Unexpected ways your baby's names are mispronounced

[CoalCraft]

I have two daughters, Beatrix and Lois. I thought these were two classic names with a single settled pronunciation each, with minimal room for misinterpretation, at least by native English speakers. Both was I wrong!

For the avoidance of doubt, we pronounce these names...

• bee-uh-trix
• lo-iss

And yet DD1 is often called "beet-rix" and DD2 is often called "Loyce", as in rhyming with voice.

i usually let the first go as I just think "close enough", but I can't resist correcting "loyce" 🤢

Beatrix is sometimes also called "Beatrice", which is an understandable mix up that we did expect but is annoying when even family do it, and Lois is often misheard as "Lewis" so that people assume she's a boy. Not bothered by either of these when the general public do it though.

So what unexpected mispronunciations or misinterpretations did you encounter after naming your baby?

Ok so I might be being a bit over-sensitive, reading my messages back - but this has always annoyed me. I know how this name is pronounced, it is Greek, it's not up to a whole nation to decide to say it wrong. (I am half Welsh, before anyone starts)

Nothing to do with being in the bible - it is of Greek origin, and the Greek say it Lo-iss. How would you like it if you name had been butchered your whole life, including by the country of your birth, who insists that they know how to say it (wrongly)?

@TallulahBetty , do they? I believe they say it as Loys

The greek say it as Loys, I mean.

No. I have looked it up many times over the years. Anyway, bowing out now as this has irrationally angered me

It has a lot to do with the Bible - many names in the Bible are pronounced as if they were in the language that the bible is written in. Paul in French sounds different to Paul in English

DH is Craig and when we spent time in Australia they had huge difficulties with it. Chris, Crag, Creg, all of these.
A Scottish friend living in Australia has a daughter called Islay, like the island (Eye-La) and everyone pronounces the Y, and sometimes the S as well.

People change how names are pronounced all the time, it's a normal part of localisation. "Jesus" is pronounced very differently in English than in Spanish, for example, and I'm sure both are very different to the original Aramaic.

I'd never heard the "Loyce" pronunciation before I named my daughter Lois but that doesn't mean there's anything wrong with it (other than it sounding ugly to me, personally)

I thought they would be pronounced:

Beatrix (Beer-tricks) as in Beatrix Potter

and

Lois (Loo-ee) as in Louis Vuitton

Jesus is from Hebrew, I think. Same origin as Joshua. Yeshua
The Paul example should have included a german Paul.
.

Oh, I just Googled and apparently historical Jesus would have spoken Aramaic, so I guessed he would have been named in that language too, but quite happy to be told it's Hebrew. I'm no biblical scholar!

@TallulahBetty when people mispronounce her name - her name is Lois (english pronunciation), so the welsh pronunciiation is probably quite unpleasant to her.

But to accuse the welsh of butchering a perfectly acceptable welsh pronunciation of name is out of order.

If you have a name with more than one pronunciation in use, then you will almost certainly get both.
Lots of names have more than 1 pronunciation in the UK-
Lucia, Clara, Maria, Sophia,
Iona (two different names with the same spelling)

I get both Joyce and Josh regularly, the first usually in person but both in person and in emails. My name is relatively unusual so I don't really blame randoms but even my auntie calls me Josh! Every bloody time, every Xmas card. You would have thought she'd have noticed by now that I'm not a man 😅

What other way is there to pronounce Clara? I thought that was one of the easy names!

I would have thought so, too! I suppose some might say cl-air-a?

Yes, I knew someone at school who pronounced it Clair-a.

@caroleanboneparte , Clara was Clair-a until fairly recently. Have you not seen David Copperfield on the telly?

@CoalCraft , I believe he spoke Aramaic with some Hebrew and a little Greek. I was taught that the name was from Hebrew, but can't say for certain.

Weird post.

Lots of names vary in pronunciation and spelling depending on the language. Which version of John do you consider to be correct? Are the many, many other different ways of pronouncing and spelling John wrong and “butchering” the name?

The English language itself is far from above adopting names and pronouncing them differently to what is “correct” Louis pronounced Lewis for example. Do we think Amelie is pronounced “correctly” in the UK? It most certainly is not.

My son Caleb (Kay-lub) got called kleb on the phone by the gp the other day, and continued to call him kleb even after I'd used his name in a sentence. I found it amusing.

@SemperIdem , My earlier post missed out a few words, something like 'I can empathise with how it feels for ', but she's wrong about the greek pronunciation of her greek name. According to a greek cypriot by birth and Greek mother tongue friend, it's 'Loys', so @TallulahBetty is not correct in her accusation.

Caleb is said as CAL-ebb in Welsh.

Going back a few pages, 'Craig' is pronounced 'Crag' in Gaelic. And 'Cairn' is 'Carn'.
So people who say the names that way are not wrong.

I have an Isabelle, expected the spelling issues but didn’t expect how often people would hear Isabella.

Lois = Low-iss (Lois Lane or the mum on family guy!)

Sort of similarly, I have a Natalie which was usually said and written as Nat-ly by young children. Quite cute, in a way.