"Neanderthal/ ~tal"

[Jonathan Lighter]

Wikipedia explains the two English versions thisaway :

  "The term Neanderthal Man was coined in 1863 by Irish anatomist William King. Neanderthal is now spelled two ways: the spelling of the German word Thal, meaning "valley or dale", was changed to Tal in the early 20th century, but the former spelling is often retained in English and always in scientific names, while the modern spelling is used in German."

  Certainly "Neandertal" has been far more common in my experience over the past twenty years or more, though I grew up spelling and saying "Neanderthal" with the "th". Is this the only English borrowing whose spelling (and to some degree pronunciation) has been changed to reflect a later change in spelling in the source language ?

  I knew an anthro grad student once who derided my use of "Neanderthal" as "wrong."  I told him his use of "toolkit" was "offensive."  Then we beat each other up.

  That last part is fiction. But he did say, somewhat sniffily, that "-thal" was "an incorrect pronunciation," even in English.

  JL


---------------------------------
How low will we go? Check out Yahoo! Messenger’s low  PC-to-Phone call rates.

------------------------------------------------------------
The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org