todmorden is Todmuhden not Tod-more-den.
Keighley is Keithley.
I'll confirm Rawtenstall is Rottenstall (or to the young Ro'enstall) and Bury has the same U as burn. Hereabouts we bury the dead and eat berries. They don't have the same sound.
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A few jolly limericks on the subject:
There was a young fellow named Cholmondeley,
Whose bride was so mellow and colmondeley
That the best man, Colquhoun,
An inane young bolqufoun,
Could only stand still and stare dolmondeley.
The bridegroom's first cousin, young Belvoir,
Whose dad was a Lancashire welvoir,
Arrived with George Bohun
At just about nohun
When excitement was mounting to felvoir.
The vicar - his surname was Beauchamp -
Of marriage endeavoured to teauchamp,
While the bridesmaid, Miss Marjoribanks,
Played one or two harjoripranks;
But the shoe that she threw failed to reauchamp.
An adventurous pirate named Menzies
Simultaneously boarded two denzies.
The Rover, Sir Ralph,
Said, "Do you think that's salph?
You don't want to damage your thenzies."
The Baron of Fawsley, Lord St John,
Had a fine buckskin coat with a frt john.
He said, "It was guthven
Me by Viscount Ruthven,
Who thinks I'm a cowboy, or t john."
Pinot :)
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Very Good Pinot!
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Greenock = greenock.
Well said!
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Harrietsham in Kent is pronounced Harsham
Is it? I've lived 5 minutes down the road from it for 20 years, and I've never heard it pronounced as such ???
I was a bit mystified by that as well and had a sudden moment of panic. Being born in Kent but not of Kentish stock I was worried that I might have have been calling it Harrietsham all these years and had secretly become a laughing stock :o
Another Kentish one - Wrotham (Rootam)
Carole
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A variant on the Cholmondeley limerick:
A young man called Cholmondeley Colquhoun
Kept as a pet a babquhoun.
His mother said, "Cholmondeley,
Do you think it quite colmondeley
To feed your babquhoun with a spquhoun?"