Hekate pronounciation

[Chamomile]

I've always thought that Hekate would be pronounced with a long E sound at the end, similar to other Greek names like Socrates and Euripydes (spelling?).

But I recently read that most people pronounce it with a long A at the end.

Which is it? Can we really know for sure?

Thanks!

[bellamandu]

heh-kah-teh

[Chamomile]

Thanks.

I'm also interested in sources that back up one pronunciation over another if anyone knows of any.

[Brigid Rowan]

I say it Heck-ah-tay, but maybe Im wrong, lol...

[Cinnamon1991]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the Greek pronunciation is eh-KAH-tay. On wikipedia, Hekate is written in Greek letters and I always thought this is how you pronounced it (Greeks don't pronounce the H and there are two different pronounced e's ('eh' as in hEllo and 'ay' as in dAY)

[Aidron]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the Greek pronunciation is eh-KAH-tay. On wikipedia, Hekate is written in Greek letters and I always thought this is how you pronounced it (Greeks don't pronounce the H and there are two different pronounced e's ('eh' as in hEllo and 'ay' as in dAY)

I tend to go with this pronunciation myself, with the 'H' being soft or silent all together. I've heard people pronounce it every way imaginable, but for I pronounce it as Eh/heh-KUH-tay.

[Chamomile]

Thank you all.

So why would names like Persephone and Socrates have a long E sound when Hekate would not?

[Aidron]

Thank you all.

So why would names like Persephone and Socrates have a long E sound when Hekate would not?

I think you need to look at the name written in Greek to get any insight into this. I don't know either of those as they are written in Greek, so I cannot say.

[Lunacie]

Our ritual on Ostara was to include a play about Hades, Persephone, and Demeter, and we all agreed on the pronunciation of the young couple. But the gal who put that ritual together was pronouncing Demeter as DEH-meh-ter, and I've always said deh-ME-ter.

Since she grew up in Boston and and I grew up in the middle of the country (geographically), we pronounce lots of things differently. But since she learned about the Greek stories in college from a professor and I learned them from reading my mother's college textbooks all by myself in grade school, I wonder if she is saying them right while I am saying them wrong?

Of course, if she only had one professor then she only learned one way of saying the name and it may not be the right way, but it doesn't really matter to either of us which is more correct since "it's all Greek" to both of us anyway. :lol:

[NefertSatSekhmet]

I learned how to pronounce Hecate after hearing that great Goddess chant-
Isis Astarte Diana Hecate Demeter Kali Inanna

Also I have run across this site-
Notes on the name "Hekate" (http://www.avalonia.co.uk/gods_pagan/hekate/notes_on_the_name.htm)

[Routhven]

In spanish, it is pronounced:

EH-kah-teh

And SO-cra-tes Per-SE-fo-ne etc... well. in spanish E is allways pronounced like the second E in the word REGRET.

Salutations.

[Lunacie]

I learned how to pronounce Hecate after hearing that great Goddess chant-
Isis Astarte Diana Hecate Demeter Kali Inanna

Also I have run across this site-
Notes on the name "Hekate" (http://www.avalonia.co.uk/gods_pagan/hekate/notes_on_the_name.htm)

Hmm, I think I was already saying de-ME-ter before I heard that song, so I thought they were singing it the right way. :lol: But I wasn't doing Dee-an-ah like they did.

[electricpeppers]

heh-kah-teh

This is how I pronounce it too. I have heard variations though.

[Chamomile]

I think you need to look at the name written in Greek to get any insight into this. I don't know either of those as they are written in Greek, so I cannot say.
Thank you, good advice.

[TheWomanMonster]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but I think the Greek pronunciation is eh-KAH-tay. On wikipedia, Hekate is written in Greek letters and I always thought this is how you pronounced it (Greeks don't pronounce the H and there are two different pronounced e's ('eh' as in hEllo and 'ay' as in dAY)

That's how I learned it as well.
(I played Medea in a high school production... mwahaha).

[Fiamma]

Thank you all.

So why would names like Persephone and Socrates have a long E sound when Hekate would not?

One word for you: anglicanization.

I'm sure there are others, but I can't think of any language offhand where "e" is pronounced like the English long e.

I could be wrong, but I think that it would be more correct to pronounce Persephone as per-seh-phon-eh where the "ph" isn't really pronounced like "f" but more like a sort of breathy "p" and "h" together, and "Socrates" wouldn't be "Sock-ruh-tees" bot more like "Soh-crah-tehs"

Correction or confirmation from someone who knows better is welcome and appreciated.

[Chamomile]

One word for you: anglicanization.

I'm sure there are others, but I can't think of any language offhand where "e" is pronounced like the English long e.

I could be wrong, but I think that it would be more correct to pronounce Persephone as per-seh-phon-eh where the "ph" isn't really pronounced like "f" but more like a sort of breathy "p" and "h" together, and "Socrates" wouldn't be "Sock-ruh-tees" bot more like "Soh-crah-tehs"

Correction or confirmation from someone who knows better is welcome and appreciated.
Ah, thank you...this enlightens me a great deal...

[Cinnamon1991]

Thank you all.

So why would names like Persephone and Socrates have a long E sound when Hekate would not?

Because that's English pronunctiation. Over 2 years, I've pronounced 'Persephone in 10 ways or so, so I tried to learn myself read a little Greek so I could pronounce the word properly. Persephone is pronounced as: Pair-seh-FO-nay. (eh as the e in hello, and the R is rolled, but not as much as the spanish R).

I searched for Socrates on wikipedia and it's written in Greek like this: Σωκράτης
so it's pronounced Soh-KRA-tays. (The R, again, lightly rolled, and the OH in 'Soh' isn't the 'o' of the o in Oh my god, but the o as in 'orb'.

Hope this makes sense...
.. it does make sense in my head ^^

[Chamomile]

Thank you, that makes sense...I'm applying English phonics to Greek names, I guess.

[Lunacie]

As I recall, in Spanish the emphasis is nearly always on the next to last syllable of a word. I've always wondered if other languages (particularly Greek) have a similar rule?

[Cinnamon1991]

As I recall, in Spanish the emphasis is nearly always on the next to last syllable of a word. I've always wondered if other languages (particularly Greek) have a similar rule?

I'm not a Greek language expert, but a lot of names of the Greek Gods have the emphasis on the second last syllable: PersePHOne, AphroDIte, ATHEna..

[Routhven]

As I recall, in Spanish the emphasis is nearly always on the next to last syllable of a word. I've always wondered if other languages (particularly Greek) have a similar rule?

Well that is not really true, most of 'em has emphasis on the last or on the third from the last. What we have is é á ó í ú to show the correct emphasis of the word when it normaly would be pronounced differently. So that we have:

Hékate, Sócrates...

Atenea (Atena), // ateNEa (aTEna).

This is spanish phonology for our vowels.

A = english in americA
E = english e in amErica
I = english i in amerIca
O = english o in octOpus
U = english u in You

Apply this to the greek names and I think you'll have it. Spanish language comes from Latin.

Blessings,

[Routhven]

I'm not a Greek language expert, but a lot of names of the Greek Gods have the emphasis on the second last syllable: PersePHOne, AphroDIte, ATHEna..

In one, PerSEphone, it has the emphasis on the third one.... At least in Spanish :O


Hope I'm helping ^^

[Fiamma]

As I recall, in Spanish the emphasis is nearly always on the next to last syllable of a word. I've always wondered if other languages (particularly Greek) have a similar rule?



*mentally running over all the multisyllabic Italian words coming to mind...mostly names of pasta at the moment..lol*

I do believe Italian is similar in that way, but like I said, most of what I can think of offhand is pasta names..cavatappi, tagliatelle, rigatoni, rotini, spaghetti, farfalle, linguine, fettucine, lasagna....yeah, all have emphasis in the penultimate syllable :-P

[Zephyrstorm]

As an aside - because I must babble about it somewhere - just please please don't pronounce it the way the guy that does the Darker Shade of Pagan pronounced Her name on the most recent episode. I shuddered every time he said it.

He pronounced it heh-KATE (long a - like take).