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Question

zuzu

So, it occurs to me that I’ve been writing things like, “We’re on the road to Gilead” an awful lot lately, and…well…I’m not exactly sure how to pronounce it.

I’ve been pronouncing it “Juh-LED” in my head, but mostly because that’s the way that Gilead, Connecticut is pronounced. Gilead is near Hebron, which is pronounced “HEE-bron” in Connecticut and “heh-BRUN” in the West Bank.

At least I know that BURR-lin, Connecticut is pronounced that way because of an effort to distance the town from Berlin during WWI. But I have no reference for Gilead.

30 thoughts on Question

  1. I’ve always heard it pronounced–at least in my churchgoing youth, as GILL-ee-ad. And I’m 99% sure that’s how it’s pronounced in the film version of The Handmaid’s Tale as well.

  2. Yeah, seconding the GILL-ee-ad, with six years of Episcopalian school singing “Balm in Gilead” to back me up (hard G, not like a J).

  3. And I’m 99% sure that’s how it’s pronounced in the film version of The Handmaid’s Tale as well.

    I have to admit, I didn’t get more than about 10 minutes into the film version of The Handmaid’s Tale, so I never heard that.

    I would like to check out the opera, though.

  4. I’m with monkey, where the g is a soft g. But since I suspect I’ve never heard it pronounced and am just making it up based on the spelling, I’m not a greatly credible source (especially since the soft g is a pretty rare sound in Hebrew): the internet claims it’s a hard g.

  7. Yeah, definitely, Gill–eee-add. Ever since I read the Handmaid’s Tale, though, I consciously find myself singing “There is a bomb in Gilead, to make the wounded whole…”

  8. Rough rule of thumb: if Connecticut pronounces the name of a foreign place one way, choose the other.

    Jbob in Hartford, CT

  10. This is a happy coincidence, as I just finished reading the Marilynne Robinson novel and was wondering about a safe way to talk about the book without actually pronouncing its name. (FWIW, the novel is great.)

  11. I’ve always pronounced it in my head as ‘gil-eee-ahd’ with the hard ‘g’. But I don’t know if that’s right.

    Hey, was it ever decided how ‘Feministe’ was pronounced?

  12. Versailles, Missouri is pronounced Ver SAILS. I love the flexibility of language, don’t you? 😉

  13. Not great movie (years ago and I have NO clue of its name) but I loved a scene with an American student moving to Oxford Uni, and he drawls, “hey, well we all speak the same lanaguage”

    To which the response (from the Oxford person speaking the Queen’s English) is, “Well, some of us torture it less than others.”

  16. Forked River, NJ = For-ked River (And these are English words!)

    Buena, NJ = Byoo-nuh

    Bala Cynwyd, PA = Heh. Gotta love Welsh. (Ba-luh Kin-wood, for the record).

  17. Worcester, MA = Woostah

    New Haven, CT = N’haven

    Scituate, MA = Sitchooet

    Leominster, MA = Leminstah

  18. I’ve always heard it pronounced Gill-ee-add too, with a hard g.

    Havre de Grace, MD – Haver de Gracie. And it’s such a lovely name pronounced the proper French way.

  20. Norfolk, VA = Nawfuck to locals, Nor-folk to everyone else.

    Staunton, VA = Stanton

    We also have Massaponax and I constantly think of the song “Passamaquady” from Pete’s Dragon whenever I hear it spoken simply because it’s a complex use of syllables that many people don’t get. The same goes for the Mattaponi (often pronounce Matt-pony) River and Indian Reservation.

    We’ve got so many though….*sigh*

    And yes, it’s Gil-ee-ahd. I was raised up in an episcopal church. Also, watch The Spit Fire Grill where the song “There is a balm in Gilead” is used in the movie.

  23. Here’s another CT one…

    Thames River in UK = tems (silent h, short e)
    Thames River in New London, CT = thames (th + long a), sort of like it looks

  24. When I lived in Kansas, any time someone mentioned the state of Arkansas (ar-kan-saw), they pronounced it

    AR-KAN-SUHSS

  25. Here’s another CT one…

    Thames River in UK = tems (silent h, short e)
    Thames River in New London, CT = thames (th + long a), sort of like it looks

    There’s a young adult book called Thames Doesn’t Rhyme with James. It’s quite cute.

    My personal favorite is still Featherstonehaughs in England. That’s pronounced Fanshaw.

  26. Monticello = Mont-ih-CELL-o
    Lafayette = La-fee-YETTE
    Versailles = Ver-SAILS
    Wabash = WAW-bash
    Washington = WARSH-ington

    Gilead = GILL-e-add

    Mispronounceation (and misspelling[sp?]): It’s not just for Hoosiers.

    Swintah *grin*

    Motto: I live in Indiana, don’t hold it against me.

  28. I lived just outside a small town named Pouce Coupe in BC for most of my young life (15 minutes out of Dawson Creek, BC).

    It’s from French, Poose CouPAY. Outsiders call it Poose Coop. You can tell a local cause they call it Poose COOPee.

  29. A couple of words more about the Hebrew pronunciation. (I do this in memory of my mom, who was a native Hebrew speaker. She died 2005 January 7.)

    The G (gimel) is always hard; there is no “soft G” or “J” sound in Hebrew.

    The I is pronounced like EE in FEET; if you pronounce it with the vowel of FIT you sound very American.

    The L is a perfectly normal L.

    The second syllable is pronounced, almost exactly, the way an American from the upper midwest, or a radio news anchor, pronounces ODD.

    In careful pronunciation, there is a glottal stop before the second syllable, so it comes out geel-‘ODD. The glottal sound is made by the Hebrew letter ayin. In some kinds of scholarly Biblical Hebrew, a neutral vowel sneaks in between the L and the ayin, leading to a three-syllable pronunciation, geel-uh-‘ODD. It is this neutral vowel that St. Jerome was trying to capture in his spelling “Gilead”, I believe.

    OK, that got past boring.

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