prophe(s/c)y again

[Mark Mandel]

On 10/24/07, Arnold M. Zwicky <zwicky at csli.stanford.edu> wrote:
>
> On Oct 24, 2007, at 4:45 AM, Mark Mandel wrote:
>
> > It goes both ways. Just now I chanced on "prophesy" as a noun, used
> > by Terri Windling (who should know better): "the keys to the riddles,
> the
> > prophesies' answer" (Realms of Fantasy, Oct. 2007, p.32).
>
> ah, but is this just spelling?  this all started with a pronunciation
> difference.
>
> huge number of hits for {"a prophesy"}, but i'd guess that nearly all
> of them represent the pronunciation with /i/.  also many hits for the
> verb "prophecied", presumably pronounced with /aj/.
>

(Was I up at 4:45 am? Ah, Pacific Time.)

"presumably pronounced with /aj/." A reasonable supposition for those who
were writing what they'd heard. But once in writing it can be picked up by
people who don't connect it with /aj/ -- perhaps have never heard /'prOf at saj/
-- and pronounced with /i:/ as the spelling suggests.

m a m

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