Date: Sun, 3 Dec 1995 09:07:41 -0500

From: "Dennis R. Preston" preston[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]PILOT.MSU.EDU

Subject: Re: /w/ and /hw/



Hmmmmmm. This does not help in the issue I raised. The suggestion that a

German substratum provides the [u] pronunciation (rather than the more

general [o]) addresses my question. It is intuitively satisfying since I

think I noticed this phenomenon first in Milwaukee, a well-known repository

of such features. Tony's observation raises another issue. Why is 'whore' a

'wh' word at all? If it is from Latin 'karus,' the [a] to [o] business is

clear, but it should have been Latin 'kw' to become English 'wh,' (that is,

'hw'). So, Anglicists, why is it 'wh' at all?

Dennis (who has forgot too much of his Germanic philology) Preston

preston[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]pilot.msu.edu



The word "whore" derived from Lat. karus 'dear (one)' where acc. to the First

Consonant Shift [k] [h] ~ [x]. This might be of some help.



\tony