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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
Joined: Jan 2001
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My husband was helping one of the boys with a little project today, which involved the use of an envelope, and I noticed that he was speaking of an "ahnvelope." I usually pronounce it with an "en" rather than an "on" first syllable, but I've heard the word pronounced both ways all my life. So, scratching the itch of curiousity, I resolved to learn why the variable pronunciation. And it is:
"Envelope" was borrowed from the French, and initially was pronounced as the French word was, with the "ah" sound, like envoy, encore, ennui, ensemble, entree, entourage, and entrepreneur. That pronunciation is still considered acceptable, although it is now in the minority, as "envelope" has become anglicized.
How do you pronounce "envelope"? Has that pronunciation changed over the years? Does it differ from how your parents pronounced "envelope"?
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Truthfully, Sparteye, I've been using both, interchangeably, all my life, and I've always wondered the same, but never bothered to LIU. I think I've come to use en- more frequently, though. The only rhyme or reason for the use of one or the other I can recognize offhand, in my personal lexicon, is that I believe I'm more prone to use ahn- in a more pointedly formal situation like asking someone at a wedding if they presented the couple with their ahnvelope, yet; or for an ahnvelope to be presented as an award (or one I ask for in public or onstage to open to read a listing), etc. And I usually use the ahn- alone...when it's in combination it's en- as in "business envelope" or "self-addressed stamped envelope". (now I'm wondering why I do this).
In the verb form, of course, it's always en- with me. "We can envelope the whole area." But, then, the suffix changes here, too, from -lope to -lup [en-VEL-up]
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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The idiot also known as Capfka ...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Hate to admit it, but I do the frog pronunciation too (most of the time).
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Pooh-Bah
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Pooh-Bah
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I'm with WON, use it both ways - neither rhyme nor reason to it. I also agree with the verb form, but my guess is every one would.
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veteran
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veteran
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I thought (as someone who only recently spelt "printemps" wrong  ) that the French pronunciation for "en-" was more like on- than ahn-. Is this a transpondial thing? We never pronounce the "-lope" on the end in the French style, which makes me wonder if word endings get assimilated first. Anyway, it'd always be an EN-veh-lope to me. To my mind, as words of French origin become fully absorbed into English it comes across as increasingly pretentious resuscitating French sounding bits (poshification again). My practice is mirrored on the other side of the Channel - the French pronounce "football" as a French word, for instance. This reminds me of garage = gar-idj or gar-ahhj. Though that's another can of worms, so forget I said it. 
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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En as in awning. When I learned French back in the thirties, there was a very fine
system of phonetic symbols that was marvelously helpful. A crime that some many
othes infereior versions have been prepetrated as to make all of them useless.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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like WO'N-- i say both, but Shona, don't think you are going to get away with
This reminds me of garage = gar-idj or gar-ahhj. Though that's another can of worms, so forget I said it.
the first is the UK way of saying the word, the second the US.. and the rest of the world will have to weigh in for itself. I have never heard garage as gar-idj except on imported (UK) television. but i would say car idj for carriage. but that d is really very, very soft.
garage is almost grer ahhj (almost a growlying sound at the be beginning not a gar (like a gar fish, or to rhyme with car))
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veteran
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En as in awning
That'd definitely not right in terms of how Brits say "awning" (aw sound like "lawn", "prawn", "born" almost).
The en- sound in envelope in French, spoken by the French, is the same as the -en- sound in lent ("slow"). Or as in entre ("between"), come to think of it. Same applies to most "-en-" words in French that spring to mind. The sound is much much more like "on" than "ahn" or "awn".
I suspect there are Transpondial vowel sound differences making their presence felt here.
Or maybe I'm just plain wrong, and my memory/awareness of French is failing me.
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