For your consideration...

Now do Peen-a-lope.

We have a new character in our Call of Cthulhu game named Calliope and for the first two weeks I could only say it if I was looking at it. Otherwise it kept coming out CallyOPee

I have met two people called Calliope, one English one French and both pronounced their names the same way as Bruce Springsteen in Blinded by the Light. and I was very glad. Because with Irish names ...

I do not EVEN know what you'd do with that combination of letters in Irish but it would not sound like Calliope as it is normally pronounced :D

It might in some parts. Which is the problem. 😆

"Dia dhuit, Cacio e pepe"

It's definitely not pronounced 'Bruce Springsteen' :p

This is the foundational pronunciation reference for many of us 🤘🏻

Cah-LIE-oh-pea. Now I’m wondering if I’ve been saying it wrong.

That is the correct way to say it. :)

Okay, good.

A calliope in a circus is pronounced “cally-ope” where ope rhymes with hope.

Ca-lie-oh-pee, according to my cat, Calliope

To complicate things, I've heard roughly the same spectrum of pronunciations with Cassiope. (But mostly Cass EYE oh pee.)

Somehow I got in the habit of mispronouncing the items on my grocery list; "popsicles" is now pronounced to rhyme with the famous Greek hero

For years, I've been trying to write a comedy set in Ancient Greece with a minor character named Testicles ... just so we can use the line, 'Ah, Testicles - glad you dropped in.'

It’s been done.

Oh, it was fairly obvious someone would get there before me. But it would have been a first for our local theatre in a small South Wales town, and I'd have been happy with that. 😁

I’m pretty sure you’re the only person in Wales to have seen it, so write it! Make your own.

I've got plenty of filthy double entendres just waiting to be ejaculated at an unsuspecting audience, don't worry.

Make sure to post it when it gets to the stage.

I can relate to that!

bsky.app/profile/mcke...

Telephone pronounced to rhyme with Persephone. Or vice versa

We integrate our Greek Philosopher to rhyme with two-tone spectacles and approach mine-strewn soup on a dead-slow setting.

I have had similar trouble with Pontius Pilate ever since a friend mispronounced it like the gentle strengthening exercises during a frantic game of Articulate...

It’s an Ancient Greek work. Its original pronunciation will always be a bit of a mystery. And it has lasted 2500 years since in a variety of non-native languages where it has been pronounced a number of different ways. Most accepted English version is Cal-EYE-oh-pee. Other variants acceptable.

Last I heard was Kal-EYE-oh-pay, but my trust in these matters is in pieces.

Same.

I suspect from the comments I've been pronouncing it incorrectly for some time (Ka-LYE-OH-peh) Contour: _--_

I have a heroine named Calliope (pron Cally-o-pee), but she hates it so much everyone calls her Calli.

I've always assumed Bruce Springsteen had it right: Kall-eye-oh-pee. youtu.be/xPy82OO6vRg?...

Cal-ee-ope is a pronunciation I’ve only heard in New Orleans, but it’s quite important to say it that way, there!

Am I correct to in fee that you’re watching Season 2 of The Sandman?

God, no. Just wittering to my kid over lunch.

"In fee" = "infer" Like I really need autocorrect to intervene to make me seem even more incoherent.

and why it's different when it's steam powered

i once interviewed a young woman called calliope. she was mortally embarrassed by her name.

Like cantaloupe

I’m not sure that helps

If we're talking the fairground music, it's cally-ohp, and if we're talking the Greek name, it's call-ee-OH-pee (or probably call-i-OH-pee, for the ancient Greek).

Sorry to unfollow, but I really don't need every reply in your thread reposted as a new thread. But I'll still be reading your books. 😉

Sure. Swing by if you’re feeling fun. I’m not a very literary poster - I tend to goof around on social media when I’m not angst-ridden the over climate crisis.

Like antelope. Call-e-lope.

kaleidoscope without the dosc obvs

Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis without the "Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis" and with Calliope.

(I *think* it’s kal-I-O-P but I’m still shook by recently hearing a lecturer say “Aphroditty”)

This is close to modern Greek so I find it much better than Afro-DIE-tee.

Am I the only person who has to make an effort not to say a-spar-ta-me when people ask what it’s sweetened with?

I don’t make the effort…

This is how Sam Beam of Iron and Wine sings it in 'Jesus the Mexican Boy' and he has a magnificent beard so that's where I'm placing my money.

Penelope to rhyme with envelope

Can confirm. My cat is Penelope. She is often "pene-lope" except when she sleeps with her feet tucked in, then she's "pene-loaf".

eg

I'm just pretty sure it's not cah-lie-oh-pee, which I think is reserved for the steam-powered musical instrument.

Other way around :)

Pee-oh-lie-cah or Eep-ho-eil-hac?

Wikipedia gives this for the muse with IPA and pronounciation respelling with schwa, ə, the ”a” in about Calliope (/kəˈlaɪ.əpi/ kə-LY-ə-pee; Ancient Greek: Καλλιόπη)

I once heard a story from an actor who did the voice-over for a documentary about the history of the Olympics. He struggled to master the pronunciation of the Greek names, but eventually nailed it... And then he heard himself intone, "And now, the procession of ath-lee-tees enters the stadium." 1/2

After which, the director cracked the door of the sound booth and said, "Well, we made a bit of a test-o-cleese of that. Another take?" 2/2

Like Penelope then?

Like all ungulates. Both the Muse and Odysseus' wife were hooved mammals. (Note: In double-checking my ungulate knowledge, I now know that whales are ungulates, despite a distinct lack of hooves. Thanks, Wikipedia!)

Undulate ungulates, eh?

Certainly explains how she was behooved to deal with those suitors.

Boom goes the excellent pun.

New Orleans or regular?

I know how it is pronounced, but I still want to say "Cally-Ope". Just like how I jokingly refer to my friend Penelope as "Peena-lope".

I pronounce it the same way this guy does 19 seconds into the video before he starts playing his steam calliope. youtu.be/EQkErWOeLPA...

It’s pronounced shar-DAY.

You need to ask an ancient Greek. 😁

CALI-YO-PAY

Ballet fan* here: k'-LIE-oh-pee. With the first syllable virtually elided. *Balanchine's Apollo has a cast of three muses: Calliope, Polyhymnia and Terpsichore. We learn these pronunciations with our first pliés.

Makes sense.

It might not be correct, but the most fun way is to make it rhyme with Alley-oop. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alley-oop

You don't want to know how New Orleanians pronounce it (it's a street name here)

I do!

www.whereyat.com/how-to-prono...

Cal-e-ope. 🤷‍♀️

I do too. Lived on the Northshore since 2010 and don’t think I’ve heard the word.

www.whereyat.com/how-to-prono...

Huh. Okay, while we’re at it - am I the only one who calls it St Louis cathedral? I mean, it isn’t a cathedral and I don’t know where I picked that up.

I'm a heathen, myself......but they call themselves a Cathedral, so.... www.stlouiscathedral.org

Okay, I feel better. Thanks.

Pleasure.

The way Bruce Springsteen says it, right?

Those damn things are annoying.

I always thought the pronunciation was dependent on whether it meant a person or the musical instrument Ka-lie-o-pee: person Kal-ee-ope: instrument

Depends on the context! One way for the muse, another for the musical instrument. There's a mnemonic poem: Proud folk stare after me, Call me Calliope; Tooting joy, tooting hope, I am the calliope.

In the American Midwest when I was growing up in the mid 20th C, we used k'LIGH-oh-pee for the instrument as well.

But is that first one Cali like the state or Cal-eye like a Jedi?

If you're speaking English, it's like a Jedi, if you're speaking (Ancient) Greek it's like in Cali.

My mother's name is Calliope, it's "Cali" like "Cah-lee", so "Cah-lee-OH-pee".

In New Orleans, there are streets named after the Muses. The locals call that street "KHAL-ee-ope."

Yeah that's also closer to Greek, vs. the accent in the middle to get "kha-LIE-oh-pee" that I see people say

I mean, I used to live in the town of Chili, New York, which rhymes with "bye bye." Local usage is not a reliable determiner of... well, anything, really

Just providing an anecdote to demonstrate one of many ways I have heard the word pronounced. You are free to do with it as you please, including nothing at all.

ok

And Socrates was "soh-KRAH-təs" in his lifetime. Again, it's all about context.

I learned this in in “Bill And Ted’s Excellent Adventure.” Thanks Alex and Keanu!

Uhm, it's actually "SOH-craytes"

* air guitar *

As featured in 'Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure'. See also: the correct pronunciation of Uranus, which undermines all those jokes about the planet's name (Ooh-RAHN-oos).

The latter. kə 'LĪ ə pē.