Judeo-Christian

[Wilson Gray]

On 11/20/05, Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
>
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
> -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
> Poster: Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at BABEL.LING.UPENN.EDU>
> Subject: Re: Judeo-Christian
>
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> Quoting Wilson Gray <hwgray at gmail.com>:
>
> > On 11/20/05, Benjamin Zimmer <bgzimmer at babel.ling.upenn.edu> wrote:
> > >
> > > * Judeo-Christian, a.
> > >
> > > 1847 _Harbinger_ 16 Jan. 88/2 A unitary religion, embodying the
> > > Judeao-Christian [sic] doctrine of Universal Love, shines, the
> > > torch-bearer of humanity, far in advance of its actual institutions.
> > > http://proquest.umi.com/pqdweb?RQT=3D309&VName=3DHNP&did=3D429940111
> >
> > To the best of my knowledge, "_Judaeo_-Christian" is still the
> prescribed,
> > if not the preferred, spelling.
>
> To be sure. Many of the early cites use the "Judaeo-" spelling, very often
> with
> the "ae" ligature. My [sic] above is intended for the misspelling,
> "Judeao-".
>
> > That's why a lot of people say
> > "Judayo-Christian." In fact, this latter was the pronunciation that I
> used
> > myself till the early '70's, when I heard a Jewish friend consistently
> use
> > "Judeeo-Christian." I gave this some thought and realized that she was
> > correct, given that -ae- is pronounced [i], except in the name, Mae.
> > Nevertheless, in my library days, we uniformly pronounced _Judaeica_ as
> > "Judayica" and not as "Judeeica."
>
> I'm not sure if a knowledge of the "Judaeo-" spelling is a necessary
> prerequisite for the "Judayo-" pronunciation. "Judeo-" could be pronounced
> that
> way on the model of such foreignisms as "Galileo", "Montevideo", "Rodeo"
> (the
> Copland ballet), etc.
>
>
> --Ben Zimmer
>

You're right, Ben. I completely missed the misspelling.

As for your other examples, you're right, again: the yearbook at my college
was called _El Rodeo_, pronounced "el rodayo."

-Wilson

--
-Wilson Gray