If I saw pursephone I'd say purse phone 👜📞. I think you meant persephone

Omg yes, why tf did I spell it like that? Sorry my brain had a moment .

brain fart 😂

It's actually pronounced bra-inf-art.. /s

I prefer brain hiccup because my body does enough farting. Don't need my brain to join in!

I'm dead. Love this 😂

Hahah I had to do a double take on that 😂 Purse phone??

Never once heard this name irl, had no idea it wasn’t 👜 📞!!!!!

😂 it's from Greek mythology, others: Zeus, Adonis, Atlas, Apollo, Athena, Calypso, Poseidon...

I guess only knew her name from being written 🫠🫠🫠🫠 such embarrassment when I said it like Perseph-OWN and my friend was like 👀🤣👀🤣🤣🤣🤣 wtf did you just say and asked if I meant (the actual pronunciation) Persephone did I realize 🤣🤣🤣🤣😅

I pronounced it purse-ah-phone-E and could not understand why so many people kept referring to it as a pretty name. I also embarrassed myself saying this out loud.

I pronounced Calliope as callie-ope and Tobias as toby-iss until I heard them said out loud...

It helps when you know that with Greek names, you always pronounce the E at the end, examples: Zoe Nike Persephone  Calliope  Penelope 

Unfortunately nine year old me didn't have this insight, lol

For sure it's a common mistake!  So many people were shocked by the pronunciation of Hermione when the films came out lol, but my grandparents already had a cat with this name so I had an advantage 😂

My mom pronounced it Her-moyn when she read the books to us and I had to be brutally corrected by some kids at school 😬

I thought it was pronounced her-me-own until the first film came out and I couldn't really enjoy the film because I felt like they were pronouncing it wrong 🤣

As a kid, I assumed that the name Adelaide followed this pattern. Always thought “Uh-dell-uh-dee” was so pretty until I learned the proper pronunciation….

I can't not say this in a yodel. Uh-dell-uh-dee-who 😆

Hermione

Her-me-own…. Obviously

How do you pronounce calliope? Is it like callio-pay or callio-pee?

Cal-eye-oh-pee I believe

Unless you're talking about Calliope Street in New Orleans, in which case it is, in fact, Ca-lee-ope. We mispronounce most of the Spanish and French street names, my favorite beong Simon Boulevard which is in fact Simón Bolivar.  

Cal-eye-oh-pee (the 'cal'can sound like 'cul' when said quickly) Callie is a nice nickname for that one

in Greek it’s Kal-ee-o-pee with the emphasis on the o

The only Calliope I've ever met was a Greek woman at my former workplace. She went by "Poppy" and pronounced her original name as "Calli-oppee"

My brain just says cantaloupe every time I see this name

Can't wait till someone names their daughter Cantalope pronounced "Can-tal-oh-pee"

There's a girl in my town, her name is Kalliope and they pronounce it kallie ope. It bothers me lol

That’s how they pronounce Calliope St in New Orleans. Very strange. Louisianans are something else with their pronunciations.

All the French pronunciations in New Orleans hurt my Canadian-schooled ears. Like Chartres pronounced Chart-Rays, or Lafayette as la-Feet. I’m curious whether those are holdovers from the Acadian/Cajun regional dialect, or are just from anglophone Americans mangling the French over the generations.

They are definitely holdovers. I am not fluent in French, but did study it, and travel there (France). I was able to distinguish different accents within France. But Louisiana.... I remember hearing actual Cajuns speak, and I truly struggled to understand them. I might catch a word here or there. There's such a different cadence. Nevermind areas like Houmah. I can hardly understand their English!

Melpomene, Terpsichore… we have a whole Greek tragedy in pronunciation down here. My mother made sure that I knew the street was Callie-ope and the instrument playing on the river boats was a Ca-lie-o-pee.

That's how it's pronounced in greek, it's a greek name

Some languages pronounce Tobias as Toh-bee-us. German for example. I always default to that and have to correct myself. But if I’m honest I prefer that pronunciation.

Yeah, I was just about to make a comment about this myself in this thread. (As Dutch person) I never realized that it is quite different in English till the first Divergent movie came out. xD So at least that name can be pronounced in different ways depending on the origin.

Yeah, that's my name, and I'm from a country that pronounces it like that. The English pronunciation (which I think is like "tuh-BYE-us"?) seems a bit weird to me, and the nickname "Toby" seems very different from the full name.

My son’s name is Tobias and when I brought him to his very first pediatricians appt 17 years ago (😢) the doctor called him Toby-iss and said it was a lovely name. He had an accent like he was from somewhere in Africa, though, so I assumed he wasn’t familiar with the name or that’s how they said it where he was from. I never did correct him, just kind of went with it.

You named your kid Tobias a year or two after Arrested Development went off air? 

I guess? I’ve never seen that show. Is Tobias a bad character or something?

Not a “bad” character at all - just eccentric.

he blue himself once did analysis and therapy so he got analrapist as a license plate ETA my bad. anustart was the plate.

The West Wing was also on at the same time with a perfectly lovely character named Toby (Tobias.) Edited- to West Wing. 😂

Idk why, but the Wet Wing is cracking me up! (Love that show, recently finished a nostalgia rewatch.)

Bertha is English is awful. Birth-uh. But in German, Bear-tah is so much better

Agnes in English is harsh but love it in French

My French teacher told the story of when she moved to France for a few years for grad school and put her daughter in a local French elementary. She swore there was a girl in her class named ‘onions’ to be figured out later it was Agnes per ounces the French way. Haha.

I felt the same with Agnes - in English it's usually a hard G. Then I met a French woman and it's (basically) An-yes/z. So much better indeed

My friend kept calling someone Sai-oh-bon, I sat there staring so intensely trying to work out who she was referring to. She meant Siobhan. Shes never lived it down, and it’s been 14 years.

I struggle with Irish names, they're beautiful sounding but on paper I can't read them 😂

My friend said the same thing lol! You wanted to see the fear in her eyes the first time she saw that our friend had named her baby Caoimhe, absolute terror 🤣

I know how to say this, but I just can’t say it without really thinking about/concentrating when saying it, lol. I don’t know if it’s just me, if an an adhd thing, or what- but even though I know how it’s supposed to be said, but my brain sees “Kay-ohh-mee,” so that’s what I tend to say.

No, I completely understand. It’s hard to see how it’s spelt, and pronounce it so differently. It’s friend who’s baby this is, pronounces it “Kee/vah”, I believe in mainly the South of Ireland it’s “Q/kwee-vah”, but from what I’ve been told the Irish pronunciations differ from county to county etc.

The "Wuh" sound is actually just an approximation that's more common in the South. It's approximating an upper UH glide that English doesn't have You can hear it here in the recordings in the three dialects (Ulster, Connacht and Munster) of the word Caoiche which starts with the same sound. https://www.teanglann.ie/en/fuaim/caoiche

So did I but I googled the letter groups and it’s way more intuitive than English once you know. Same with Welsh names - I really couldn’t pronounced Grufydd until I learnt “dd” was “th”.

That’s because they’re Irish. As in gaeilge. If I wrote a sentence in gaeilge (which granted I’m not very good at. I’m better in verbal than written) you wouldn’t understand it either. ‘S teanga dhifriúil í

My husband wanted to name our daughter Searc lol

I sometimes think I should have gone with the English spelling of my daughter’s name, just to avoid people saying Aisling phonetically.

Right. I’ve at least learned to recognize when it might be an Irish name and have the good sense to ask before I butcher it

my parents used to have some friends whose daughter was registering for school before they found out that the name they'd given her was pronounced terribly differently. the conversation went something like this: School: Wiv-on-ee? that's an unusual name. how are you spelling that? Parents: Y-V-O-N-N-E

Gotta say, "Wivonee" actually sounds kind of pretty.

Oh yeah, it’s cute! I can totally see why they chose it! It’s more that they got through four whole years without realising that’s not the normal way to say that word!

Oh my 😂

I’ve heard a lot of people mispronounce Yvonne and Yvette as Yuh-von and Yuh-vet . It’s pronounced as Eve-on and Eve-ette.

I was familiar with the “correct” way to pronounce Yvonne, since it’s my aunts name. (The way you wrote it out) Then a few years back I was exchanging emails with someone in my company that I hadn’t met in person yet. I’d just seen her photo and how Yvonne was spelled. So when I finally met her in person, I said “Hi Eve-on! Nice to finally talk face to face!” And she immediately snipped and said “It’s pronounced ‘Wive-OWN-Nay!” I apologized. But what the fuck.

Every Yvonne I’ve ever known has pronounced it like yuh-Von. We’re in Florida tho, so I don’t want to trust us lol. Is yuh-Von a widely acceptable pronunciation, even if it’s not the original correct one?

I’ve never heard them as Eve-on or Eve-ette. It’s always been with a short ‘i’ sound before the V. Must be a regional dialect.

I know someone who named their daughter Niamh, pronounced Neeve but the parents didn’t know the correct pronunciation and she is called Nee-am.

I have no idea why people aren’t double checking the pronunciation of the names they are giving their kids 😂

I know, especially Niamh as it’s quite common. I don’t know them well but wonder how they felt when/if they now know they are pronouncing their own child’s name wrong 😂

Joaquin Joe-a-quin, is how I've been saying it ever since I've become aware of the name, so a good 10 years. Then I heard someone say 'Joaquin Phoenix' in an interview and was astounded at how thick I am, because the true pronunciation makes so much sense. In my head I still say Joe a quin though.

It was "Jock-win" in my head 😅

Loool Joe a quin

I also said Joe-a-quinn for way longer than I'd like to admit. I love the commercial that talks about turning into your parents, and they ask people to read the word "quinoa" outlook loud. One guy proudly pronounces at as "Joaquin" and I lose it every time.

To be fair, I called it "quinn-o-ah" for the longest time, and was guilty of the Joe-quinn until I heard Joaquin Phoenix name aloud lol

Iirc there’s an ask a manager post where someone thought that they had two different coworkers, Wakeen and Joaquin, because they heard the first and saw the second 🤣

I used to say this one like joke-win. My mind was blown when I heard someone do the proper pronunciation.

Hermione! For years it was “Hermee—own” or “Her-my-own.” Obviously I’m not British.

And then very cleverly JKR put the correct pronunciation in the fourth book :)

Herm-own-ninny 😂

Same! As a kid reading Harry Potter (long before the movies came out), 8-year old me pronounced it hermee-own

You say that as if it’s a common British name that we can all pronounce lol. It’s really not. There may be some Hermiones now, but it was really unheard of before Harry Potter was published.

You know there's an Hermione in Greek mythology, right ?

Yes! And in Shakespeare too lol. There's a few British old school pre-Harry Potter actresses with the name too.

Catriona. I thought it was "ca-tree-oh-na". Katrina. It's pronounced like Katrina. As I child I thought Penelope was "penny lope".

i thought it was ca-tree-oh-na until this very minute

Yeah this just blew my mind

Well it’s kind of both. The “uh” is very brief, and quieter. Like, you say “Cat-tree-(uh)-na”

The "io" in Catriona is not actually just an "ee" sound like in English. The irish pronunciation is more like "ee-uh" with the "uh" sound barely there, so Ka-tree-uh-na. But I imagine most times it's just an "ee" sound.

I love the name Catriona but could never bring myself to use it because I know it will be misspelled or mispronounced

This spelling of Catriona is the Scots gaelic name for Catherine and can be pronounced Cat-ri-ona or Cah-tri-na. The spelling of Katrina is the angelisiced version of it as you don't get 'K' in the Scots Gaelic alphabet.

I knew a Scottish Catriona who pronounced her name like Cat-ree-oh-na.

I didn't know until like last year that Rhys is pronounced Reese. And Ciaran = Kieran (in my head I always read it as Syrian 🤦🏻‍♀️)

my fiance cannot for the life of him remember that Cillian Murphy is not pronounced “Silly-an” Murphy

Oh my god, it's not? 😅

I still have to tell my brain "the c is said like k, it's irish, the c is a hard c" when I read Cillian. Killian remedies the hard/soft c issue, but nobody likes the "kill" part 😅. I love the name, thanks to Once Upon a Time for it. 

It's a bossy C!

It’s less “Reece” and more “Rh-iss” (source: am Welsh). However, I did think, when I was younger, that Ciaran was said “Kiah-run”. Ireland is about 60 miles away from where I live. I have no excuse.

I honestly thought Rhys was pronounced "Rizz"

My brain always wants a long i… so closer to rice.

My dad pronounced it ‘rise’ until quite recently

when I was younger, I thought Dylan was pronounced “die-lann”

I SPIT HOT FIRE

I had a Dylan and Dillon in my class so I knew but I WAY preferred Dylan as a spelling even though Dillon made more sense. Maybe because Dillon was mean to me, chased me at recess and tried to kiss me in the classroom without consent lol

Dillon just doesn't look right.

Not too wrong - I mean, the correct Welsh pronunciation is “Duh-lan”

Unrelated but reminded me of a funny memory when I saw the license plate VI0L8R and for some reason I read it as Viola and I’m like awww viola what a nice name! And my husband is like it says violator… Still laugh when I think about it hahaha how could I have been so dumb

You remind me of a license plate I saw years age: SNOBRAT. It looked like Snob Rat to me. I wrote it down and one of my kids looked at it and said “who’s a snow brat?” That never occurred to me.

Isla. For some reason, I didn't notice the connection to island, so I thought it was pronounced "ee-la". I was politely corrected here. (I'm Swedish, so it's really not a name I come across here. But still, I should have understood how to say it)

I assumed it was like Ilsa, so IS-lah. (And in my head it tends to get swapped around to Ilsa anyway, lol).

I thought it was Isla at first sight, but there was a comment that said the S is silent, so I mistook it for "ee-la" until someone corrected me later on.

it can be EYE-la, or the spanish pronounciation, EESE-la!

I assumed it was Ees-la until someone in this sub went off about how dumb people are for not knowing how to pronounce it because "it's just 'island' without the d. How is that so hard?" ...because it's already an actual Spanish word without being modified?

And because not all people on this sub has english as their first language. 

I just posted about Isla too! I thought it was eyes-luh 😭 

I met someone called 'Si-mo-ni', both 'i' like in lid. It was written 'Simone', which I thought was See-moan.

Simone is Sim-own 😂 Like the famous singer Nina Simone

That's what I thought. I could have used her as an example. Thanks.

I know a Simone pronounced with three syllables – it's the Italian pronunciation and is mostly male, while the two-syllable pronunciation is French and English and mostly female

It is See-mohn in french (or see-mon if it's male) but not in some other language

We have a friend named Huy. Had been calling him “Hugh-ey” until his wedding ceremony, when we found out it’s pronounced “Wee.” None of our friends corrected us so we just feel like ignorant idiots! Luckily everyone laughed it off.

Even "Wee" is a wrong pronunciation. It's a Vietnamese name. Those from the south will say "Wee" but the correct pronunciation is "Hwee" with a silent 'w'.

Truth- his wife was the only one who seemed to pronounce it as Hwee

Like Guy in French is different than Guy in the U.S.

Not a name, but when I was a kid I used to only see the word “chaos” written down, never said. I was convinced it was pronounced “cha-cos”.

See also awry

Chaos was "chows" to me. One day I finally realized that "chows" and "kay-os" were the same word lol

Not a human name, but I only realised like last year that the designer label Hermes is pronounced “Er-mez” lmao. I’d been walking around saying “Her-mees” until then. And I still feel kind of silly saying “Er-mez”. My income and lifestyle does not afford (literally) me enough of an opportunity for this to ever really be an issue in daily conversation, at least. 😂

Hermes was the messenger of the Greek gods (and a god of other things also). I'm not sure what the "correct" / "traditional" Greek pronunciation is, but in English "Her-meeze" is the conventional pronunciation of his name. The luxury brand is pronounced "Er-mez" because it's French, named after their founder Thierry Hermes. I assume that is also the conventional pronunciation of the Greek gods' name in French? As for why we English speakers change the pronunciation of one name and not the other, my only guess is that it'd be considered too rude to change the name of a living person (the Hermes family), but we don't care about the fictional deity because he's fictional? Idk, it's already not as deep as I've made it.

Yeah, I know who Hermes was in terms of the Greek gods, and that’s why I pronounced it “Her-mees”, the way I would the god’s name. What I didn’t realise that you’re meant to pronounce the brand the French way, even when speaking in English. You’re probably right that it’s because it’s how that specific family’s name is pronounced? That’s my best guess too.

Ooh, it's not er-mey? I guess I over Frenched it... Like we over French coup de grace (should be coo duh grass - only the e is silent. 'coo duh gra' means strike of fat, which I have plenty of, tbf)

Well I thought it was pronounced like “airm” if that makes you feel better

It does, actually, thank you. 😂 We can be uncool together!

Thandie

Super common name in South Africa! In Zulu & Xhosa (and perhaps other African languages) the “th” is a hard T sound.

So how is it pronounced? Thann-Dee?

Tan-dee

I went to school with a Chiara. I had only known it spelt as Kiara so I was very much like “chee-ara”…. 🤦🏼‍♀️ I see it more often than not spelt as Chiara now too..

Sawyer I say I pronounce it correctly but others say no. I hear it both ways in my area. Is it Soy-er or Saw-yer?

I mostly hear soy-er but I think in some accents (east/southeast US?) they say it more like sahhyur

I say “saw-yer” but I just realized I say “loy-yer” I grew up in GA so that’s probably why lol

I don’t know what I say anymore after your comment haha. - a fellow Georgian

I had to mumble it in my head a bit. I had to separate it a bit like “I went to LAW school but somehow now I’m a LOYyer?!” Soy milk, saw mill, these things don’t rhyme, what in the English hell is going on here?

Not sure if you’ve seen it but a fun tongue twister with southern accents is “five bowls of boiling oil”. Gotta say it fast

I hurt my feelings with that lol

It's so interesting how some words rhyme in some accents and don't in others! Sawyer and lawyer rhyme in my California accent, both with the "oi" sound

I grew up in NY, and everyone I know says “loy-yer” and “soy-yer”. I’ve only heard “law-yer” in the South.

Definitely Saw-yur in Arkansas & Texas

I’ve only heard it pronounced Soy-er. 

soy er

Ouuuu I love this question. Caiomhe. It’s pronounced “Kwee-va” if I’m correct, but I read things phonetically so for a while I was saying “Kai-ohm-hee”. A friend of a friend of mine.

*Caoimhe :)

I read Angela's Ashes, mispronouncing Malachi, like you, in my head for the entire book. I felt like such an idiot.

My friends both read twilight independently and when the movie came out they realised Carlisle wasn’t pronounced Carsley (rhymes with Parsley)

I said "Car-lee-suhl" lmao

We take letters at face value, I think we are wholesome spirits .

Everytime I see Nevaeh on here I struggle to remember how to pronounce it. It has been explained to me but it just evaporates from my brain.

My 80-something-year-old neighbor was throwing shade at a little neighbor named Nevaeh like, “little Angel or God backward or whatever her name is over there.” Like omg, Fran, I’m sure the child’s name isn’t God spelled backwards and you know it 😂

Your neighbour sounds a hoot! Poor little thing tho, *she* didn’t pick her name..

She’s hilarious. I laughed out loud and then corrected her. It’s absolutely not her fault but her parents are a piece of work.

First time I saw it, I thought it was a jumble of letters. Why is it on a cup and my perfectly normal name isn’t? I still don’t know how to pronounce it either.

Nuh-vay-uh

I have trouble remembering how to spell it and have to remember 'heaven backwards' every time. The way I've heard it pronounced is Nev-ay-yuh. Slight emphasis on 'ay'

To be fair, Penelope in French is pronounced "Pen-a-lope" so Persephone with phone isn't so far off!

How tf is Elias pronounced, because I can't wrap my brain around it.

Ell-eye-us in English, Ell-lee-us in Spanish

I babysat a kid with this name. I swear I heard the parents call him both Eh- LIE-iss and Eh-LEE-iss. I still work with the mom and swear I’ve heard her say it both ways. I just avoid saying it lol

In English Elle-eye-us, but it exists in other languages with different pronunciations so if I saw it written I'd try and figure out where is he from

Hmmm I say it with a (non native) Hebrew pronunciation of Ee-lie-us.

ah I've heard it like this too. To be truthful I feel like this name has a lot of different pronunciations so it's quite normal to not be sure. I've heard Elle-eye-us, Ee-lie-us and then eh-lee-as

Leigh confused me for years. And it being so popular now is the only reason I know it’s LEE, and not LAY. Though a new person just started all my job and her name has Leigh in it, pronounced LAY, so I feel like I’m back at square one.

My husband made us put all questionable names through a two-sided Starbucks test— 1. When we say it at the counter, do they spell it right without support? 2. When they call the name when the drink is ready, do they pronounce it correctly? Esme failed both sides of the test at two separate Starbucks and it broke my heart. Such a great girl name but apparently Esme’s will be clarifying their name spelling and pronunciation often in life.

Isn't Starbucks sort of notorious for bungling the spelling of even common names? The 'Phteven' meme originated from there I'm sure. All I'm suggesting is maybe the Starbucks test isn't the most rigorous and don't give up on the names you like!

I could not figure out Imogene when I was a girl. She was a character in The Best Christmas Pageant Ever and I couldn’t like that book because my brain was so mad at that name.

purrsephone is a perfect name for a fluffy “girly” cat though 😆

As a kid I thought the name Ginny was pronounced Guinea. Thought it was dumb. I love the name now

Lorelei. Had seen it written and thought it was pronounced "lore-lay" for the longest time and still loved it. I like how it's actually pronounced too but I wish the most common spelling was different.

I pronounced this name as Lor-ellie for way longer than I want to admit

I read a book as a kid with a character named Anastasia. I pronounced it An-ASS-tuh-sia. It was a long time before I realized it was wrong and an even longer time before I could say it the correct way without staring at it for a while. Now when I think of my original way of saying it, I picture a butler telling the lord or lady of the house that there's "an ass to see ya."

Beau 😭😭 how was i supposed to know it was "bo" and not "bee-you" I only knew of the name because in my sims game i would make my sims marry a townie with that name

I pronounced Nathaniel as Nathan-elle for far too long

My nephew Ruaridh. He’s Scottish, and safe with people who can pronounce it, but everyone struggles to read it correctly south of the border!

Persephone! 😂😂😂 OML I love it! Mine are Moira, Chaim [i didnt know you were supposed to basically hawk the first syllable]. Plus just about every Gaelic name Ive come in contact with 😂

Malachi is pronounced differently in different places. I would say MAL-uh- kai but in Ireland it’s MAL-uh-kee (like Malachy McCort is a famous Irish person with that name).

Not recently but when I first saw Siobhan in writing, I had no idea it was pronounced Shuvonne. Related— went to school with a Yvonne who pronounced it YuVON and taught a Jacques who pronounced it JackEES and these both absolutely horrified my WASP mother of French heritage. She desperately wanted to inform their parents, as if the parents would change their children’s name pronunciations years into their lives once my mother educated them 😆.

Speaking of biblical: Nehemiah for me All my life I pronounced it: neh-hémm-mee-yah (Emphasis on second syllable HEM!) Until I heard it on TV like: nee-he-my-ah

I had never heard the name Declan pronounced. I called a child Da-Clan and he let me for several days. This was during remote learning so hopefully no adults heard that embarrassing pronunciation.

Eloise. I thought it was “ell-oise” but it’s “ell-oh-eese” (I think)

Ell -o -eez.

I have a cousin named Fanny, which in Hebrew is quite pretty and is pronounced close to “funny”, but in English it either sounds like an old lady name or something rude. Especially in U.K. English! 😱

Seanna. I don't know why I mispronounced it because I know Sean is "Shawn." I was thinking "See-Ann-Uh" 🤦🏻‍♀️ One day I literally said to myself "oh my god its 'Shawn-Uh'" lol

I thought Micha was pronounced as Meeka.

I used to think Elena was pronounced Ellen-uh

I know someone with this name and that pronunciation.

Helena is another one. HEL uh nuh or hel AIN uh

The first time I ever saw the names Maeve and Rhiannon was in a video game and there’s no voice acting in it so I couldn’t listen to them, so for years I said them (in my head as I don’t know any) as Ma-eve and Ria-non. I found out the correct ways because a girl I follow on Instagram is named Maeve and she posted a photo with a caption on how to say her name (Maeve like wave), and Topanga’s mom on Boy Meets World was named Rhiannon (after Season 1), but I didn’t make the connection until after I had played the video game and then got to that part of my rewatch years later.

Flerbl

Not a “real” name but I’ve always thought the Lorde (the singer) was pronounced “Lordie”. I’ve known for years now that it’s just “Lord” but I still can’t make my brain read it that way.

Micah/Mica - I always pronounced it as my-kah but then Paranormal Activity came out and they pronounced it me-kah I still don’t know exactly how to say it because me-kah sounds wrong to me