Let us start simply, with the names of a few objects. These are all in the grammatical class of nouns, you remember from school about nouns?
| man | → | waskeetomp |
| bear | → | masq |
| woman | → | usqua |
| house | → | weetu |
| tree | → | mahtug |
When pronouncing the words, we are using the English alphabet to try to pronounce the sounds of the words. This is the way in which the early recorders of the language wrote them down. Here is a simple guide to pronunciation:-
| a | cat | short a |
| á | father | long a |
| ay | my | rather like the English "I" |
| b | between puddle and but | |
| ch | itchy | a combination of ch+j |
| d | dee | long e |
| e | me | long e |
| g | as a k | |
| h | hop | |
| i | a in about | or eye. 'i' can be complicated. |
| k | ka | tending to g |
| m | emphasis | |
| n | en | energy |
| o | a | as short a |
| oo | mood | |
| ô | vogue | nasalised, like blánc (fr.) |
| p | as b | |
| q | quack | kw sound |
| s | sun | |
| t | tee | |
| u | uh | as a in about |
| w | water | |
| y | you | |
| z | zee |
There is also a special character which was used to represent a sound 'oo', like the 'oo' in 'mood'. The usual representation in the records is the infinity symbol '∞', but in most modern language revivals, the figure '8' is used. I do the same here.
Here is an additional guide to Narragansett pronunciation I found on Dr O'Brien's web site
There is also some useful information Here
Now for some exercise!
Here are some common everyday objects. How do you translate the names? How do you say the name?
|
poopohs | |
|
anum | |
|
chaquog | |
|
may | |
|
appun | |
|
qussuk |