Tecuhtli, teuctli, tekwtli

[Michael McCafferty]

Quoting ANTHONY APPLEYARD <a.appleyard at BTINTERNET.COM>:

> Michael Mccafferty <mmccaffe at INDIANA.EDU> wrote:
> > I should have added that "teuctli" is composed of only *two* syllables:
> > /te:kw-/ + /-tli/, and, of course, the penultimate syllable is strong.
> > The pronunciation of this word and others noted by Dave is "exotic" for
> > speakers of European languages and require some practice to master.
>

Michael says:

I didn't receive this posting or the one I sent that preceded it. In any event,
here is what I wrote that preceded it:

"I haven't had the time yet to look at your site, but
Dave has made some excellent points, Ian. The only thing I would add is vowel
length. Since vowel length is phonemic in Nahuatl, Dave's phonemic /tekwtli/ is
actually /te:kwtli/, where the digraphs /kw/ and /tl/ are actually unit
phonemes (and thus in actual, "vigorous" linguistic transcription would each be
represented by a single symbol, in the first case by a k with superscript w and
in the second case by a Greek lambda."





> Someone raised this matter a year or two ago. I advised him to say
> [te_cuatli], stressed on the [e_], and then to gradually get rid of the [a]
> without letting the [w] disappear or turn into [u].
>
>
Interesting. I've had success just teaching students to first learn to say
[te:kw-], which is not that hard. Then I have them say [-tli] several times.
And then combine the two sounds.

In truth, I don't think there is really any challenge in learning how to **
pronounce** "teuctli" and "Moteuczoma," etc. The challenge is learning how to
not get distracted by the orthography. The sounds are easy.

Michael
>